Vincenzo Capone - prohibition agent

'War hero'-turned-lawman hid his family identity

When Vincenzo Capone became a town marshal
in Nebraska, he called himself Richard James Hart

Vincenzo Capone, older brother of the notorious mobster Al Capone, was born on this day in 1892 in Angri, a town in Campania located between Salerno and Naples.

While Al drifted into crime as a teenager, Vincenzo wanted a different life. After running away to join a circus, he changed his name and invented a new background to conceal his true identity. He acquired a reputation as a war hero before forging a career in law enforcement, notably pitting himself against the criminal gangs of his brother’s world as an agent for the Bureau of Prohibition.

The first in a family of nine children, Vincenzo had just one sibling, his brother Ralph, when his father, Gabriele, a barber, and his mother, Teresa, emigrated to the United States in 1895. His father continued to work as a hairdresser, while Teresa’s skills as a seamstress enabled her to find a job. They settled in Brooklyn.

Over the years that followed, the family grew and Vincenzo and Ralph were joined by Frank, Alphonse, Ermina, John, Albert, Matthew and Mafalda. Sadly, Ermina did not survive her infancy.

As they grew up, most of his younger brothers became involved with petty crime. By contrast, Vincenzo, who had already adopted James as his “American” first name and would often take the ferry to Staten Island, where the fields and woods offered an escape from the overcrowded streets of the city. 

As a lawman, Capone modelled
himself on William "Two Gun" Hart

He offered to help out in stables and learned to ride horses. His father secured a job for him there after witnessing his son’s fascination with Buffalo Bill Cody and the Wild West Shows that were popular at the time.

It may have been his fascination with the wild west that led to his decision at the age of 16 to run away from home. It has been speculated that Alphonse, who was eight at the time, wanted to go with him but that Vincenzo told him to go home. The family knew nothing about where he had gone until a letter arrived from Vincenzo a year later, saying he was in Kansas, travelling with a circus.

The author Jeff McArthur, who wrote a book about Vincenzo, says that he joined the Miller Brothers Ranch Wild West Show and called himself James Hart, which is thought to have reflected his admiration for the silent movie actor William S Hart, who often starred in Westerns. He worked to shed his Brooklyn accent and explained away his swarthy southern Italian skin colour by claiming he was half American Indian.

His determination to adopt a new identity was confirmed when he joined the military under the name Richard James Hart, insisting he was born in Indiana and had worked as a farmer.  

Accounts vary of his time in service.  Some say that he fought in France in World War One, achieved the rank of lieutenant, was made a military policeman and was awarded a Distinguished Service Cross for ‘extraordinary heroism in action’. However, another story says that he joined the veterans organisation the American Legion after the war was over but was later expelled when it was found that the Department of the Army had no record of any war service. 

Al Capone - Vincenzo's younger brother -
was head of the Chicago crime syndicate

Regardless of which version is true, Capone returned to America and changed his name legally to Richard James Hart. He married Kathleen Winch in 1919, and they had four sons, Richard, William, Sherman, and Harry. They made their home in Homer, Nebraska, where he became a town marshal and soon afterwards a federal prohibition agent. 

He was among the more eccentric agents. Mimicking the persona of his hero, William S Hart, he wore leather cowboy boots with spurs and a 10-gallon hat, carried two pearl-handled pistols and rode around on a horse, even though he owned a car.  After a series of successful raids against bootleggers, he gained the nickname of "Two-Gun" Hart - the same moniker the silent movie business bestowed upon his idol.  It was somewhat ironic that, at the time Vincenzo was locking up bootleggers under his new identity, Al Capone’s control of the illegal booze market in Chicago was a major part of his crime empire.

As Hart, Vincenzo joined the Bureau of Indian Affairs, where he was charged with investigating criminal activity on Indian reservations. He built further on his larger-than-life reputation and arrested at least 20 murderers in addition to smashing a number of moonshine liquor operations, although he was himself convicted of manslaughter after killing a man he claimed was refusing to surrender.

It did not stop him continuing to serve as a town marshal and a justice of the peace but when the Great Depression arrived in the 1930s his life began to unravel. Caught shoplifting from a grocery store, he was dismissed from both positions.  Soon, struggling to support his family, he contacted his brother Ralph - a key member of the Capone crime family - asking for financial help. He even attended a reunion at Ralph’s house when Al Capone was released from prison on parole in 1939, eight years into his jail sentence for tax evasion. 

In 1951, Ralph himself was tried for tax evasion in 1951. It transpired that he had been laundering money through Hart since 1941 and when Hart testified during his trial, he did so as James Vincenzo Capone. 

Hart was subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury in Chicago, on a date set in 1952. By this time, he was suffering from diabetes and could only walk with a stick. Shortly after testifying he died of a heart attack at the age of 60.

The Castello Doria in Angri, once ruled by the
powerful Doria family from Genova

Travel tip:

Vincenzo Capone’s hometown of Angri, which is also the birthplace of the mobster Frank Nitti, who worked for Al Capone, is situated where the urban sprawl that fans out around Vesuvius meets the Lattari mountains at the beginning of the Sorrentine Peninsula. It is rich in history. The scene of the battle that marked the victory of the Eastern Roman Empire over the Goths in 552, it became an important town under Bourbon rule and in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in the 19th century.  The Castello Doria, notable for its two concentric towers, is an example of the town’s rich architectural heritage, dating back to the period between the 17th and 18th centuries in which Angri was controlled by the Doria family of Genova.

Hotels in Angri by Booking.com

Palm trees line the waterfront at Salerno, a city
often overlooked by visitors to Campania

Travel tip:

Salerno, situated some 25km (16 miles) from Angri, has a population of about 133,000. It is a city with a reputation as an industrial port and is often overlooked by visitors to Campania, who tend to flock to Naples, Sorrento, the Amalfi coast and the Cilento. Yet it has an attractive waterfront and a quaint old town, at the heart of which is the Duomo, originally built in the 11th century, which houses in its crypt the tomb of one of the twelve apostles of Christ, Saint Matthew the Evangelist. It is also a good base for excursions both to the Amalfi coast, just a few kilometres to the north, and the Cilento, which can be found at the southern end of the Gulf of Salerno. Hotels are also cheaper than at the more fashionable resorts.

