Paolo Di Canio - footballer

Sublime talent overshadowed by fiery temperament

Paolo Di Canio had four
successful years at West Ham

The brilliant but controversial footballer Paolo Di Canio was born on this day in 1968 in the Quarticciolo neighbourhood of Rome.

Di Canio, an attacking player with a reputation for scoring spectacular goals, played for several of Italy’s top clubs but also forged a career in Britain, joining Glasgow Celtic in Scotland and representing Sheffield Wednesday, West Ham United and Charlton Athletic during a seven-year stay in England.

After finishing his playing career back in Italy, he returned to England to become manager of Swindon Town and then Sunderland, although it was a brief stay.

Di Canio scored almost 150 goals in his career but his fiery temper landed him in trouble on the field while his political views - he was openly a supporter of fascism - attracted negative headlines off it.

Despite growing up in a working-class area of Rome which was a stronghold of AS Roma fans, Di Canio supported their city rivals SS Lazio from an early age.

As a child, he was overweight, but his love for football drove him to beat his addiction to junk food and high-calorie fizzy drinks and become supremely physically fit. 

He signed his first professional contract with Lazio in 1985 at the age of 17, having impressed with the club’s Under-19 team, spending a season on loan at the lower division club Ternana before making his senior debut in Lazio colours in October 1988.

Di Canio began his career with the
club he supported as a boy, Lazio

Lazio had won promotion to Serie A the previous season and Di Canio became an instant hero with Lazio fans when he scored the only goal in the first Rome derby of the season.

It soon became clear that Di Canio was a highly-talented player and it was not long before he earned a move to Juventus in 1990. However, he found himself competing for a place against such stars as Roberto Baggio, Salvatore Schillaci, Pierluigi Casiraghi, Fabrizio Ravanelli, Gianluca Vialli, and Andreas Möller and his displeasure at not being given more game time led to a falling-out with coach Giovanni Trapattoni.

He moved to Napoli and, after one season, to AC Milan, with whom he won a Serie A medal in 1996 but again could not hold down a permanent role in the side and departed after a row with their coach, Fabio Capello.

His next move was to Scotland, joining Celtic, where he scored 15 goals in 37 games in the 1996-97 season, easily the best return of his career. He was the Scottish Professional Footballers Association player of the year but after his demand for a substantial pay rise was knocked back he refused to travel on the club’s pre-season tour to the Netherlands and was swiftly offloaded.

Di Canio’s next club was in England, where manager David Pleat made the inspired decision to team him up with another Italian forward, Benito Carbone, at Sheffield Wednesday. As the two became a brilliant double act, scoring 25 goals between them in the 1997-98 Premier League season, Pleat’s gamble in paying £4.2 million for Di Canio looked to have paid off.

It all turned sour, however, in September of the following season in one of the most notorious incidents in the history of the Premier League when Di Canio was so incensed at being shown the red card by referee Paul Alcock in a match against Arsenal that he pushed the official to the ground. Banned for 11 matches and fined £10,000, Di Canio never played for Wednesday again.

Di Canio signing autographs on a return visit to Upton
Park in 2010. He had been hugely popular there

Yet by the following January, he was lighting up the Premier League again, this time with West Ham United, who had signed him for a bargain price of £1.5 million. His four years there were arguably the best of his career, bringing him 47 goals in 118 Premier League games. He might have stayed longer had they not been relegated in 2003, the club releasing him on a free transfer.

A year with another London club, Charlton Athletic, proved less successful and in 2004 he returned to Italy, rejoining his first club, Lazio. It was there that his political views came to the fore. Having revealed in his autobiography in 2001 that he was an admirer of Italy’s Fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini, he would sometimes celebrate a goal with a fascist salute, much to the delight of the far-right political factions among the Lazio fans.

Their adoption of Di Canio as a figurehead did not sit well with the club’s hierarchy, who felt the club’s reputation was being damaged. In 2006 his contract was not renewed. He signed instead for a lower league club, Cisco Roma, where he had two seasons before announcing his retirement in 2008.

Three years later, he returned to England to begin a career in management. In his first job, at Swindon Town, he won promotion to from League Two to League One in his first season and might have gone on to enjoy more success had the club not hit the rocks financially. He moved next to Sunderland, but his time on Wearside ended after only six months, despite him supervising a stunning 3-0 win away to arch rivals Newcastle United in only his second match.

Sunderland had lost their vice-chairman, the Labour politician David Miliband, and the patronage of the Durham Miners’ Association because of Di Canio’s political views, but it was after complaints from the players about his treatment of them that he was sacked in September, 2013.

