Introduction

Pretty much all of us know and honor the eminent Greeks abroad. People who, with the nickname "The Greek", made us and make us proud. And not only proud but sometimes also influential, because this small country of ours gives birth to such personalities, as if other peoples do not have such. And I do not exclude myself. I can tell you directly that I am very proud to speak Greek and I learned this Greek from my mother and she from hers. However, I did not make this introduction to remind you of Greeks like Maria Callas, like Karatheodoris or von Oikonomou and others you know anyway, but for some who unfortunately do not know their relatives well either. Some who do not neither scientific journals nor art stories were involved. Humble people, which you will not find either in Papyrus Larus or in Domi, except in the open encyclopedia Wikipedia.

Who was Giannis Kokkoris?

Giannis Kokkori ,. He was born in Leonidion on September 17, 1877. He was the son of Michalis and Stamatina Kokkori. In 1895, Giannis Kokkoris emigrated to New York, where he worked for the sponge merchant Lembesi. In 1896 he went to Tarpon Springs and began working for John Cheney, also a sponge merchant. Giannis Kokkoris brought his brother George in 1898 and 1900 and his other brother Elias. The brothers initially worked for John Cheney. The so-called "glass" cylinder with the glass bottom, which we still see today some fishermen use to tame octopuses in the shallows. The first sponge trader in Tarpon Springs, was the aforementioned John Cheney. He saw sponges from all over the Gulf of Mexico coming to the area by boat, fishing for the sponges and leaving for their homelands. John Cheney, a wealthy banker from Philadelphia, immediately realized that this area would become the seat of the American sponge industry. So he and Ernest Meres built warehouses and barracks and transported the sponges first by carriage to New York. In Tarpon Springs, the American sponge industry began to be born. Continue to page 2…

A description by Peter N Yiannos

Here is how Peter N Yiannos describes the pristine seabed of the Gulf of Mexico in The History of the Tarpon Sponge Industry: "... they sailed a few miles into the bay. They lowered their sails and prepared for the moment when they waited so anxiously. It was the first time human feet would walk on the bottom of the bay. A magical power pushed them into the mysteries of the seabed, and full of hope they nurtured the treasures of the sponges. Returning to Tarpon was a triumph. The good news reached Greece, all over the Aegean and especially in the Dodecanese. Entire crews came from Spetses, Hydra, Aegina, Symi, Kalymnos, Halki ... No one was married or even if they were, they had left behind their wives and children on the islands. The only Greek woman in Tarpon was Anna Kokkori, the wife of Giannis Kokkori who had also brought their child Michalis. The first Greek child to be born in Tarpon was their daughter Stamatina in 1906. The first Greek diver to see the Gulf of Mexico was Demosthenes Kavasilas from the Dodecanese and Stylianos Besis from Aegina. These two divers, in the description of Peter N Yiannos: "... were stunned by the natural wealth of the seabed they saw, thousands of sponges adorned the pristine and desolate fields of the seabed. Thousands of corals of all colors and shapes like thick grapes in marine vineyards. Colorful peacock feathers, wonderful sea gardens through which fish of all kinds swam. Every 10 minutes the divers sent the baskets full of the best quality sponges the world had ever seen ... »In 1907 the spongers formed a community to establish a church and elected Nikolas Peppas from Aegina as the first president. He was the driving force behind the construction of the first Church of St. Nicholas, which could accommodate 250 people and cost about $ 3,500. The parish was recognized by the Greek Church in 1908. But even after the organization of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America in 1922, the Church of St. Nicholas continued to function as a separate community until in 1976 it was recognized by the Archdiocese at the urging of the current elder. They did not want to belong to the Archdiocese, they wanted it to be an independent community. The Greek Community grew over time and in 1925 had a Greek school with 200 students. The church of Agios Nikolaos did not fit them anymore. So they decided to make a new one. But they did not have enough money, only $ 20,000 in their coffers. Then the faith and the spirit of cooperation and brotherhood and above all the Greek philotimos acted and gave the solution. So the spongers decided to give the best sponge they would collect at each dive to the Church. With these sponges that were of vintage quality and promoting them in good markets of Greece, they achieved great prices, as a result of which they quickly raised 150,000 dollars. Thus began work in 1941 and was completed in 1943. The new Church of St. Nicholas was built according to the plan of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. For more than 50 years, in this resort of 18,000 inhabitants located 20 miles southwest of Tampa, the The celebration of the baptism of Christ takes place in the most prominent and characteristic way for the USA. The Cathedral of St. Nicholas is its focus. It is estimated that tens of thousands of people attend the two-day ceremonies that include Hierarchical Liturgy and Litany from St. Nicholas Church in Spring Bayou culminating in the spectacular diving to catch the Cross by dozens of young teenagers. so that in 1975 the city council officially declared the city as the "City of Surfaces" in the USA. But this community, another truly great center of Hellenism in the United States, owes its rise to the humble sponge, a primitive hermaphroditic creature that filters 64 glasses of water a day from its body. And this is connected with a Greek demon, Leonidiotis Giannis Kokkoris, who passed away in 1944 in County Duvall, Florida. But we, in metropolitan Greece, must not forget the pioneering Greeks who created Greece abroad under adverse conditions. And such a man was Giannis Kokkoris from Leonidion of Kynouria. Let the soil that covers him be light.

John Michael Cocoris

Supplement for Giannis Kokkoris

Shortly after the end of World War I, John Cheney (the original employer of Giannis Kokkoris at Tarpon Springs) gave an interview to Louis Adamic. He was asked why he and other American businessmen left the sponge industry in favor of the Greeks, to which he replied: The reason is, as he said, the undoubted superiority and ability of the Greeks in sponges. Sponges are their life. They have been doing this job for 2000 years. We say the old Americans were beginners. We did not get this job even though we made money in the beginning. The Greeks had the will and the ability to work harder than us. So the sponge is theirs now. And they did very well, I'm happy. They justly won this fight by playing honestly with the right business rules. They belong to the sponge and it also belongs to them. The Greeks are great people and I am very happy that I contributed to them coming here (Florida). They are brilliant citizens Γιάν Giannis Kokkoris comes here and there and sees me. John Cheney died shortly after that interview in Tarpon Springs in 1939, at the age of 81. A little later in 1944 he was followed by the demon Leonidiotis.