It all started with a boat. Joseph Cortese, founder of Little Italy Pizzeria, made the journey to America along with many other Italian immigrants in the 1960s. Cortese immigrated to the country when he was 10 years old. He could not speak English when he arrived, so he started working as a dishwasher at a pizza restaurant.

After turning 18, he owned his first pizza restaurant in Florida during the 1970s. It was not until 1991 that the Cortese family would move to Athens, Georgia where his and others’ efforts have given rise to a family-wide Italian food operation that spans the cities of Athens, Gainesville, Auburn and Tuscaloosa, and now, Statesboro, too.