Chapter 6: The voice of ivo
Over the past five years I have thought about that train ride to and from Perugia and how I wish that I could have been a different person to take more from the experience. Reflecting back, there were many other factors at play, including the paralyzing effect of cultural isolation in a foreign country that isn’t mentioned in the envy-inducing memoirs by American ex-pats. But at the time that’s who I was. I retreated back to the States, to what I knew and could do well.
Almost two years ago when I read of Ivo’s passing, I was awakened with a start and newfound reason to resurrect that autumn day in 2016. It was finally time to revisit what this generous voice had to say so that others would know it, too. Now I was in a different place, maybe where I needed to be in order to open that chest of memories. Perhaps I did have an important story to share now. So shortly after Ivo died, I unboxed those memories and carefully laid out the xeroxed papers and books. After a few days using my own limited Italian and tedious typing into Google Translate, the short articles were translated and a picture began to come together. Most importantly, I resurrected the hour-long iPhone recording of Ivo that sat unopened on my computer for years. Above all else, that file symbolized to me an enormous insecurity and disappointment in being unable to participate in a conversation that would never happen again. Despite my best technical efforts, no translation program could help with the gravely, aging voice or unique dialect that formed his endless stream of thought as we roamed around Terontola.
Fortunately, with my advisor’s help, I was able to arrange for a local Italian-American to translate Ivo’s recording. Not only was the translator, Lino, extremely kind to meet during the pandemic and help with Ivo’s project, but as someone near to Ivo’s age, he also had a personal connection with the story. Lino also grew up as a young boy in Italy during the war, and recalled the Germans taking control of his family’s small village in the mountains. They had no choice but to comply, but in the initial fray, his grandmother was fatally shot. Changing the topic, his eyes brightened and his smile upturned as he remembered the years after the war, sitting by his family’s tabletop radio listening to the crackling live broadcasts of Bartali’s cycling races.
Once racing had commenced in 1946, a huge rivalry between Bartali and his former teammate, Fausto Coppi, consumed the nation. Coppi was the dapper, long-limbed climber from the Piedmont region in northwest Italy and five years younger than Bartali. He showed enormous promise just as the war was breaking out, winning the last pre-war edition of the Giro d’Italia in 1940 at twenty years old. Mussolini was obsessed with his country setting athletic records, so in 1942 Coppi went for the world Hour record, which is considered the most difficult solo effort a cyclist can attempt. He and his team planned the event at Milan’s Vigorelli velodrome and hoped that it could be completed in between Allied bombing attacks that were leaving the city heavily damaged. Beneath a ceiling with holes and along walls lined with stacks of surplus army supplies, Coppi set a new record of 45.798km (28.394 miles) in one hour on his steel Legnano with wooden rims.
Right after this record, Coppi was sent to the front lines in North Africa to fight in the Italian army. He was captured by the British near Tunis in 1943 and for the next 18 months was a prisoner of war. At one of the POW camps, he caught malaria, but because of his anti-fascist views, the British treated him benevolently and he recovered (Busca, 2021). Like Bartali, when the war ended he anxiously returned to racing. Their fierce competition united the war-torn country with sport, but also separated Italians into clearly divided houses that still stand today: the tifosi fandom of either Coppiani or Bartaliani. Italian journalist Dino Buzzati described the sensation during one race (Nevres, 2016):
“The tifosi have forgotten everything: who they are, the work waiting for them, the illnesses, luxuries, unpaid bills, headaches, love, everything except the fact that Coppi is in the lead and Bartali continues to lose ground.”
Unrepentantly unreligious, Coppi represented the industrial, economic stronghold of northern Italy, while the pious, muscular Bartali represented the more conservative, working class of the south. The two racers fought on battle worn roads of Europe, stirring fans into a frenzy as they traded wins in the Tour de France and Giro d’Italia and other big one-day races until Bartali finally retired in 1954.
