L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, AUGUST 21, 2014 www.italoamericano.com L'Italo-Americano 11 Dear Readers, An August assortment of Italian connections for you: Bicycles have an Italian con- nection that goes back to artist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) and his bicycle design sketch, but the Italian bicycle race known as Giro D'Italia goes back to "La Gazzetta dello Sport". It seems that the Italian equivalent of the "Tour de France" was born out of a circulation battle between rival newspapers. In late 1908 "La Gazzetta dello Sport; cycling editor, Armando Cougnet heard rumors that their rival, "Corriere dello Sport" was about to sponsor a "Tour of Italy" and a preemptive strike was required. In spite of the fact that La Gazzetta was strapped for cash, they found friends with funds and the first Giro began on May 13, 1909 in Italy's financial capital Milano and finished there 17 days later after taking in Bologna, Chieti, Naples, Rome, Florence, Genoa and Torino. The winner was a stonemason, Luigi Ganna. Over a century later the Giro D'Italia is still sponsored by its original backer, the daily La Gazzetta dello Sport, with a pink leader's jersey to match the pink pages of the paper. *** Bicycle racing across Europe never quite stopped during World War II, although the major tours were not organized and for the most part were replaced by a series of one-day races, dubbed "the Giro di Guerra". The war cut short the careers of several cycling champs. Gino Bartali, 1938 Giro Tour winner, pretended to go out training each day in German occupied Italy, but in fact he was acting as a courier for a Catholic network that was smuggling Jews out of Italy. The material was used to forge pass- ports for a resistance network. Riding between Florence and Assisi, he advised on train move- ments, but most important, hid- den in his frame were forged documents that were used to make fake passports enabling Jewish refugees to escape. The network is said to have saved some 800 lives. Note: "Assisi Underground", the book and movie depicting the actions and benevolence of ordinary Italians toward the Jews, has been ignored for years in favor of Steven Spielberg's "Schindler's List". Alfredo Martini used his bike to ferry Molotov cock- tails for the Italian partisans, a risky business on the rocky roads of the time. After the Second World War, the Giro was seen as a symbol of Italy getting back on its feet, with the first postwar edition christened the "Giro di Rinascita": the Giro of Rebirth. The symbolism of sending cyclists from one end of the country to the other over roads ravaged by war- in some cases they had to walk across tempo- rary bridges- was impossible to ignore. The race proved that the country was on the move again. *** Swiss Guards have been pro- tecting the Pope for centuries. When I first visited Italy in the 1950's, I wondered aloud why, with all those Italians around, the Vatican was not hiring locally. It turns out that long before Italy became a unified nation, Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527), Italian statesman and diplomatic repre- sentative of the Florentine State prior to 1512, when he was ban- ished by political enemies and began his literary works on polit- ical science, The Art of War, The History of Florence, The Prince, etc., had written that "Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous...for they are disunited, ambitious, undisci- plined and treacherous...weak and cowardly when they are met by determined enemies; they have no fear of God and do not maintain commitments with men..." And it came to pass that in 1527, word reached the Vatican that Porta Portese and other walls constructed to protect the city from invasion, had been breached by the mutinous forces of Holy Roman EmperorCharles V, called "condottieri" they were soldiers for hire, by kings or princes (It may be remembered that even in Colonial America, when General George Washington crossed the Delaware during the American Revolutionary War to confront his enemies, they were not only British troops, but Hessians from Hesse, Germany, mercenar- ies used and paid for by Parliament and King George III). Meanwhile back at the Vatican, the message was somber. The Vatican's army of mercenaries then consisted of Swiss, French, Italian, Spanish and German units, all of which were ordered to prepare for the onslaught of Charles' mutinous troops, mainly Spanish, who had not been paid and were hell bent on plundering and killing anyone who attempted to stop them. The Commander of the Swiss contin- gent, Kaspar Roist, instructed his men to prepare to protect the pope at all costs; that was their duty and in doing so they would live up to their reputation: The Guard dies but he never surren- ders. When the riotous and rebellious forces entered the area of the Borgo, the streets adjacent to St. Peter's Square, fear and flight set in and most members of the Vatican's army left their assigned posts and disappeared, as Machiavelli had predicted. There was no obstacle to the capture and ransom of the pope- but one. Swiss contingent com- mander Roist ordered his men to escortPope Clement VI out of the Vatican to the security of Hadrian's tomb, today known as Castel Sant'Angelo, a fortress along the Tiber near the Apostolic Palace and reached through a passetto(passageway) which still may be seen today. The remaining 147, Roist included, took up posi- tions designed to delay the advance of Charles' mutinous troops, although the Swiss com- pany's numbers were dwarfed by their opponents. Roist would remain with them to the end. None of those 147 men sur- vived. The Guard had lived up to its pledge. The fulfillment and honoring of their oath to protect the pontiff, tried and tested in battle, has led every pope since Clement VI, who later returned to the Vatican safely, to place his faith, confidence, and life in the hands of the Swiss Guard. Nearly half a millennium later, that papal confidence has never wavered and today the Pope's Swiss Guards are one of the most colorful sights in the Vatican. A Swiss Guard recruit takes his oath during the swearing-in ceremony

• Cover