It was October 1906. The place: southern Italy, the boot, Calabria — across the Strait of Messina from Sicily. Our subject: Pietro Giovinazzo. Keep your eye on Pietro. According to family lore, Pietro was a stowaway on a ship from his native Reggio Calabria to America.
He couldn’t get the papers to legally emigrate because he had pulled a knife on a policeman during a fight in his hometown. He was quite the rabble rouser, who always had a knife or gun and knew how to use both. “He wasn’t afraid of the Devil himself,” said my Uncle Bruno, ultimately one of Pietro’s many grandsons.
