The Italian Connection

 Dear Readers, A May minestrone of Italian connections: Mother’s Day coming up Sunday, May 8th brings thoughts of my own mother Caterina, and how I was twice-blessed with a mother-in-law, Angelina, of the same caliber as my own. Angelina had three …

Dear Readers,  Father’s Day is celebrated in June, hence some “Italian Connections” from my paternal side: Antonio Meucci “invented the telephone,” my father used to say, but of course all we little Italian-American kids had learned the inventor was Alexander Graham …

Dear Readers,  An April assortment of Italian Connections for you: A Chance at Life, formerly known as Boys Town of Italy has been providing education and supportive services to children around the world since founder, Monsignor John Patrick Carroll Abbing, established his …

Dear Readers,  July jottings, most with an Italian Connection. Jazz, honored by the US Postal Service with the issue of a Jazz Forever Stamp in 2011, reminds me that the father of American Jazz was an Italian-American named Dominic (Nick) …

Dear Readers, My March minestrone of Italian connections is served: Aerospace is not generally associated with Italy but the history of Italian-American cooperation in aerospace goes back to the pioneering flights of the Wright brothers. In 1909 Wilbur Wright was invited to …

Dear Readers, An April assortment of Italian connections for you: Blue Jeans are assumed by most young people today, incorrectly as it happens, to have originated in the USA. Their real place of origin in fact, is Genoa, Italy, where the blue cotton cloth …

Dear Readers, May has many dates with an Italian connection: Alessandro Scarlatti, the great Sicilian composer of the Baroque Era was born May 2, 1660, in Palermo. He died in 1725, in Naples. He married Antonia Anzalone, with whom he …

Dear Readers, St. Patrick’s Day, which we celebrate on March 17th, has an Italian Connection. In his autobiography, Confessions, written shortly before his death, the saint tells us that his father was a Roman official named Calpurnius. Calpurnius was an ancient Italic …

Dear Readers, February is the month we celebrate President’s Day, February 21st this year. Back in the day, when I attended Grade school, Lincoln’s birthday, February 12th, and Washington’s birthday, February 22nd, were celebrated separately. To ensure that federal workers had …

Dear Readers,  June-Giugno will hopefully be a happy month for you with weddings, birthdays, graduations and Father’s Day (June 19) coming up. And let’s not forget the feast days of St. Peter (June 29). It was also on June 16, 2002 …