When I asked Lino which house he belonged to, he smiled and admitted that he was decidedly from the side of Bartali. He eagerly dove into translating Ivo’s recording and reading his articles and books, which brought back great memories of this heroic time from his past. His final translation of the recording was impeccable and respectful. It was difficult, he said, because of the constant change of topics and stream of consciousness as Ivo and I walked from location to location. Lino’s work was able to lay the final brush strokes of the story Ivo was sharing with me.
A Destiny with Bartali
Ivo was born in Terontola in 1938 and made this small, rural corner of southeastern Tuscany his home for life. He described in his friend Claudio’s book, “Il Nonno Racconta La Guerra,” (Grandfather Recounts the War) (Faltoni, 2011) that during World War II, he and his boyhood friends would scurry into the hills above their town to watch bombing raids, betting small marbles whether the train station would be hit or not. At more innocent times, his father would call him over to watch a famous bike racer pass through the town on his training rides: Gino Bartali. By the age of 12, the lure of bicycles had firmly taken hold and he began apprenticing as a bike mechanic at a well-respected shop in nearby Cortona that maintained bikes for the greatest cyclists of their region. The teenage Ivo was taken under the wing of owner Ruben Schippa, who taught him the trade and introduced him to local professional cyclists such as Lido Sartini who had also begun working at Schippa’s shop as a boy. In the small world of cycling, young Sartini even helped Bartali at the shop when he found himself stranded out on a training ride. Eventually, Sartini became a professional and raced alongside Bartali, Coppi, and Fiorenzo Magni during the ”Golden Age” of cycling in the 1950s (Sestini, 2013).
In 1954, a twist of fate set Ivo on his life’s path. One of Bartali’s bicycle mechanics had fallen ill and his team needed a skilled and trusted person to take his place. So at the age of 16, Ivo left the small village of Terontola and joined Bartali’s support team for three weeks in the greatest race in Italian sport: the formidable Giro d’Italia. That year the race began in Palermo and wound its way north for 4,300-kilometers to finish in Milan (Faltoni, 2011). He rose to the occasion and became the favored mechanic of Bartali. When Ivo saw his name in the daily papers reporting the progress of the event, it instilled a great deal of pride to be known for assisting such a champion. Bartali finished 13th in his final lineup, but the trust and closeness forged at the race began 46 years of friendship between the two Tuscan men. Although Ivo was only a professional mechanic to Bartali for one year, afterwards he was always at his side (I. Faltoni, personal communication, October 28, 2016).
Like a Confessional
Bartali retired from profession cycling at the end of 1954, allowing the younger post-war generation to inaugurate a new era. The friendship with Ivo strengthened on their journeys together and the champion gradually opened up about his activities during the war (I. Faltoni, personal communication, October 28, 2016).:
“Bartali would always confide in me many things, not because I asked him, I did not know anything, but when some old people would yell, ‘Bartali, how many did you help and save today?’ he would repeat to them, ‘These things one does and then they must be forgotten.’
I would see him getting mad often, whenever we were in the car together, at the Giro d’Italia and other races when he would call me for either driving him or just riding alongside him. I would then ask him, ‘Gino, how come the other day you got upset over the things that man said?’
It has taken me over 20 years to put it all together, to discover that I was the one ‘knowing’ these things because he would then reply, ‘Ivo, these things you must never tell anyone ever. It is as if you have gone to confession to a priest.’
I knew he had great faith, was a very devout Catholic, so I chose to forget all these things because he would tell them to me, I felt, in confidence.”
Most of what Ivo learned from Bartali in the confessional of their friendship has been recounted in recent years. He takes particular pride having learned the true intent of Bartali’s risky visits to the Terontola-Cortona train station and that his hometown was such a critical location to the Assisi Network’s plan saving Jews. In Florence, Bartali received the documents and placed them inside his bicycle, then rode 100-kilometers south through Arezzo to Terontola. He stopped to see his friend, the tailor Dino Magara, who made him a breakfast of two slices of white bread and prosciutto del contadino with a glass of red wine. The meal fortified him after the long ride, but the hardest part of the journey was just to come.