Also on this day:

1472: The birth of Renaissance painter Fra Bartolommeo

1918: The birth of operatic baritone Anselmo Colzani

1925: The birth of film producer Alberto Grimaldi

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Rocco Commisso - entrepreneur

US businessman with roots in Calabria

Rocco Commisso cheering on his Fiorentina
team from the stands in Florence

Rocco Commisso, the founder of the American cable TV provider Mediacom and owner of football clubs in the United States and Italy, was born on this day in 1949 in Marina di Gioiosa Ionica, a small seaside town in Calabria.

With annual revenues of more than $2,000 million, Mediacom is the fifth largest cable company in the US, having been launched from Commisso’s basement in 1995, when he began to buy up small community cable systems, mainly in the Midwest and Southeast. It now has its headquarters in Blooming Grove, New York.

Commisso, a football fan from his childhood, bought a majority stake in the New York Cosmos club in 2017 and completed the purchase of ACF Fiorentina in Italy two years later, with plans to return each club to its glory days of the past.

With a southwest aspect on the Ionian coast, Marina di Gioiosa Ionica is something of an idyllic spot today, blessed with wide beaches and clear inviting water. As Commisso was growing up, however, it was a relatively deprived area as Italy struggled to rebuild after World War Two and it was not uncommon for families to leave the area in search of prosperity elsewhere.

Rocco’s father, a carpenter, joined a stream of emigrants from the area to the United States, setting up as a carpenter just outside Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania. Once established, he paid for the rest of the family to join him and Commisso left for a new life at the age of 12, with his mother and two siblings.  A year after arriving, the Commisso family moved to New York, making their home in the Bronx.

Commisso grew his Mediacom empire after 
starting the business in his basement

A bright student, Commisso made rapid progress at school but it was his talent for football and music that were most helpful in advancing his education.

In 1963, a week after moving from Pittsburgh, he entered a talent show at the Wakefield Theatre in the Bronx and landed a weekly gig playing the accordion to entertain the audience before and between movie showings. The manager of the theatre took a liking to him and helped him obtain a place at the Mount Saint Michael Academy, a prestigious private high school, where he studied while working at his brother’s pizza restaurant in his spare time.

His football skills, acquired during a childhood in which his heroes were the likes of John Charles and Omar Sivori at Juventus, helped him with the next step in his education, first of all winning him a 50 percent scholarship at New York University and then a full scholarship at Columbia, one of America’s great Ivy League universities, where he graduated in industrial engineering in 1971.

A degree from Columbia University opened doors, for Commisso to a position at the pharmaceutical company Pfizer, who allowed him to arrange his shifts so that he could study for an MBA from Columbia Business School.

A natural entrepreneur, he always had an eye for a side hustle and in 1975 he opened a discotheque in the Bronx specifically geared towards Italian immigrants, who appreciated the mix of dance music and traditional Italian crooners.

Commisso still has the accordion skills that helped
him progress after arriving in New York

Meanwhile, his business career took him into the financial sector, in which he worked for Chase Manhattan Bank before moving to the Royal Bank of Canada, where his work involved making finance available to the media and communications sectors.

That led first to a position as Chief Financial Officer for Cablevision, which grew to become the eighth largest company in the sector in the US under his stewardship, and then to him launching Mediacom.

Meanwhile, he never lost his affection for football and was captivated by the launch of the North American Soccer League in the 1970s, becoming a regular fan of the New York Cosmos, the team of Brazil legend Pelé and Franz Beckenbauer and the Italian star Giorgio Chinaglia.

The Cosmos went out of business in 1985 after the NASL boom faded. The name was relaunched in 2009 but teetered on the brink of bankruptcy in 2017, when Commisso moved in to save it from a second extinction.  The club’s current status, in the National Independent Soccer Association, effectively the third tier of professional football in the United States, is a long way from the extravagance of the early 1970s but Commisso has ambitions to return the club to the top of the American game.

He has similar ambitions for Fiorentina, whom he bought in 2019 after being approached by several clubs in Serie A. Fiorentina were a powerful club in the 1960s and 70s. Their last Serie A title came in 1969 but Commisso has plans to turn them into a force again. 

Married with two children, Commisso lives in Saddle River, New Jersey.  According to the Bloomberg Index, he is worth around nine billion dollars. 

Marina di Gioiosa Ionica is blessed with long
expanses of wide beaches

Travel tip:

Commisso’s home town of Marina di Gioiosa Ionica is situated in the province of Reggio Calabria, about 80km (50 miles) southwest of Catanzaro and about 120km (75 miles) northeast of Reggio Calabria, with a population of just over 6,500. As well as offering broad beaches and clean water for bathing, the town has the remains of an ancient Roman theatre that was unearthed in the early 20th century, a relic of the former Roman settlement of Romechium.  There are also a number of towers built to defend the area against invasions by Saracens and Turks. 

Catanzaro's rebuilt duomo, the Cattedrale di
Santa Maria Assunta

Travel tip:

The city of Catanzaro, the nearest major population centre to Marina di Gioiosa Ionica, is a city largely reconstructed following major earthquakes in 1783 and 1832, that destroyed all its ancient monuments. The small Norman church of Omobono was one of only a few survivors. Overlooking the confluence of the Fiumarella and Musofalo rivers, Catanzaro offers beautiful scenery with peaks, ridges, mountain ranges as far as the eye can see. The city’s cathedral, built over a Norman cathedral built in 1121, was given a Renaissance façade in the 16th century but has been destroyed and rebuilt at least twice since, most recently after the Allied bombings of 1943.

