Italian-American Herald - January 2023

LOCAL HISTORY
Padre Pio touched many lives, including some close to home
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JANUARY 2023
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A MONTHLY NEWSPAPER SERVING THE ITALIAN-AMERICAN COMMUNITY WWW.ITALIANAMERICANHERALD.COM Return to Sicily
Mystical island abounds with wonders - both natural and man-made
Illustrative map of Sicily, Italy.
ADOBESTOCK.COM
By Jeanne Outlaw-Cannavo
Sicily, Persephone and Trinacria. These are just a few names bestowed on the beautiful island in the Mediterranean Sea. It was Persephone I was thinking of as I saw the island rise from the sea during my first visit in 1996 as our traghetto (ferry) crossed the strait of Messina. Sicily has been forged by the cultures of Greek, Roman, Byzan- tine, Arab, Norman, German and Spanish
Bourbons which has left a diverse legacy
for today’s Sicilians. I was excited to meet my husband’s family and to explore the homeland of his ancestors. I never imagined it would become my second home and such an integral part of my life.
We spent numerous summers living
on the island and tried to return every few years. After our last visit in 2018 we could not wait to return. When travel restrictions began to ease, we made plans to return this
past September.
As we prepared to land in Catania in
mid-September, I looked out the window for the imposing sight of Mount Etna. The highest and most active volcano in Europe is visible from well over half of the island on a clear day and this year I was determined to see it up close in person.
On the ride to Graniti I noticed how
See SICILY - page 4
Visit to ancestral home was ‘life-changing,’ so she kept going back
By Ken Mammarella
When Virginia (Ginger) DiGalbo tells her life story, two themes recur: her Italian heritage and the importance of her large and welcoming family.
“I’ve always been very proud of my Italian heritage, and I made that a priority,” she said. She shares that pride with the
2,000 members of Società Bell’Italia, a Facebook group she founded. “I’m very proud that I finally learned Italian, and I am very proud to say I could travel around Italy by myself.”
Her first trip – in 1988, with her parents and daughter – was to meet her mother’s relatives for the first time. And time in the hamlet of Ferrari di Serino – where her family
goes back to 1525 – reminded her of the 1950s in Mount Laurel, N.J., her lifelong home.
Her next trip will be this coming summer, with 10 relatives, for the wedding of a fourth cousin.
In between were 15 trips in which she and her husband used all their vacation – at
See DIGALBO - page 6
Vol. 10 / No. 1