Despite applying for several jobs subsequently, Di Canio has not worked in management again, although in an interview in 2021 he expressed a continuing desire to return to England should an opportunity arise.

The former police headquarters in Quarticciolo
is an example of the area's stark architecture

Travel tip:

Quarticciolo, which can be found about 10km (six miles) east of Rome’s city centre, is part of the Alessandrino district and is a predominantly working class neighbourhood. It was built by the Fascist regime in the late 1930s and bears many of the characteristics of the architectural styles favoured at the time, combining stark urban lines with occasional echoes of classicism. At its centre was the Casa del Fascio, which served as the municipal offices and the headquarters of the party. Residential apartments were strictly assigned depending on size of family or societal status, with some set aside for war widows, some for active soldiers, others to members of the Fascist militia. Ironically, as German troops occupied Rome after the fall of Mussolini in 1943, the area became a stronghold for partisans and resistance fighters and the operational base for Giuseppe Albano, a famous partisan known as Il Gobbo di Quarticciolo - the Hunchback of Quarticciolo - and his Gobbo Gang.

The Palazzo Spada, which dates back to the
mid-16th century, is one of Terni's older buildings

Travel tip:

Before he made his Serie A debut for Lazio, Paolo di Canio spent a period on loan with Ternana, a smaller club based in the city of Terni, in Umbria, which is situated about 95km (59 miles) north of Rome, near the border with Lazio. Terni was left in need of substantial renewal after the Second World War and therefore combines historical buildings with more modern ones. For example, in the central Piazza della Repubblica, which stands where the forum of the Roman city of Interamna was located, is the Palazzo Spada, which was designed by Antonio da Sangallo, who died in Terni in 1546. By contrast, the Corso del Popolo, the central thoroughfare behind Palazzo Spada, was built in the post-War period, while the Lancia di Luce, a 30m high steel artwork by Arnaldo Pomodoro, was added as recently as 1993.

Also on this day:

1879: The birth of musician Ottorino Respighi

1897: The birth of politician Manlio Brosio

1950: The birth of tennis star Adriano Panatta

1964: The birth of footballer Gianluca Vialli

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Charlie Cairoli - circus clown

Milan-born performer who became a Blackpool legend

Charlie Cairoli became one of the world's
most famous clowns

The circus clown Charlie Cairoli, who would at his peak set a world record by appearing at the Blackpool Tower Circus in England for 40 consecutive seasons, was born in Affori, now a suburb of Milan but then a town in its own right, on this day in 1910.

Cairoli performed at the Tower for the first time in 1939 and returned every year until 1979, quitting only when his health began to fail him.

The run was not broken even by the outbreak of the Second World War, which Britain entered soon after he arrived, or his own arrest as a suspected ‘enemy alien’. He was the Tower’s most popular attraction for almost all of those years.

Cairoli, though born in Italy, was actually from a French family, albeit one of Italian descent, who christened him Hubert Jean Charles Cairoli.

His father, Jean-Marie, was also a clown; his mother, Eugenie, came from another French circus family with Italian heritage, the Rocono. Charles - known as Carletto - and his brother Louis-Philippe became part of the show as young children. Carletto made his debut at the age of seven.

At that age, he was doing little more than fetching and carrying for his parents, who were the stars. By the age of 17, he was entrusted with the role that would make him famous, that of the slapstick character known in the circus as an auguste, the figure of fun who would inevitably end up with a custard pie in the face, their trousers ripped off or a bucket of water over their head. Cairoli adopted a red nose, a bowler hat and oversized shoes as his trade marks.

Charlie Cairoli and his wife, Violetta.
during the TV show This Is Your Life

When he was 24 and working in Paris with his father in their Cairoli Brothers act at the the Cirque Medrano at Montmartre, he met his future wife, Violetta Fratellini, then only 19 and also from a famous circus family, who was there as part of a knockabout acrobatic act. Carletto showed off his musical talent by serenading her on the clarinet. By Christmas 1934 they were married.

In the winter of 1938, the Cairolis went to work in a Christmas pantomime in Birmingham, England. Clem Butson, the manager of the Blackpool Tower Circus, saw them in action and offered them a contract for the 1939 summer season.

When war broke out in September, Cairoli found himself in a difficult position. His father had French nationality and his brother had gone back to fulfil his military service. But Cairoli was born in Italy and was therefore Italian.

