Laura DiNello cultivates a family mosaic in Charleston
The story of Laura DiNello is as layered as the mosaic masterpieces that she's known for. The self-taught Italian-American artist grew up in Chicago in a culture that frowned upon visual art as a valid profession, especially for women. Most family and friends saw DiNello's drawings and paintings as a cute hobby. When she announced that sh...
Villa Tronco prepares to celebrate 75 years in Columbia
By Allen Wallace As American soldiers arrived at Fort Jackson in 1940 to prepare for what soon would become World War II, many were served home-cooked meals by a woman who ran a fruit stand across from a bus station on Blanding Street. Sadie Tronco's acts of kindness for the soldiers led her to found a restaurant that will celebra...
Italian family thanks soldier's Rock Hill family
Gaetano and Caroline Simonelli were just children on a farm in Nazi-occupied Italy in 1943 when a fighter plane screamed across the sky and crashed within feet of their home. The pilot was killed. The Simonelli family, devout Roman Catholics, buried him right there on the farm. In a Rock Hill cemetery 71 years later an old man named Bobby...
Huntsville connection to Italian astronaut aboard International Space Station
A Soyuz spacecraft has safely docked at the International Space Station, beginning the Expedition 42 Futura mission. It transported an American and Russian astronaut, as well as Italian Samantha Cristoforetti.She's a flight engineer with the European Space Agency. But before all of that, she attended Space Camp at the US Space and Rocket C...
Mayor Joe Riley to raise curtain on his final Spoleto
by Bruce Smith It will be a poignant scene on Friday when the new season of the internationally renowned Spoleto Festival USA opens with a brass fanfare and speeches on the steps of Charleston City Hall. It will be the last time that Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr., who helped bring Spoleto to Charleston almost four decades ago, p...
Sons of Italy to award scholarships
The Sons of Italy in America St. Augustine Lodge 2780 is accepting applications for scholarships for the 2015-16 school year. Scholarships are open to any current St. Johns County High School student with a demonstrable Italian-American heritage (of any proportion) and will be judged by the following primary criteria. ■ Applicants mus...
New season of Spoleto Festival USA opens Friday
The new season of the Spoleto Festival USA lights up stages across Charleston beginning on Friday. Here's a guide to this year's edition of the internationally known arts festival. A bit of history — Spoleto was founded in Charleston in 1977 by the renowned composer Gian Carlo Menotti, modeled after and as a companion to his Festival of T...
Rigoletto onstage at SMDCAC, August 15 & 16
The South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center and Miami Lyric Opera will present Rigoletto on Aug. 15 at 8 p.m. and Aug. 16 at 4 p.m. Miami Lyric Opera masterfully performs the classic work that defined Italian opera, Giuseppe Verdi's Rigoletto at the South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center. Famous for mocking the husbands of the women the...
Eighth annual Nuovo Cinema Italiano invites us into the heart of Italy
"Passione. Musica. Violenza. Vita." These four words flashed on the screen amidst clips of fighting, dancing, kissing and beautiful Italian scenery. And so started a weekend full of Italian theatre. This past weekend, the eighth annual Nuovo Cinema Italiano Film Festival took place in the Sottile Theatre in full force. The College of Charl...
After 27 years of Memphis Italian Festival, the gravy still stands alone
Come Thursday, East Memphis will host its own version of Smoke on the River. Call it Pasta in the Park, Gravy in the Grove or, officially, Memphis Italian Festival. As they've done since 1989, folks will gather to show off their heritage through their food, and some fun will be had along the way. They'll compete in homemade wine. They...
Celebrate Italian-American Month with Outdoor Concert by Italian Tenor, Joseph Spinella in Bradenton, Florida
On Friday, October 25, 2013, internationally-renowned tenor, Joseph Spinella performs a concert with with music from his new show, illusionAria, combining classical Italian songs with some new arrangements created exclusively for the show. The show is in celebration of Italian-American month, which recognizes the contributions people of Italian des...
3 bodies, coffin stolen from mausoleum at Italian Club Cemetery in Ybor
Grave robbers struck a mausoleum at the Italian Club Cemetery in Ybor. Investigators said someone broke into one of the mausoleums and stole a coffin with three bodies inside. It is not known when the crime happened because the cemetery has little traffic. The stolen coffin contained the bodies of Carlos Spicola, who died in 1914, Ma...