24 January

Giorgio Chinaglia - footballer

Centre-forward from Carrara became a star on two continents

The footballer Giorgio Chinaglia, who would start his career in Wales before enjoying stardom in his native Italy and then the United States, was born on this day in 1947 in Carrara in Tuscany.  A powerful centre forward and a prolific goalscorer, Chinaglia scored more than 100 goals for Lazio. His 193 for New York Cosmos made him the all-time leading goalscorer in the North American Soccer League.  Chinaglia left Italy at the age of nine after his father, Mario, decided that his family would enjoy a more prosperous future abroad given the state of Italy's economy in the immediate wake of the Second World War.  Jobs at a Cardiff steelworks were advertised in the employment office in Carrara and Mario successfully applied.  He would eventually leave the steelworks to train as a chef, building on his experience as a cook in the army, and ultimately opened his own restaurant.  Read more…

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Galeazzo Maria Sforza - Duke of Milan

Effective leader with dark side

Galeazzo Maria Sforza, who became the second member of the Sforza family to take the title Duke of Milan, was born on this day in 1444 in Fermo, in what is now the Marche region.  Sforza was an effective ruler but is often remembered as a tyrant with a cruel streak.  He ruled Milan for just 10 years before he was assassinated in 1476.  In that time, Galeazzo did much to boost the economy of Milan and the wider area of Lombardia. He introduced measures to promote and protect the work of Lombard craftsmen and boosted agriculture by the introduction of jasmine farming and rice cultivation. Farsightedly, he realised that a healthy population was a more productive one and expanded the health institutions started by his father, Francesco Sforza.  He minted a new silver coin, the Testone, which carried an image of his profile on the reverse.  Read more…

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Assassination of Caligula

Controversial emperor killed by Praetorian Guard

Gaius Julius Caesar Germanicus, the Roman emperor usually referred to by his childhood nickname, Caligula, was assassinated at the imperial palace on the Palatine Hill in Rome on this day in 41AD.  His killers were officers of the Praetorian Guard who confronted him in an underground corridor at the imperial palace, where he had been hosting the Palatine Games, an entertainment event comprising sport and dramatic plays.  According to one account, Caligula was stabbed 30 times in a deliberate act of symbolism, that being the number of knife wounds some believe were inflicted on Julius Caesar, his great-great-grandfather after whom he was named, when he was murdered in 44BC. Most accounts agree that the chief plotter in Caligula’s murder, and the first to draw blood, was Cassius Chaerea, an officer Caligula was said to have frequently taunted. Read more…

Farinelli – music’s first superstar

Castrato rated among all-time opera greats

The opera singer Carlo Broschi – better known by his stage name of Farinelli – was born on this day in 1705 in the city of Andria in what is now Apulia.  Farinelli was a castrato, a type of classical male singing voice that was enormously popular from the 16th to the 18th century, one which had an enormous range and flexibility, a little like a female soprano but subtly different.  It was achieved through the somewhat barbaric practice of castrating a male singer before puberty, which is why there are no castrati today. Among other things, the procedure caused changes in the development of the larynx, meaning the voice effectively never breaks, and of the bones, including the ribs, which grew longer than in non-castrated boys and gave the castrato singer considerably enhanced lung power and capacity.  Read more…

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Arnoldo Foà – actor

Talented performer, director and writer worked into his 90s

Theatre and film actor Arnoldo Foà was born on this day in 1916 in Ferrara.  He began acting in the 1930s and was still appearing on stage after the year 2000 when he was over 90. He had parts in more than 100 films between 1938 and 2007.  Foà was born into a Jewish family living in Ferrara but moved with his family to live in Florence when he was three years old, eventually attending an acting school there.  He abandoned his economics and commerce studies in Florence at the age of 20 to move to Rome and attend the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia.  Foà began appearing on stage in the 1930s but his situation became difficult during the war. In order to earn money he had to stand in for actors when they were ill using a false name.  He eventually moved to Naples and when the Allies arrived worked for their radio station as an announcer. Read more…

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Davide Valsecchi - racing driver and TV presenter

