The Phenomenal Vespa Are You Italian? Italy’s Supermarket Magic
John Volpe’s Fateful Decision SPRING 2014
a
ITALIAN AMERICA
CUSTOM DESIGNED BY UNITOURS Enjoy a group tour
with thE sights you want to sEE plus thE activitiEs that fit your intErEsts • Wine Tasting • Cooking • Historical Sights • Family Reunion • Religious Sites • You Name It! • Scheduled Cultural Heritage Tours also available …See web site for details The experienced professionals at Unitours can plan and execute the custom tour your group dreams about, at a price that is an incredible value. Check our website or call for more information.
Tel: 800-777-7432 • 914-253-9446 Email: mpisano@Unitours.com Website: www.Unitours.com SPRING 2014
ITALIAN AMERICA
b
Adv #5710 - Italian America Magazine - 7.5” x 9.75”
SPRING 2014
VOL. XIX No. 2
Italian America T h e O ff i c i a l P u b l i c a t i o n o f t h e O r d e r S o n s o f I t a l y i n A m e r i c a
Features
6
“VESPIAMO!”
The Phenomenal Vespa Scooter By Eric Bryan
12
18 22
A FATEFUL DECISION
John Volpe’s Presidential Near-Miss By Joseph A. Bosco
ARE YOU ITALIAN?
Rediscovering Our Identity By Richard Juliani
SUPERMARKET MAGIC Italy’s Best-Kept Secret By Jackie Townsend
ON THE COVER: The ever-popular Vespa. See story page 6. [Photo: Akihito Truong Phan Hoang Lich]
2 High Profile 3 National News 4 Oggi in Italia 5 Pagina Italiana 9 Book Club 10 Our Story
D e pa r t m e n t s
15 It’s “Only” a Movie 16 On the Bulletin Board 17 Speakers Bureau 21 Giovinezza! 24 OSIA Nation 26 Foundation Focus
28 Fighting Stereotypes (CSJ) 29 Letters to the Editor 30 The Last Word 32 The Sons of Italy 27 Your National Office
Shoppers Guide
Italian America is published by The Order Sons of Italy in America 219 E Street, NE • Washington, DC 20002 • Tel: 202/547-2900 • Web: www.osia.org Editor-in-Chief Dona De Sanctis, Ph.D. ddesanctis@osia.org Writers Joseph A. Bosco, Eric Bryan, Diane Crespy, John W. Del Russo, Sr., Richard Juliani, Emily Maletta, Philip Piccigallo, Joseph Scafetta, Jackie Townsend Graphic Designers Krystyne Hayes, Diane Vincent To advertise: Call Pat Rosso at 215/206-4678. Email: pieassociates@comcast.net. See www.osia.org for advertising rates, specs, demographics, etc.
Italian America Magazine is a publication of the Order Sons of Italy in America (OSIA), the nation’s biggest and oldest organization for people of Italian heritage. To subscribe, see www.osia.org or call 1-800-552-6742. SPRING 2014
1
ITALIAN AMERICA
High Profile
AND “ADDIO” TO... [photo credit: Erik Tomasson]
VAL CANIPAROLI is a ballet dancer and choreographer whose works are in 45 dance companies. For more than 40 years he has belonged to the San Francisco Ballet as a dancer and choreographer. “Lambarena”, his best-known work, is performed both to Bach and to traditional African music.
Italian Americans in the NEWS
JUDITH SALERNO, M.D. is now president and CEO of the Susan G. Komen for the Cure, in Dallas, TX. Previously, Dr. Salerno was at the Institute of Medicine and at the National Institutes of Health where she researched Alzheimer’s disease and other illnesses affecting the elderly. A 1985 graduate of Harvard Medical School, she has raised three children and done volunteer medical work among the less fortunate. LAURA TEDESCO, Ph.D., an archeologist with the U.S. State Department in Washington, D.C. spent 16 months in Afghanistan as part of a U.S. team sent to identify ancient sites, bombed by the Taliban that the U.S. would later try to restore and preserve. Leaving behind her husband and two young children in 2010, Dr. Tedesco met with village elders and Afghan archeologists in war zones. She had to wear a bullet-proof vest and helmet for most of her time there. CHARLES VACANTI, M.D. of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, was the senior researcher on a team that created embryonic stem cells from ordinary cells instead of embryos. The experiment indicates the possibility of growing stem cells from a person’s own tissue and avoiding transplant rejection. The procedure could treat such illnesses as diabetes and Parkinson’s disease. LAURA VOZZELLA, a political reporter for the Washington Post, has received a 2013 Polk Award, one of journalism’s greatest honors. She shares the award for political reporting with two other Post reporters. The three uncovered $165,000 in gifts and loans to Virginia governor Bob McDonnell and his wife from a wealthy entrepreneur, allegedly in exchange for promoting a food supplement he sold.
SPRING 2014
2
CLAUDIO ABADO, the Italian conductor who led many great European orchestras, died Jan. 20 in Bologna. He was 80. Known for his support of contemporary music, he once said, “Music does not end with Puccini.” JIM FREGOSI, an all-star shortstop with the LA Angels, died February 14 in Miami of a stroke. He was 71. Fregosi also played for the Mets, Rangers, and Pirates and later managed the Angels and the Philadelphia Phillies. He had a career average of .265 with 151 homers and 706 RBIs. ANDY GRANATELLI, race-car driver and businessman, who made his STP brand famous, died of congestive heart failure Dec. 29, 2013 in California. He was 90. Mr. Granatelli designed and owned racecars and was inducted into 19 engineering and motor-sports halls of fame. In 2003, the Sons of Italy Foundation honored him. WILLIE NOVELLI, actor Joe Mantegna’s uncle, died January 7 at age 91. A decorated WWII veteran, he campaigned for U.S. Army Museum near DC. Mr. Mantegna insisted his character, a U.S. Supreme Court Justice in the 2002 CBS television series, “First Monday,” be named for his grandfather and Willie’s brother, Joe Novelli.
Every issue of Italian America has a Shoppers Guide section at the back with products, trips, books and services aimed at Italian American consumers. These items and services make wonderful gifts as well as useful products for home and personal use. We urge our readers to make the Shoppers Guide their “go-to” directory when needing something for themselves, family and friends. Our advertisers support us. We hope our readers will support them. Also, when you order something, be sure to mention that you saw their ad in our magazine. Some offer our readers a discount.
ITALIAN AMERICA
National News
Italian American issues and events
Brumidi Stamp Campaign Continues By John Del Russo, Sr.
Last November, we lost Brumidi’s greatest champion when Joseph N. Grano died at age 68 from a stroke. For years, Joe Grano lobbied for greater recognition of Constantino Brumidi, who decorated the inner dome, corridors and rooms of our nation’s Capitol building. As president of the Constantino Brumidi Society, Joe succeeded in having the artist honored posthumously with the Congressional Gold Medal in 2008. He was pushing to have a Brumidi postage stamp when he died unexpectedly, but his campaign continues. Currently, a House Resolution is on the floor that would celebrate the 150th anniversary of Brumidi’s painting of the Capitol dome with a U.S. postage stamp. To lend support to this initiative, readers of Italian America can contact their members of Congress, asking them to support House Resolution 101. “We owe this to Joe Grano and to Brumidi,” says OSIA National Executive Director Philip Piccigallo.
HOUSE RESOLUTION 101 This resolution expresses the Sense of the House of Representatives that the United States Postal Service should issue a commemorative postage stamp in 2015 to honor Constantino Brumidi, Artist of the Capitol, and to commemorate the 150th anniversary of his completion of “The Apotheosis of Washington” in the Capitol. Please support the Brumidi commemorative postage stamp campaign. Simply contact your Representative by e-mail* or by phone 202-224-3121 and ask him or her to co-sponsor this resolution. *All U.S. Congressional Representatives, their e-mail addresses, and their direct phone lines can be found at this link: http://www.house.gov/representatives/. For further information, call the House of Representative switchboard at 202-224-3121 in Washington, D.C.
I/A Women Earn Olympic Medals
Italian Americans in the White House
By Joseph Scafetta
Currently, four Italian Americans are advising President Barack Obama on the environment, health care and legislative issues. As 2013 ended, the president brought on board two Washington veterans: Phil Schiliro, his former chief of legislative affairs; and John Podesta, President Clinton’s former chief of staff, who also headed Obama’s transition team in 2008-2009. Mr. John Podesta is Schiliro is working on the president’s health care President Obama’s policies while Mr. Podesta advises on climate, key advisor on the environment. energy, the environment and other issues. Podesta is aggressive on the environment, urging the president to issue rules that protect public lands, cut carbon emissions and severely restrict mining near waterways.
Three athletes of Italian heritage brought home medals in their sports at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Figure skater Marissa Castelli earned a bronze medal on the eight-person U.S. team. Julia Mancuso also won the bronze in super combined skiing while Josephine Pucci received a silver medal as one of 21 players on the U.S. women’s hockey team. Bravissime!
Olympians Marissa Castelli and Simon Shnapir SPRING 3 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
By Dona De Sanctis
The two men join Jennifer Palmieri, the White House director of communications, who develops the president’s media agenda and works on such important speeches as the inaugural address and the state of the union speech. Another senior staffer is Alyssa Mastromonaco, who is deputy chief of staff for operations. She works under the chief of staff, the highest ranking White House staffer. Their office is concerned with hiring and supervising other staff and advises the president on various matters. ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 3
Oggi in Italia
Italy’s news, politics and culture
Italian Astronaut’s Close Call Stumps NASA NASA scientists are still trying to discover why Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano nearly drowned when he went for a spacewalk outside the International Space Station (ISS) last July. The near-tragedy happened when the bag of drinking water in his space suit began leaking into his helmet. The suit had leaked about a week before when he walked in space, but the faulty bag had been replaced on orders from the NASA ground crew. When the new bag also began leaking into his helmet, Parmitano spend 22 anxious minutes in space before returning safely to the ISS. Until the mystery is solved, NASA has suspended spacewalks except under emergency circumstances. Italian scientists began studying space travel at the end of the 19th century. In the 1960s, Italy was one
of the first countries to investigate space exploration. To date, seven Italian astronauts have flown in space, but Parmitano was the first to take a spacewalk. The lone Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano woman astronaut, Saduring his close call in space. mantha Cristoforetti will fly to the ISS in November and return in May 2015. The ISS is the largest artificial body in space. It has been circling low in the Earth’s orbit since 1998. Astronauts have been on board since 2000 to conduct experiments in biology, physics, astronomy and other sciences. It can often be seen by the naked eye at night.
Helping Italy’s At-Risk Youth La Grande Bellezza Wins Oscar for Best Foreign Film By Emily Maletta Along with designer clothing and the Mediterranean diet, Italy is now exporting an innovative self-government approach to youth developLearning useful vocament for at-risk young people. tional skills is part of the BGTI experience. Funded by the American-based Boys’ & Girls’ Towns of Italy (BGTI), the self-government approach teaches young people at two “Towns” outside Rome the vital skills to become employed and productive members of society. BGTI began shortly after WWII when Monsignor John Patrick Carroll-Abbing petitioned Pope Pius XII for permission to help Italian boys, orphaned by the war and living on the street. In 1955, the program expanded to include girls. Today, BGTI welcomes unaccompanied minors who have fled to Italy from more than 18 nations. At Boys’ Town and Girls’ Town, young people elect their own mayors, commissioners, and judges, who have the final say in resolving town issues. Residents learn the importance of civic engagement as well as such marketable vocational skills as the art of pizza and bread making. For more information or to donate, call the Boys’ & Girls’ Towns of Italy New York Office at 212.980.8770. E-mail: office@bgti.org. Web: www.bgti.org. SPRING 2014
4
In March, Italy took home its first foreign film Oscar in 15 years when Paolo Sorrentino’s La Grande Bellezza won the prestigious award. The last time was in 1999 when Roberto Benigni’s La Vita è Bella [Life Is Beautiful] won. Director Sorrentino’s film has been likened to a modern-day Dolce Vita for its portrayal of decadence and excess in modern Rome. In it, Director Paolo Sorrentino accepts the the protagonist, a writer, is forced Oscar for La Grande to examine his life spent in night- Bellezza. [Kevin Winter/ Getty Images] clubs and at parties. The result is “a timeless landscape of absurd, exquisite beauty,” as one reviewer described it. The film has also received a Golden Globe for best foreign film of 2014. This is the 6th film that Sorrentino has directed. Currently, the 43-year old film-maker from Naples is working on In the Future, an English-language film starring Michael Caine. La Grande Bellezza brings to 11 the number of foreign Oscars Italy has won over the years, a world record. France comes in second with nine.