Before the war began he had applied for French citizenship but the papers had not come through. He even made the dramatic gesture of taking a watch he had given by the German leader Adolf Hitler after a performance in Munich and throwing it into the sea off the end of Blackpool’s North Pier, in the hope it would make his allegiance clear.

Cairoli regularly ended his Blackpool Tower Circus
shows soaked to the skin

Nonetheless, along with many other Italians living in Britain, mainly in the catering industry, Cairoli was deported to the Isle of Man.

Happily, proof of his French citizenship had arrived by October and he was able to return to the mainland, where he and his father spent the winter working in a munitions factory and appearing in variety shows before returning to Blackpool Tower for the summer season.

Cairoli was fortunate that Blackpool Tower Circus continued to operate throughout the war years, its location on the Lancashire coast just far enough away from the major cities to be relatively safe from bombing. And with foreign acts unable to travel to England, the Cairolis thrived.

He and Violetta established a good life in Blackpool, where they would remain for the rest of their lives. Cairoli’s popularity as a performer grew and the arrival of television saw his profile rise substantially in the ‘60s and ‘70s, with frequent television appearances both in Britain and America.

At the same time, he became a regular on stage in variety shows and pantomime, especially during the winters, including the Grand Theatre in Leeds and Alhambra in Bradford. On one occasion, he brought Christmas shopping in Leeds to a standstill as he led hundreds of youngsters through the streets to the City Varieties, where he gave a special show.

Cairoli had musical talent as well as a gift for comedy

A measure of his status as one of Britain’s best-loved entertainers was an invitation in 1970 to appear on the hugely popular TV show This Is Your Life.

Cairoli continued with a hectic schedule of performances until 1979, when exhaustion forced him to miss a number of shows at the Tower. In November of that year he announced his retirement, which lasted only a few months, sadly.

He died in February 1980 at the age of just 70, at his home on Blackpool’s North Shore. His widow, Violetta, survived him by 22 years. One of their three children, also called Charlie, revived his father’s character for cabaret and pantomime performances, but never appeared at the Tower Circus.

The Villa Litta is a 17th century house within Milan's
oldest city park at Affori, where Cairoli was born

Travel tip:

Since 1923, Affori has been part of greater Milan and now has little to distinguish it from many other suburbs in the city, which now has a population of 1.25 million.  There is evidence of a settlement in the area since 915 and there are some remnants of a medieval town, notably a 14th century watch tower that forms part of a more modern building in Via Osculati. Affori’s main historical building today is the Villa Litta, a 17th-century house located within Milan’s oldest city park. The villa, originally built by Count Pirro I Visconti Borromeo in the style of the Medici villas of Tuscany, it was subsequently owned by several families of the Milanese aristocracy, namely the Corbella, the D'Adda and the Litta.

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The Piazza Santa Maria Novella in Florence, where Giuseppe
Garibaldi gathered support for his Expedition of the Thousand

Travel tip:

Violetta, Cairoli’s wife, was the granddaughter of Gustavo Fratellini, a circus trapeze artist and acrobat from Florence who was also a follower of Giuseppe Garibaldi, the patriotic general who led the drive to Italian unification in the 19th century, most notably with his Expedition of the Thousand, which claimed Sicily, Naples and the southern part of the mainland on behalf of the new Kingdom of Italy. Fratellini may have been inspired by a major speech Garibaldi gave to a crowd gathered in Piazza Santa Maria Novella as he toured the Italian cities, gathering recruits for his army of red shirts.

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More reading:

Moira Orfei - 'Queen of the Big Top'

The Venetian nobleman who fought to save Commedia dell'Arte

The comic genius of Ugo Tognazzi

Also on this day:

1564: The birth of astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei

1898: The birth of comic actor Totò

1927: The birth of Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, papal candidate

1944: Allied bombing destroys Monte Cassino Abbey

(Picture credits: Villa Litta by Goldmund100; Piazza Santa Maria Novella by Sailko; via Wikimedia Commons)

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Giuseppe Bonomi - architect

Roman who became famous for English country houses

Joseph Bonomi the Elder: a painting by John
Francis Rigaud (Royal Academy of Arts, London) 

The architect Giuseppe Bonomi, who became better known by his Anglicised name Joseph Bonomi after spending much of his working life in England, was born on this day in 1739 in Rome.

Records nowadays refer to him as Joseph Bonomi the Elder, to distinguish him from his son of the same name, who became a sculptor, artist and Egyptologist of some standing and tends to be described as Joseph Bonomi the Younger.

Joseph Bonomi the Elder is known primarily for designing a number of English country houses in the last two decades of the 18th century and the early years of the 19th.