Double GP2 champion’s track career ended in frustration

Davide Valsecchi, now a TV commentator but in his racing days rated as one of the best drivers never to be given a chance in Formula One, was born on this day in 1987 in Eupilio, a small town in the lake district of northern Italy.  Valsecchi was twice a champion in GP2, the category just below F1, but despite stints as a test driver and reserve driver for Lotus on the main Grand Prix circuit was never given a chance to compete at the top level.  Frustrated because he thought he deserved an opportunity, Valsecchi quit the sport but soon forged a career in television coverage of F1, first as an analyst and then as a commentator, becoming a popular figure with viewers for his excitable style.  He also co-presents the Italian version of the hit British car show, Top Gear.  Valsecchi made his debut in the Formula Renault and Formula 3 classes as young as 16. Read more…

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Book of the Day: Arrivederci Swansea, by Mario Risoli

As an unknown apprentice with Third Division club Swansea Town in the 1960s, Chinaglia stole milk bottles from doorsteps because he couldn't afford breakfast. Nine years later he was on an annual salary of £85,000. Chinaglia, who had lived in South Wales since he was eight, returned to his native Italy to rebuild his ailing career and, after spells with two Third Division clubs, he joined Roman side Lazio in 1969. There, in the Olympic Stadium, Chinaglia became the idol of the Lazio tifosi. In 1974 he finished Serie A top scorer with 24 goals and helped Lazio to their first - and so far, only - league title, pipping the traditional giants Juventus, Milan and Inter. Arrivederci Swansea tells his remarkable rags-to-riches story.

Mario Risoli is a journalist and writer. His first book, When Pele Broke Our Hearts, made the Sunday Times top-ten bestseller list and Arrivederci Swansea: The Giorgia Chinaglia Story, also received critical acclaim. He lives and works in Wales.

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23 January

NEW - Pina Carmirelli - violinist

Virtuoso trusted with 17th century masterpiece

Pina Carmirelli, who became one of Italy’s most gifted violinists of the 20th century, was born on this day in 1914 in Varzi, a town in the province of Pavia in Lombardy about 90km (45 miles) south of Milan.  Carmirelli enjoyed a brilliant career as a soloist and as a member of various chamber groups, the most notable of which was the Boccherini Quintet, which she co-founded with her husband, the cellist Arturo Bonucci, in order to revive interest in the music of the 18th century cellist, Luigi Boccherini.  She was held in such high regard that the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, where she taught for many years, allowed her use of one of the prized possessions of their Museum, the 1690 Tuscan, Medici violin that was one of a set of five instruments the great Antonio Stradivari built for Ferdinando de’ Medici, the Grand Prince of Tuscany.  Read more…

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Silvio Gazzaniga - sculptor

Milanese artist who designed FIFA World Cup trophy

Silvio Gazzaniga, the sculptor and medal-maker who created the trophy held aloft every four years by the winners of football’s World Cup, was born in Milan on this day in 1921.  Gazzaniga designed the trophy, with its spiralling lines depicting two players, with arms outstretched in triumph, carrying a globe on their shoulders, in 1971, after entering a competition organised by football’s world governing body, FIFA.  The organisation had been faced with a dilemma after the 1970 World Cup, when champions Brazil earned the right to keep the Jules Rimet Trophy, the prize for which the competition was originally played, by winning for the third time.  In the knowledge that they would need a new trophy before the next tournament, in 1974, they invited designers to submit their ideas, eventually collecting 53 proposals from artists all over the world. Read more…

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Salvatore Lima - politician

Christian Democrat MEP murdered by Mafia

Salvatore Lima, a politician strongly suspected of being the Sicilian Mafia’s ‘man in Rome’ before he was shot dead near his seaside villa in 1992, was born on this day in 1928 in Palermo.  The Christian Democrat MEP, usually known as Salvo, had been suspected of corruption as Mayor of Palermo in the 1950s and 60s and in his time as a member of the Chamber of Deputies, between 1968 and 1979, when he formed a close association with Giulio Andreotti, the three-times Italian prime minister whose rise to power was helped considerably by the support Lima garnered for him in Sicily.  Lima's links with the Mafia were established by a magistrates’ enquiry into his death when it was concluded that he was killed as an act of revenge following his failure to have sentences against 342 mafiosi accused in the so-called 'maxi-trial' of 1986-87 annulled or at least reduced.  Read more…