ITALIAN AMERICA
Pagina Italiana
Per chi studia la nostra lingua
Il Dialetto Napoletano Il dialetto napoletano è una lingua propria, secondo L’UNESCO. E molti esperti linguistici lo considerano la seconda lingua ufficiale d’Italia. È senza dubbio il Napoli e la sua famosa baia dialetto più parlato del paese. con il Vesuvio sullo sfondo. Sapete che:
• La lingua napoletana è stata ispiratrice di grandi poeti e scrittori. Nessun altro dialetto è così popolare. Oggigiorno, circa 11 milioni di persone parlano napoletano.
• Il napoletano (in dialetto: nnapulitano) è antichissimo con le sue origini sin dai tempi di Pompei. Il vocabolario napoletano ha parole greche, latine, spagnole, francesi e persino arabe!
• ‘O barbiere te fa bello, ‘o vine te fa guappo e ‘a femmena te fa fesso. Il barbiere ti fa bello, il vino ti dà coraggio e la donna ti fa stupido.
• Non è chiamato dopo la città, ma dopo il Regno di Napoli, che un tempo copriva la maggior parte del mezzogiorno. Napoli ne era la capitale.
• ‘Nu pate d”a mangià a ciente figlie! Ciente figlie nun danno a mangià ‘nu pate. Un padre sfama cento figli! Cento figli non sfamano un padre.
• Il napoletano viene parlato in quasi tutte le regioni meridionali: la Campania, nel basso Lazio, l’Abruzzo, il Molise, la Puglia e la Basilicata mentre il siciliano si parla solo in Sicilia. • Le canzoni napoletane come “O Sole Mio” si cantano in dialetto napoletano e sono in parte responsabili per la diffusione del dialetto per tutta l’Italia ed all’estero.
PROVERBI NAPOLETANI Vere perle di saggezza di un popolo che ha alle spalle una storia millenaria. Quello che segue è solo un piccolissimo assaggio.
• A lava’ ‘a capa ‘o ciuccio se perde l’acqua, ‘o tiempo e ‘o sapone. Chi lava la testa di un asino perde l’acqua, il tempo e il sapone.
“O Sole Mio” La Canzone Napoletana Classica
‘O sole mio” è la canzone più cantata e più venduta nella O SOLE MIO in napolitano storia. L’hanno eseguita tutti i cantanti, in tutte le lingue, Che bella cosa na jurnata ‘e sole, da Enrico Caruso a Elvis Presley (“It’s Now or Never”). n’aria serena doppo na tempesta! È stata cantata in ogni angolo della terra ed anche nello Pe’ ll’aria fresca pare già ‘na festa spazio da Yuri Gagarin, il primo astronauta a viaggiare nello Che bella cosa na jurnata ‘e sole. spazio. La cantò durante quel suo memorabile viaggio, il Coro: Ma n’atu sole 12 aprile 1961. cchiu’ bello, oi ne’. Ha una storia particolare. Questo inno al sole di Na- ‘O sole mio poli venne composta nella Russa nel 1898 da un giovane sta ‘nfronte a te! musicista, Eduardo Di Capua. Compone questa splendida musica usando versi scritti da un suo amico, il poeta ‘O sole, ‘o sole mio sta ‘nfronte a te, Giovanni Capurro. sta ‘nfronte a te! I due autori hanno ricevuto solo due cento lire per la loro canzone. Fu il loro unico compenso percepito in Quanno fa notte e ‘o sole se ne scenne, vita perchè all’epoca i proventi andavano tutti all’editore. me vene quase ‘na malincunia; Entrambi moriranno nella miseria più nera. Eduardo Di sotto ‘a fenesta toia restarria Capua dovrà addirittura vendere il suo pianoforte per quanno fa notte e ‘o sole se ne scenne. Ripetete il coro pagare i debiti e le cure mediche. SPRING 5 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
O SOLE MIO in italiano
Che bella cosa una giornata di sole, un’aria serena dopo la tempesta! Per l’aria fresca pare già una festa... che bella cosa una giornata di sole! Coro: Ma un altro sole più bello non c’è il sole mio sta in fronte a te Il sole, il sole mio, sta in fronte a te sta in fronte a te Quando fa sera e il sole se ne scende, mi viene quasi una malinconia... Sotto la tua finestra, resterei, quando fa sera ed il sole se ne scende. Ripetete il coro ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 5
By Eric Bryan
One of the most iconic images of Italy in the 1950s and 1960s is the colorful Vespa scooter. Inspired by the U.S. military Cushman scooters used in Italy during World War II, the Piaggio Company in Tuscany began producing the scooters commercially in 1946. The resulting Vespa scooter went on to become one of Italy’s greatest manufacturing success stories. In 1953, its appearance in the film, Roman Holiday, which also introduced Audrey Hepburn, reportedly generated more than 100,000 sales. By 1956, Piaggio had sold over one million scooters. Celebrities such as Dean Martin, Charlton Heston, Marlon Brando, and John Wayne were fans and its popularity grew so great that a new Italian verb was coined: vespare, meaning to travel by Vespa.
to the masses and commissioned an engineer, Renzo Spolti to design a motor-scooter. Spolti’s prototype was the Moto Piaggio 5 (MP5), but the workers at the Biella factory christened it Paperino (Donald Duck), perhaps inspired by the nickname given to the tiny Fiat 500 car, Topolino (Mickey Mouse). The MP5 98cc scooter had a chain drive, was bulky and didn’t have a step-through design which allowed women in dresses or skirts to ride it. Piaggio was so dissatisfied that he halted production of the Paperino. By this time, approximately 100 of them
had already come off the assembly line. Those that survive today are highly-sought after by collectors.
The Wasp
Enrico Piaggio next asked the aeronautical engineer, Corradino D’Ascanio to take over the project. Some specifics were required: the scooter had to be elegant yet durable, reliable and simple to operate with
An advertisement for the Vespa 50 aimed at the youth market
Donald Duck
In 1943, after his aeronautics factories were destroyed by the Allies, Enrico Piaggio decided to offer low-cost transportation
The Vespa MP5 prototype displeased the manufacturer. SPRING SPRING 2014 2014 66
ITALIAN ITALIANAMERICA AMERICA
The Evolving Vespa
A pinup calendar girl on a Vespa in 1951 foretells the scooter’s popularity.
a layout that prevented the rider’s clothes from getting dirty. D’Ascanio’s dislike of motorcycles coupled with his experience in aeronautics led him to create a groundbreaking new machine. The engineer found motorcycles uncomfortable to ride. The chain drive is messy, and changing a motorcycle tire was cumbersome. With these ideas in mind, D’Ascanio took an ergonomics-first approach and began plans by first drawing the figure of a rider who sat comfortably upright, then sketched his proposed machine below and around the figure, accommodating the human proportions. D’Ascanio’s innovations included a unibody frame, the placing of the gearshift on the handlebars, a footbrake, direct-drive, and attaching the front wheel to a single strut instead of a fork to allow for quick and easy wheel changes. And women liked its frame’s step-through design. This 98cc model was the Moto Piaggio 6 (MP6). When Enrico Piaggio saw the prototype and heard the buzz of its motor, he exclaimed, “Sembra una vespa!” (“It seems like a wasp!”). The nickname stuck. SPRING 7 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
Like automobiles, this popular scooter has gone through many transformations in the 68 years since Piaggio premiered his Light Motorized Runabout (Motoleggera Utilitaria), or Vespa 98 at the Rome Golf Club in 1946. This model was almost the same as the MP6, but D’Ascanio had made some refinements such as adding an engine cooling-fan, and repositioning the horn and handbrake. The Vespa 98 made the cover of La Moto magazine, and Piaggio initially sold the scooters through Lancia dealerships. Optional features for the Vespa included a kickstand, whitewalls, and a speedometer. The Italian public was curious but skeptical of the new
The Growth of A Legend Some Vespa Production Figures • 1947: 10,535 produced • 1948: 19,822 Vespa 125s produced •1950: 60,000 produced for Germany • 1953: 171,200 produced; Year also marked production of the 500,000th scooter. •1956: Over one million produced to date •1960: Two million produced to date •1970: Four million produced to date •1988: 10 million produced to date • 2013: 18 million produced to date
A poster of the 1953 movie that helped popularize the Vespa
creation, and the first year’s production number was only 2,484 units. In 1947, Piaggio brought out the second generation Vespa 98. This model included improved lighting, a smaller front fender to further simplify front wheel removal, and a new start lever which was easier to operate. The silver finishes of these vehicles reflected the aeronautical heritage of the Piaggio Company. The Vespa 98s could do 37mph, and cost $244 ($293 for the luxury model) in 1946. As sales numbers climbed, Piaggio offered the Vespa 125, a new 125cc scooter, in 1948. With a top speed of 43mph, this model had improved suspension, a rear shock absorber, and easier engine access. A competition 125, the Sei Giorni, appeared in 1951. With its modifications, this scooter could do 60mph, and won nine gold medals at the 26th International Six-Day Event. A further incarnation of the 125 also debuted in 1951: the Vespa Siluro (Torpedo). With a sleek silver body of panels, fins and fairings which ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 7
enclosed the rider, this was a timetrials model that broke the standing kilometer record with a time of 21.4 seconds and an average speed of 106.3mph. After the Sei Giorni, came the Vespa 150 GS, a mass-produced sporty model with a 145.6cc engine and a top speed of 63mph. It is regarded as the height of beauty in scooter design, and the most famous Vespa. Released in 1955, examples of this classic are prized by motor enthusiasts and collectors the world over.
Corradino D’Ascanio A Modern Da Vinci
Women liked the Vespa’s step-through style.
In 1963, Piaggio created the Vespa The Future...
50, a small-sized 49cc scooter that could do 25mph. It is the last model designed by D’Ascanio. Known for its simplicity and easy handling, this motor-scooter was especially popular with Italian teen-agers. Its small engine allowed it to circumvent the Italian Highway Code which required license plates for vehicles with motors of greater than 1.5 horsepower. Over three million Vespa 50s were built.
As sales mushroomed, Piaggio had the scooters made under license in France, Spain, Belgium, Great Britain and Germany. Production expanded into Brazil, Indonesia, and India in the 1960s.
From its single motor-scooter introduced in 1946, Piaggio has since created hundreds of different models, including a military Vespa, which carried a 75mm anti-tank gun; scooters with sidecars; scooters with trailers; and other competition models. Production of the Vespa continues to this day. The latest model, the 2014 deluxe Vespa 946 has a 150cc engine, cruises at 58mph and costs about $10,000, but much cheaper models are also available. New projects include the development of hybrid scooters. Thanks to its “wasp,” Piaggio is the world’s top producer of two-wheeled motor vehicles. The Italian Vespa is truly un fenomeno mondiale!
Eric Bryan is a freelance writer originally from Burlingame, California.
The 2014 deluxe Vespa 946 costs about $10,000. SPRING SPRING 2014 2014 88
The man who created the Vespa was born in 1891 in Popoli, a town in the Abruzzo region. Corradino D’Ascanio was interested in aviation early on, achieving flight at 14 with a homemade hang-glider. He earned an engineering degree at the Politecnico di Torino in 1914, and in the 1920s to 1932, designed prototype helicopters. After WWII, Ferdinando Innocenti approached D’Ascanio to design the Lambretta scooter. Innocenti insisted the frame be constructed of tubing. This conflicted with D’Ascanio’s vision of a stamped spar-frame, so the engineer took his plans, which would lead to the Vespa, to Piaggio. D’Ascanio continued with helicopter projects in the 1940s and 1950s, and in 1964 worked for the Agusta Group designing the Agusta ADA, a helicopter intended as a trainer and crop-sprayer. D’Ascanio’s inventions included a punch-card computer, timed cigarette-holders designed to curb his own smoking, and elaborate games. Despite the overpowering success of the Vespa, D’Ascanio regretted that his aeronautics achievements went underappreciated. He died in Pisa in 1981.
