Life between romance and crime
by Alda Amadori Palmas (wife of Giuseppe Palmas)
Questa pagina in Italiano

Thinking back on life with my husband there are many facts and events, both happy and painful, which come to the surface. It was not always easy to live with him, but the accumulated experiences enriched my existence and looking back, on balance, are positive.

We were married in 1946 after an engagement which was not altogether approved of, and departed for Milan the day we were married. He had his elementary teaching degree in his pocket, and I had completed three years of a degree in pharmacy, with several exams still to take due to the war. But at that point being alive and unharmed after World War II was already important capital. Everything else was possible. My husband's guts and determination seemed to be able to open all doors.

At first I hit up against a hard reality I hadn't known before, but gradually I was also swept up by enthusiasm for hard work and adventure. Pino, his family nickname, loved to write. He wrote quickly, in a simple and concise style. Under a pseudonym he even published a few romance novels which were modestly successful.

One day we met a friend of his from Cesena who had been in Milan for some time, and, like exiles in a foreign country, we started talking about our hopes and dreams. Pino's most ardent dream was to become a journalist, and it just so happened that this friend knew the chief editor of "Corriere Lombardo", the then famous Ciro Poggiali, and he could arrange for them to meet. The next day Pino met Poggiali and he decided to take Pino on staff on a temporary basis. When he wanted to, Pino could be sweet and charming. This was a turning point. My husband threw himself lock, stock and barrel into this new career, with great results. He certainly had the means to become a great journalist, but his career was destined to take another turn.

He was assigned to the crime section. I often joined him as he roamed about Milan - making the rounds of the police commissaries in search of news, jumping from one tram to another. He was soon promoted to cover police headquarters, a more rewarding position but also more demanding since he had to be on night duty. A few times we went to the printing press to see the newspaper being printed and get the first copy, which he liked to call "tomorrow's newspaper". Pino often got home at dawn and, to my great delight, would wake me up to tell me the events, including tragic ones, he had come across during the night. He got to be friends with the police superintendent Agnesina, who passed on lots of information to him. Pino had a real nose for news and managed to get the scoop on quite a few stories including that of Rina Fort, a murder story which created a great sensation at the time. He was often able to transform the most banal misdemeanor into "poetry", always finding some sort of psychological justification for the crime committed. Indeed, more than one time that he started up a collection at work to help out some poor wretched soul. He loved to read us his pieces before they were published. I remember the time in Milan as one of the nicest in my life, thanks to so many interesting encounters and new discoveries. All doors were open to us. And our house was also open to everyone, frequented by people like Mosca or Guareschi. I remember that Guareschi, proud of his roots in Emilia, would always tease us about our loyalty to Romagna, while thoroughly enjoying our Romagna cuisine. On Sunday when there were track and field events we always went to the Arena. In his youth my husband had been a fairly good athlete and he was always a bit nostalgic about the track. There we inevitably met another famous "Romagnolo", Vittorio Bonicelli, an old and dear friend who was as homesick as we were.

In 1950 our lives took another turn. My husband, who had become a special correspondent, was sent to report on the Polesine flood, accompanied by a photographer. He got the idea that he could also take on this task, having always been interested in photography. So he became a press photographer.

Soon afterwards he quit the newspaper and opened a press photography agency. He got some other friends (Gillo Faedi and Giacomo Baldazzi) from Cesena to join him. There was plenty of work; at one time there were 14 people working in the agency. Some of his colleagues eventually became famous, but Pino was never jealous of their success. One of his best qualities was generosity. As I said, the agency functioned, but Pino was always out and about, uninterested in the economic side of the business and after a while the agency shut down.

Pino then decided to move to Rome. It was 1953. He started working for Marcello Maggiori's press photography agency, located near Via Veneto. Eventually Pino took over the agency. We lived in Viale Mazzini near the Television headquarters, another source of news. The first, of course, was the movie industry. By then I had graduated from pharmacy school and divided my time between Sezze Romano, where I was managing a pharmacy, and Rome, and later between Tivoli and Rome, where Pino was very well-known and sought after. He portrayed many actors and actresses, and I often had the chance to get to know them personally.

My husband was a restless soul and, above all he missed his Romagna. He tired of the chaotic life in Rome and badly wanted to return home. So, for the third time, we left everything and moved back to Cesena.

In his home town Pino opened a photography studio with an attached art gallery and continued to work for various Italian and international newspapers and agencies. As usual, however, unperturbed and disinterested, he overlooked the economic aspects of the business and it was never profitable. After a few years he fell ill with cancer and died in 1977, leaving behind a rather muddled financial situation but also his precious photographic archive and the memory of a life full of changes. But along with these changes, sometimes also painful, came wider horizons.

Alda Amadori Palmas