Tampa midwife Maria Messina Greco's midwife records span from 1908 to 1939. Maria Messina Greco, was a Sicilian immigrant and midwife who began delivering babies in Tampa, Florida as early as 1907. She kept a record of each birth in a series of 62 small notebooks. Maria was well educated, having earned a degree in midwifery at the University of Palermo in Sicily. She was said to have delivered as many as 2,000 babies before she came to the United States. The midwife record books show that she brought 6,734 children into this world. Maria Messina Greco was one of 18 midwives in Tampa's early years. Two other well-known midwives were Dona Ercolina Premori and Giuseppina Valenti. It took a dedicated team of four persons nearly two years to transcribe the records and put them in spreadsheet format. Sharing their knowledge of the Sicilian language, along with talent in deciphering the handwriting, the monumental task was organized by Vienna Fuente and accomplished by Angelo Lorenzo & Jeannette Tamborello, with technical assistance by Rosemarie Chambers--persons who all share a passion for Tampa history and its heritage.
