From Prisoner to Patriarch: A New Orleans Love Story

Giovanni and Vergie DiStefano on their wedding day in New Orleans. Retired tailor Nunzio Giovanni “John” DiStefano is one of many Italian immigrants who moved to the United States in the 19th and 20th centuries in pursuit of the American Dream. But DiStefano’s story is no ordinary immigrant’s tale. Unlike most New Orleans area residents …

Finding Love Against the Odds: A New Orleans Wartime Romance

By Linda DiMarzio Massicot and Elisa Speranza "I fell in love with his ears,” said Dorothy Messina DiMarzio as she recalled the first time she saw her future husband, Ermanno. She was the daughter of Sicilian immigrants and he was an Italian prisoner-of-war. After the Allies defeated the Axis powers in North Africa in 1943, …

Italian POW Wife Recalls Unique Romance

“It all started with me,” said Marguerite Graffagnini Maranto. A spry 92-years-young, she spoke in the kitchen of her Hammond, LA home. Her eyes twinkled as she told the story of how she met her husband Mario back in 1944, when she was 17.

All’s fair in love and war—Italian POWs in New Orleans during World War II

In May of 1943, Allied forces defeated the Italian army in North Africa. 51,000 Italian prisoners-of-war (and about 380,000 Germans) were brought to the US and held on military bases across the country. About 900 of them were brought to Jackson Barracks, just outside New Orleans.