Also on this day:

1553: The birth of Alfonso II d’Este, the last Duke of Ferrara

1710: The death of Baroque composer Bernardo Pasquini

1947: The birth of football coach Nevio Scala

1954: The birth of former Italian prime minister Paolo Gentiloni

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Mario Buda - anarchist

Prime suspect in Wall Street bombing 

Mario Buda was suspected of being involved
with several bombings in the United States

Mario Buda, the anarchist suspected but never convicted of the 1920 Wall Street bombing, was born on this day in 1884 in Savignano sul Rubicone, a town in the Emilia-Romagna region, about 90km (56 miles) southeast of Bologna.

Some 38 people were killed, with hundreds more injured, when a horse-drawn cart packed with explosives exploded close to the New York Stock Exchange building on the famous thoroughfare. Buda was identified by a blacksmith who had rented him the horse and Federal agents began an investigation.

The Italian, who had emigrated to the United States in 1907, was known to the police after being arrested previously in connection with a double-murder in the town of Braintree, Massachusetts. He had escaped from custody on that occasion and evaded detection again, boarding a ship to return to Italy before he could be questioned over the bombing.

Born into a family of modest means, Buda led an unsettled youth. He was arrested for robbery at the age of 15 and later served a jail term after being indicted on a charge of noise pollution at night. On his release, he was apprenticed to a shoemaker but remained restless and, like many young Italians in the early 20th century, imagined that moving to America would lead to a more prosperous life.

This proved far from the case. He flitted from one menial job to another amid a climate in New York that was hostile towards immigrants, particularly Italians, who were the victims of racial prejudice.  In 1911, he went back to Italy but, finding his life chances no better than before, decided to make another attempt to settle in the US two years later, this time in Boston, a city with links in the community to Romagna, where he worked in a shoe factory.

Nicola Sacco (left) and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were
key figures in the anarchist movement in Boston

The origins of his interest in the anarchist movements are not clear, although Romagna was a hotbed of such activity in Italy. In America, it is known that he met Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, two Italian anarchists, in Massachusetts, where Buda had become involved in the labour movement, often travelling to join protests and support strikes.

He began to attend anarchist meetings and to follow Luigi Galleani, a powerful orator and advocate of anarchist action, who edited a newspaper, Cronaca Sovversiva - Subversive Chronicle - which had 5,000 subscribers before the US Government closed it down in 1918.

In 1916, Buda was arrested for taking part in a demonstration in Boston against American intervention in World War One and sentenced to five months in jail after refusing to swear an oath on the Bible at his trial. On his release, he fled to Mexico with Sacco and Vanzetti to avoid being conscripted.

He was suspected of being a participant in a number of bombings, including an attack on a parade in San Francisco supporting US involvement in WW1 that killed 10 people, and another in Milwaukee, where a bomb placed outside an Italian Evangelical Mission was removed but then exploded inside a police station, killing nine officers and two civilians.  Soon afterwards, a series of further bombings prompted the US Government to draw up the Immigration Act of 1918, which provided the powers for foreigners to be deported even on the basis of mere suspicion of subversive activity.

The 1920 Wall Street attack killed 38 people
and wounded hundreds more

The double-murder in Braintree, for which Buda was accused but escaped custody, resulted in the indictment of Sacco and Vanzetti on 11 September, 1920, five days before the Wall Street attack. Galleani had been deported the previous year and it is thought that Buda - by then going under the name of Mike Boda - wanted to do something to avenge his friends. 

Whether the Wall Street bomb was his work was never proved, although clearly someone had the motive to leave the horse-drawn wagon and its deadly cargo - some 100lb of dynamite and 500lb of cast-iron sash window weights - between the Stock Exchange building and the headquarters of J P Morgan, with a timing device that caused it to detonate at just after noon on 16 September. Among those who were injured but survived were Junius Spencer Morgan III, the son of J P Morgan, and Joseph P Kennedy, the father of future US president John F Kennedy.

Despite the testimony of the blacksmith, Buda was able to travel to the state of Rhode Island, the tiny state that neighbours Massachusetts and Connecticut, obtaining a passport from the Italian consulate. In October, he left New York on a French ship bound for Naples and by November was back in Savignano, where he resumed his aborted career as a shoemaker.

He kept a low profile initially but again was drawn towards anarchist causes. Arrested during clashes between fascists and anti-fascists in 1921, he was accused along with 15 others of being complicit in the murder of a police sergeant but was acquitted through lack of evidence. However, in August of the following year, a raid on his home turned up letters from anarchists in America and Italy and he was tried and convicted on conspiracy charges.  He was imprisoned on the island of Lipari, where he became reacquainted with Galleani, a fellow prisoner, and then Ponza, before being released in 1932.

After initially moving to Switzerland, he returned to Savignano, where he had a relatively quiet life thereafter, continuing to make shoes.  He died in 1963 at the age of 78, having allegedly admitted to a nephew in 1955 that he was responsible for the Wall Street bomb.

The pretty harbour in the town of Lipari on the
island of the same name in the Aeolian Islands

Travel tip:

With a population of approximately 10,000, Lipari is the largest of the Aeolian Islands, a volcanic archipelago off the coast of Sicily. The town of Lipari has picturesque streets reminiscent of Capri, with plenty of bars and restaurants, plus a pretty harbour and an historic castle.  It can be reached by a ferry from Milazzo, on the northeastern coast of Sicily, the journey taking just under an hour, while local boat services link Lipari with the other islands, such as Stromboli, Vulcano and Salina.  Although Lipari has volcanic origins, it is around 1,400 years since the last eruption, with volcanic activity today limited to thermal springs and fumaroles. 

The Roman bridge across the waterway reputed
 to be the historical Rubicon river

Travel tip:

Savignano sul Rubicone, where Buda was born and died, is a town of some 16,000 inhabitants in the province of Forlì-Cesena, about 30km (19 miles) southeast of Forlì.  It takes its name from the Rubicon, the river famous for Julius Caesar's historic crossing, when he led the army of Cisalpine Gaul, of which he was governor, across the river into territory controlled directly from Rome, thus sparking a civil war.  For centuries the exact location of the original river was unknown, but in 1991, the Fiumicino, a river which passes through Savignano, was identified as the most likely location. Prior to that the town was called Savignano di Romagna.  Along Via Matteotti in the town there is a bridge over the river said to date back to Roman times, marked with a statue of Julius Caesar.

