La Basilicata nel Mondo (People from Basilicata in the World) was an illustrated monthly magazine produced by Giovanni Riviello in Naples, Italy. It was one of the mostly widely distributed Italian magazines abroad. It regularly featured natives from the southern Italian region of Basilicata (also known by its ancient name Lucania) who were excelling in America.
From lawyer to skyscraper builder • Anthony Campagna • 1925
When the lawyer Antonio Campagna was forced to embark for America, on a ship loaded with much pain and little human hope, perhaps I think, with sadness, that fate was evil for him and forever precluded the way to success, which he – fervent with talent and activity – had set out to achieve through his legal studies and the practice of the bar. Perhaps even he, during the silent nights of the Ocean and the talks with the sea, I despair that in the land of “business” fate would have induced him to relegate his toga and pandettes [books of law] to the cobwebs of the attic and would still humiliate him, and persecuted, bending him for the needs of life to the hardest work.
And, perhaps, while sailing he regretted having entrusted himself to the Ocean, who, in his intellectuality, always dreamed of the greedy quiet of his studies and the dominion of the classrooms and crowds, bewitched and influenced by the charm of a true and powerful word.
But the indelible memory of his childhood and early youth encouraged and sustained him on the way to fortune, he spent among hardships, domestic misfortunes and the vengeance of the cowards, and that firm heart of his, which knew how to rise, even moaning, encounter to fate.
He wanted to succeed. And his iron will was equal to the power of his soul.
Student and … anarchist.
Anthony Campagna was born in Castelmezzano on December 31, 1884.
Although the economic conditions of his family were all but prosperous, he was soon initiated into classical studies, in which his keen wit, his natural aesthetic sense and a deep and sincere love of study greatly made him progress. At the age of seventeen he obtained his high school diploma with honor and enrolled in the faculty of law at the Royal University of Rome. Two years later, however, having had the misfortune of losing his father, and having fallen on his too young shoulders the weight of the family, he moved to the University of Naples, where, only at long intervals, he could allow himself the luxury of attending courses. But this thoughtful and austere young man, intelligent and persevering, poor, of humble birth, who looked out, despite the hardships, as a great promise of the future, aroused the low envy and the life of the inept of Castelmezzano, who with diabolical design , they thought of losing him, qualifying him at the Naples Police Headquarters … for a … dangerous anarchist.
The Police Headquarters, of course, having received the report, had him identified, shadowed and monitored. And when Naples, where Anthony Campagna was then attending the 4th law course, drank the official visit of the former Emperor of Germany, William II, the house where the young Lucanian student lived was surrounded by a large crowd of agents and policemen, to prevent the release of the …. dangerous bomb. A few days after this episode, Campagna receives a telegram, in which he was warned of the serious illness of a member of his family. Afterwards, he goes to the Police Headquarters to obtain permission to leave. Introduced in the presence of the Quaestor, like a Carbonaro from the 21st, the spirited young man introduces himself and shows the telegram: “I am the anarchist Campagna. I have received bad news from home. May I leave?”
The commissioner first reads the telegram, niches a little, then hastens to inquire in detail about the social and economic conditions of the Campagna family from Castelmezzano. Knowing that they were humble and poor people – in those blessed times it was possible to sometimes be right even by the Quaestors – he sensed that the complaint was nothing but a slander and … he left Antonio Campagna free to leave, taking his leave with these words.
“Go, my son: I understand everything!”
[To read more about Anthony’s experience in Naples, in his own words, read his Autobiography online HERE.]
As an emigrant
It is easy to understand how, when in July 1906 Anthony Campagna achieved, with the highest grade and honors, the degree in law, the envy and hostility of his fellow villagers, not only did they not disarm, but they pointed out, creating him in his native country, an environment of discomfort and isolation. On the other hand, the conditions of the family, getting worse and worse, led him to think of faraway America, the land of rapid successes and fabulous fortunes.
However, with his nature as an esthete and a dreamer, perhaps he would not have decided to leave, if, to put an end to the delay and hesitation, a fact had not occurred as providential as it was occasional.
Fresh from America, where he had amassed a large fortune, for a quick visit to Italy, he was then in Castelmezzano, his homeland, the Knight Joseph Paterno – whom we had the honor of extensively dealing with in the 3-4 issue of the magazine – builder of skyscrapers in New York, to whom the lawyer Anthony Campagna soon had to tie himself in fate, as a partner in companies, and in blood, marrying a sister [Marie Paterno].
Paterno took to good will and to protect the young scholar, encouraging him to emigrate and disposing him spiritually. So it was that, in May 1908, accepting an invitation from a friend, who urged him to go to Chicago, to take over the direction of a weekly newspaper. Anthony Campagna won his last reluctance and entrusted himself to the sea.
