Giorgina Venosta and Aldo Bassetti, 1960s to 2021

It was for Aldo Bassetti that my mother Giorgina ended the suffocating marriage with my father Bernardo. Then they broke up for a long time, until 1983, when they met again, never to leave each other again until her death in 2021. Aldo, who came from a historic Lombard textile company, was a typical case of an 'enlightened entrepreneur'.

The Caprotti family: Aunt Silvia, grandfather Peppino’s sister (1896 – 1994)

Silvia is the middle sister. From the letters that have remained to us, she is seen to be very attached to the family. In 1922 she became engaged to Ernesto Thomas, who in that very year founded the wool mill in Brusimpiano on Lake Lugano that still bears his name, and married him in 1923. Aunt Silvia, who is also present in the lives and affection of her grandchildren, grandfather Peppino's children, and whom I knew as a boy in the 1980s, spent her entire life in Brusimpiano, where she died very old in 1994.

The Caprotti comparison: Ercole Marelli and technological innovation

marelli not only follows but also creates the market, through the company's continuous innovations. Caprotti behaves similarly, starting with technological innovation and factory development, albeit in an entirely different sphere and with a product that is much more sensitive to the immediate demands of the market.

Manifattura Caprotti and continuity: fabrics from the 19th century to the 1980s

As in the past, the factory has continued to produce its fabrics in the present, updating to the fashions of the times some of its classics such as the checked or fancy fabrics, produced at least since the 1840s in the bright colours that were so popular and kept in production, updated in fabric and colour preferences, for more than a century more.

The Caprotti family, the birth of Esselunga and US counter-espionage: James Hugh and James Angleton

Film buffs who have seen Robert De Niro's 2006 film The Good Shepherd - The Shadow of Power may know that the main character, played by Matt Damon, is inspired by James James Angleton, one of the most legendary and controversial figures in American intelligence. However, the figure of James Hugh [Angleton], the father, is also of extreme interest ...