Profile: Marianna Gatto: Preserving the Italian American Soul of Los Angeles

 

Marianna Gatto: Preserving the Italian American Soul of Los Angeles

By Christopher Forte

The Italian Californian

For anyone who cares about Italian American history in California, the name Marianna Gatto deserves to be remembered with gratitude and respect. As Executive Director and Co-Founder of the Italian American Museum of Los Angeles, Marianna helped turn a long-neglected dream into a living cultural institution. Through her leadership, historic Italian Hall in Downtown Los Angeles became more than an old building. It became a museum, a gathering place, a classroom, and a monument to the Italian American story in Southern California.

The Board of Directors of the Italian American Museum of Los Angeles recently announced that Marianna Gatto will step down as Executive Director at the end of June 2026. Their announcement described her as “the heart and soul of IAMLA since its very beginning,” and that phrase seems exactly right. What is today a vibrant museum preserving and sharing the history of Italian Americans in Los Angeles began with vision, persistence, fundraising, advocacy, and a deep belief that this story mattered.

Marianna Gatto is a Los Angeles native, historian, author, educator, and museum leader. She has spent decades working in public history, nonprofit leadership, museums, education, preservation, and Italian American cultural advocacy. Her work with IAMLA began long before the museum opened its doors. She began working on the museum project in 2005, helped lead the campaign to restore historic Italian Hall, and became director of the museum in 2010. In 2016, the Italian American Museum of Los Angeles officially opened to the public inside the restored Italian Hall, a 1908 building that once served as a social and cultural center for the Italian community of Los Angeles.

Los Angeles is not always the first place people think of when they hear the words “Italian American history.” Many people think of New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, or New Orleans. But Italian Americans have been part of Los Angeles from its earliest history, and the Italian presence in Southern California is far deeper than many people realize. That is part of what makes Marianna’s work so important. She helped remind Los Angeles, and the wider Italian American community, that California has its own Italian American story.

I had the privilege of meeting Marianna once, years ago, when the Italian American Museum of Los Angeles was still under construction. She gave me a private tour of the future museum space, and even then I could sense the importance of what was being built. It was not just about walls, display cases, or old photographs. It was about memory. It was about restoring a place where our ancestors once gathered and giving future generations a way to understand who they were, what they built, and how they shaped Los Angeles.

That tour stayed with me. At the time, the museum was still a work in progress, but Marianna spoke about it with the kind of seriousness, knowledge, and passion that made it clear this was not simply a job for her. It was a calling.

Under her leadership, IAMLA opened its award-winning permanent exhibition and developed into one of the most important Italian American cultural institutions in the western United States. According to the Board’s announcement, Marianna led the campaign to restore Italian Hall, opened the museum in 2016, created the museum’s award-winning permanent exhibition, mounted eleven original temporary exhibitions, built a collection of thousands of photographs, artifacts, and oral histories, and helped offer public programs reaching audiences across Los Angeles and beyond.

That is a remarkable legacy.

Marianna has also authored and curated exhibitions exploring the Italian American experience from many angles: immigration, identity, women’s work, food, invention, entertainment, regional traditions, and the wider Italian diaspora. Her work has helped move Italian American history beyond nostalgia and into serious public history. It has shown that Italian Americans were not only participants in Los Angeles history, but builders of it.

Her scholarship also extends beyond the museum walls. She is the author of The Italian Americans of Los Angeles: A History, a major contribution to the study of Italian American life in Southern California. She has appeared in documentaries, spoken widely, consulted on historical projects, and helped educate the public about the Italian American experience in Los Angeles and beyond. In recognition of her work, the Italian Republic awarded her the title Cavaliere dell’Ordine della Stella d’Italia, Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy.

But perhaps her greatest achievement is that she helped give Los Angeles Italian Americans a mirror. For generations, Italian Americans in Southern California often lacked a central institution telling their story. Families remembered pieces of it. Churches, restaurants, wineries, clubs, and neighborhoods preserved fragments of it. But IAMLA brought those fragments together and gave them a home.