Among these are Lambton Castle in County Durham, Barrells Hall in Warwickshire, Longford Hall in Shropshire and Laverstoke House in Hampshire.

He also designed the saloon the in grand house of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu in Portman Square in London, sadly destroyed during the Blitz in the Second World War.

A painting of Lambton Castle in County Durham, one of
several country houses in England designed by Bonomi

Bonomi’s father hailed from the Veneto and was an agent to members of the Roman aristocracy. Giuseppe was educated at the Collegio Romano, the Jesuit school in Rome that taught pupils from elementary school to university age.

Giuseppe was said by his son Ignatius to have been a pupil of the architect Antonio Asprucci, although other sources suggest his pupillage was with the nobleman and amateur architect, Girolamo Teodoli (or Theodoli), famed as the designer of the Teatro Argentina and the belltower of the church of Santa Maria dei Miracoli, both in Rome.

Bonomi worked in Rome initially and acquired a good enough reputation that a meeting in Rome in with Robert and James Adam, the Scottish architects and furniture designers who developed the Adam Style, led to an invitation to work for the brothers in London, who employed him as a draughtsman from 1768.

He continued in their London office until 1781 but became frustrated at not receiving any large commissions of his own.

Barrells House in Warwickshire featured the deep portico
that became one of Bonomi's trademarks

In the meantime, he had become a close friend of the Swiss painter Angelica Kauffman and married her cousin, Rosa Florini. In 1783 Kauffman persuaded Bonomi to move back to Rome, where he returned with his wife and children. He became a member of the Clementine Academy in Bologna and the Academy of St Luke in Rome, which pointed to the move being permanent.

However, the following year he returned to London, probably to work on the design of Dale Park, a country house at Madehurst in Sussex. He was to remain in London for the rest of his life.

An innovative designer whose style has been described as modernised Roman, he added touches that became associated with his designs, such as porticoes that were deep enough to provide a shelter for carriages.

He became a favourite of the English nobility, his clients including John Lamboton, Earl of Durham, for whom he built the now Grade II listed Lambton Castle, near Chester-le-Street, and Heneage Finch, the Earl of Aylesford for whom he built the gallery at Packington Hall in Warwickshire. Bonomi also built St James’s Church, within the estate.

His fame was such that he was mentioned in Jane Austen's novel Sense and Sensibility.

In 1804, Bonomi was appointed architect of St. Peter's at Rome, although this was apparently an honorary position only. He died in London in March 1808, aged 69, and was buried in the Marylebone Cemetery.  Another of his sons, Ignatius, followed in his father’s footsteps by becoming an important architect in England, where he was active in particular in the northeast.

The Teatro Argentina in Rome was built over the site of the
curia of the Theatre of Pompey, where Julius Caesar was killed

Travel tip:

The Teatro Argentina, now an opera house and theatre located in Largo di Torre Argentina, is one of the oldest theatres in Rome, constructed in 1731. Commissioned by the Sforza-Cesarini family and designed by the architect Gerolamo Theodoli, it is built over part of the curia section of the Theatre of Pompey, the location of the assassination of Julius Caesar. Duke Francesco Sforza-Cesarini, who ran the Teatro Argentina Theatre from 1807 to 1815, was a theatre fanatic who reportedly ran up huge debts in pursuit of his passion. Rossini’s The Barber of Seville was given its premiere there in February 1816, just after Duke Francesco's death.

Piazza del Collegio Romano in the Pigna district of Rome,
with the college building on the left

Travel tip:

The Collegio Romano was a school established by St. Ignatius of Loyola in 1551, just 17 years after he founded the Society of Jesus. It has occupied several locations, regularly moving to accommodate an increasing number of students, the final one being in the historic Pigna district of the city, on what is today called Piazza del Collegio Romano. Renamed the Gregorian University in 1584 after its benefactor, Pope Gregory XIII, it remained at that location until 1870, when the fall of Rome completed Italian unification. The Gregorian University moved to another location after the building was taken over by the Italian government. Today, its eastern wing houses the headquarters of the Ministry of Heritage and Culture.

More reading:

Luigi Vanvitelli - the 18th century's most famous architect

Rossini's Barber of Seville makes its debut in Rome

Francesco Zuccarelli - the landscape painter who appealed to English tastes

Also on this day:

1853: Verdi's Il Trovatore is performed for the first time

1935: The birth of Assunta ‘Pupetta’ Maresca – camorrista

1940: The birth of anti-Mafia judge Paolo Borsellino


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