Vespa designer D’Ascanio (L), admiring an early model ITALIAN ITALIANAMERICA AMERICA
The Sons of Italy
Book Club
SPRING 2014 Selections
The Heart is the Teacher The Glassblower’s By Leonard Covello Apprentice
The Partisans: Sons & Daughters
A man ahead of his time, Leonard Covello, a New York City teacher and principal (1887-1982), believed in multi-culturalism, especially when it involved his second-generation Italian American high school students who were not even offered Italian as a foreign language during the 1930s. Thanks goes to the Calandra Italian American Institute for reprinting this remarkable educator’s autobiography that tells how an immigrant boy from Campania became the champion of Italian American students and other minorities at a time when this country wanted them to become Americans by being ashamed of their parents and their heritage. A must read! [$18.00; paperback; 220 pages; Calandra Italian American Institute]
This gripping novel is based on fact: the little-known story of how Italian men and women partisans assisted the Allies and fought the Nazis, who were occupying their country during the last two years of WWII. Theirs was a true “civil war” that took place in Italy’s cities, towns, mountains and countryside. Fighting with stolen weapons and often little food or protection from the elements, over 35,000 Italian partisans smuggled weapons, set up spy networks, and found safe houses to hide Jews and escaped political prisoners. Many gave up their lives to free Italy. Author Drago mixes fact and fiction to tell their story. [$16.95; paperback; 301 pages; amazon.com]
& Guido D’Agostino
By Peter Pezzelli
Fabio Terranova lived to dance until an accident destroyed his dream of leaving his mountain town in central Italy to star on Broadway. Instead, he finds himself shipped off by his mother to an uncle in Rhode Island where he is forced to learn the art of glassblowing. His uncle also immigrated to America many years earlier for mysterious reasons. Set in the present-day, the novel harks back to the timeless struggles and triumphs that everyone meets traveling through life. On his journey, Fabio learns to live with his heartbreak and find joy in the new direction his life has taken. [$29.95; hardcover; 264 pages; West Passage Publishing]
By Peter Drago
Also Worth Reading Sport and the Shaping of Italian American Identity By Gerald R. Gems
Sports helped many Italian immigrants assimilate and when they succeeded they gave a sense of pride to millions of their transplanted countrymen. In the process, sports helped these immigrants from Italy’s many small towns and villages develop a sense of national identity as Italians rather than Sicilians, Calabresi, Neapolitans, etc. This well-researched book describes how that important and remarkable transformation occurred. [$45.00; hardcover; 336 pages; Syracuse University Press]
Our Italian Surnames
By Joseph G. Fucilla Most Italian Americans know who they were named for, but how many of us know where our last names come from? Thank Prof. Fucilla for supplying the answers. His was the first comprehensive collection of thousands of Italian surnames, their origin and history. Published in 1949 and still available through Amazon.com, his classic is essential for both scholars and amateur genealogists. [$29.95; hardcover; also in paperback and Kindle; 300 pages; Genealogical Publishing Company] SPRING 9 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 9
Our Story
Italian American history and culture
Mt. Rushmore Carver Honored A memorial honoring Mount Rushmore Chief Carver Luigi Del Bianco will be unveiled May 10 in Port Chester, N.Y. Del Bianco immigrated to Port Chester from Italy in 1921 and lived there with his family until his death in 1969. Stor yteller Lou Del Bianco, his grandson and namesake, got the idea for a memorial after visiting Mount Rushmore in 2011, where he performed a one-man show about his grandfather and his largely unrecognized contribution to the national tribute to Lincoln, Jefferson, Washington, and Theodore Roosevelt. When the popular TV show, “Cake Boss” honored his grandfather with a Mount Rushmore cake, the younger Del Bianco decided to raise the funds for it himself. Grandson Lou Del Bianco with his famous ancestor
“I wanted the people of Port Chester to know that the master carver of this national monument lived right here,” he says. “What better way to do that than with a permanent memorial that will last for generations – just like Mount Rushmore?” The Del Bianco family donated a major portion of the funds for the bronze relief memorial, but more were
A clay model of the memorial to Luigi Del Bianco needed for the memorial stone, lighting, landscaping, and the foundation’s reinforcement. Del Bianco contacted relatives, friends and all the local civic organizations, including the Rotary and Kiwanis clubs and the Knights of Columbus. Several local businesses donated labor and materials. “The response has been fantastic. The people of Port Chester have really come through to honor one of their own,” Del Bianco says. For details, see w.luigimountrushmore.com. Email: ldb31@icloud.com.
Remembering Our Veterans As every year, on Memorial Day we remember the men and women who gave “the last full measure of devotion,” when they died protecting our nation. Not all received medals, but all were heroes. Among them is George Ferrari, the first Italian American to earn a Medal of Honor. Ferrari was born in New York City in 1845 and joined the U.S. Army when he was in his early twenties. He was assigned to the 8th U.S. Cavalry and sent to the Arizona Territory where he fought in the Apache Wars of the late 1860s. On September 23, 1869, he and two other cavalry troopers were cited for “gallantry in action” against the Apache at SPRING 2014
10
Red Creek. All three received Medals of Honor. Little is known of his life other than his Army service, not even the date of his death.
The Medal of Honor, our nation’s highest recognition for heroism
George Ferrari’s name brings to 26 the number of Italian American who earned the Medal of Honor. The list, compiled by the Sons of Italy Commission for Social Justice, is on our website: see www.osia.org/ culture&history/reports&studies. [Editor’s Note: Italian America magazine thanks reader Sam Pisciotta of Pueblo, CO for his assistance with this article.]
ITALIAN AMERICA
Our Story
Italian American history and culture
“Secret Story” Exhibit Marks 20th Anniversary Twenty years ago, on February 24, 1994, the exhibit, Una Storia Segreta: When Italian Americans Were Enemy Aliens opened at the Museo Italo Americano in San Francisco for a brief month-long run. Then the unexpected happened. Crowds flocked to see it; newspapers gave it front-page coverage; and requests to see it streamed in from cities across the nation. Since then, the exhibit of photographs, posters, and memorabilia has traveled to over 50 sites nationwide, revealing for the first time how the civil rights of 600,000 Italian Americans were violated during WWII. They were largely elderly immigrants who had never become citizens. Many were subjected to curfews, restricted travel, and loss of possessions including businesses, radios and even binoculars. Some 10,000 on the west coast were forced to move inland while others were interned. The study of Italian virtually disappeared along with many Italian American newspapers and civic organizations. During the 1990s, private citizens and national Italian American organizations, including the Sons of Italy, joined the exhibit’s project director, historian Lawrence DiS-
tasi in petitioning the U.S. Department of Justice to open its files so that this painful chapter of our history could be brought to light. “La Storia Segreta” exhibit has origiTheir efforts renal photographs like this one that sulted in national document the internment of Italians and Italian Americans in WWII. legislation, cosponsored by Congressmen Eliot Engel and Rick Lazio along with Engel’s chief of staff, John Calvelli who helped move the bill through Congress. And finally, President Bill Clinton signed the Wartime Violation of Italian American Civil Liberties Act into law November 7, 2000. DiStasi’s book, “Una Storia Segreta: The Secret History of Italian American Evacuation and Internment during World War II” is available in paperback for $21.95. For details, see www.segreta.org or email lwdistasi@sbcglobal.net.
D.C. Italian Church Celebrates Centenary Unlike nearby Baltimore, Washington, D.C. does not have a proper “Little Italy” neighborhood. It had a strong Italian presence, however, at the turn of the 20th century when some 3,000 Italian workers and their families flocked to the city to help build Union Station, the Library of Congress and other important buildings in the capital.
for espresso, cappuccini, and cornetti. Some also attend the church’s Casa Italiana cultural center to learn Italian from native speakers, who teach all levels and all ages, from children to seniors.
Last December, the church celebrated its 100th anniversary with a Mass and a Gala dinner, attended by national and international leaders and about 700 parishioners and They also created the friends. Among the special One-hundred-year-old Holy Rosary Roman Catholic Church in Washington, DC is both a spiritual and a mosaic and terrazzo floors of guests were Italy’s ambascultural center. their neighborhood Roman sador to the U.S., Claudio Catholic church, Holy Rosary, which opened its doors in Bisogniero; Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia 1913. These artisans are long gone, but their descendents and Sam Alito; the Papal Nunzio, Archbishop Carlo still travel from the suburbs of Virginia and Maryland on Maria Viganò; U.S. Army Chief of Staff. Gen. Raymond Sunday to hear the Mass in Italian at Holy Rosary Church. Odierno, and numerous church and civic leaders. Altri Afterwards, they gather in the church community hall cent’anni, Holy Rosary! SPRING 11 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 11
John Volpe’s Presidential Near-Miss By Joseph A. Bosco demonstrated his vote-getting prowess, winning a third term as governor in a record landslide and with the widest margin of all governors elected in 1966.
John Volpe, the son of Italian immigrants from Abruzzo, followed his father in the construction business, but went on to become a thrice-elected governor of Massachusetts; a presidential cabinet member as secretary of transportation under Richard Nixon; and ambassador to Italy.
Volpe confidently proclaimed to the Nixon camp that he had “won big in Kennedy-land and could do it again” in Catholic, Italian-American, and ethnic areas across the Northeast and Midwest.
A life-long staunch supporter of civil rights and the underprivileged, Republican and Democratic peers Gov. Volpe was a serious candidate as elected Volpe chairman of the National Richard Nixon’s vice president in 1968. Governors’ Conference. Nixon seemed This article reveals a behind-the-scene to be grooming him for the ticket. In John A. Volpe (1908-1994) look at what might have been had Mr. January, 1968, he went to Boston to businessman, governor, cabinet Nixon chosen him instead of Spiro Agnew. discuss campaign strategy and meet officer and ambassador It is written by Joseph A. Bosco, Volpe’s Volpe’s staff. He advised Volpe to travel special assistant when he was secretary overseas to burnish his foreign-policy credentials. In early of transportation and previously, his assistant legal counsel April at Nixon’s New York apartment, they discussed when Volpe was governor. Volpe’s upcoming trip to Asia as head of a U.S. governors On Aug. 8, 1968, Republican presidential nominee Richard Nixon made a fateful decision at the Miami convention. In the last hour before he would announce his running mate, he switched Secret Service protection from John Volpe of Massachusetts to Maryland’s Spiro Agnew--and lost the partner who could have prevented the Watergate scandal that destroyed his presidency.
delegation.
Nixon had given South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond a veto in return for the Southern delegations’ support over their preferred candidate, California Gov. Ronald Reagan. At the end of all-night meetings, Thurmond handed Nixon three lists naming “acceptable” conservatives, “unacceptable” liberals, and “no objection” moderates: Volpe and Agnew.
A FATEFUL TRIP
Both men had pursued the job. Agnew openly played to Thurmond’s “Southern strategy” by dropping his earlier liberal civil rights stance and attacking black rioters and antiwar protesters. Volpe took a different tack, arguing that Nixon would carry most of the South anyway but needed the bluecollar Democratic strongholds of the North. Volpe had SPRING 2014
12
Volpe’s next step would be the uncontested April 30 Massachusetts GOP primary which would give him control of the state’s 34 delegates to deliver to Nixon when most needed (even though several, led by Edward Brooke, the only African-American in the U.S. Senate, preferred the undeclared Rockefeller). But tragic fate intervened with Martin Luther King’s assassination on April 4, 1968. Agnew seized on the ensuing riots in Baltimore and 100 other U.S. cities to escalate his law-and-order rhetoric. Volpe, just arrived in Japan, faced a painful dilemma--should he continue the foreign trip Nixon encouraged or return to Massachusetts? Boston had already experienced some rioting and 100,000 shocked citizens gathered on the Common. Lt. Gov. Francis Sargent, now acting governor, had mobilized the National Guard. Volpe called from Tokyo to assess the situation. I ITALIAN AMERICA
WHAT IF...?
History is full of what-ifs. What if Volpe had returned from Japan? What if he had secured the handful of votes needed to defeat Rockefeller’s challenge and retain Nixon’s confidence? And what if he had become vice president? One scenario is that Vice President Volpe would have been unable to prevent the Watergate mess, Nixon would have resigned anyway, and Volpe would have become the first Italian-American president.
