L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 2013 L'Italo-Americano Dear Readers, November Notes with an Italian Connection: Andrew M. Canepa, editor of the always interesting and informative Piemontesi Nel Mondo of Northern California Boletin once informed me that since its inception in 1901, Italians have been awarded eighteen Nobel Prizes. Two have been won the cunning and intelligent Colombian drug lord is another. And Jack Lauer, a ne'er-dowell, good time Charley exNavy Seal completes the pyramid and creates a snapshot of the era.
 San Francisco, Costa Rica and an exotic Caribbean island form the backdrop for this journey to a spider web of political intrigue and ambiguity, moral relativism and unbridled good read. India Basin Triangle, an E-Book by Oasis Publishing, is currently available for $7.99 through Amazon Kindle. Two body's chemical tools used to direct cell growth and build nerve networks. This discovery led to the study of how the cells can go wrong in diseases such as dementia and cancer. *** All Souls Day, the second day in November, is the day we pray for friends and family who have died, because we believe Dr. Rita Levi-Montalcini by Piemontesi (fewer than the Liguri and about as many as the Sicilians). Both of them were in medicine, both laureates were born in Turin, and both were of Jewish ancestry. In 1969, Salvatore Eduardo Luria (aka Salvador Edward Luria, 19121991) won the prize for his discoveries concerning the replication mechanism and genetic structure of viruses. At the time, he was a professor of biology at MIT. He had graduated in 1935 summa cum laude from the medical school of the University of Turin, but due to the anti-Semitic laws of 1938 he was forced to emigrate first to France and then to the U.S. A fellow student of Luria and 1936 Turin medical graduate Rita Levi-Montalcini, born in 1909, spent her early career (in spite of anti-Jewish legislation, war and German occupation) conducting neurological research in a clandestine laboratory. During the last two years of World War II, she was a medical doctor in a Tuscan refugee camp run by the AngloAmerican authorities. After the war, she too emigrated to the U.S. as a professor of biology at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Rita Levi-Montalcini won the Nobel Prize in 1986 for her research into cellular growth factors. She was a "Senatore a Vita" of the Italian Republic. Dr. Rita Levi-Montalcini's "vita" ended at her home in Rome at age 103 on December 30, 2012. The famed neurologist and Nobel Prize winner unlocked the secrets of the our prayers and memorial masses will continue to aid those who have passed away and are on their journey to be in the presence of God for eternity. Sometimes, we also pray to our family members who lived Holy lives and while not formally canonized are now "saints" in the eyes of God.
 Since November is also the month of thanksgiving, we can say "Grazie Dio" for those departed who enriched our lives and whom we fondly recall. If you can also quote the Johnny Mercer lyric "When the angels ask me to recall the thrill of them all, then I shall tell them, I remember you". Your life, despite the ups and downs has been blessed... *** Craig Carrozzi, San Francisco based author and adventure traveler, has been writing books for over twentyfive years and I have been buying, reading and enjoying them "con gusto" ever since. Carrozzi writes fiction but they read nonfiction because many are based on actual happenings as is his latest book, India Basin Triangle. India Basin Triangle is a crime novel in the San Francisco Noir tradition. Based on an actual case involving international drug traffickers in the rollicking 1980s, the story juxtaposes the thoughts and actions of three main characters as they move inevitably toward a final collision that is quietly orchestrated by a mysterious woman.
 Henry Acuña, the dedicated, straight-shooting FBI agent in charge is one angle of the triangle. Jairo Restrepo, of Craig Carrozzi's hard cover titles, Cityscapes and The Curse of Chief Tenaya, sold out and are now available at $3.99 from Amazon Kindle. They may soon be available from Barnes and Noble Nook, too, so check. *** Erich Priebe died last month (Oct. 11th) at the age of 100, in www.italoamericano.com Nazi related groups making his burial place a "shrine". S.S. Captain Erich Priebe, as you may recall, was the German comandante, responsible for the killing of 20 Italians for every German soldier killed in a 1944 ambush on Via Rasella in Rome. After the war, Priebe changed his name and lived in Argentina for many years. When he was discovered, returned to Italy, tried and convicted of this mass homicide, he arrogantly refused to admit that there had even been a crime, "Fosse Ardeatine, tutte invenzioni degli Americani".
 The scene of the crime is now a "Fosse memorial Ardeatine" (Via Ardeatina, No. 174, open 8:30am to 5:00pm daily). The forbidding bunkerlike monument houses the rows of identical tombs containing photos of the victims. Beside it is a Museum of the Resistance. Interesting works of modern sculpture include The Martyrs, by Francesco Coccia, and The Gates shaped like a wall of thorns by Mirko Basaldella.
 In German occupied Rome (1944) the German S.S. police randomly herded over 320 Romans, men, women and children into meat trucks, took them to an abandoned quarry south of Rome and shot them point blank.
 The execution was in reprisal for a bomb attack that had killed 32 German soldiers when they started up Via Rasella, and marched into a partisan ambush. The German decided that a minimum of 10 Italian civilians would die for every one German killed. The Lanterna (Lighthouse of Genoa) an apartment in Rome owned by his attorney. After an autopsy at Ospedale Gemelli, his body was rushed to a "top secret" location in order to avoid any nostalgic Visiting the Fosse Ardeatine one cannot help being moved.
 The dead ranged in age from a boy of 14 to an old man of 74. They included shoe- 23 makers, shop-keepers, students, professors, lawyers, engineers, day laborers, office workers, a music teacher, three doctors and a priest. Family members still tend most of the graves.
 The Germans blew up the tunnels where the massacre had taken place, but local peasants had witnessed the scene and later helped to find the corpses. The site is now a memorial to the values of the Resistance against the Germans, which gave birth to the modern Italian Republic. *** Colleges in Northern California with an Italian connection, the University of San Francisco and St. Ignatius College Preparatory were founded in 1855 as St. Ignatius College by Jesuit fathers led by Antonio Maraschi, born in Oleggio in the province of Novara. In fact, until 1910, the Mission Californiae of the Society of Jesus was directly administered from the Jesuit Province of Turin. *** "La Lanterna" is the symbol of the city of Genoa, town of Christopher Columbus. It has seven centuries of history. The lighthouse is mentioned in a decree dated 1129 that entrusted supervision to the people of Genoa. This first tower was probably built around 1128 on a rock rising out of the sea in a place known as Capo di Faro (Lighthouse Cape).
 The light was provided by a fire fueled by dry stems of heather (brugo) and broom (brisca), which were constantly added to its summit in order to signal the port entrance. Certain 12th century documents show that painstaking attention was paid to the care and maintenance of the tower and that every ship entering the port of Genoa had to pay duties.
 A succession of maritime authorities have been responsible for the management of the Lanterna over the centuries: the Consoli del Mare (Sea Consuls), Salvatori del Porto (Saviors of the Port), Padri del Comune e Salvatori del Porto (Fathers of the Commune and Saviors of the Port) and the Conservatori del Mare (Keepers of the Sea). Their records make it easy to reconstruct the history of the Genoa Lighthouse.
 In 1316 the tower officially became a lighthouse. Caught up in the war between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, its foundations were damaged in 1318, and reinforced in 1321. The first lantern was fueled by olive oil and installed in 1326, as recorded by the Genoese historian Giustiniani. ***

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