Also on this day:

54: The death of the Roman emperor Claudius

1815: The execution of Joachim Murat, former King of Naples

1899: The birth of racing driver and car-maker Piero Dusio

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Luigi Galleani - anarchist

Activist who mainly operated in the United States

Luigi Galleani supported anarchist
philosophies from a young age

Luigi Galleani, an anarchist active in the United States in the early part of the 20th century, was born on this day in 1861 in Vercelli in Piedmont.

Galleani was an advocate of the philosophy of "propaganda of the deed" first proposed by the 19th century Italian revolutionary Carlo Pisacane. 

The theory was that violence against specific targets identified as representatives of the capitalist system would be a catalyst for the overthrow of government institutions.

Between 1914 and 1932, Galleani's followers in the United States - known as i Galleanisti - carried out a series of bombings and assassination attempts against institutions and perceived “class enemies.”

The Wall Street bombing of 1920, which resulted in the deaths of 38 people, was blamed on followers of Galleani, who had been deported from the United States to Italy the previous year.

The large following he acquired among Italian-speaking workers both in Italy and the United States stemmed from his brilliant oratory.  He also edited a newspaper, Cronaca Sovversiva - Subversive Chronicle - which he published for 15 years until the United States government closed it down in 1918.  At one point Cronaca Sovversiva had 5,000 subscribers.

Born into a middle-class family in Vercelli, he studied law at the University of Torino but he never graduated. The end of the 19th century was a period of social tensions, marked by the creation of workers’ movements and repressive measures by the state.  Galleani was attracted to anarchist ideology and soon found himself sought by the police in Turin.

The aftermath of the Wall Street bombing of 1920, which
was blamed on Galleani's supporters in the United States

He fled first to France in 1880 and then Switzerland. When he returned to Italy in 1893 he was arrested and sent to prison for three years, found guilty of conspiring against the State. On his release he was exiled to the island of Pantelleria, off the coast of Sicily, where he met he met and married a young widow, Maria Rollo, with whom he had four children.

They escaped Pantelleria in 1900, fleeing to Egypt, which at the time had a large expatriate Italian community. He befriended a number of anarchists but his presence became known to the Egyptian authorities and he was informed that they would soon begin proceedings to extradite him to Italy.

Abruptly, he and Maria left Egypt and went to London. They then emigrated to the United States, arriving in 1901.

Soon after arriving in the US, Galleani attracted attention in radical anarchist circles as a charismatic orator. He settled in Paterson, New Jersey, and became the editor of La Questione Sociale, the leading Italian anarchist periodical in the United States.

The textile mills in Paterson, New Jersey, where
Galleani found support among the workforce

In 1902, during a strike by silk workers at a factory in Paterson of which Galleani had been an agitator, police opened fire on the strikers. Galleani was wounded in the face and later indicted for inciting a riot. He fled to Canada but was expelled.

In time, he settled in Barre, near Vermont, where he found more support among the community of Italian stonemasons. It was there that he founded Cronaca Sovversiva.

It was a result largely of the content of Cronaca Sovversiva, which not only contained articles advocating the overthrow of government but in one issue included bomb-making instructions, that Galleani was deported back to Italy in 1919.

He continued to publish Cronaca Sovversiva but after Benito Mussolini’s Fascists came to power in 1922 he was arrested and sentenced to 14 months in prison. For the second time in his life he was exiled to Pantelleria, then the island of Lipari, and finally to Messina.

Eventually he was allowed to return to the Italian mainland and died in 1931 in the village of Caprigliola, in the area of Tuscany known as Lunigiana, at the age of 70.

Before and after Galleani was deported, America was hit with a wave of bombings blamed on his followers, culminating in the Wall Street attack in 1920, which injured 143 in addition to the 38 deaths. Many other attacks resulted in fatalities.

The Piazza Cavour in Vercelli, where Galleani was born.

Travel tip:

Vercelli, where Galleani was born, is a city of around 46,500 inhabitants some 85km (53 miles) west of Milan and about 75km (46 miles) northeast of Turin. It is reckoned to be built on the site of one of the oldest settlements in Italy, dating back to 600BC, and was home to the world's first publicly-funded university, which was opened in 1228 but folded in 1372. The Basilica of Sant'Andrea is regarded as one of the most beautiful and best-preserved Romanesque buildings in Italy.  Since the 15th century, Vercelli has been at the centre of Italy’s rice production industry, with many of the surrounding fields in the vast Po plain submerged under water during the summer months.

The sighting tower in Caprigliola may
be almost 700 years old

Travel tip

The village of Caprigliola sits on a sandstone rock on the left bank of the Magra river in Lunigiana, an area of northwestern Tuscany known for its great beauty that was a favourite of the poet Dante Alighieri, who enjoyed the peace and solitude of the mountain regions.  Long-term Caprigliola residents still use a unique dialect that is a mix of Tuscan, Emilian and Ligurian words.  Caprigliola has a fine example of the circular sighting towers that were once a feature of the Lunigiana landscape between the 11th and 15th centuries. This one, which rises to a height of 28.8m (95ft), may have been built in around 1230. It is not open to the public but can be visited by contacting the parish priest.

More reading:

How anarchist Gino Lucetti tried to assassinate Mussolini

Why anarchist Giuseppe Pinelli inspired a Dario Fo play

Gaetano Bresci - the anarchist who killed Umberto I

Also on this day:

1612: The death of composer Giovanni Gabrieli

1943: The death of mountain photographer Vittorio Sella

1990: The birth of footballer Mario Balotelli


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Felice Pedroni - prospector

Italian’s discovery sparked Fairbanks Gold Rush

Felice Pedroni, a photograph taken in Alaska
in the early 20th century

The gold prospector known as Felix Pedro was born Felice Pedroni on this day in 1858 in the village of Trignano, near the small Apennine town of Fanano in Emilia-Romagna.

