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Because Memory Isn't Eternal: A Story of Greeks in Upstate South Carolina
Because Memory Isn't Eternal A Story of Greeks in Upstate South Carolina Author:Deno Trakas In 1895, Nicholas Trakas left his village in southern Greece, boarded a steamship for America, and made his way to another southern village, Spartanburg, where he became the South Carolina city's first Greek resident. He opened The Elite--one of the finest candy kitchens in the South--built a house on a lot he purchased for $44 and a pet parrot ... more »that could cuss in Greek, and began a wave of immigration from his home country into the burgeoning Upstate area.
A century later, his grandson, Deno Trakas, a writer and professor at Wofford College, explores a peculiarly Southern version of the Greek-American story in Because Memory Isn't Eternal. By introducing readers to four generations of Trakas family members, their remarkable friends, and their hardworking business partners, he tells a greater story and reflects on how these complex, larger-than-life characters have preserved the best of Greek culture down South. This intimate and often humorous memoir includes stories of Greek-American marriages, food, language, restaurants, religion, and misadventures, including the day two Trakas boys accidentally burned down the family's church.
A constantly repeated refrain at Greek funerals is ''Aionia i mnimi'' - ''May his (or her) memory be eternal.'' More often, Trakas reveals, memory is ''painfully, annoyingly short.'' His loving illustrated tribute to Greek-Americans assures that these stories and this history will not be forgotten.« less