Richard Nixon and Spiro Agnew at the 1972 GOP Convention. Would we have had Watergate if John Volpe had been Nixon’s running mate instead?
joined Sargent and a half-dozen other Volpe aides around the speaker phone at the governor’s empty desk. The nearunanimous view was that Boston’s streets seemed under control and Volpe should continue his trip. I dissented, believing the governor’s place was at home at this critical time. Volpe decided to stay in Japan. Boston’s media and Massachusetts Democrats, already critical of Volpe’s earlier travels, quickly condemned his absence. Three weeks later, Massachusetts voters spoke when the GOP held its presidential primary. Volpe ran as the unopposed “favorite son” and his presumed victory was expected to be the final essential step in his quest for the vice-presidency. But on Election Day, Rockefeller suddenly announced his candidacy, (urged not only by Brooke and other liberals but also, secretly, by LBJ, who detested Nixon and considered Vice President Hubert Humphrey an inadequate successor. In a below-the-radar write-in campaign organized by Brooke, Rockefeller edged Volpe by a few hundred votes out of 100,000.
More likely, Vice President Volpe would have aborted the Watergate scandal where Agnew, threatened with indictment by Attorney General Elliot Richardson, could not. Moreover, Agnew’s slashing partisan rhetoric so alienated Congress that Nixon, on his tapes, called him “my insurance against impeachment.” Volpe, on matters of public morality, was the anti-Agnew. Deeply religious, he prided himself on fighting corruption in private business and public service. He had created the Massachusetts ethics code, and as governor and secretary he demanded probity from his staff. The strongest evidence of how Volpe would have moderated the Nixon White House was his performance in Nixon’s Cabinet. Like his fellow governors, George Romney at HUD and Walter Hickel at Interior, Volpe frequently clashed with Nixon aides Robert Haldeman and John Ehrlichman—but unlike his colleagues, he usually won.
A MORAL BEACON
Volpe sometimes saw policy differences as moral issues. He twice threatened to resign if Nixon followed his aides’ advice to overrule him on requiring air bags in cars and creating Amtrak (“Railpax”). In both cases, Nixon
Volpe’s advantage over Agnew evaporated and relegated him from convention kingmaker to mere bystander. Though Nixon continued touting him as a leading contender for vice president, he later recounted in his memoir that Volpe’s loss had “embarrassed him, irritated me and given a great boost to Rockefeller.” Yet, in the final hours before his convention decision, Nixon was still pondering the Volpe-Agnew choice, having received Thurmond’s blessing to go with either. But Volpe’s fate had been sealed three months earlier. When the GOP bigwigs left the room, a key Nixon adviser reminded him that “Volpe couldn’t even carry his own state” with no one else on the ballot. SPRING 13 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
President Dwight D. Eisenhower appointed John Volpe Federal Highway Commissioner in 1957. ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 13
reversed himself and backed Volpe, increasing White House resentment of the obstreperous governor. Volpe had a secret White House ally: fellow daily communicant Rose Mary Woods, Nixon’s personal secretary. Offended by Nixon’s inner circle, she saw Volpe as a kindred spirit and gave him the critical access to Nixon denied all Cabinet officers and even Agnew. (After Nixon’s railroad legislation turnaround, an irate Ehrlichman called Volpe to complain, “I don’t know how you got to the president, but he’s decided to sign your bill after all.”). Pat Nixon also liked and respected Volpe.
of Italian immigrants and opponent of legal segregation in the Navy). Yet, Strom Thurmond shared black leaders’ admiration for the man.
VOLPE’S LEGACY
Volpe identified with his Italian
Volpe deplored official corruption as much as he did racial injustice. A Vice President Volpe, learning of illegal White House activities, would have marched into the Oval Office and confronted the president. Nixon would have had no choice but to call a halt long before the scandal threatened his presidency. Unlike Agnew, Volpe’s bipartisan popularity in Congress would have made him an acceptable potential president, a powerful incentive for Nixon to do the right thing.
Volpe rejected the motivating prinroots, as this title of his biography ciple of Nixon’s political aides—that indicates. the media and Congress were out to Saving Nixon from himself would have been Volpe’s destroy Nixon even before Watergate. Volpe enjoyed a finest contribution to America. The great visionary leader political fight and played to win, but he did not see his would have been spared the petty, sordid business that political opponents as personal enemies. As governor and Watergate became, and freed to focus on the larger issues transportation secretary, he pushed far-reaching measures of war and peace for which he was so eminently qualified. in Democratic-controlled legislatures and invariably won So much for what might have been. Instead, having broad bipartisan support. extracted the last ounce of campaigning from Volpe and Volpe also refused to view national security issues in his Cabinet colleagues, Nixon fired most of them after his partisan rather than patriotic terms. Though he strongly 1972 re-election. Volpe was offered the ambassadorship supported Nixon’s policy on Vietnam (as he had LBJ’s), to Italy—which he wanted but only after another year or he respected those, like his granddaughter, who opposed two to complete his innovative transportation policies. it. He saw the Vietnam War as a national tragedy not only This time, there was no appeal and he was given an ultibecause of the lives destroyed but also because decent, matum: Take Rome now or lose it and leave the Cabinet loyal Americans were on both sides of the issue. anyway. He took it. White House aides tried to get Volpe to woo hardOver the next two years, one Nixon aide after another hat support with a speech blasting mainstream antiwar fell from grace, disbarred or behind bars. As Nixon’s own demonstrators, not just the violent few, as anti-American. end neared, the ever-dedicated, ever-forgiving Volpe seVolpe saw it as the kind of bitter, confrontational speech cured a personal message to him from Pope Paul VI praisAgnew would make and he refused to deliver it. Instead, ing his work for peace and offering prayers on his behalf. reminiscent of the letters he exchanged with his granddaughter, he gave his own defense of Nixon’s policy in Joseph A. Bosco taught China-Taiwan-U.S. relations at Georgetown’s reasoned, moral terms while conceding the equally moral School of Foreign Service and later served as China country desk officer in the office of the secretary of defense. He is presently a motivation of those on the other side. Someone once member of the U.S.-China Task Force at the Center for the National called Volpe “a bridge over troubled waters.” Interest and writes frequently on national security affairs. His email Volpe’s passion on civil rights won him the respect of contact is boscoja@gmail.com. the same African-American leaders Agnew was antagonizThis article is an edited version of “The man who might have preing. After meeting with Volpe, Charles Evers, brother of vented Watergate” which can be found in its entirety at http://www. the slain Medgar Evers, compared him to Robert Kennedy politico.com/story/2013/08/opinion-joseph-bosco-richard-nixon(though it was a lifelong commitment for Volpe, the son watergate-95308.html SPRING 2014
14
ITALIAN AMERICA
How stereotyping shapes the public image of today’s Italian Americans. Send your contributions to ddesanctis@osia.org or mail to: “It’s Only a Movie,” Italian America Magazine, 219 E Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002. Include name and daytime telephone number. No telephone calls please. Mailed submissions cannot be acknowledged. Contributors’ names, when known, are in parenthesis. By Dona De Sanctis
• FOOTBALL FUMBLE Last January, during “The Jim Rome National Sports Radio Show” in Chicago, Rome discussed the University of Louisville’s rehiring of its football coach, “that grease ball, Bob Petrino”. The show is syndicated by CBS Sports Radio. • AFLAC CONTROVERSY CONTINUES The health insurance company, AFLAC, is still denying its television commercial, “Family Business,” has Italian American stereotypes. In it, two gangsters threaten to harm the company mascot, a white duck. The company refuses to drop the commercial, which plays Italian songs on mandolins while actor Frank Vincent of ‘Goodfellas’ and ‘The Sopranos’, fame, threatens the duck. To complain, call or write to AFLAC CEO Daniel Amos at damos@aflac.com. Telephone 706/323-3431. • MAFIA CHILDREN’S COSTUMES For only about 30 bucks your toddler or teen-ager can dress up like a Mafioso next Halloween, thanks to costumes available through Amazon.com. Girls, you are not left out. You, too, can be part of the Mob as “Mafia Mamas.” Adult sizes at higher prices are also available. What’s next? Letting children dress up as drug lords, mass murderers or terrorists? Contact Amazon CEO Jeffrey Bezos at jeff@amazon.com or call 866/216-1072 to have these items dropped. • THE CAPONES They claim to be related to Al Capone, but their reality show should be called “The Cafones” because they represent the tired stereotypes of ignorant, overweight men, loud women, conversations peppered with four-letter words, and food fights in dysfunctional families. The 10-episode series, which airs on the Reelz channel, has been
SPRING 15 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
panned by critics but is still on the air. The relationship to Capone is tenuous at best: one of the characters claims that his great-great grandfather was Scarface’s uncle, but apparently that’s all it took to get on television. Email info@reelz.com and tell them you will boycott their sponsors. [Karen Fanale, Massachusetts and others] • CHRISTIE’S HERITAGE ASSAILED Do most people in his state think that NJ Gov. Chris Christie ordered the George Washington Bridge tie-up? To find out, Bill O’Reilly sent his correspondent, Jesse Watters to take a survey last January. During the interviews, which aired on “The O’Reilly Factor,” viewers also saw clips from gangster movies while the theme from “The Sopranos” provided the background music. This was not the first time that Gov. Christie’s Italian roots (on his mother’s side) have been brought up. Paul Mulshine, a NJ Star Ledger columnist, calls Christie “Tony Soprano,” and says he is “half Gaelic, half garlic.” Wonder what the media would say about him if Christie were of Hispanic or African American heritage? [Manny Alfano, the Italian American One Voice Coalition] • THE “DAVID” IS PACKING? The Italian government is fuming over an Illinois gun maker that is using Michelangelo’s masterpiece, the David, to advertise one of its rifles. The Armalite ad shows David holding the gun instead of his slingshot. Italian Culture Minister Dario Franceschini threatened legal action if the company does not withdraw the ad. The Italian government claims that it has the copyright to all commercial uses of the marble masterpiece, which was created between 1501 and 1504. It stands in the Accademia delle Belle Arti in Florence. Italian law does not allow distorting Italian works of art. Armalite has not made any public comment on the controversy. [Egidio Currenti, New York]
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 15
Bulletin Board
What’s new: discounts, services and events
From Memories to Story Book By Francine Poppo Rich
Maria LaPlaca Bohrer and I met years ago when I was her instructor in a children’s book writing workshop. One exercise was to write about a simple childhood memory, using all five senses. She chose her Uncle Frankie’s stoop on 18th Street in Brooklyn, New York where she sat every Sunday with all her cousins, listening to her uncle’s stories about his own childhood. From the stoop, Maria could smell her grandmother’s gravy and meatballs cooking next door and hear “Nana” singing as she cooked. As Uncle Frankie moved into his 90s, Maria focused on turning that writing exercise into a picture book as a tribute to him, her Nana, and all her Italian relatives who had influenced her life. She revised her story 17 times after that first workshop and looked for a publisher but met only rejection. Then one day, about three years after the workshop, Maria and I ran into each other. I read her story, and as I did, I recalled my own Brooklyn Sundays with my Italian grandparents on their stoop in Brooklyn. I could see the bun Maria LaPlaca Bohrer with atop Grandma’s head, her Uncle Frankie
smell the meatballs cooking, hear the crinkling of the plastic covering the couch, and feel the love in that family. I felt compelled to share Maria’s story with today’s children and decided to publish it. So, at last, Maria has found a home for her stoop story. Blue Marlin Publications released Sofia’s Stoop Story: 18th Street, Brooklyn in February, 2014. Lou Fancher and Steve Johnson, who have illustrated many award-winning picture books, have brought Uncle Frankie, the cousins, Nana, and their Italian traditions to life and, hopefully, into your children’s lives. Sofia’s Stoop Story is a 32-page, hard cover picture book that retails for $17.95. You can buy it through the publisher at www.bluemarlinpubs.com or at amazon.com. Francine Poppo Rich is the publisher of Blue Marlin Publications. She lives in Bay Shore, N.Y. with her husband and three children. Her father, John James Poppo, belonged to the Sons of Italy Guglielmo Marconi Lodge #2232 in Islip, NY and was once the lodge’s Venerable. Contact her at francinerich@bluemarlinpubs.com.
