The F.lli Navarra college closed down in 1929 and my father went first to Catania and then to Bari, becoming a university lecturer in tree cultivation. We left Ferrara when I was three years old. I came back to the F.lli Navarra college after eighty years, on 16 June 2009. The visit had been organised for the AGER project managemen
t committee, which had a meeting that morning at the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Ferrara. Even though my entire academic life has been dedicated to tree cultivation and fruit growing, and my teaching and scientific work had often brought me to the Ferrara area, I had never had the chance to go back to the college. I wasn't prepared for the emotions I would feel at returning to my place of birth. I couldn't remember it, but it was just as I had imagined it, possibly through my parents' stories and the few photographs that had been taken. A new fruit growing culture was dawning in Ferrara at the time of my birth, 
which would subsequently become world famous due to the advanced level of technology employed. The agricultural college had understood this potential and supported its development. This can be seen in a series of publications made by its director, Donato Scaramuzzi, in the three-year period between 1927 and 1929, to give his innovative observations a wider public.
A Bible and heresy
The Ariostea library keeps a treasure which caused discussions, all the more up-to-date when acquired.
Thanks to the information provided by a noted book collector, Renzo Bonfiglioli, in 1959 the Municipality of Ferrara acquired a treasure of history and culture: the Biblia Latina annotated by Girolamo Savonarola, when a novice in Ferrara, between 1479 and 1482.
"Nebbia" by Andrea Veronese
Love defeated by political fervour in Ferrara through the 1950 s.
The novel Nebbia [Fog] by Andrea Veronese held me enthralled from its very first pages, encouraging me to have it published as part of the Corbo literature series. The book makes an impact right from the very first scenes, where the focus gradually narrows down onto the events that unfolded in Ferrara between 22 October and 8 December 1954, when
Dancing
Ferrara dance venues, from debutante balls to Latin-American nights.
In his book A question of stature. The story of a boy who grew too much, Gaetano Tumiati brings us back to a Ferrara of the thirties and forties, when young people met in exclusive places to dance the tango, waltz, mazurka, and the rumba.
Update on the Costabili collection
The research on collecting never stops.
This article will provide an update on the Costabili collection in view of new information that has emerged over the last 10 years on works that have often only been recently identified as forming part of the Costabili collection.
I was born in the F.lli Navarra Agricultural College
Or: how I found my forgotten birthplace, during a professional visit
I was born in Malborghetto di Boara (Municipality of Ferrara) on 26 December 1926, in the F.lli Navarra agricultural college. My father had taken over management of the college a few months previously, having transferred from the Fabriano agricultural college.
I was born in the F.lli Navarra Agricultural College
Written by Franco ScaramuzziOr: how I found my forgotten birthplace, during a professional visit
I was born in Malborghetto di Boara (Municipality of Ferrara) on 26 December 1926, in the F.lli Navarra agricultural college. My father had taken over management of the college a few months previously, having transferred from the Fabriano agricultural college.
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Num. 32