L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2019 www.italoamericano.org 16 L'Italo-Americano " No matter where you go, you end up somewhere!" Y ankees legend Y ogi Berra once proclaimed. Americans remember the Hall of Fame catcher for his "Yogi-isms," an abundant series of delightfully paradoxical apho- risms about life and baseball. Classic quotes include "It ain't over 'til it's over" and "When you come to a fork in the road, take it" or "The future ain't what it used to be." With his quaint, plain and sometimes surreal wording, the famous NY Yankees pitcher often stated the obvious but his redundant truisms were humor- ous and filled with a significant d o s e o f c o m m o n s e n s e a n d truthfulness. Always disarming- ly on point, Yogi was a sort of a homespun philosopher. He even got his nickname for a resemblance to an Indian fakir i n a m o v i e t h a t a c h i l d h o o d buddy claimed he noticed. Or was Yogi even then dishing out words of wisdom? Not only was he a very good athlete, and later a great coach, but he was also a war hero and a c h a r a c t e r , o n e o f t h e m o s t beloved. "No matter where you go, you end up somewhere!" C e r t a i n l y , I a m a g a i n s o m e - where this week as I present a new tourist destination for your active Italian trip. Guess where I am? I am exactly where I am sup- p o s e d t o b e , i n t h e t e r r i t o r y where Yogi's legendary story started just 19 miles from Milan. Yogi was born in St. Louis in 1925-- he grew up in a brick house at 5447 Elisabeth Avenue on The Hill, the city's Italian n e i g h b o r h o o d . B u t f u n n i l y e n o u g h , h e c o u l d s p e a k t h e Milanese dialect pretty well. Isn't that lovely? As a native of Milan, I was gladdened to hear such a thing! The cultural icon whose fame transcended the baseball world was born as Lawrence Peter Berra to a peasant family from Malvaglio, a hamlet of Robec- chetto con Induno, in the dis- trict of Cuggiono. Yogi's par- ents Pietro Berra and Paolina Longoni lived in Malvaglio in a f a r m h o u s e a t V i a C i m i t e r o . Pietro fled to St. Louis in 1909. Paolina arrived later. Their two older sons, Mike and Tony, were born in Malvaglio. With a population of some 8,000 residents, the district of Cuggiono is a very convenient a r e a f o r r e a c h i n g M i l a n a n d Malpensa airport. Located in the Ticino Park of Lombardy, it borders Piedmont on the west separated by the Ticino River. "It is an attractive and welcom- ing place," says Camilla Fusè, president of an association of local tour guides. The countryside is pretty. Especially the hamlet of Castel- letto has long been a favorite escape among Milanese itching to ditch city life. The town hall is located at the 18th-century Villa Annoni, a stunning exam- ple of neoclassical architecture with its wonderful park. But I can't wait to see the house just five minutes away in Malvaglio where Yogi's parents lived. My next guide is Giuseppe Buggini. His wife Rita Tavec- c h i o i s Y o g i ' s f i r s t c o u s i n . " G i u s e p p i n a L o n g o n i , m y wife's mother, was the sister of P a o l i n a , t h e m o t h e r o f Y o g i Berra," Giuseppe explains. The building is under the sun and pretty run down. I peer into the only room that has the exact furniture… Yogi visited Mal- vaglio in the late '50s. "The whole family clan went out to dinner," Giuseppe says. "Yogi spoke the Milanese he learned from his parents." "Baseball was his vocation. As a teenager, he was sometimes beaten by his father because he didn't want to go to work. But later, his father realized that baseball was Yogi's true way to express his authenticity." Then Giuseppe shares an anecdote that m a y s e e m l i k e a s k e t c h i n a comedy show: "When Yogi vis- ited here, he saw that Italians use a bidet. He was impressed and realized it was a useful sanitary installation. He immediately bought several bidets and have them delivered to the US." I take my leave of Giuseppe a n d m e e t u p w i t h E r n e s t o Milani, a historian of Italian immigration to North America who gave honorary citizenship t o Y o g i i n M a y 2 0 1 5 o n t h e occasion of his 90th birthday. Milani flew all way to Mont- clair, New Jersey to meet with "the Eternal Yankee." "He was sitting in a wheelchair at the Yogi Berra Museum," Milani recalls. "The moment he saw me, he went: 'cume te stee?'" -- " h o w a r e y o u ? " i n M i l a n e s e dialect. Berra passed away in September that year. "He was surprised to be granted honorary citizenship of the Cuggiono dis- trict," he says. Almost everybody from Cug- giono has an American relative. "There was a massive migra- tion of 5,620 Cuggionesi farmers between 1861, the year of Italian Unification, and 1911," says O r e s t e M a g n i , p r e s i d e n t o f Ecoistituto Della Valle del Tici- no, an interesting migration his- tory research center located in a d e c o n s e c r a t e d 1 8 t h - c e n t u r y church of Cuggiono. "Our farm- ers were unhappy with the work- ing conditions and the uprisings of 1880 didn't bring the results they expected, so leaving was the right choice for many." A great number of Cuggione- si are in St. Louis and Herrin, Illinois where they were initially employed as coal miners. "There is a Cuggiono place in St. Louis o n T h e H i l l a n d a C u g g i o n o street in Herrin," says Mattia Lassini, a lawyer with the pas- sion for photography. His great- grandmother was born in Herrin. The District of Cuggiono: Yogi Berra, a cultural icon who could speak Milanese MARIELLA RADAELLI Park in Cuggiono at sunset . Photo credit Mattia Lassini Collettivo Talpa Yogi Berra in the NY Yankees © Jerry Coli | Dreamstime.com The house where Yogi Berra' parents lived when in Malvaglio. Photo Credit Mattia Lassini Collettivo Talpa ALL AROUND ITALY TRAVEL TIPS DESTINATIONS ACTIVITIES

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