Heirloom Herb & Vegetable Seeds from Italy Nearly a century ago, in 1925, Constantino Pagano founded a seed company that has become one of the oldest and most respected in Italy. The firm’s heirloom herb and vegetable seeds are now available in the U.S. through Lake Valley Seed, the exclusive U.S. distributor of Pagano Seeds. Lake Valley Seed sells Pagano’s seeds for basil, parsley, tomatoes and more, directly importing them from Scafati, a town near Salerno in Campania. The Boulder, Colorado firm also offers a wide variety of flower seeds. “We SPRING 2014
16
started in 1985 to promote the health benefits that come from growing and eating one’s own vegetables and herbs,” says Neil Esseveld, the company’s marketing manager. The company supports both organic agriculture and the farmto-table movement. It will not sell seeds that are genetically modified, according to Esseveld.
Heirloom seeds from Italy are now available in the USA through Lake Valley Seed.
For a 20% discount on seeds, see the company ad on page 33 and be sure to give the ad’s special code. For more information, visit www.lakevalleyseed. com. ITALIAN AMERICA
Bulletin Board
What’s new: discounts, services and events
Sons of Italy Speakers Bureau Need a speaker for your club meeting or a special event? Contact these speakers directly. Some may require travel expenses and/or honorariums. For more speakers see: www.osia.org at “Studies in Culture.”To apply, contact Dona De Sanctis at ddesanctis@osia.org. FLORIDA & BEYOND Historian & author Carlo Ferroni speaks on Italian POWs in WWII and his book on this topic. Book signings. Contact: 831 688 2961 (FL) Email: bncferroni@aol.com. LOUISIANA Author/historian Alan Gauthreaux speaks on his book about Italian immigrant history in Louisiana. Book signings. Contact: 504 452 7147 (LA) Email: agauthreauxma@gmail.com MID-WEST Author Dominic Candeloro, professor of Italian American studies (ret.) on Italian Americans of Chicago; Italian American literature; and more. Book signing of Italians of Chicago. Contact: 708 354 0952 (IL) Email: Dominic.Candeloro@gmail.com. Also will Skype. NORTHEAST & BEYOND Poet and journalist Rick Black on the poetry of Nick Virgilio of NJ whose haiku poems have become classics. Contact: 908 227 7951
(VA) Email: rick@turtlelightpress.com Website: turtlelightpress.com SOUTH CAROLINA Author Frank Pennisi on his novel, Sciatu Mio that follows three generations of Sicilians from Italy to America. Book signing. Contact: 843/272-9997 (SC). Email: fpennisi@sc.rr.com WASHINGTON, DC AREA Writer/researcher Linda Barrett Osborne, who edited “Explorers, Emigrants, Citizens,” a massive “visual history” of Italian Americans for the Library of Congress, will speak on this impressive book and do book signings. [The book was a Sons of Italy Book Club Winter 2014 title.] Contact: 202 269 0779 (DC) Email: lindabosborne@gmail.com
New Bargain Tours of Italy
Free Festival Guide
This year, the Sons of Italy through its travel agency, Unitours, is offering tours of Italy that include Venice, Naples and Sicily. Prices start at $3,099, with multiple departure dates between February and October 2014.
The Sons of Italy’s national headquarters in Washington, D.C. has produced a free directory of 366 annual Italian American festivals in 39 states and the District of Columbia.
The tour package price includes round-trip airfare between the U.S. and Italy on Alitalia, four-star hotel accommodations, all breakfasts and dinners, and escorted tours to world-class museums and historical sites with English-speaking guides. For more information or to book your trip, email mpisano@unitours.com or call 1.800.777.7432. See ad inside front cover.
To add a festival to next year’s directory, contact OSIA National by fax (202/546-8168) or email: nationaloffice@osia. org. Deadline: December 31, 2014.
Keeping the traditions alive. [Photo: Paul Porcelli]
The 2014 Sons of Italy Festival Directory can be downloaded at www.osia.org. For a free printed copy, send a large (9” x 12”), self-addressed envelope: Sons of Italy Festival Directory, 219 E Street NE, Washington, DC 20002. Sorry. No telephone or fax orders.
SPRING 17 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 17
By Richard N. Juliani
would these immigrants not assimilate but that they would also greatly damage American society. Demands for the restriction, if not the complete exclusion, of immigration emerged in legislatures, newspaper editorials and popular opinion. But the controversy was only beginning.
Recently, Italian America Magazine reported that since the last national census of 2010, the number of people who identified themselves as being of Italian heritage increased from 16 million to 18 million. Since only 14,000 Italians have immigrated to the United States since the year 2000, what caused this nearly 13 per cent increase, which appears to run against both common sense and scholarly expectations?
Foreigners Not Welcome!
In the early 20th century, America faced its first major A late 19th century newspaper cartoon illustrates how Italian immigrants were stereotyped involvement in internationas “undesirable citizens.” al politics when it entered One explanation could World War I. The nation also be the rediscovery of their cultural heritage and identity by faced the potential threat of huge numbers of foreign resiyoung, upwardly mobile Italian Americans. But after several dents — many of them citizens of enemy nations. Leaders, generations in America, people of Italian ancestry were long including former president Theodore Roosevelt declared believed to have little if any identification with their foreign that national security required that there be no hyphenated origins. Clearly, the opposite is taking place. Why? Americans — only “100% Americans.”
The Pressure-Cooker Melting Pot
During the 18 and early 19 centuries of this nation’s history, most Americans did not worry about newcomers becoming assimilated. They simply assumed that the foreigners would become Americanized. By the late 19th century, however, when millions of southern Italians and eastern European Jews streamed into the country, people began to fear that other nations were dumping their criminals, mentally ill, paupers, and other undesirable citizens on these shores. th
th
These new arrivals were often seen as less compatible with American values, customs, and institutions than earlier immigrants. Americans worried that not only SPRING 2014
18
The Americanization Movement now sought to deliberately change the identity and behavior of immigrants and their families. Federal, state and local offices as well as public and private agencies developed publications, classes, celebrations and other activities to help immigrants become citizens, learn to read, write and speak English, and live as Americans. Still, Americans did not welcome the first generation of Italian immigrants with open arms, but had no problem letting them do the jobs that other Americans found too difficult, dirty, or dangerous. Some Americans thought that too many Italians had already come while others thought that Italians were genetically less intelligent and ITALIAN AMERICA
nect themselves from a cherished ancestry, but one that was often denigrated by the larger American society — and especially the mass media. In a sense, assimilation seemed to have won — at least for the moment. In the late 1960s, however, some influential scholars found that ethnicity was alive and well among the descendants of Italian immigrants and other ethnic groups. Now assimilation could mean that becoming American no longer required abandoning a heritage or renouncing a hyphenated identity. As ethnicity became chic, America became more cosmopolitan. We see this transformation in the cooking and dining habits of Americans. While the early Italian immigrants learned some unpleasant things about what was thought of them, other Americans learned that Italians had some pretty good food. By the end of the 20th century, onceexotic elements of foreign kitchens had become part of American culture. And as the door of respectability opened culturally, it also allowed a renewed ethnic identity — or at least a search for that identity – to enter as well.
“Symbolic Italians?” A WWII poster illustrates why many Italian Americans never learned Italian. Schools were discouraged from offering Italian, too.
more inclined to violence and crime. As a result, the early immigrants decided to become more like other Americans. Their children, who were in school, in factories and even in their own churches became Americanized even faster. They became almost strangers to their parents yet were still not fully accepted by society. Aided by the findings of the new social sciences, more tolerant thinkers argued that it was not necessary to force the foreign-born to become Americans by “pressure cooker assimilation.” They believed that assimilation remained an inevitable and natural process. Influential scholars offered theories of how each generation would become indistinguishable from other Americans in their thinking and behavior and become fully accepted into American society. At least, this was the way it was supposed to happen. But becoming American still required abandoning all “foreign” behavior and identity. Halfway through the 20th century, this is what happened to most of the children and grandchildren of Italians who had arrived during the Great Migration. But it even went further. Many “Italian Americans,” as they were called, had been asked to disconSPRING 19 ITALIAN2014 AMERICA
The assimilation of Italian Americans did not necessarily mean that all traces of their past had been erased, but they certainly had become less pronounced. Some scholars called what was left “symbolic ethnicity” — such as Americans of Italian heritage celebrating their roots on special occasions, especially on Christmas Eve, when they would observe the traditional dinner of the “Seven Fishes.” It could also have been called “situational ethnicity,” which meant that a person would reveal his or her Italian background by using a word or phrase in dialect; or by raising a child more in keeping with the old ways of par-
Italian immigrants became American citizens, helped by organizations like the Sons of Italy. ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 19
enting than the more modern and “progressive” American way. It could even manifest itself in a preference for using a plumber, a barber or even a physician whose last name was Italian and who was assumed to be somehow more trustworthy, if not more competent.
As a result, today, ethnic identity is not simply imposed by biographical circumstances, but also an “elective affinity” that involves personal choice. If one can deny or hide from ancestry, another person can pursue and find it. At the beginning of this article we wondered what has caused the dramatic increase in our nation’s Italian American. The answer appears to be that despite intermarriage, and more than a century of encouraged and even forced assimilation, many Americans have become “born-again Italian Americans.”
But along with these “lapses” into the past, later generations of Italian AmeriDuring WWI, many cans discovered that they still Americans, including were not fully accepted and, former president worse, that they had given up Theodore Roosevelt, worried about the loyalty too much of their traditional of so-called “hyphenated culture too soon. Then they Americans.” learned something even more astounding — that other Americans sometimes envied them for things missing from their own lives – especially the strong family ties among Italian Americans or their so-called “Mediterranean” diet. So they learned that it was all right to be “Italian” — even if they were no longer as fully Italian as their ancestors had been.
So we have come full circle. The early Italian immigrants learned English, became citizens, and adopted
Born-Again Italian Americans
The return to embracing one’s roots is particularly noticeable among Native Americans. At the end of the 19th century, the American Indian population had declined so much that experts believed that it was becoming extinct. Then something unusual happened. Their officially reported number began to grow. Obviously, it wasn’t due to migration from elsewhere, or because of a rising birth rate. Instead, it was caused by “identity switching” -- people who had once tried to hide their heritage now began identifying themselves with it. Today, it appears that Americans of Italian descent, including many of mixed ancestry, are doing something similar. And that leads us to a mystery — for sociologists have hard data that show the rate of intermarriage between Italian Americans and other groups has continued to climb. It would seem we have entered what may be called the “twilight of ethnicity”. But a growing number of young people, who may have only one Italian or Italian American grandparent, are identifying themselves with that heritage instead of with that of their ancestors who were Irish, German, etc.
SPRING 2014
20
Italian Americans gradually were accepted in part thanks to the benefits of their healthy Mediterranean cuisine.
American ways because they wanted to work, raise their families and avoid the wrath of other Americans, who believed that they did not belong here. Today, their descendants eagerly embrace their Italian past. They visit Italy as tourists, sometimes seeking family records in the towns and villages their ancestors left. They try to learn Italian. They undertake the arduous process of becoming citizens of both Italy and America. As they struggle to retrieve their lost heritage, they now enthusiastically reclaim their identity as Italian Americans. Richard N. Juliani, a retired professor of sociology, formerly at Villanova University, is the author of books and articles on Italian immigration and Italian American history, including Priest, Parish and People: Saving the Faith in Philadelphia’s Little Italy (2007). ITALIAN AMERICA
Giovinezza!
