Source Information

Order Sons of Italy in America
Ancestry.com. California, U.S., Order Sons of Italy in America, Lodge Records, 1928-1960 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.
Original data: OSIA California Grand Lodge Documents. Washington, DC: Order Sons of Italy in America.

About California, U.S., Order Sons of Italy in America, Lodge Records, 1928-1960

This database contains documents from the California Grand Lodge of the Order Sons of Italy in America from 1928 to 1960.

Historical Background

The Order Sons of Italy in America (OSIA) was established in 1905 in New York as a mutual aid society to assist Italian immigrants coming to the United States. The Grand Lodge of California was established in 1922 and at various times has had lodges in Oregon, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, and even Hawaii under its umbrella. Among its efforts, OSIA has offered members scholarships, help with obtaining citizenship, aid to the poor, and life and mortuary benefits.

What’s in the Records

This database contains a number of different document types from the Grand Lodge of California, including membership applications, transfer cards, hospital fund applications, member file cards, and other miscellaneous documents.

Information included in the records varies widely by document type, but you may find details such as

  • residence
  • age
  • name
  • birth date
  • birth country
  • father’s name
  • mother’s name
  • marital status
  • spouse’s name and age
  • number of children
  • occupation

Some forms have multiple pages associated with them, so if you find a record you will want to use the arrow keys to browse forward and back to make sure you find all the documents related to your ancestor.

Some records are in Italian.