In July 1902, on or around the 22nd, Pedroni discovered gold in the Tanana Hills northeast of the fledgling town of Fairbanks, Alaska in a small, then unnamed stream (later to be called Pedro Creek).

Some claim that Pedroni was the prospector who, on his return to Fairbanks from his prospecting mission, uttered the famous words "There's gold in them there hills", although there are other accounts of where the phrase originated.

What does not seem to be disputed is that Pedroni’s discovery triggered what became known as the Fairbanks Gold Rush as more than 1,000 other gold diggers flooded the area.

Brought up in a family of subsistence farmers in Trignano, Pedroni was the youngest of six brothers. He left Italy in 1881 after the death of his father. He moved first to France, then took the bold decision to board a steamship to America.

After disembarking in New York City, where he was registered as Felix Pedro, he found work as a labourer but, having heard about the gold in Alaska and was determined to get there. As soon as he had saved enough money, Pedroni moved on, first to Ohio, then Washington State, British Columbia and Yukon, each time taking a job and biding his time until he could afford to move on. He became an American citizen in 1888.

Fairbanks quickly developed as a city with the wealth
generated by the gold rush sparked by Pedroni's find

Once in Alaska, Pedroni panned for gold in the Fortymile, the Piledriver Slough and various other waterways, including the 'Lost Creek' in which Pedroni and his partner, Tom Gilmore, claimed to have found a sizable amount of gold in 1898, but were forced to abandon due to lack of food.
Despite marking the spot and searching for it for the next three years, they were unable to find it again.

It was while trying to locate the creek that they were drawn to the camp that would become Fairbanks after seeing plumes of smoke from a steamboat. They dropped down from the hills above the settlement, stocked up with supplies and returned to their search.

This time they did find gold, in the Tanana Hills, northeast of Fairbanks.

Pedroni died in July, 1910 at age 52 at St. Joseph's Hospital in Fairbanks - which by then had grown rapidly to be the largest city in Alaska - reportedly of a heart attack.

This was later disputed by business partner Vincenzo Gambiani, who suspected Pedroni's Irish wife, Mary Ellen Doran, of poisoning him.

The inscription on Felice Pedroni's simple grave in Fanano,
the town near his birthplace in Emilia-Romagna

Pedroni had intended to marry an Italian girl and, in fact, returned to Italy in 1906 a wealthy man, in search of a bride. He thought he had found one in Egle Zanetti, a young teacher from Lizzano in Belvedere with whom he fell in love. She turned down his proposal, however, and returned to Alaska, heartbroken.

By contrast, Mary Doran was said to be a saloon girl of loose morals. Gambiani believed she killed Pedroni so that she might inherit his fortune.

Pedroni’s body was initially shipped to Colma, near San Francisco, to be buried, which is where it remained until October, 1972, when it was found, exhumed, and moved to Italy to be re-interred in Fanano. First, however, some hair samples were tested, the results of which reportedly supported the theory that Pedroni had been murdered.

Today, Pedroni is remembered in Alaska as one of the founding fathers of Fairbanks. In 1947, the Felice Pedroni Monument was erected on the Steese Highway north of Fairbanks, near what is still known as Pedro Creek. The annual Fairbanks Golden Days celebration always begins with a rededication of the monument.

The countryside of the Valle di Ospitale, close to Fanano
in the Frignano regional park in Emilia-Romagna

Travel tip:

Fanano is a town of some 2,500 inhabitants within the Regional Park of the Modenese High Apennines, otherwise known as the Frignano regional park, a rich and colourful natural area of lakes and mountains maintained for the growth and preservation of rare species, animals and plants. The park covers 15 thousand hectares, rising to a height of 2,165 metres (7,100 feet) at the summit of Monte Cimone. Among the several rare species to be found in the park are Alpine Marmots and Apennine Wolves. The area is popular for mountain biking, trekking and orienteering, and snow tracking in the winter. Fanano itself is close to the lakes of Scaffaiolo and Pratignano and the Passo della Croce Arcana, an alpine pass at 1,669m (5,475ft) between outlying areas of Fanano and Cutigliano.

The Ducal Palace in Modena, which dates back to 1635, was
once the most sumptuous palace in Europe

Travel tip:

Fanano is just over 60km (37 miles) from the city of Modena, which is well known for a variety of reasons, as a centre of the car industry - Ferrari, De Tomaso, Lamborghini, Pagani and Maserati all have connections with the city - the home of balsamic vinegar, and the birthplace of the great tenor, Luciano Pavarotti. One of the main sights in Modena is the huge, baroque Ducal Palace, which was begun by Francesco I d’Este, Duke of Modena, on the site of a former castle in 1635. His architect, Luigi Bartolomeo Avanzini, created a home for him that few European princes could match at the time. The palace is now home to the Italian national military academy. In the Galleria Estense, on the upper floor of the Palazzo dei Musei in Modena, there is a  one-metre high bust of Francesco by Gian Lorenzo Bernini.

More reading:

The Italian origins of San Francisco's Ghirardelli Chocolate Company

How Gaetano Merola founded the San Francisco Opera

Carlo Camillo di Rudio - the Italian aristocrat who fought in the Battle of Little Bighorn

Also on this day:

1118: The death of Adelaide del Vasto, Countess of Sicily

1839: The birth of politician Antonio Di Rudini, twice Italy's prime minister

1881: The birth of magazine artist Fortunino Matania


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Carlo Camillo Di Rudio - soldier

Italian aristocrat who survived Battle of the Little Bighorn

Carlo Camillo Di Rudio spent 32 years
in the United States Army

Carlo Camillo Di Rudio, a military officer who became known as Charles Camillus DeRudio and gave 32 years’ service to the United States Army in the late 19th century, was born in Belluno in northern Italy on this day in 1832.