Historic Italian Hall itself is part of that story. Built in 1908, it stands in the area that was once Los Angeles’ Little Italy. Today, surrounded by the movement and noise of modern Downtown Los Angeles, it remains a witness to another time: a time of immigrant families, mutual aid societies, feast days, weddings, political meetings, dances, music, food, work, faith, and community. Through Marianna’s leadership, that building was not only restored. It was given a voice again.

The Board has announced that Theresa Camille Adile Metzler, a member of the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors, will serve as Interim Executive Director. A search for a new Executive Director is expected to begin in the fall of 2026. This transition comes as IAMLA prepares to mark an important milestone: the 10-year anniversary of the museum’s grand opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony at its historic 1908 site in Downtown Los Angeles.

That anniversary should be a moment not only to celebrate the museum, but also to honor Marianna Gatto’s extraordinary contribution. Institutions do not build themselves. They require people willing to fight for them, raise money for them, explain their importance, endure setbacks, and keep going when the dream seems far away. Marianna did that.

For Italian Americans in California, IAMLA is more than a museum. It is proof that our story belongs here. It is proof that Italian American history in Los Angeles is not a footnote. It is part of the city’s foundation. It is part of California’s story. It is part of America’s story.

As Marianna Gatto steps into her next chapter, she leaves behind something lasting. She helped preserve the memory of those who came before us, and she helped create a place where future generations can encounter that memory for themselves.

Grazie, Marianna, for your vision, your scholarship, your perseverance, and your service to the Italian American community.

The Italian American Museum of Los Angeles is located at 644 North Main Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012. Admission is free, with donations encouraged. Readers are encouraged to visit, support the museum, and continue the work of preserving and sharing the rich history of Italian Americans in Los Angeles.

 

Rudolph Giuliani: Former New York Mayor Out of ICU, Still Recovering as Public Reflects on a Complicated American Life

Former New York City Mayor Rudolph W. “Rudy” Giuliani is reportedly out of intensive care but still recovering in the hospital after a serious bout of pneumonia. According to recent reports, Giuliani, 81, had been placed on a ventilator during the most serious stage of his illness but has since improved enough to breathe on his own and leave the ICU.

As of the latest available public information, Giuliani has not yet been reported as fully discharged from the hospital. His condition appears to be improving, but he remains under medical care.

The health scare has brought renewed attention to one of the most dramatic and controversial public lives in modern American politics: a Brooklyn-born Italian American prosecutor, mayor, national hero after September 11, presidential candidate, Trump ally, and later a figure surrounded by legal and political controversy.

From Brooklyn to the Federal Courthouse

Rudolph William Giuliani was born on May 28, 1944, in Brooklyn, New York. Trained as a lawyer, he rose through federal law enforcement and became U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York in the 1980s. In that role, he built a national reputation as a hard-driving prosecutor.

Giuliani became especially known for taking on organized crime, public corruption, and financial misconduct. His prosecutions helped shape the image that followed him for decades: tough, relentless, combative, and unafraid of powerful enemies.

For Italian Americans, Giuliani’s rise carried a particular cultural weight. He was one of the most visible Italian American public officials in the country, emerging from New York’s ethnic, political, and legal world at a time when Italian American identity was often unfairly tied in the public imagination to organized-crime stereotypes. Giuliani’s career complicated that image: he was Italian American, and he was also one of the prosecutors most associated with taking on the Mafia.

Mayor of New York City

Giuliani was elected mayor of New York City and served from 1994 through 2001. His administration emphasized public order, crime reduction, fiscal discipline, and quality-of-life enforcement.

Supporters credit him with helping turn around a city that had struggled with high crime, disorder, and economic anxiety. Critics argue that his governing style was often harsh and that some policing policies were overly aggressive and damaging to communities of color.