In Chicago, at first, the newspaper’s business did well: then the wind changed and the publications, despite the good will and the efforts of tenacity and skill of the Director, were suspended.
So, Anthony Campagna, remembering Joseph Paterno’s promises of help, I don’t hesitate to go to New York. And Joseph Paterno was truly providential to him.
Farewell to codes and pandettes [books of law]
In America, Anthony Campagna always harbored the illusion of being able to make way and riches with the exercise of his profession. It was therefore with painful astonishment that he heard about his fellow countryman about this.
-What do you want to do now in America?
-I’m a lawyer. I’ll be a lawyer!
-But here there are many other laws than in Italy.
-I studied them.
-There are already so many lawyers, without causes!
-I hope to make my way!
Then abruptly, Joseph Paterno asked him: “Listen, do you want to enrich?”
The young studious dreamer hesitated somewhat, then said: “You don’t come to America to starve.”
The fellow countryman pressed: “And you want to get rich soon?”
With a poetic and hermetic formula, Anthony Campagna replied: “Life is so short!”
With an equally rough and precise formula, Joseph Paterno drew him into reality.
“So, my dear friend, throw away the codes and come with me to the construction site. You will be a builder. A lawyer soon learns to manage a construction site. You are young. You are talented, you will make a fortune.”
The lawyer, who dreamed of domination of the classrooms and crowds, did not calm down at first. I speak of his twenty years of studies, of his degree, he said disdainfully that he did not feel the heart to throw the toga to the nettles to become the assistant of the Paterno building company, to leave the courthouse, for a construction site of skyscrapers . I also face some scruples: what would have been said of him in Castelmezzano?
But after a few weeks of doubts, torments, nostalgia, melancholy, he entered the Paterno construction site. He became a builder of skyscrapers.
The skyscraper: “Lucania”
The dollars began to rain. AnthonyCampagna soon mastered the English language, studying constructions, first took over the general direction of the Paterno shipyards, then became a partner.
Four years later, he was able to found a new construction company, which he himself directs.
Mindful of his distant native land, he wanted to give the first nine-story skyscraper of his company the name “Lucania” as if to create an oasis in the middle of the gigantic heart of New York, which reminds all the Lucanians of their rugged and strong land.
After this first, the skyscrapers of the firm of the lawyer Anthony Campagna flourished, one after the other, like colossal stems.
In New York, he is hugely popular. Everyone remembers that he was the first to break the American housing crisis, building the first skyscraper immediately after the war. In his construction sites – real Italian schools – Lucanian and Italian workers prefer to work for moral and civil assistance.
Anthony Campagna’s activity is wonderful, like his wit, like his patriotism, like his moral uprightness.
In New York he is counted among the “lords of the skyscraper”.
Probably, he no longer regrets having left the codes and the toga, but his nostalgia for his favorite studies remained invincible, in which he, for his strong talent, would certainly have emerged, as he emerged in the construction technique, of which and become a perfect teacher.
In fact, in his studio, between a skyscraper project and the reproduction of a villa already built, he peeps at the picture of his lawyer degree, on the wall in front of the work table.
That degree and those projects certainly represent to the spirit of Anthony Campagna what his dream was and what his reality is. And if the memories of his harsh and difficult youth suffuse him with “bittersweetness,” they make him even more complete the joy of just triumph.
Love for the native land
In his triumph, the lawyer Anthony Campagna, lord of skyscrapers, did not forget his native town, Castelmezzano, which was so treacherous and hostile to him.
His charity is inexhaustible. A man of study, he takes care first of all of the schools in his country; and, annually, a true refreshing boon, he sends subsidies in money, clothing, shoes, for needy pupils and tools and furnishings for schools. Together with his brother-in-law and his benefactor Joseph Paterno he took the initiative for the construction – already well underway – of a school building in Castelmezzano, which will cost over seven hundred thousand lire. He spent money in every public utility and civil improvement work of his country and of all Basilicata.
He pays with love the ancient envy of his fellow citizens.
Generous in his triumph, as he was strong in the struggle, beneficial with the same spirit and the same breadth with which he was benefited. And in the fervor of his never interrupted work, he only seeks, as a spur and comfort, the good consent of his countrymen from Basilicata. And he is happy if, from the height of one of his skyscrapers, above the fog of height, which veils the tumult of the “City”, a sweet vision of his distant Basilicata flashes before his eyes and fills them of love with the passion and devotion of a good and compassionate son.
Honor to him, who has honored his land and its people, whose very noble traditions of work, tenacity, virtue, talent, has always inspired and shaped his work, especially after success and fortune, who have smiled at him, and which appear more deserved and sympathetic to us, if we consider the pain, adversity, hardship in which Anthony Campagna’s pensive and virtuous youth struggles and anguishes.