News for Young Italian Americans
Italian American Studies in U.S. Colleges As the nation’s fifth largest ethnic group, Italian Americans have had a notable presence in this nation for more than a century. Yet, ironically, until relatively recently, Italian American studies have been neglected at U.S. colleges and universities. The first course on Italian Americans, their history and culture was offered only 40 years ago in 1974 at the City University of New York’s Queens College by Professor Richard Gambino, author of “Blood of My Blood: The Dilemma of the Italian-Americans.” The program has grown since then and today, the college offers an undergraduate minor and an MA in the field. Five years later, in 1979, the City University of New York established the John D. Calandra Italian American Institute. It was the first institution in the U.S. devoted to documenting and preserving the Italian American experience. Today, the Calandra Institute conducts research, holds numerous conferences, lectures and exhibits on Italian Americana. It also has a research center, website, newsletter, cable program, and an academic journal devoted to Italian American history and culture. Through the institute’s Columbus CUNY/Italy Exchange Program, students can study at seven universities in Italy. Other colleges are following suit. In Chicago, Loyola University is working with Casa Italia to raise money for an endowed professorship in Italian American studies. They have raised $350,000 so far, but need an additional $150,000 to launch what supporters hope will be a vi-
brant program by 2020. It will be the first time in the school’s 140year history that Italian American culture is part of the curriculum. Italian American studies are On the west growing but still largely in coast, the Italian New York City institutions. American community of Southern California has partnered with California State University, Long Beach to establish the Center for Italian Studies that includes a minor in Italian or Italian American studies and scholarships for study in Italy. Next fall, the school will launch its first M.A. in Italian studies. An Internet search reveals other similar programs, but they are concentrated in the Greater New York metropolitan area: CUNY’s Brooklyn College; State University of New York at Stony Brook; and the Ivy League’s New York University. “We hope that more universities across the U.S. will offer Italian American studies,” says Philip Piccigallo, the executive director of the Sons of Italy. “Knowing about their past is essential for our young people to face the future with pride in who they are and where they come from,” he says.
Of Note • The Italian American Studies Association (IASA), formerly the American Italian Historical Association, is made up of scholars, writers, artists and others interested in exploring, recording and studying the Italian American experience. See www.italianamericanstudies. net for details. • “Bella & Harry: Let’s Visit Rome!” by Lisa Manzioni, a travel writer, is a richly illustrated storybook for children ages five and up. It features two little dogs that explore the monuments and streets of Rome, its customs and cuisine. (35 pages; hardcover; $16.95) SPRING 21 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
• Another engaging children’s storybook, “The Adventures of Silvana and the Magic Unicorn” by Antonio Longo presents a little Italian American girl who travels through time and space to Sicily on the back of a unicorn. There she learns about Sicily, its food, customs, monuments, and even some Sicilian and Italian before she returns to her big Italian family and a new baby sister. (46 pages; softcover; $8.00)
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 21
The Secret behind Modern Italian Cuisine By Jackie Townsend
Like most Americans, when I think of home-made Italian cooking I see a busy housewife toiling away in her kitchen, pinching gnocchi with her thumb; gathering tomatoes from vines hanging off her balcony railing; and snipping basil leaves from the spice pots on her window sill. I see her trudging up a cobbledstoned street to argue with the macellaio about the best cut of meat; then marching over to the salumeria to admonish the grocer for yesterday’s too salty prosciutto. I see her hurrying to the panificio to get the first batch of freshly baked bread. As the American wife of an Italian with a big family, I have eaten meals that began like this and have never once been disappointed. But now, this traditional way of food shopping and preparation is being challenged by the popular supermercato and its packaged foods. I discovered this phenomenon only recently, on a visit to Rome, when one night I was served the most fabulous
Outdoor markets like this one are still found in Italy, but the supermarket is more convenient for today’s Italian working woman. SPRING 2014
22
pesto I’d ever eaten. My cousin’s wife is an excellent cook as well as a working mother of three. “It’s from Genoa,” she said proudly as she ran to show me the package. Package? No mortar and pestle to grind basil, garlic, cheese, oil and pine nuts in the traditional preparation of pesto created in her own hometown of Genoa? She was not ashamed-which left me ashamed for thinking she might be ashamed. After all, am I ashamed for cooking with a microwave? No. Using prepared food is simply how the modern Italian woman cooks. [Plus, I don’t think Italians are ever ashamed.] The pesto didn’t taste as if it were mass-produced and packaged. It was this, above all, that confused me. The next day I accompanied her to my first Roman supermarket. It had an ancient external façade, but once inside it looked like any supermarket: unmemorable, disorganized, and fluorescent-lit. I followed her
A typical Italian supermarket stocks packaged foods that taste authentic. Italians expect nothing less!
around while she threw items into her shopping cart that would become our three-course meals for the next few nights. Everything was packaged, including the meat and the fish. Nothing said “organic” or “free range.” The bacon was already cut into cubes for the pasta alla carbonara; the ricotta was in a carton, the clams frozen, and the ravioli vacuum packed. I’ve eaten handmade ravioli in Italy, and yet when I ate hers that night I couldn’t tell the difference. The second-course chicken was succulent, though it didn’t hurt that it was rolled up with slices of prosciutto. Nothing tasted preserved. Nothing tasted over-processed. The quiet ease and grace that so naturally permeate most Italian kitchens remained intact. No fuss. No noise. No sighs or banging of pots and cabinet doors. One might think no effort at all was made to prepare dinner. One night, in between feeding her three kids, my cousin set out a loaf of still-warm, homemade bread. It was made with the Bimby, she said. “Ah, the Bimby,” I responded, an anticipatory gleam in my eye, for while I’d heard of this Bimby, I’d never actually seen one. It is a combination of cooker and food processor as well as a very expensive appliance with prices averaging around $1,500 in the U.S. Despite the high price tag, many Italian women have them but few talk about them. Like the supermarket— that crass American invention—the Bimby is hush-hush. All I knew was ITALIAN AMERICA
Italian touches. Here are a few of my favorite “taste of Italy tips” to enhance our meals here in America:
The Bimby or Thermomix is an expensive, but time-saving appliance in many Italian kitchens today.
that it was some big contraption that could make almost any dish. From pudding to pasta, from cake to pizza, the Bimby does it all. It’s hard to imagine an Italian woman throwing a bunch of ingredients into a machine and pressing “start.” Since then, I’ve come to learn that it really doesn’t matter whether the dishes are homemade or prepackaged because unlike processed food in the U.S., mass-produced food in Italy tastes the way it should: like real food. While modern Italians are discovering the convenience of prepackaged foods, Americans like myself are returning to food that comes from untainted earth. We look for the buzzwords organic, farm-raised, wild-caught, and unprocessed. All fine and good, but after visiting my relatives in Italy it occurred to me that I might be missing the point. Forget if it’s organic or farm- raised; forget about the salumeria, panificio, and macellaio! Many Italian working women no longer have the time or energy to do that kind of food shopping—hence, il supermercato. But they still insist that their food tastes good. Short of relocating to Italy, we Americans can still make our food taste better by adopting some of SPRING 23 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
• Buy a bunch of basil, cut the stem ends and put it in a glass of water. Keep at the ready on your kitchen counter or sill (because it looks and smells nice). When you need a leaf just pull it off, ideally, to put on some locally grown tomatoes you’ve just sliced, adding some chopped garlic, dribbles of oil, balsamic vinegar, and a touch of salt. • On a small platter, place thinly sliced prosciutto and salami. (The U.S. has just relaxed a decades-old ban on cured pork from Italy!) On the side, add small chunks of parmigiano reggiano cheese. [Don’t be fooled by imposters. Only authentic parmigiano can have “reggiano” on the label.] • Slice a fresh ball of mozzarella in a small plate and dribble olive oil and crushed pepper on it. • Offer Imported Italian olives as an antipasto. • Serve red wine from a ceramic pitcher. (When I’m in Italy, if a labeled bottle is put on the table I think it’s because I’m there, the Americana. If I weren’t, there’d be a simple carafe or pitcher filled with homemade wine.) • Place chunks of fresh Italian bread or grissini by each plate. • Drink wine from water glasses. • For il dolce, mix strawberries with sugar and either balsamic vinegar or red wine. Buon appetito! Jackie Townsend is a writer who recently released her second novel, Imperfect Pairings, an exploration of these themes. For additional information please visit Townsend’s website at: http://jackietownsend.com
Imperfect Pairings A Modern Love Story Set in Italy In this her second novel, Jackie Townsend presents Jamie, a smart, careerdriven American woman who falls in love with an Italian who Author Jackie initially hides his Townsend heritage. “Jack is short for John,” he tells her, but she soon discovers that John is “short” for Giovanni. Handsome, intense but inscrutable, Giovanni is a man of few words. After two months together, she accompanies him to a family wedding in Italy. There she learns that Giovanni hadn’t been back to his troubled family estate in ten years, but it only took him five minutes to feel as if he’d never left. Suddenly his language is no longer her language, and Jamie discovers the secrets of a crumbling villa, an old family scandal, a tragic mother, an estranged father, and a host of spirited Italian cousins. Giovanni is finally forced to face the destiny he tried to escape and Jamie makes a rash decision that changes her life forever. “My hope,” says Townsend “is Imperfect Pairings will encourage readers to think about the legacy they would leave behind if their life were defined not by how much they have achieved, but by how much they have loved.” Available through local bookstores and on Amazon.com. For more information, visit jackietownsend.com. ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 23
OSIA Nation ®
MAKING A DIFFERENCE
NEBRAska
PENNSYLVANIA
For more than 50 years, the Grand Lodge of Nebraska and the Cristoforo Colombo Lodge #1419 have held a Pasta Thursday lunch for 600 to 800 people in Omaha. The meal is served in the lodge’s hall in the city’s Little Italy neighborhood. The building sports a red, white and green awning and the OSIA logo. For the lunch, lodge members make over 240 gallons of sauce that has simmered for 24 hours, 2,000 hand-rolled meatballs and 200 pounds of lettuce. The lodge and this event have been featured often in the local media and in election years, candidates also visit. Last December, the lodge elected its first-ever woman president, Sarita Ruma, an event that also made the local newspapers.
Impoverished Indian tribes in South Dakota had a warmer Christmas thanks to the Piazza Nuova Lodge #2665 in Newtown, PA. For a number of years now, member Barbara Lawless has organized a clothing drive, financed by a large anonymous donation and the lodge. Barbara and two friends packed $2,450.00 worth of warm jackets, jeans, shirts and more that they had bought from Kohl’s with help from fellow Lodge member Bonnie Van Zelst from the Kohl’s Associates in Action A-Team. “We are happy doing God’s work,” Barbara says.
Lunch “just like Nonna used to make” in Omaha
FLORIDA
RHODE ISLAND
Michael F. Vander Wyden, Esq., takes the idea of giving of one’s self literally. For the second time in three years, he let his hair grow to more than 2 feet and donated it to Locks of Love which makes human hair wigs for children who suffer from medical hair loss. He also is very active in the Order. He is orator in his lodge, the Upper Keys Sons and Daughters of Italy, Lodge#2843 and State Deputy for the Grand Lodge of Florida to several area filial lodges.
The Grand Lodge of Rhode Island along with members of local lodges honored the memory of Raymond Dettore, Jr., an OSIA past national orator and national historian. He died December 15, 2012. Exactly a year later, the lodges erected a monument to his memory in Providence’s Little Italy section of Federal Hill. The granite monument remembers him as “a great American and a good and noble soul.”
A cut above the rest: Michael Vander Wyden ColoradoF.discovers Italy!
Rhode Island remembers Raymond Dattore, Jr.
SPRING 2014
24
Packing clothes for needy Indian tribes: (L. to R.) Jennifer Gallagher, Barbara Lawless, and Lise Baxter
LODGE ALERT Lodges and grand lodges holding events that attract large numbers of the public should take out “special event” insurance policies to protect them from liability issues. Recently, a grand lodge planned a huge Italian festival which was cancelled because of a hurricane and its subsequent damage. The grand lodge had no such insurance and had to pay thousands of dollars to vendors that had signed contracts with the grand lodge.
ITALIAN AMERICA
OSIA Nation ®
OSIA LODGES AT WORK
OHIO
Special recognition
Keeping a tradition that began in 1911, the Cincinnatus Lodge #1191 held its annual “Original Italian Dinner” fund-raiser for a local Catholic church. Members prepared more than 220,000 homemade ravioli, 23,000 meatballs and 600 gallons of sauce, according to member Ralph Di Fulvio. He says that last October, thousands came for pasta, dessert, bread and salad for all for only $12.00.
LORRAINE BILOTTI of the Albert Bilotti Lodge #2540 in Mesa, AZ was honored by her lodge for holding numerous offices and tirelessly volunteering in over 31 years of service to the Order.