Giovanni Michelotti – car designer

The many Triumphs of Turin sports car genius

One of the most prolific designers of sports cars in the 20th century, Giovanni Michelotti died on this day in 1980 in Turin.   Known for his hard work and creative talent, Michelotti has been credited with designing more than 1200 different cars.  He worked for Ferrari, Lancia and Maserati in Italy but car firms abroad soon got to know about him and he also designed for Triumph and BMW.  Michelotti was born in Turin in 1921 and worked for coach building firms before opening his own design studio in 1959.  The first of his designs put into production was for an Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 in 1947.  Among the legendary sports cars designed by Michelotti in Italy are the Ferrari 166 MM and the Maserati Sebring.  In Britain he was responsible for many successful Triumphs, including the famous Spitfire, Stag and TR4. Read more…

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Muzio Clementi – composer and pianist

Musician is remembered as ‘father of the piano’

Composer Muzio Clementi, whose studies and sonatas helped develop the technique of the early pianoforte, was born on this day in 1752 in Rome.  He moved to live in England when he was young, where he became a successful composer and pianist and started a music publishing and piano manufacturing business. He also helped to found the Royal Philharmonic Society in London.  Clementi was baptised Mutius Philippus Vincentius Franciscus Xaverius the day after his birth at the Church of San Lorenzo in Damaso in Rome.  His father was a silversmith, who soon recognised Clementi’s musical talent and arranged for him to have lessons from a relative, who was maestro di cappella at St Peter’s Basilica.  By the time he was 13, Clementi had already composed an oratorio and a mass and he became the organist at his parish church, San Lorenzo in Damaso. Read more…

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Luisa Casati – heiress and muse

Outrageous marchioness saw herself as a living work of art

The heiress, socialite and artist’s muse Luisa Casati, known for her outlandish dresses, exotic pets and hedonistic lifestyle, was born on this day in 1881 in Milan.  Casati, born into a wealthy background, married a marquis – Camillo, Marchese Casati Stampa di Soncino – when she was 19 and provided him with a daughter, Cristina, a year later, yet the marriage was never strong and they kept separate residences from an early stage.  It was not long before she tired of a life bound by formalities and the strict rules of etiquette and everything changed after she met the poet, patriot and lothario Gabriele D’Annunzio. They became lovers and D’Annunzio introduced her to the world of writers and artists.  Tall, almost painfully thin and with striking looks, she became a creature of fascination for many young artists, who craved the chance to paint her.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Stradivari, His Life And Work (1644-1737), by W Henry Hill, Arthur F Hill and Alfred E Hill

The Hill family’s Antonio Stradivari: His Life and Work (1644–1737) has been a cornerstone of reference for students of the great Italian luthiers since its publication in 1902, yet is also a genuinely absorbing read. W E Hill and Sons of London for much of the 20th century were the world’s foremost dealers in violins and other musical instruments and handled and authenticated more Stradivari instruments than anyone in history.  The 1690 Tuscan, Medici which Pina Carmirelli played for 15 years passed through their hands on several occasions. Written by three of  founder William Ebsworth Hill's four sons, the book reconstructs Stradivari’s biography despite sparse archival records, discussing his apprenticeship (likely with the Amati family), his marriage, children, and workshop, and makes a careful attempt to place him within the social and economic life of 17th-18th‑century Cremona. It also provides a detailed analysis of the development of his style as a luthier, dividing his career into four distinct periods, with much technical detail of how his instruments were constructed. There is also a descriptive catalogue of known Stradivari instruments and fascinating sections on his workshop and the materials he used, with a whole chapter devoted to the Cremonese varnish alone. 

W E Hill and Sons was founded in 1880 by the violin and bow maker William Ebsworth Hill, establishing a reputation for the quality of the instruments they produced and as an authority on fine instruments generally, which was continued by his sons, William Henry, Arthur, Alfred and Walter. Based originally in Wardour Street, the firm occupied premises in New Bond Street for 80 years before moving to a country house location in Buckinghamshire, returning to London in 2018 to their present headquarters and workshop in Hampstead. 

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Pina Carmirelli - violinist

Virtuoso trusted with 17th century masterpiece

Pina Carmirelli quickly established herself as
one of Italy's most talented violinists

Pina Carmirelli, who became one of Italy’s most gifted violinists of the 20th century, was born on this day in 1914 in Varzi, a town in the province of Pavia in Lombardy about 90km (45 miles) south of Milan.