Having arrived in New York City as an immigrant from England in 1860, he served as a volunteer in the American Civil War (1861-65) before joining the Regular Army in 1867 as a 2nd lieutenant in the 2nd Infantry, an appointment which was cancelled when he failed a medical. Undeterred, he was readmitted and joined the 7th Cavalry in 1869, eventually attaining the rank of Major.

He participated in the Battle of the Little Bighorn, in which the US Army suffered a defeat to the combined forces of Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribesmen. The battle was part of the Great Sioux Wars of 1876, fought for possession of the Black Hills in South Dakota, where gold had been found.

DeRudio was thrown from his horse as the American forces under Major Marcus Reno were driven back across the Little Bighorn River to regroup on the eastern side. He was left stranded on the western side and hid for 36 hours with a private, Thomas O’Neill. They were twice almost captured but eventually managed to cross the river to safety.

DeRudio had led an eventful life even before his experiences in the US military, during which he also took part in the Nez Perce War on 1877, another conflict with Native Americans.

A scene from the Battle of the Little Bighorn, as depicted
by the artist Charles Marion Russell

Born the son of Count and Countess Aquila di Rudio, he attended an Austrian military academy in Milan before leaving at the age of 15 to join the Italian patriots during 1848 uprising known as the Five Days of Milan. Later, he fought in Rome and Venice against the Austrians.

Soon afterwards, he tried to sail to America but was shipwrecked off Spain. By 1855, he was living in east London and had married Eliza, the 15-year-old daughter of a confectioner from Nottingham, with whom he eventually had six children.

In 1858 he took part in a failed attempt to assassinate the Emperor of France, Napoleon III, at the Paris Opera.  The attempt, led by another Italian revolutionary, the Carbonari leader Felice Orsini, involved three bombs and killed eight people, wounding another 150, but missed its intended target.

Orsini and his co-conspirator, Giuseppe Pieri, were executed but DeRudio’s sentence was commuted to a life sentence to be served on Île Royale, a neighbour of Devil’s Island in the western Atlantic off French Guiana.  But he and 12 others escaped from the island and landed in what was then British Guiana, more than 800km (500 miles) along the northern coast of South America.

From there he returned to England but his taste for action would not be contained and he emigrated to the United States, specifically to fight on the Union side in the Civil War.  Once commissioned to serve in the Regular Army, he was never entirely trusted by his superiors, including the then Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, who tended to disbelieve his accounts of his own military service career.

He retired on his 64th birthday and spent his final years in California, where he died in 1910 at the age of 78, while living in Pasadena.

Belluno sits in the shadow of the Dolomites

Travel tip:

Belluno, where DeRudio was born, is a beautiful town in the Dolomites, situated just over 100km (62 miles) north of Venice. The town sits in an elevated position above the Piave river surrounded by rocky slopes and dense woods that make for an outstanding scenic background. The architecture of the historic centre has echoes of the town's Roman and medieval past. Around the picturesque Piazza Duomo can be found several fine buildings, such as the Palazzo dei Rettori, the Cathedral of Belluno and Palazzo dei Giuristi, which contains the Civic Museum.

The Scuola Militare "Teulie" is in Corso Italia in Milan

Travel tip:

The military academy in Milan attended by DeRudio is known today as the Scuola Militare "Teulié", a highly selective institution attached to the Italian Army and, having been founded in 1802, one of the oldest military academies in the world. It was closed by the Austrians in 1848 after the cadets, of which DeRudio was one, took part in the Five Days of Milan, the uprising against the Austrians. It became a military hospital. During the early part of the 20th century it was a military barracks, becoming the headquarters of the III Corps of the Italian Army, before reverting to its former status as a military academy in 1996.

More reading:

How the citizens of Milan rose up to throw out the Austrians

The story of fighter pilot Silvio Scaroni

The pope from Belluno who was in office just 33 days

Also on this day:

303: The martyrdom of Sant'Alessandro of Bergamo

1498: Michelangelo accepts the commission to sculpt his masterpiece, La Pietà


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Constantino Brumidi - painter

Rome-born artist responsible for murals in US Capitol Building

Constantino Brumidi left Italy in 1852 after
being released from prison

Constantino Brumidi, an artist whose work provides the backcloth to the daily business of government in the United States Capitol Building in Washington, was born on this day in 1805 in Rome.

Brumidi’s major work is the allegorical fresco The Apotheosis of Washington, painted in 1865, which covers the interior of the dome in the Rotunda.

Encircling the base of the dome, below the windows, is the Frieze of American History, in which Brumidi painted scenes depicting significant events of American history, although the second half of the work, which he began in 1878, had to be completed by another painter, Filippo Costaggini,  as Brumidi died in 1880.

Previously, between 1855 and about 1870, Brumidi had decorated the walls of eight important rooms in the Capitol Building, including the Hall of the House of Representatives, the Senate Library and the President’s Room.

His Liberty and Union paintings are mounted near the ceiling of the White House entrance hall and the first-floor corridors of the Senate part of the Capitol Building are known as the Brumidi Corridors.

Brumidi arrived in the United States in 1852, having spent 13 months in jail in Rome following the upheaval caused by the occupation of the city by French forces and the revolution among Roman citizens that led to the formation of the short-lived Roman Republic.

A section of Brumidi's Corridor in the
Capitol Building in Washington

He was already a well-known and respected artist, whose murals adorned a theatre built at the villa of the wealthy Torlonia family. At the time of the revolution he was working for the Vatican, where he has restored some frescoes for Pope Gregory XVI and painted a portrait of Pope Pius IX, for whom he was also a captain in the civic guard set up to defend the city. At the same time, he and his family were running a coffee shop in Rome inherited from his father.

When Pius IX fled to avoid capture when the republic was declared, Brumidi took it upon himself to remove some valuable art works from the Vatican for safe keeping. When Pius IX returned, however, Brumidi was arrested, accused of theft and sentenced to 18 years in prison.