CONNECTICUT A local mayor played Santa Claus while Italian folk dancers in authentic costumes entertained at the Ella T. Grasso Lodge #2538 annual “Breakfast with Santa” in Hartford. The fund-raiser for Meals for Needy Kids wrapped up the lodge’s year of helping the helpless. In 2013, the lodge raised and donated $24,000 to 14 charities, plus annual college scholarships. “For Christmas, we also collected and donated coats, food, and toys for needy families,” says lodge treasurer, Vincent Lombardo. The lodge’s Pot-Luck Socials and Culture Nights to attract people have brought the lodge membership to 203 people, he says.
Italian folk dancing was part of a Christmas fund-raiser SPRING 25 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
TONY FUSCO, who leads Fusco Financial Services, has received a Five Star Wealth Manager Award from Crescendo Business Services. He has belonged to the Towson Dulaney Lodge #2292 in Towson, MD for the past 28 years. JOHN IZZI celebrated his 100th birthday with his family and friends at a dinner last May. He belongs to the Guido Baccelli Lodge #687 in West Chester, PA. ALBERT MARRA was awarded a special achievement medal by the U.S. Coast Guard for “superior performance of duty” last March when he translated into English Italian documents related to the investigation of the cruise ship, Costa Concordia, which sank in 2012. He has been in the Coast Guard Auxiliary since 1995 and belongs to the Roma Lodge #254 in Virginia Beach, VA where he has held various offices and chairs the lodge’s scholarship program. DAVID MERCALDO, author and playwright, presented his latest novel, “Famiglia” to the Italian Cultural Foundation at Casa Belvedere on Staten Island, NY last March where he also did book signings. His novel, “Ferry” was a Sons of Italy National Book Club selection in 2013. He is an OSIA national at-large member. DENNIS PIASIO, a former president of the Grand Lodge of Florida, and OSIA national trustee, died March 12. He was devoted to the Order, tirelessly working to enroll new members and helping lodges all over the country with their recruitment efforts. He will be sorely missed. ARMANDO TORRE, a painter, poet and professional restorer of antiques, has written several hundred poems in Neapolitan dialect that capture his journey from a boy who lived through WWII in war-torn Naples to an adult living in the computer age. He belongs to the Marconi Lodge #2232 in Islip, NY. MARIA GUARRERA WILMETH, who tirelessly promoted the study of Italian in Washington, D.C. and surrounding suburbs, died of heart failure December 18, 2013 at age 89. Dr. Wilmeth was born in Sicily and came to the U.S. as a WWII war bride. She became a linguist, earned a PH.D. in linguistics from Georgetown University and then taught French and Italian for many years. She founded and led the Italian Cultural Society of Washington’s Italian Language Program; worked with the Italian Embassy to place teachers of Italian in area schools; was founding president of the American Association of Teachers of Italian, and also active in many other organizations concerned with the study of Italian in the U.S. She was an OSIA national at-large member. THE ROMA LODGE #254 in Virginia Beach, VA celebrates its 100th anniversary this year with a series of celebrations throughout 2014. Auguri e Cent’anni! ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 25
The Sons of Italy Foundation
®
HELPING THOSE IN NEED
Foundation Focus By Joseph J. DiTrapani, President, The Sons of Italy Foundation As the philanthropic arm of our beloved Order, the Sons of Italy Foundation [SIF] has donated more than $128 million to medical research, domestic and international emergency relief efforts, cultural preservation and special projects since its founding in 1959. This includes over $58 million for scholarships and, more recently, support for our wounded troops and war veterans. The SIF also has given considerable funds to preserve Italian language study in the U.S. as well as to the World War II Memorial, the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial, and the 9-11 Memorial and Museum. How is the SIF able to fund so many projects? Unlike the Order which is funded through your dues, the SIF must rely on contributions and fundraising to support its projects. In recent years, the SIF has had four principal sources of revenue: • The National Education & Leadership Awards (NELA) Gala. Established in 1988 as a breakfast, the Gala has become an elegant black-tie affair featuring some 1,000 leaders of in business, government, diplomacy, science, academia, entertainment and sports. Among the honored guests and honorees the SIF counts Presidents George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush; along with Vice President Joe Biden, Secretaries of State Hillary Clinton, Colin Powell and several Italian presidents and prime ministers. Over the years, this Washington tradition has raised in excess of $32 million for the SIF. The SIF also gives out nearly
$100,000 annually in scholarships to young Italian Americans. Unfortunately, funding has declined steadily over the past decade, and we may have to cut back this important and popular program. • Direct Mail Campaigns. Begun in 1990, this program sends out fund-raising mailings with gifts (mailing labels, tee shirts, greeting cards) to OSIA members and the general public. So far, it has generated more than $1 million in unrestricted funds for the SIF and helps support not only philanthropy but also your national office in Washington, D.C., and its staff. • Recurring Giving Campaign. The SIF’s new Recurring Giving Program allows supporters to dedicate a set contribution amount on a monthly basis that is both painless and tax-deductible. Consecutive contributors of even as little as $10 each – become members of the select Sustaining Patrons Circle. For details, call the SIF National Office in Washington, DC at 202.547.2900 or e-mail: sif@osia.org. • General contributions and Special Campaigns Joining the Recurring Giving Campaign is the SIF Legacy Program, which enables supporters to leave a portion of their estate to the SIF. Both programs are in their early stages and cannot be relied on as yet to provide funding. Clearly, the SIF faces serious challenges in raising funds. I hope we can count on your support as we seek to make 2014 the most successful fundraising year for the SIF ever.
Attention All Lodge Officers! Are your members complaining that they are not receiving their magazines? Here’s some information that might help them. As lodge officers, you must send the names and addresses of all new members to your state’s Grand Lodge. You also must inform your Grand Lodge of all address corrections and changes, too! It is best to do this every month. Grand Lodge contact information is listed at www.osia.org under “About OSIA” or call OSIA National at 202/547 2900. Grand and Subordinate Lodges must observe the following deadlines in sending their updated mailing lists to ABR, which prepares the labels for our magazine mailings. They are: December 1 – winter issue March 1 – spring issue June 1 – summer issue Sept 1 – fall issue
SPRING 2014
26
ITALIAN AMERICA
News from National
WHAT NATIONAL DOES FOR YOU
OSIA Expands Travel Program By Diane Crespy
“Just because we love everything Italian doesn’t mean we don’t appreciate other lands and cultures, too,” says Philip Piccigallo, who heads the Sons of Italy’s national headquarters in Washington, D.C. “For that reason, we have developed a partnership with the noted travel company Collette and offer a trip to Spain for OSIA this fall.” The itinerary includes Madrid, Toledo, Barcelona, the Alhambra, numerous UNESCO world heritage sites and Columbus’s tomb, according to Piccigallo. The OSIA-Collette Travel Program will offer OSIA four tours a year to various travel destinations. (Except Italy, of course. Be sure to check out our trips to Italy through our partner Unitours. See page 17.) A bonus of the program is Collette’s agreement to donate 10% of all OSIA land and air bookings to the Order. “This is just another way we are generating non-dues revenue to support OSIA activities,” says Piccigallo.
Visit the Alhambra, Spain’s ancient Islamic palace, this fall with OSIA. Collette has many dozens of other tours that OSIA members can take and still earn a donation for OSIA. “We believe this new venture will open up the world to our members and supporters who want to have a first-rate travel experience while also helping the Order,” Piccigallo says. [See ad on page 33.]
• For more information about the OSIA-Collette Travel Program, visit http://www.gocollette.com/ for itineraries. • To book a trip, call 800-437-0235. • Remember to mention “Order Sons of Italy in America” and promotion code “U001.AX1.918” for OSIA credit. Buon viaggio!
OSIA Launches New Membership Program By Philip R. Piccigallo
A new OSIA Gold Membership Program was approved and launched during a meeting of the leadership in New Orleans last February. The program was introduced by Past National President Paul S. Polo of Connecticut and supported by OSIA First Vice President Joseph Russo of Massachusetts and Past National President Robert Messa of Pennsylvania. OSIA Gold members receive all the traditional OSIA benefits in addition to a Gold membership card inscribed with their date of membership and a gold lapel pin engraved with the OSIA name and logo. They also receive preferred inThe prototype of the new vitations and seating at special Gold Membership pin SPRING 27 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
events, including the Sons of Italy Foundation’s annual National Education & Leadership Awards (NELA) Gala in Washington, D.C. Annual dues are $100.00. During the meeting that launched the program, Polo signed up 44 members, who will be recognized as “Charter Members.”
OSIA Past National President Paul S. Polo of Connecticut
In the 1990s, Polo spearheaded the very successful Sons of Italy Foundation “Golden Lion Sponsorship Program,” which raised nearly $600,000 for scholarships. He hopes this new program will be as successful for OSIA. “I am asking our members to demonstrate their love for and commitment to the Order by joining this select group of leaders,” Polo said. ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 27
®
The Commission for Social Justice
fighting defamation
CSJ Champions of Italian in NY Hats off to the New York State CSJ and its members, who are successfully championing the study of Italian in their communities. Kudos to Anthony Corsello for successfully finding the money to introduce Italian into the curriculum of the biggest Catholic elementary school on Staten Island. Corsello chairs the NY CSJ District III, which covers all five boroughs of New York City. Last year, then-National CSJ President Santina Haemmerle told him that St. Clare’s Elementary School was interested in offering Italian, but needed funding for the program. He swung into action by contacting the CSJ presidents in District III who raised and donated the needed $1,000. Lou Gallo, the incoming NYs CSJ Chairman, successfully petitioned his board to match the donation to the tune of an additional $1,000 for the program. Last June, Corsello, Gallo and Haemmerle, along with Joseph Rondinelli, president of the Grand Lodge of New York, presented a check to the principal that will launch the program.“This was not the first time that Anthony Corsello and the District III CSJ presidents have stepped up to the plate,” says Haemmerle. Several years ago, he helped another parochial school, St. Athanasius in Brooklyn, NY, introduce an Italian Language Program with a grant from the District III CSJ, she says. The NYS CSJ also scored a victory in preserving Italian in the Greece School District, a suburb of Rochester,
Learning Italian in elementary school gives students a valuable start in fluency. experience. NY. Last year, the school board planned to drop Italian from one of its high schools. Teachers contacted the local Vincent Lombardi Lodge #2270. The lodge reached out to the NYS CSJ, which launched a protest campaign that included the teachers, parents, the lodge and a supportive school board member. “We flooded every school board member and the superintendent with e-mails and attended the November 2013 board meeting where we learned that the board would reinstate Italian in the 7th grade at Olympia High School.,” Gallo says.
NYS CSJ Fighting Defamation New York State’s CSJ has been particularly active in two hot-button stereotyping controversies, reports Lou Gallo, the group’s chairman.
Attorney, County Manager and the mayor of Schenectady about the issue.
The first concerns the lunch truck that calls itself “the Wandering Dago.” The offensive moniker got the truck banned from the Saratoga Race Course this summer and drew the disapproval of New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo. Now the company is suing the New York Racing Association, claiming their First Amendment free speech rights have been violated.
Gallo also contacted the Polish AmeriMany Italian can Congress on Long Island because the Americans hope the Wandering truck offers a “Polack” menu. An upstate Dago will get lost. New York lodge, Gabriele D’Annunzio #321 has met with the city’s mayor and attended Schenectady City Council meetings to express their concerns. “So, we’re following this very closely and anxiously await the court’s decision on the “free speech issue,” Gallo says.
“We’ve been involved with the issue since July 2013 when we barraged the owners of the truck with e-mails and Facebook posts,” says Gallo. The NYS CSJ reached out to all 15 Schenectady county legislators, the County
The NYS CSJ is also working to get the offensive Aflac Corporation Wise Guy commercial pulled. [See page 15.] It has joined with other groups organizing a letter and e-mail campaign sent to Aflac executives.
SPRING 2014
28
ITALIAN AMERICA
The Perfect Gift
Please give this gift subscription to:
Looking for a unique present for family or friends? Give the gift of your rich Italian American heritage with a one-year subscription to Italian America magazine, the most widely read publication in the U.S. for people of Italian descent. We will contact your gift recipient telling him or her (or them) of your present. Fill out the form below and return to us ASAP.