Carmirelli enjoyed a brilliant career as a soloist and as a member of various chamber groups, the most notable of which was the Boccherini Quintet, which she co-founded with her husband, cellist Arturo Bonucci, in order to revive interest in the music of the 18th century cellist, Luigi Boccherini.

She was held in such high regard that the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, where she taught for many years, allowed her use of one of the prized possessions of their Museum, a 1690 violin that was one of a set of five instruments the great luthier Antonio Stradivari built for Ferdinando de’ Medici, the Grand Prince of Tuscany.

Carmirelli played the precious instrument, known as the 'Tuscan, Medici' in numerous recitals and concert performances between 1962 and 1977, as well as in some recordings, notably those with the Boccherini Quintet.

As a child, Pina Carmirelli is thought to have been inspired to follow a career in music by her grandfather, the conductor and composer Carlo Podesta. She began studying music and performing as a concert pianist at a very young age. 

She also had a music-loving uncle in Cremona, which - thanks to the Stradivari, Amati and Guarneri families and others - is steeped in the traditions of violin-making. Carmirelli visited the historic city throughout her childhood and it became something of a spiritual home. 

Later, as a student of Teresina Tua and Michelangelo Abbado, she graduated from the Conservatorio di Musica “Giuseppe Verdi” in Milan in violin in 1930, and in composition five years later.

Carmirelli with the Boccherini Quintet soon after it
was formed. Arturo Bonucci is on the right, seated

She was awarded the Stradivari Prize in 1937 and the Paganini Prize in 1940, which cemented her status as one of the most gifted young violinists in Italy. 

Carmirelli’s distinguished career was notable for her deep affinity for Classical and early Romantic music. Along with her husband, who was 20 years her senior, she formed the Boccherini Quintet in 1950, followed by the Carmirelli Quartet in 1954, also featuring Bonucci.

She also became first violin of I Musici, the chamber orchestra from Rome, formed in 1952, which became well known for their interpretations of Baroque and other works, particularly those of Antonio Vivaldi and Tomaso Albinoni.

The orchestra consisted of 12 musicians, most of whom were students of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia. They were so successful that their recordings of Vivaldi’s most famous work, his collection of violin concerti known as The Four Seasons, sold more than 25 million copies.

Bonucci, who she met in 1938 and soon married, was a decorated pilot as well as a musician, but also a committed opponent of the Fascist regime, a stance shared by Carmirelli. 

In later years, Carmirelli played often at
the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont

They collaborated in the revival of Luigi Boccherini’s music after Carmirelli, on tour in Paris, discovered by chance in the library of the Paris Conservatory a complete collection of Boccherini’s works for strings, which had been long forgotten. Carmirelli persuaded the Italian consulate to buy them on her behalf before she and Arturo painstakingly worked through 147 string quintets for two cellos and over 84 string quartets, forming their Boccherini Quintet in order to do them justice in front of an audience.

While Carmirelli’s career was rooted in Italy, she also performed extensively abroad, including in the United States. Her American engagements included chamber tours, guest appearances with orchestras, and collaborations that helped introduce European chamber traditions to US audiences.

For example, she became a regular at the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont, which she visited for the first time in 1964, not long after the death of Arturo, for whom she was still in mourning. She admitted that the sense of community at the festival allowed her to set aside some of her sadness and feel part of a family again, sharing her knowledge and experience with countless musicians in the years that followed.

Carmirelli, who had by then enjoyed a 50-year association with the Accademia di Santa Cecilia, died in 1993 in a town today known as Capena, in northern Lazio, some 35km (21 miles) north of Rome. She had reached the age of 79.

Varzi, the Lombardy village that was Pina Carmirelli's
birthplace, has a well-preserved medieval centre

Travel tip:

Varzi, where Pina Carmirelli was born, designated by the Associazione I Borghi più belli d’Italia as one of Italy’s most beautiful villages, is the gateway to the Upper Oltrepò region, an unspoiled area of the Apennines located at the southern tip of Lombardy, close to the borders with Piedmont to the west, Emilia-Romagna to the east and Liguria to the south. It is characterised by medieval architecture largely unchanged for centuries. Historical attractions include the 13th century Malaspina Castle and Witches’ Tower, the 18th century Palazzo Tamburelli, the 16th century Chiesa di San Germano and the Oratories of the Bianchi and the Rossi, built in the 17th century in different architectural styles, one late Renaissance, the other Baroque. Remnants of the medieval walls are visible in the towers of Porta Soprana and Porta Sottana. Varzi is famed for its Salame di Varzi DOP, which supposedly owes its flavour to being cured by the breezes from the Ligurian Sea. A crucial stop along the Via del Sale trade route, which connects the Po Valley with the Ligurian coast, Varzi enjoyed great prosperity from the 13th century onwards under the Malaspina family, who built many of the buildings that distinguish the village today.