It was only after many pleas were made on his behalf that the pope decided to show mercy on Brumidi and grant him a pardon, his decision influenced by Brumidi’s intention to emigrate to the United States.

Born in Rome of a Greek father and Italian mother, and trained in painting and sculpture at the Accademia di San Luca, he applied for US citizenship as soon as he arrived in New York and began to earn a living from private commissions and and by painting murals and altarpieces in various churches.

Among his religious paintings are a fresco of the Crucifixion at Our Lady of the Scapular and St. Stephen Church on East 29th Street in Manhattan, for which he also executed a Martyrdom of St. Stephen and an Assumption of Mary.

Brumidi worked at the Capitol Building for
25 years until his death

He also executed frescoes at Taylor's Chapel, Baltimore and further examples of his work can be seen at n the Cathedral-Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Philadelphia, St. Ignatius Church in Baltimore, and St Aloysius Church in Washington.

When he was granted US citizenship in 1857 he was already in the employ of the US Government, earning eight dollars a day. He was so proud of his new status that a fresco he completed soon afterwards, in the Hall of the House of Representatives, he signed ‘C. Brumidi, Artist, Citizen of the U.S.’

Brumidi died in Washington and was interred at Glenwood Cemetery. His grave was unmarked and its location lost until 1952, when a document detailing where he had been buried was found and a marker was finally placed above it.

His work in the Capitol was not acknowledged for many years but in September, 2008, President George W. Bush signed a law that posthumously awarded him the Congressional Gold Medal, to be displayed in the Capitol Visitor Center, as part of an exhibit honoring him.

The Accademia di San Luca in Palazzo Carpegna

Travel tip:

The Accademia di San Luca was founded in 1577 as an association of artists in Rome with the purpose of elevating the work of "artists", which included painters, sculptors and architects, above that of mere craftsmen. The Academy was named after Saint Luke the evangelist who, legend has it, made a portrait of the Virgin Mary, and thus became the patron saint of painters' guilds.  From the late 16th century until it moved to its present location at the Palazzo Carpegna - just behind the Trevi Fountain along Via della Stamperia - the Academy was based in a building by the Roman Forum near the Academy church of Santi Luca e Martina, designed by the Baroque architect, Pietro da Cortona.

 A view over St Peter's Square at the heart of the Vatican

Travel tip:

The Vatican can be defined as the palace within the Vatican City in which the pope resides or Vatican City itself, an independent state inside Italy, policed by its own security force, the Swiss Guard. St Peter’s Basilica, built over the place where St Peter is believed to have been crucified and buried, is part of Vatican City, as are the Vatican museums where you can see the Sistine Chapel, which was decorated by Michelangelo. The Pope holds audiences in the Vatican every Wednesday and blesses the crowds in St Peter’s Square every Sunday.

More reading:

How Michelangelo's ceiling of the Sistine Chapel was revealed for the first time

The Sienese sculptor who made his mark in Pittsburgh and Birmingham, Alabama

The Tuscan architect whose work found him fame in Detroit

Also on this day:

1471: The death of the flamboyant Pope Paul II

1928: The birth of former President of Italy Francesco Cossiga

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Johnny Dundee – world champion boxer

Sicilian changed his name to sound non-Italian

The boxer Johnny Dundee, who was a child when his family emigrated to the United States, was born in Sciacca, a town on the southwest coast of Sicily, on this day in 1893.

Johnny Dundee contested more than
330 professional bouts

Dundee, regarded by many boxing historians as the first of the great Italian-American fighters, had more than 330 fights in a 22-year career in the ring.

At the peak of his career, in the 1920s, Dundee won both the world featherweight and world junior-lightweight titles.

Dundee’s real name is thought to have been Giuseppe Curreri, although some boxing records have his second name as Carrora.  The large numbers of Italian immigrants arriving in New York at around the turn of the 20^th century, few of whom spoke any English, sometimes overwhelmed officers at the city’s processing station on Ellis Island and mistakes in recording details were common.

There are variations, too, in accounts of how old Giuseppe was when his family uprooted him from his childhood home, with some saying he was just five but others suggesting he was nine.

What seems not in dispute is that his family joined other Italian families in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, a tough area of overcrowded slums where gang warfare was rife and young men such as Giuseppe needed to learn quickly how to look after themselves.

It was as a street kid that Giuseppe was noticed by the boxing promoter Scotty Monteith, who would scour the working class neighbourhoods looking for potential fighters.  He noted that, though smaller and younger than many gang members, Giuseppe would rarely be on the losing side in a scrap.

A young Dundee pictured early in his career

He approached the youngster and asked if he would be interested in taking his fighting talent into the ring.  Naturally, given how little money his family had, he jumped at the chance – even though he was told at the outset he would have to change his name, at least when he was in the ring.

Racial stereotyping and prejudices were rife in New York at that time. Italians, particularly Sicilians, were regarded with suspicion, with many other ethnicities believing them to be dishonest and cowardly.

Most of the professional fighters were from Irish stock and Monteith knew he would find it hard to sell tickets to watch an Italian.  The story goes that he proposed he called himself ‘Johnny’ because it was a popular name in the Irish community and ‘Dundee’ because that was the Scottish town from which his own family originated.

The name change earned him a nickname – ‘the Scotch Wop’ – that would be unthinkable in today’s politically correct times.

As Dundee he won his first fight and went on to enjoy a career that brought him almost 200 wins, including 17 by knock-out, despite the general view that he lacked punching power.  He suffered only two knock-outs himself in his whole career.

Dundee was renowned for his quick
feet and skilful glovework

Apart from his quick feet and canniness in the ring, Dundee’s other great quality was his patience.  His first attempt at a world title, against the world featherweight champion Johnny Kilbane, came in his 87^th fight and ended in a draw.

He then had to wait eight more years, until fight number 265 in November 1921, for another opportunity.  This time, he was successful as opponent George ‘KO’ Chaney was disqualified, and Dundee was crowned world junior lightweight champion.