His years as mayor remain one of the most debated chapters in modern New York history. To admirers, Giuliani represented discipline and urban revival. To detractors, he represented confrontation, hardline policing, and political combat.

But whatever one thinks of his mayoralty, no one can deny that his public image changed forever on September 11, 2001.

September 11 and “America’s Mayor”

Giuliani’s defining moment came during the terrorist attacks of September 11, when the World Trade Center towers were struck and collapsed in Lower Manhattan.

As mayor, Giuliani became one of the most visible leaders in the immediate aftermath. He appeared at Ground Zero, gave public briefings, helped communicate with a shocked city, and projected steadiness during one of the darkest days in American history.

It was during this period that Giuliani became known as “America’s Mayor.” For many Americans, his leadership after September 11 became the central image of his public life.

That history is also relevant to his current health story. Reports about his recent hospitalization have noted that Giuliani’s pneumonia was complicated by a pre-existing respiratory condition that his representatives have linked to exposure after the 9/11 attacks.

The Current Health Scare

Giuliani was hospitalized in early May 2026 with pneumonia. Early reports described his condition as serious, with his representatives saying he was in critical but stable condition. During the most difficult stage of the illness, Giuliani was reportedly placed on a ventilator.

His condition later improved. Reports said he was removed from the ventilator, began breathing on his own, and was released from intensive care.

That does not mean he has fully recovered. The most current reporting indicates that Giuliani remains hospitalized while he continues to recover. In plain terms: he is better than he was, but he is still sick enough to require hospital care.

For a public figure who has spent decades in the national spotlight, the news has prompted both concern and reflection. Giuliani’s admirers remember his leadership after September 11 and his years as a prosecutor and mayor. His critics point to the controversies and legal troubles that have defined his later years.

Both are part of the same story.

Later Political Life and Legal Controversies

After leaving City Hall, Giuliani remained a major national figure. He ran for president in 2008 and later became a close ally and personal attorney to Donald Trump.

His later political career became especially controversial after the 2020 presidential election, when Giuliani became one of the most visible promoters of Trump’s false claims that the election had been stolen. Those efforts brought significant legal consequences and damaged his public reputation.

Giuliani faced lawsuits, professional discipline, and major financial judgments. One of the most prominent cases involved Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, who sued him for defamation after false claims were spread about them following the 2020 election.

For many Americans, this later chapter reshaped how they viewed Giuliani. The man once praised across party lines after September 11 became a deeply polarizing figure in the country’s ongoing political divide.

A Complicated Italian American Legacy

For readers of The Italian Californian, Giuliani’s life is especially interesting because of the way it intersects with Italian American identity, New York politics, law enforcement, media, and public memory.

He is one of the most famous Italian American political figures of the modern era. His career included triumph, ambition, controversy, and decline. He helped define an era of New York City politics, became a national symbol after a tragedy, and later became a central figure in some of the most divisive political battles in recent American history.

His legacy cannot be reduced to one label.

He was a prosecutor who took on organized crime.

He was a mayor who helped lead New York through September 11.

He was a national political figure.

He was also a man whose later years became clouded by legal battles, public criticism, and controversy.

Now, at 81, Giuliani’s hospitalization has added a more personal chapter to that public story. The latest news is encouraging, but cautious: Rudy Giuliani is alive, out of the ICU, breathing on his own, and recovering — but he remains hospitalized.

Final Thoughts

Rudolph Giuliani’s life has been one of extraordinary public visibility. Few American figures have experienced such dramatic shifts in reputation: from crusading prosecutor to big-city mayor, from September 11 symbol of resilience to controversial political combatant.

His current health battle reminds us that behind every public legacy is a human being — aging, vulnerable, and subject to the same fragility as anyone else.

For now, the most accurate update is simple: Rudy Giuliani appears to be improving, but he is not yet fully recovered. His story, like his legacy, remains unfinished.