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The inner courtyard of the Conservatorio di Santa
Cecilia, where Carmirelli taught for many years

Travel tip:

The Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, one of the oldest musical institutions in the world, was established in 1565. It was founded in Rome by Pope Sixtus V at the Church of Santa Maria ad Martires, better known as the Pantheon. Over the centuries, many famous composers and musicians have been members, among them in recent times the opera singers Beniamino Gigli and Cecilia Bartoli. Since 2005 the Academy’s headquarters have been at the Parco della Musica in Rome, which was designed by the architect Renzo Piano, in Viale Pietro de Coubertin in the Flaminio district, close to the location of the 1960 Summer Olympic Games. Previously, the Accademia was based at the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia, which dates back to 1875. Entrances can still be seen in Via dei Greci and Via Vittoria, not far from the Spanish Steps in central Rome.  The museum housing the 1690 Tuscan, Medici violin and the other instruments that comprised the Medici Quintet is located in the Parco della Musica complex. In the exhibition gallery some 130 instruments are on display and about 50 luthiery tools in an open-air laboratory where the museum luthiers work.

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More reading:

Why Luigi Boccherini spent his last years in Madrid

Niccolò Paganini, the violinist whose extraordinary talent aroused bizarre suspicions

The 17th century luthier whose instruments are still seen as the best in the world

Also on this day:

1752: The death of composer and pianist Muzio Clemente

1881: The birth of heiress and muse Luisa Casati

1921: The birth of sculptor and trophy-maker Silvio Gazzaniga

1928: The birth of controversial politician Salvatore Lima

1980: The death of car designer Giovanni Michelotti

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22 January

Giuseppe Musolino - brigand

Vengeful killer who became an unlikely folk hero

Giuseppe Musolino, the Calabrian bandit whose fight for justice after a wrongful conviction turned him into a folk hero despite the multiple murders he committed in a quest for vengeance, died on this day in 1956 in a psychiatric hospital in Reggio Calabria.  He was 79 years old when he passed away, having been just 22 when he was sentenced to 21 years in prison for an attempted murder he swore he did not commit, with the evidence against him no better than circumstantial.  He escaped after just three months and embarked upon a killing spree in which he may have murdered as many as nine individuals and attempted the murder of several others, all of whom had played a part in what he saw as a corrupt trial.  The revenge killings took place during his two years and nine months on the run, during which Calabrians had taken to him as a symbolic figure. Read more…

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The Battle of Anzio

Key moment in World War II brought heavy casualties

British and American troops landed on the beach at Anzio, a coastal town south of Rome in the region of Lazio, in the early hours of the morning on this day in 1944.  The Allies were planning to dislodge German troops blocking the route to Rome and to liberate the capital city quickly, but the Battle of Anzio was to last for many months and cause the deaths of thousands of soldiers on both sides.  Operation Shingle, the name for the complex amphibious landing, had been the idea of the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, as he lay in bed recovering from pneumonia in December 1943. His concept was to land two divisions of men at Anzio, and nearby Nettuno, bypassing the German forces entrenched across the Gustav Line in central Italy, to enable the Allies to take Rome.  But the operation was opposed by German troops, as well as forces from the newly-created Italian Social Republic. Read more...