Bartali rode one kilometer to the quiet two-lane bridge overlooking the rail line. Pretending to finish his sandwich or inflate his tire, he waited for the train coming from Assisi to pass beneath and then rode to the station. Placing his precious steel Legnano race bike against the wall in front of the platform, he entered the station’s café for a coffee. The carefully placed racing bike signified his presence and a flurry of interest commenced as fans crowded to catch sight of him in the café or to get close enough to hear stories of his training rides. Beyond the commotion, fake identification documents were prepared by underground workers as the starstruck Germans lingered near Bartali, distracted from guarding the station. The Jews who had been hiding in Assisi had just arrived and had 6-7 terrifying minutes to grab their new documents and change trains to Rome and Allied territory, or north to Milan and Switzerland (Faltoni, 2011). Gino’s timing to arrive at the bridge, the station, and the café was done with its own military-like precision. “Il postino per la pace” (the courier for peace) could not fail as the lives of so many depended on his singular role.
The bridge above the Terontola-Cortona rail line where Bartali would wait to descend to the train station to distract the Germans.
Like everyone who was loyal to Bartali, if they knew of his story from WWII “they never hinted a phrase or word of his commitment” (Faltoni, 2012). Ivo later made his living as a journalist and promoter of national and regional bike races, often bringing in Bartali to celebrate with the winners. He says of Bartali:
“He was not a bigot, but a man of true and deep Christian faith, who demonstrated with his daily way of life, both in the family and with the many people he met….He never took off his badge of Catholic action and was perhaps the most representative and worthy person to wear it.”
Throughout his life, Ivo carried the name of Bartali on his shoulders, whether it was the cycling champion, or as the story of his heroic deeds were revealed, as an honest witness to Bartali’s character and meaning to the world. He was one of the only people left from the war who remembered seeing Gino at the train station during his work distracting the Nazis. After Bartali died, Ivo dedicated his life to ensuring that the story would live on and no one would forget. He was a key witness in the research of Paolo Alberati, a graduate student and professional cyclist who investigated Bartali’s clandestine work for his thesis at the University of Perugia in 2002. Alberati had become curious when he learned from state police and Ministry of the Interior archives that Bartali had been under surveillance during the war for his unusually long “training” rides (MacMichael, 2010):
“I found files dedicated to Gino Bartali by police officers who had infiltrated the world of cycling and sports journalism, who spied on the champion and couldn’t explain the motive for those training rides that were hundreds of kilometres long.”
Further research and the secrets that Ivo had been holding for decades made Alberati one of the first to crack open evidence that Bartali saved 250 Jews during the Holocaust as well as Catholic dissidents who fought against Fascism. Ivo wrote press releases and encouraged the Bartali family, local government entities, and sports media to attend his thesis presentation:
“Paolo Alberati has completed with scrupulous and careful historical research, enriching it with interviews of considerable depth. Thanks to this thesis we can relive, after 60 years, the great but silent moral commitment carried out in those endless days by the myth of the sport Gino, supported by a true Christian faith and which saw the city of Assisi as its protagonist. in memory of those who fought and worked for good in one of the darkest periods of our history, your presence would be greatly appreciated.”
In 2006, Alberati’s thesis was later published as a book, “Gino Bartali: mille diavoli in corpo” (a thousand devils in the body, an exclamation uttered by a stunned Coppi as Bartali outsprinted the peloton at the end of the 300-kilometer Milan-Sanremo race in 1950). The swell of interest that confirmed decades of rumors had risen and Ivo’s influence in the cycling and journalism community helped Alberati and the Bartali family navigate this new notoriety. Bartali’s wife, Adriana, said to Ivo at the dedication of the bronze plaque in Terontola in 2008 that much of what they learned of her husband’s actions in 1943-44 was due to Ivo and for that she gave thanks (I. Faltoni, personal communication, October 28, 2016).
