William Kostas Andriotis
William Andriotis was at the center of his family, not at the top or to the side. The Andriotis family has maintained throughout each generation dual homeland and national pride for Greece and America. William, my grandfather, was the steward who protected and cultivated our dual national bonds. William seamlessly passed between his American and Greek identities, a fact his granddaughter finds admirable and enviable. Like our love for Greece and America, William’s life is a classic twin tale of the American Dream and Greek immigrant story.
William Andriotis was born on New Year’s Day 1920 in Enfield, CT, to Greek parents, Kostas and Irene, and his twin brothers Christos and Panayiotis. Irene was from Mytilene and Kostas had fled the Greek shores of Asia Minor (today Cesme, Turkey) to avoid serving in the Ottoman Army. His father’s arrival to Ellis Island was both a joyous rebirth and a miserable death. After about ninety-two years, his great-granddaughter sailed the same sparkling tranquil sea that he had once fled, forever surrounded in uncertainty and hate. Despite the present joy in Turkey, the tears that my Smyrna ancestors shed fell from my eyes when for the first time I understood what was my family’s unspeakable tragedy. But from the old world nightmare a family’s dream was born in the New World: my grandfather and his siblings. But, tragedy seems to know no boundaries as William’s father died while he was only two years old. He spent his formative years in Mytilene. After honorably serving in the Greek Army during World War II, William began to forge his future in Thessaloniki. He saved enough money to begin his dream in America. Food and hospitality would become his life’s passions and work. He was to be a restaurateur, chef and manager in New York and Connecticut. In a dual manner, he served his Greek culture and Greek democratic ideals in the American ideal of the small business.
Even after his marriage to Demetra Kazara of Peraia, Thessaloniki in 1955, the exchange between Greece and America continued in the family. The love of my grandfather’s life, Demetra, bore him two caring children, Sophia in 1957 (my mother) and Kostas in 1961. Demetra later moved back to Greece with the children to take care of her beloved mother Sophia. William faithfully maintained his support and devotion to his family throughout their long absence. Again, like their father, but unlike the forced migration of their grandfather, my mother and uncle could not stay long in one country and moved to America. William was to be the solid foundation for his children and eventually his only grandchild. I was fortunate to be born in Greece and raised in America with the constant loving attention of my grandfather. Like his family, he helped me maintain my dual Greek and American identities. In 1996, he was diagnosed with brain cancer. His struggle to live persisted for another year until he succumbed. His loving influence on his family remains as strong today as it was when he lived.