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Papal Swiss Guard

Colourful uniforms camouflage highly trained security professionals

The Pope’s Swiss Guard was founded on this day in Vatican City in 1506.  A contingent of guards from Switzerland has continued to guard the Pope from that day to present times and it is one of the oldest military units still in existence.  The Swiss had been producing mercenary soldiers for hundreds of years with a reputation for loyalty and good discipline.  In the 15th century they were known for their good battle tactics and were employed by many European armies.  Pope Julius II ordered the first Swiss troops to guard the Vatican and they arrived in Rome on 22 January, 1506, the official date now given for the foundation of the Papal Swiss Guard.  The Pope later gave them the title ‘Defenders of the Church’s freedom’.  Recruits to the Pope’s Swiss Guard unit have to be Catholic men of Swiss nationality who have completed military training and can produce evidence of their good conduct. Read more…

Carlo Orelli – soldier

The last trench infantryman

Carlo Orelli, the last surviving Italian soldier to have served at the start of Italy's involvement in the First World War, died on this day in 2005 at the age of 110.  Orelli had signed up for active duty at the age of 21 and joined the Austro-Hungarian front after Italy joined the war on the side of Britain, France and Russia in May 1915.  He took part in combat operations near Trieste, experiencing the brutality of trench warfare and seeing many of his friends die violent deaths, but after receiving injuries to his leg and ear he spent the rest of the war in hospital.  Orelli was born in Perugia in 1894, but his family moved to Rome, where he was to spend most of the rest of his life living in the Garbatella district.  He came from a military background and had a grandfather who had helped to defend Perugia against Austrian mercenaries in 1849.  Read more…

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Frankie Yale - gang boss

Mobster who employed a young Al Capone

The gang boss who gave Al Capone one of his first jobs was born on this day in 1893 in Longobucco in Calabria.  Francesco Ioele, who would later become known as Frankie Yale, moved to the United States in around 1900, his family settling into the lower Manhattan area of New York City.  Growing up, Ioele was befriended by another southern Italian immigrant, John Torrio, who introduced him to the Five Points Gang, which was one of the most dominant street gangs in New York in the early part of the 20th century.  In time, Ioele graduated from petty street crime and violent gang fights to racketeering, changing his name to Yale to make him sound more American and taking control of the ice delivery trade in Brooklyn.  With the profits Yale opened a waterfront bar on Coney Island, which was called the Harvard Inn. It was there that he took on a young Capone as a bouncer. Read more…

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Antonio Todde - supercentenarian

Sardinian shepherd holds record as oldest Italian man in history

Antonio Todde, who was the oldest living man in the world before he died at the age of 112 years 346 days in 2002 and remains the oldest Italian man in history, was born on this day in 1889 in Tiana, a mountain village in Sardinia.  There are 19 other Italians who have attained a higher age, but all are women. Maria Giuseppa Robucci, from Apulia, died in 2019 at the age of 116 years 90 days. Emma Morano, from Piedmont, who died in 2017 aged 117 years 137 days, remains the oldest Italian of all time.  Todde was the world’s most senior male centenarian from the death of the American John Painter on March 1, 2001 until his own death 10 months later.  He was born to a poor shepherd family in Tiana, about 140km (87 miles) north of Cagliari in the Gennargentu mountains, about 55km (34 miles) southwest of the provincial capital, Nuoro.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: King of the Mountains: The Remarkable Story of Giuseppe Musolino, Italy's Most Famous Outlaw, by Dan Possumato

In 1897, a young Calabrian peasant named Giuseppe Musolino was sentenced to 21 years of hard labour for a crime he did not commit. However, defying all odds, he orchestrated a daring escape and embarked on a relentless pursuit of those responsible for his wrongful conviction, exacting a chilling and deadly retribution.  Evading capture for nearly three years, he cunningly outmanoeuvred a vast manhunt consisting of hundreds of local and regional police, the Carabinieri, and even an Italian Army regiment. As Possumato details in King of the Mountains, Musolino's exploits transformed him into a beloved Robin Hood figure among the inhabitants of the mezzogiorno, the impoverished southern region of Italy. However, to the authorities, he was a cold-blooded murderer who had to be stopped.  Eventually apprehended, the Ministry of Justice relocated his trial 600 miles to the north, from Reggio di Calabria to Lucca, due to its belief that no jury in the south would convict him. The trial captured the attention of newspapers around the world. When Giuseppe Musolino passed away in 1956, half a century after his capture, TIME magazine aptly remarked: "Few adventurers, past or present, have become so legendary in so short a time." 

Dan Possumato is a retired US Army administrative officer and a former special investigator for the Department of State. Dan's grandfather, Giovanni Musolino, was a first cousin of Giuseppe Musolino. Dan currently lives in Maine with his wife, Ellen.

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