Coinciding with the plaque’s dedication, Ivo began promoting and organizing a “ciclopellegrinaggio” (a cycling pilgrimage) from Terontola to Assisi that wound along the same roads as Bartali when he was a courier for the underground. For the next five years, the 74-kilometer ride had hundreds of participants and even Italian Olympians and veterans of WWII, with a sendoff by Adriana, or Bartali’s son, Luigi. Another informal ride that reenacts Bartali’s work for the Assisi Network begins in Florence and ends in Assisi, 200 kilometers later. It is popular with ardent fans of Bartali who want to channel the fortitude of their hero on one long, challenging day in the saddle. The route often detours to Terontola for photos at the train station and, before he died, a rally of support from Ivo.
The train station and memorial have become something of a pilgrimage location for fans of the story, and for Italians arriving or departing on the train platforms it is a constant reminder of their proud history saving Jews. As the resurgence in Bartali’s popularity continued in the 2010s, Ivo used his contacts in the Italian cycling community to edit a small book, “Bartali L’Intramontabile” (Bartali the Timeless) in 2012, which coincided with Bartali’s recognition as Righteous Among the Nations in 2013 and the first English-language book on the topic, “Road to Valor.” Ivo’s simple book is a unique collection, a scrapbook of sorts, with photos from across the decades, reprinted articles in faded typeface, and short stories of remembrance by many of Bartali’s friends and competitors. He was never shy about putting it into the hands of Bartali fans who came to Terontola, and my copy is well worn and treasured.
One Less Voice
On the news of Ivo’s death in February 2020, I read online tributes written by his fellow Italian journalists. In each one I discovered that the Ivo I met so briefly was the same person who shared his passion of Bartali with everyone else, chuckling as I felt like a member of Ivo’s special “photocopy-and-yellow-shirt club.” His colleague Marco Pastonesi recalled (Camerini, 2020):
“He traveled with a magical leather folder from which he extracted photocopies and pennants, arrival orders and general rankings, brochures and leaflets, snacks and bottles, photographs and stickers, a white T-shirt or a yellow polo shirt, as well as some copies of his book on Alfredo Martini or his little book on Gino Bartali.”
That one day with Ivo in October 2016 that began my journey.
A floor covered with Ivo’s photocopies and books.
To those who knew him much longer, Ivo was a wingman, an unofficial mayor of Terontola, a promoter, a journalist, and an undying orator to the grande Bartali.
“Every time he named him, he raised his eyes to Heaven and made a very rapid sign of the cross on his chest.”
Reading their reflections and remembrances made me even more grateful to learn from Bartali’s wingman for even an hour.
It took five years to realize that I did not fail on that beautiful October day. I was on a different path to tell my story, one that did not conform to a traditional narrative or publishing deadline. This awareness came to me only a few weeks before my graduation defense in December. I was riding my bike on a rare, clear day above freezing in Pittsburgh trying to refresh my senses after sitting in front of the computer for hours. The leaves had long left their perches on the trees and were no longer piled on the side of the road. Once winter settled in, it was as if they never existed. The air was still and cold. I was descending a short gravel road lined with tall, bare catalpa trees whose branches arched across the road as if to shake hands with their neighbors. In the late spring, the leaves return and create a tunnel of green while the gravel road becomes a bed of fallen white petals. Their perfume releases an incredible scent as your tires crush over them. In December, however, you would never know the transformation to come in a few months.
As I was riding, the rays of the late afternoon sun reached through the bare tree branches and fell on my back. Focusing on the uneven road below me, I felt a surge, like an awakening when I didn’t even know I was asleep. The reason for my story had just been handed to me from above: What if I didn’t fail walking around Terontola that sunny October morning with Ivo? What if it wasn’t whether I could understand a word he was speaking, but that I needed to take a few years to follow a different path climbing a hill that was not yet on my map? What if the story I have finally written opens up a conversation among strangers or prompts a student to step forward apart from the bystanders or allows one survivor to have their experience remembered by just one more person? Then I have not failed. My story began when it was ready, on its own terms, and as a storyteller I have succeeded in bringing others with me.