Lady Gaga plans to fund more than 160 classroom projects in El Paso, Dayton and Gilroy
Lady Gaga has been promoting messages of love and unity for a long time. Now, she's bringing those messages to life. The singer announced Friday that she will fully fund classroom project needs in Dayton, Ohio; El Paso, Texas; and Gilroy, California, after mass shootings in the cities in the past two weeks. "In this moment, I want to channel my con...
After 100 Years In Business, Opici Family Sees Further Opportunity Ahead
Throughout its 100-year history, Glen Rock, New Jersey-based Opici Group has been involved in every facet of the wine business. Today the company is an importer, a producer, and a distributor. Its supplier arm, Opici Wines, has a portfolio of 35 wine brands and eight spirits labels, which total roughly 700,000 cases and $40 million in annual revenu...
Italian American ONE VOICE Coalition Galvanizes Widespread Opposition to NEA Resolution to Eliminate Columbus Day
The Italian American ONE VOICE Coalition (“IAOVC”), a nationwide coalition of anti-bias activists, has assembled a Task Force, comprised of a wide array of Italian American organizations, to demand that the National Education Association (“NEA”) overturn its Resolution, passed at the NEA National Convention last month, to eliminate Columbus Day. “A...
You didn’t have to be Italian to enjoy Festa Italiana di Vandergrift
Italian music played through the speakers, Italian flags waved in the winds and the smell of meatballs and pizza wafted through the air Sunday in Vandergrift for the 16th annual Festa Italiana di Vandergrift. The event was in Kennedy Park, where nearly 20 vendors served food, drinks and other treats. The festival is put on each year by the Putignan...
Little Italy San Jose to be honored at SF Giants Game!
On Friday August 30th, Little Italy San Jose will be honored as the Non-Profit recipient at the San Francisco Giants game as part of Italian Heritage night. Italian clubs from all over Northern California will join together and celebrate in a pregame Italian feast that will include food, wine, cocktails, gelato and music. Little Italy will also h...
Il Fornetto Celebrates 20 Years in Sheepshead Bay
This August will be twenty years since Angelo Viscoso gave up on a career in engineering and opened il Fornetto on Emmons Avenue – continuing his family’s tradition of serving good food to good neighbors. Vicoso, 45, grew up in the business – his parents owned and ran Vesuvio, the beloved Bay Ridge pizzeria. His roommates in college joked with h...
In memory of late father, family gives $2,000 to kids at the Iowa State Fair — $5 at a time
Five dollars at the Iowa State Fair goes further than you think. Know the right stand and a snow cone, some cotton candy, a strawberry shake, a ride down the big slide or even an order of X-Treme Balls (pork tenderloin balled up on a kebob with pickles and onions) will only cost you a Lincoln. But all the Scarpino family wanted for their $5 was a s...
Should Alexandria Rename Columbus Day as Indigenous People’s Day?
Everybody knows what happened in 1492. Columbus sailed the ocean blue and landed in South America, right? The rest is history, or should it be? Vice Mayor Elizabeth Bennett-Parker and Councilor Mo Seifeldein have formally asked City Manager Mark Jinks to direct staff to create a formal resolution for council to vote on changing the name of Columbus...
Sammy Carlo’s Catering Honored by Walsh and Boston Main Streets
Where the Salesians Boys & Girls Club parking lot is today on Bennington Street once stood Sammy Carlo’s corner store. It was there, in the 1950s that a family business started that would, after seven decades and two locations, become a staple of many diets in East Boston. Now, one block away from its original location, Sammy Carlo’s Catering has b...
Brier Hill Italian Fest will salute its roots
The Brier Hill Italian Festival will open its 28th year by honoring its founder. At the opening ceremony at 7 p.m. Friday, the boccie courts at the corner of Calvin and Victoria streets – where the festival takes place – will be dedicated to the late Dominic “Dee Dee” Modarelli, The courts are part of the ITAM Post 12 war veterans club’s memorial t...
Grillo marks 20 years at helm of one of Jersey City’s biggest spectacles
For two decades Nicholas Grillo has been the impresario of La Festa Italiana at Holy Rosary Church in Downtown Jersey City, where neighborhood newcomers are joining what’s left of the old school Italians at the annual five-day festival. Grillo was in eighth grade at Holy Rosary grammar school when he began volunteering at the now 116-year-old feast...
Paul D'Amore (President of the St. Anthony’s Feast in Boston, MA)
Summer is the festival season. In the United States there are more than 200 that celebrate Italianity, according to the list published each year by OSIA. Some of these were born many years ago, from the desire of Italian emigrants to celebrate their country of origin, sometimes their region, sometimes their city: and almost always their religion an...