BOOK REVIEWS519 OveraU, McNally's Catholic Parish Life on Florida's West Coast, 1860-1968, is an impressively researched book that wUl become the standard work on the subject for many generations. Gary R. Mormino University ofSouth Florida The Search for Thomas E Ward, Teacher of Frederick Delius. By Don C. GUlespie . (GainesvUle: University Press of Florida. 1996. Pp. xvi, 180. $29.95.) Thomas Ward (1856-1912) was buried in a pauper's unmarked grave in Houston's Holy Cross Cemetery. Ward was a professional musician, a music teacher, and a Catholic. But none of his musical compositions were preserved; only one verifiable photograph of him exists; only four of his letters are extant; his extensive library has vanished; aU correspondence between him and his famous student, Frederick DeUus, was destroyed.Why write and publish a biography about a man in historical oblivion? Moreover, GUlespie, a NewYork musicologist , an editor of the scores of modern composers, a writer for scholarly musical journals, is an unlikely biographer ofWard since his is neither an historian nor a Catholic, but his interest in the renowned Delius led him to the obscure Ward. GiUespie teUs two stories: the first, as his title implies, is about his dogged and patient pursuit for documentation about Ward; the second, is about Ward himself , a man unremembered, but whose life of quiet dignity touched others. GUlespie makes his search forWard an integral part of the narrative. Some may find this self-referential detective tale distracting; the author's research difficulties become as important asWard himself. Others may find some of GiUespie's conjectures about Ward, when evidence is lacking, disconcerting; yet one cannot but admire the author's love for his subject and his creative persistent research techniques over a ten-year period. Nevertheless, Gillespie's work is valuable for several reasons. His thesis is that Ward had an important formative influence upon Delius by imparting to him both disciplined work habits and counterpoint techniques during their association in 1884 at Solano Grove (on the St.John's River near St.Augustine, Florida). Moreover, the Southern black music which Delius heard at Solano Grove influenced DeUus' Appalachia. Although a portrait of the life of a struggling peripatetic musician, the work is not just for musicologists.Ward's Ufe is a window for viewing Catholic life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in New York City, Florida, Louisiana, and Texas. Ward's itinerancy reveals for us CathoUc orphanage Ufe, the importance of parish liturgical music at the turn of the century, the place of CathoUcism in several emerging Southern urban centers , Benedictinism on the frontier (Ward was a monk for six years at St. Leo's Monastery in Florida), and the impact of disease (especially yeUow fever and tu- 520book reviews berculosis) on individuals and communities of the period. Numerous Ulustrations and photographs enhance the reader's comprehension of the subject. In his epüogue GUlespie muses on the comparison between the successful, famous, yet blasphemous, Delius and the obscure, devoutWard.Who is successful , who is great,who is worth writing about?The author's reflections led me to a further one.This work,whose research and pubUcation was supported by the DeUusTrust (London), would have never seen the Ught of day without such patronage , a fact which caused me to ponder the role of foundations in scholarly research and publication, but that is another book and another review. Michael J. McNally St. Charles Borromeo Seminary Overbrook, Philadelphia Churches, Communities and Children: Italian Immigrants in the Archdiocese of New York, 1880-1945. By Mary EUzabeth Brown. (Staten Island, NewYork: Center for Migration Studies. 1995. Pp. vi, 219. Paperback.) ItaUan mass migration to the United States began in earnest during the decade foUowing the Risorgimento and the poUtical unification of the ItaUan Peninsula. General poUtical confusion, plummeting economy, increased taxation , a burgeoning mUitary estabUshment and extended mandatory service, as weU as a government that encouraged and, in some instances, forced emigration , aU contributed to the massive movement of the poor from the various provinces, cities, and towns of Italy to the Americas from the 1880's to the first decades of the present century. New York City, even...