The following year the boxing board of New York recognised him as the world featherweight champion, when he beat Danny Frush by knockout.

Dundee successfully defended his junior lightweight crown three times in all and though he lost in to Jack Bernstein in 1923 he regained in a rematch with the same fighter later in the year.  Also in 1923, he unified the featherweight title by defeating Eugene Criqui.

Dundee lost both his titles in 1924 yet continued to box for another eight years before retiring in 1932 at the age of 38.  Only two professional fighters in history had contested more bouts and he is widely recognised as among the top five featherweights of all time.

Despite that, he fell on hard times in later life and was grateful for the generosity of his long-time supporter Ed Sullivan, the TV variety show host, whom he had befriended as a cub reporter and at whose wedding he was best man, in coming to his aid when he was almost destitute.

He died in New York in 1965 at the age of 71.

The view from Piazza Scandaliato in Sciacca

Travel tip:

The town of Sciacca, in the province of Agrigento on the southwest coast of Sicily, has a large fishing port and despite the presence of thermal baths is not a notable tourist destination, although it has a rich history going back to the seventh century BC, when the island was under Greek control. Its medieval centre has changed little over the years, with many streets and alleys too narrow for cars.  At the edge of the centre, the broad Piazza Scandaliato offers panoramic views across the harbour.

The well-preserved Temple of Concordia in Agrigento

Travel tip:

Around 62km (40 miles) along the coast southeast of Sciacca, the provincial capital Agrigento, a city of 55,000 inhabitants built on a plateau overlooking the sea, is regularly visited by tourists largely for the ruins of the Greek city Akragas, a UNESCO World Heritage Site generally known as the Valley of the Temples and, at 1,300 hectares, the largest archaeological site in the world.  Situated on a ridge rather than in a valley, the site features a series of temples, the most impressive of which is the Temple of Concordia, one of the largest and best preserved Doric temples in the world, with 13 rows of six columns, each 6m (20ft) high, still virtually intact.

Also on this day:

1877: The birth of Count Giuseppe Volpi, founder of the Venice Film Festival

1907: The birth of Luigi Baccali, Italy's first track gold medallist at the Olympics

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Gaetano Bresci - assassin

Anarchist who gunned down a king

Gaetano Bresci plotted to kill Umberto I while
working as a silk weaver in New Jersey

Gaetano Bresci, the man who assassinated the Italian king Umberto I, was born on this day in 1869 in Coiano, a small village near Prato in Tuscany.

He murdered Umberto in Monza, north of Milan, on July 29, 1900, while the monarch was handing out prizes at an athletics event.  Bresci mingled with the crowd but then sprang forward and shot Umberto three or four times with a .32 revolver.

Often unpopular with his subjects despite being nicknamed Il Buono (the good), Umberto had survived two previous attempts on his life, in 1878 and 1897.

Bresci was immediately overpowered and after standing trial in Milan he was given a life sentence of hard labour on Santo Stefano island, a prison notorious for its anarchist and socialist inmates.

He had been closely involved with anarchist groups and had served a brief jail term earlier for anarchist activity but had a motive for killing Umberto.

A silk weaver by profession, he was living in the United States, where he had emigrated in the 1890s and had settled in New Jersey with his Irish-born wife. 

Working as a weaver in a mill in Paterson, New Jersey, Bresci and others set about propagating anarchist ideas among the large local Italian immigrant population, eventually setting up a newspaper, La Questione Social.

An artist's idea of the scene in Monza as Bresci is
overpowered after shooting the king

Bresci became one of the main contributors to the paper, devoting much of his free time to writing and organising fellow anarchists, when he heard about a horrific event in Milan on May 6, 1898 that would determine the course of the rest of his life.

Following the so-called ‘bread riots’ - a prolonged campaign of strikes and demonstrations across Italy to protest against the rising cost of living - a mass demonstration of workers had taken place in Milan on that day.

There were outbreaks of violence and the Italian army were positioned to protect key buildings. The march took an increasingly threatening nature and, fearing an attack upon the Royal Palace, General Florenzo Bava-Beccaris ordered troops to fire on the crowd.

The shootings, known as the Bava-Beccaris massacre, officially left 80 people dead, although the true number was possibly double that.

Bresci was so incensed he vowed to avenge the workers who had been cut down on the streets of Milan that day and hatched his plot to kill the king.

He kept it a secret even from those fellow anarchists with whom he had worked so closely in Paterson. In May 1900, with no explanation, he asked for the return of a $150 loan he had made to set up La Questione, a move that left some of his comrades deeply bitter towards him.

Bresci set sail for Italy on May 17, 1900 and carried out his plan two months later.  His sentence was pronounced on August 29 and his friends and family consoled themselves with the knowledge that at least he was still alive.

However, only a year later he was dead, in mysterious circumstances, discovered hanged in his cell. His death was recorded as suicide but there were strong suspicions that he was kicked to death by prison guards, who attempted to conceal evidence from investigators by throwing his body into the sea.

How the abandoned prison on Santa Stefano looks today

Travel tip:

Santo Stefano is an island in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the west coast of Italy, part of the Pontine Islands.  The prison built by the Bourbons in 1797 remained in use until 1965. It was one of the prisons used extensively by the Fascists to imprison opponents of Benito Mussolini’s regime.  The future president of the republic, Sandro Pertini, was incarcerated there for a while.  These days, the island is uninhabited but for the tourists who visit each day.

The church of Saints Peter and Paul in Coiano

Travel tip:

The small hamlet of Coiano, where Bresci was born, can be found on the hills bordering the Elsa and the Elba valleys, near Castelfiorentino, about midway between Florence and Livorno, not far from Empoli. It is known for its monumental Romanesque church dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul in Via Francigena. It is a typical example of Romanesque12th century Pisa-Volterra architecture with a façade made of half sandstone and half brick, probably due to a collapse of the upper part.

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