Slave Tales

I’ve written before about the PBS show Finding Your Roots, hosted by Prof. Louis Gates.  As an avid viewer for nine seasons the complex detective work by genealogists to uncover the roots of celebrity guests has intrigued me. But the show rarely wavers from its...

The DeSantis Offer

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis threw a lifeline to Donald Trump last week. The former president and perennial Democratic target was indicted by the Manhattan District Attorney and ordered to surrender this Tuesday for an undisclosed felony. Trump can either jet to New...

Cat Got My Tongue

According to the fun calendar I received last Christmas, March 28th is “Respect Your Cat Day.” Anyone who has visited Rome the past 20 years has noticed how its cat population overtook Torre di Largo Argentino, the square which also boasts the remains of...

Our Symbolic Heritage

House of Representative In March of 1919, newspaper editor Benito Mussolini founded the Partito Nazionale Fascista with a group of fellow veterans.  They took as their symbol the Roman fasces. That bundle of rods with an axe attached was created on the Italian...

A Ten-Foot Pole

Back in the day, Italian Americans were justifiably excited when one of their own achieved stardom.  In the 1930s, the elections of Fiorello LaGuardia and Angelo Rossi as mayors of New York City and San Francisco announced our arrival in the dominant Anglo/Celtic...