NAME:
[Please print]
Address: City
State
Zip Code
City
State
Zip Code
E-Mail:
Telephone: (
Please say it is from: NAME:
[Please print]
Address:
)
Send your check for $20.00 payable to OSIA SUPREME LODGE to:
Please allow 4 to 6 weeks for processing.
GIFT SUBSCRIPTION Italian America Magazine 219 E Street, NE Washington, DC 20002
Letters to the Editor • The winter 2014 issue had two errors. First, the headline on page 10 on Joe Grano’s campaign to honor Constantino Brumidi read “Bernini” instead of “Brumidi.” Second, in the quiz prepared by Di Feliciantonio on page 11,Tommy LaSorda’s last name means “deaf” not “blind.” Joseph Scafetta, Esq. Virginia
are the better. And we know that “reality” TV is fabricated. But after being personally insulted on Facebook, why should I bother? How do we educate the young people who want to be Tony Soprano and Snooki? Karen Fanale, Massachusetts
• Concerning the OSIA Nation “Special Recognition” column in the winter issue, please note that North Carolina’s governor Pat McCrory proclaimed the 2013 Columbus Day celebration also Italian American Heritage Day throughout the state and not “Italian Heritage Day.” Bob Giannuzzi, North Carolina
• How could the Italian America Winter 2014 feature, “Beyond the Call”, omit the Vietnam War and the heroic Navy chaplain, Father Vincent Capodanno? He was killed in action while continuously exposing himself to overwhelming— withering enemy fire to attend to the wounded and dying Marines. Paul R. Locarno, United States Marine Corps, 1968-1971
• I posted my objections to the new so-called reality show, “The Capones,” on Facebook and received so many vitriolic and personal attacks that I stopped reading them. What really concerns me is that other Italian Americans see this type of show as mere entertainment. I was told I should get a sense of humor (among other things). This is a real concern. We have an entire generation growing up on reality television. With shows like “The Sopranos”, “Jersey Shore”, and now “The Capones”, this is the image of Italian Americans they will grow up with. Reality TV basically shows young people that the more idiotic and vulgar you SPRING 29 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
Editor’s Note: Well, readers? Any thoughts? Do the words “Support your CSJ” help?
And also.... Father Capodanno received a posthumous Medal of Honor and the Navy named a destroyer the USS Capodanno, which was blessed by Pope John Paul II. It is the only U.S. naval vessel in history blessed by a pope. Fr. Capodanno is being considered for sainthood. Michael Wick, Esq., Ohio [U.S. Marines 1965-1969] Editor’s Note: Thank you both for your service to our nation. We deeply regret this oversight, which a number of other readers also called to our attention. The magazine will publish a full-length article on Fr. Capodanno in the very near future. ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 29
Italian America The Official Publication of
Italian America Magazine is produced by the national headquarters of the Order Sons of Italy in America, 219 E Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002. Tel: 202/5472900. Email: nationaloffice@osia.org OSIA National Executive Director Philip R. Piccigallo, Ph.D. Office Manager Andrea Beach Director of Development Diane Crespy Publications Editor Dona De Sanctis, Ph.D. Social Media & Communications Coordinator Krystyne Hayes Administrative Assistant Laura Kelly Executive Assistant Elisa Wilkinson Italian America is the official publication of the Order Sons of Italy in America (OSIA), the largest and longest-established organization of American men and women of Italian heritage. Italian America provides timely information about OSIA, while reporting on individuals, institutions, issues, and events of current or historical significance in the Italian-American community nationwide. Italian America (ISSN: 1089-5043, USPS: 015-735) is published quarterly in the winter, spring, summer and fall by OSIA, 219 E St. NE, Washington, DC 20002. Periodicals postage paid at Washington, D.C., and at additional mailing offices. © 2014 Order Sons of Italy in America. All rights reserved. Reproduction by any method without permission of the editor is prohibited. Statements of fact and opinion are the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily imply an opinion on the part of the officers, employees, or members of OSIA. Mention of a product or service in advertisements or text does not mean that it has been tested, approved or endorsed by OSIA, the Commission for Social Justice, or the Sons of Italy Foundation. Italian America accepts query letters and letters to the editor. Please do not send unsolicited manuscripts. Italian America assumes no responsibility for unsolicited materials. Annual subscriptions are $20, which are included in dues for OSIA members. Single copies are $2.98 each. OSIA MEMBERS: Please send address changes to your local lodge. Do not contact the OSIA National Office. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Italian America, 219 E St. NE, Washington, DC 20002. Subscriptions are available through the OSIA National Office, 219 E Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002. OSIA membership information is available at (800) 552-OSIA or at www.osia.org. Archives are maintained at the Immigration History Research Center, University of Minnesota, St. Paul, Minn. Printing by Printing Solutions Inc., Sterling, Va. To advertise: Call Pat Rosso at 215/206-4678 or email her at pieassociates @comcast.net. Also see www.osia.org for advertising rates, specs, demographics, etc. SPRING SPRING 2014 2014 30 30
By Anthony J. Baratta, OSIA National President
Encouraging the study of Italian is one of the most important activities of the Sons of Italy. Nearly a decade ago, we contributed thousands of dollars to establish an Advanced Program (AP) and exam in Italian. Last year, about 2,000 students took the exam, but that number needs to rise to 2,500 by 2016. If we fail to meet that goal, the AP Italian examination will be dropped with devastating effects on the study of Italian in both our public and private schools. To avoid this misfortune, members of the Conference of Presidents of Major Italian American Organizations that met last October, pledged to do whatever necessary to increase the number of high school students taking the AP Italian courses. This challenge was also set forth by the Italian ambassador to the U.S, His Excellency Claudio Bisogniero. Our beloved Order is in a unique position to help since we are the only large grassroots Italian American organization in the U.S. Our vast network of lodges enables us to get the message to local school districts and their related high schools and middle schools. Recently, we contacted all our Grand Lodge presidents and subordinate lodges, telling them that they have the responsibility for getting school administrators, principals and teachers of the Italian language join this crusade to save the AP Italian course and examination. This issue was also on the agenda of last February’s OSIA Plenary Session attended by the national officers and committee members of the Supreme Lodge. During the meeting, I asked our state presidents to provide financial aid to AP Italian students that need it. The test costs $89. Some students cannot afford that sum, but our lodges can and should help them by paying some or all of the exam fee. What are the benefits of AP in Italian? High school students who have taken AP courses and passed AP exams impress college admissions officers. They have proven they are excellent students and, as a bonus, they receive college credits before they even enter college. This, in turn, allows students to take more advanced courses (especially in Italian) as well as save money on tuition costs. It is most definitely a “win-win” opportunity. I cannot leave this subject without thanking some of the people who are working on this important effort. These include our own National Past President Joseph Sciame, who is currently also president of the aforementioned Conference of Presidents of Major Italian American Organizations; the immediate past president of the California Grand Lodge Maria Fassio Pignati; and the past president of the Florida Grand Lodge Ed Mottola. As a member of OSIA, you, too, can help by supporting the Italian program in your local school with financial aid to buy teaching materials or by lobbying to institute Italian at your school. We have a kit on our website that can help you: Start Italian in Your School! [www.osia.org]. The year 2016 is just around the corner. Remember, you are all links in our chain to keep Italian studies strong! ITALIAN ITALIANAMERICA AMERICA
The Sons of Italy Shoppers Guide EXPERIENCE
¡
INTEGRITY
RELIABILITY
¡
Fusco Financial associates Our advisors have been managing money for the Grand Lodge of Maryland - Order Sons of Italian America since 1991
■
■
Sound, independent, objective advice
For over 28 years, Fusco Financial Associates
Unbiased investment research
■
Customized investment strategies
■
Active, ongoing portfolio review and monitoring of investment performance
has
prided
itself
on
being client-focused. That means our
advisors
offer:
independent,
unbiased research, no proprietary products, no conflict of interest – total independence. Tony Fusco, MSFS, ChFC, AIF®
Every effort is made to meet or exceed the expectations of the individuals, families and businesses we serve. Our associates represent more than 110 collective years of experience.
505 Baltimore Avenue Towson, MD 21204 410.296.5400 • 800.810.6650 fuscofinancial.com
Securities offered through Raymond James Financial Services, Inc., member FINRA/SIPC ©2014 14-BRADE-0018 CM 2/14
SPRING 31 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 31
Travel and Tours to Italy
SPRING 2014
32
ITALIAN AMERICA
Travel and Tours to Italy
SEEDS FROM ITALY Order Pagano seeds at www.lakevalleyseed.com
20% Off Your Entire Purchase COUPON CODE: PAG1
SPRING 33 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 33
SPRING 2014
34
ITALIAN AMERICA
On The Bookshelf Books by and about Italian Americans
THE GLASSBLOWER’S APPRENTICE by Peter Pezzelli
The Internationally Acclaimed Author of Home to Italy and Francesca’s Kitchen returns with a new tale of love, friendship, and Italian American life! Find it on Amazon.com BarnesandNoble.com and bookstores everywhere visit PeterPezzelli.com
REMINDER Order your books through OSIA and Amazon.com. Just go to www.osia. org, click on “Sons of Italy Book Club” and choose either a Book Club selection or another book. Orders are shipped within 24 hours. As a special bonus, Amazon.com will donate a percentage of book sales ordered on our site to OSIA.
SPRING 35 ITALIAN 2014 AMERICA
ITALIAN AMERICA SPRING 2014 35
Your Ad HERE!
GIVE THE GIFT OF HERITAGE
A Historical Fiction Trilogy of Italian-Americans By Mario G. Fumarola
Each item hand-picked to guarantee your child a friendly introduction to the language and culture of Italy.
Remember! Sons of Italy members receive a special discount of 15%! Repeat advertisers also receive a discount. For more information, contact Pat Rosso at 215/206-4678 or email her at pieassociates@ comcast.net.
Toys & Books DVDs & CDs Clothing Pinocchio
Wasn’t It Only Yesterday
and Newly Arrived Italian Imports Immigrants . . . All!!!
Last of the First
www.ItalianChildrensMarket.com (310) 427-2700 Call for a FREE catalog!
Available by email: SQPR@RCN.com or Oneida County Historical Society: ochs@midyork.org
Problems With Your Magazine? Italian America magazine is produced by the Sons of Italy’s national headquarters in Washington, D.C. Every month, the national office receives letters, phone calls and emails from readers who are not receiving their magazine. “The reasons are varied, but the solutions are simple,” says Editor-in-Chief Dona De Sanctis. “Simply follow the instructions below and the problem will be solved,” she says. So….if you are: A LODGE MEMBER: You can only verify, correct or change your address through your local lodge. Please do not contact the national office. It cannot accept address changes. A LODGE PRESIDENT: To ensure that all new and renewing members of your lodge get their magazines and that former or non-paying members do not get it for free, you must send updated member rosters to your Grand Lodge on a regular basis. Check with your Grand Lodge to find out its deadlines. A GRAND OR SUBORDINATE LODGE REPRESENTATIVE: Please update your rosters with ABR Services every three months according to these deadlines: Mar. 1, June 1, Sept. 1, and Dec. 1. Refer to the instructions previously emailed to you. If you have any questions, please contact Diane Crespy at dcrespy@osia.org or 202/5472900. A SUBSCRIBER OR NATIONAL AT-LARGE MEMBER ONLY: Please send address changes to the OSIA National Office; Attn: Address change; 219 E Street NE; Washington, DC 20002.
SPRING 2014
36
ITALIAN AMERICA
GRI LLED A SPA R AGUS and LEEK PI ZZ A
THINK OUTSIDE T H E B OT T L E FIND THIS AND OTHER INNOVATIVE RECIPES USING OUR EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL ON COLAVITA .COM
a truste ami ran SPRING 2014
37
facebook.com/ColavitaOliveOil
pinterest.com/ColavitaEvoo
youtube.com/ColavitaOliveOil ITALIAN AMERICA
Spend Spring with Valentine The Grand Finale of the Valentine Series
The Supreme Macaroni Company NOW IN PAPERBACK From the Author of The Shoemaker’s Wife
ADRIANA TRIGIANI
www.adrianatrigiani.com Facebook.com/AdrianaTrigiani
SPRING 2014
38 For a signed bookplate, email adrianaasst@aol.com.
ITALIAN AMERICA