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BY FR. JAMES LENTINI, NATIONAL SECRETARY

Galileo Galilei (1564–1642)

Considered the “father of modern physics” and the “father of modern science.” He played a central role in the transition from natural philosophy to modern science by applying mathematics to motion. Before Galilei there was no math in physics while today’s modern physics could not be conceivable without math. Galileo studied speed and velocity, gravity and free fall, the principle of relativity, inertia, projectile motion and also worked in applied science and technology, describing the properties of pendulums, inventing the thermo-scope and using the telescope for scientific observations of celestial objects. His contributions to observational astronomy include the telescopic confirmation of the phases of Venus, the four largest satellites of Jupiter, and the observation of Saturn’s rings.

Luigi Galvani (1737–1798)

He is recognized as the pioneer of bioelectromagnetics. His discoveries triggered the field of neurophysiology, which in turn led to some of the greatest discoveries in neuroscience. Galvani’s name is used as a verb in everyday language (galvanize). In 1780, he and his wife Lucia discovered that the muscles of dead frogs’ legs twitched when struck by an electrical spark. This was one of the first forays into the study of bioelectricity, a field that studies the electrical patterns and signals from tissues such as the nerves and muscles.

Amadeo Giannini (1870–1949)

Amadeo Giannini was born to Italian Immigrant parents, in San Jose, California on May 6, 1870, and died on June 3, 1949. He was educated at Heald College in San Francisco. He founded the Bank of Italy in San Francisco on October 17, 1904. In 1928 Giannini and Orra E. Monnette agreed upon the merger known as Bank of America, the largest bank in the country. Most banks operated in single cities prior to Amadeo Giannini’s creation of the system of centralized processing, bookkeeping, and cash delivery.

Carlo

Goldini (1707–1793)

Goldoni was a prolific dramatist who renovated the well-established Italian commedia dell’arte dramatic form by replacing its masked stock figures with more realistic characters, its loosely structured and often repetitive action with tightly constructed plots, and its predictable farce with a new spirit of gaiety and spontaneity. For these innovations Goldoni is considered the founder of Italian realistic comedy. Though he wrote in French and Italian, his plays make rich use of the Venetian language, regional vernacular, and colloquialisms. Goldoni also wrote under the pen name and title Polisseno Fegeio, Pastor Arcade, which he claimed in his memoirs the “Arcadians of Rome” bestowed on him.

Pope Innocent III (1160 –1216)

Pope Innocent was one of the most powerful and influential of the medieval popes, from 1198 –1216. He exerted a wide influence over the Christian states of Europe, claiming supremacy over all of Europe’s kings. He was central in supporting the Catholic Church’s reforms of the era. This resulted in a considerable refinement of Western Canon (Church) Law. He is furthermore notable for using interdict and other censures to compel princes to obey his decisions. Innocent greatly extended the scope of the Crusades and organized the Fourth Crusade of 1202–1204. He died on July 16, 1216.

Cesare Lombroso (1835 –1909)

Italian criminologist, often referred to as the father of criminology. His views, many of which were discredited, did serve to bring about a shift in criminology from being a legalistic preoccupation with crime to a scientific study of criminals. He concentrated attention on the study of the individual offender. Lombroso’s theory of anthropological criminology essentially stated that criminality was inherited, and that someone “born criminal” could be identified by physical (congenital) defects, which confirmed a criminal as savage or atavistic.

Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527)

Machiavelli was an Italian Renaissance diplomat, philosopher, and writer, best known for “The Prince,” written in 1513. He is known as the father of modern political philosophy and political science. His book

“The Prince” has been translated into 49 languages. For many years he served as a senior official in the Florentine Republic with responsibilities in diplomatic and military affairs. His personal correspondence is of high importance to historians and scholars. He worked as secretary to the Second Chancery of the Republic of Florence from 1498 to 1512, when the Medici were out of power. Machiavelli’s name came to be a byword for unscrupulous acts of the sort he advised most famously in “The Prince.”

Guglielmo Marconi (1874 –1937)

Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi, 1st Marquis of Marconi was an Italian engineer, recipient of a Nobel Prize in physics and famous for having invented the wireless telegraphy, long-distance radio transmission and a radio telegraph system. He is credited as the inventor of radio. Marconi was also an entrepreneur, businessman, and founder of The Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company in England in 1897. In 1929, he was named a Marchese (marquis) by King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy, and, in 1931, he set up Vatican Radio for Pope Pius XI.

Antonio Meucci (1808–1889)

Antonio Santi Giuseppe Meucci is considered the first inventor of the telephone (though Alexander Graham Bell was the first to patent it). Meucci had developed a voice-communication apparatus generally identified as the first telephone. Meucci set up this communication link in his Staten Island home that connected the second-floor bedroom to his laboratory. He submitted a patent for his telephonic device to the U.S. Patent Office in 1871, but there was no mention of electromagnetic transmission of vocal sound in his caveat. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was granted a patent for the electromagnetic transmission of vocal sound by undulatory electric current. The Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities sponsored celebrations of Meucci’s 200th birthday in 2008 giving him the title “Inventore del telefono.” n