Interview with Giovanna Scaglione: The Last Years

As told to Robert Little, Renzo Carbonaro, Vladimir Pajevic and Ulrich Zensen
Copyright: 8 November 2017 All World Rights Reserved
Republished with permissions with changes to suit the format of VeloceToday.com

Nuccio Bertone’s Final Words to the World’s Greatest Auto Designer

Nuccio Bertone wrote the following letter to Franco Scaglione on May 19, 1993, only thirty days before the great designer passed away on June 19th:

My Dear Scaglione,

It is a long time or better to say, I didn’t have any news of you since our collaboration ended.

I asked around if someone had any news about you, but always in vain.

Only recently, a journalist, Maurizio Tabucchi, informed me that now you live in Tuscany and he gave me your address so I can contact you.

I remember with great emotion your contribution to our projects we had at that time; I remember your sharpness into the shapes of the futuristic cars; I also remember our fierce discussions, especially when looking for excellence.

Your passion and knowledge for aerodynamics brought you to high levels and I couldn’t do anything but follow you.

Do you remember our tests on the highways or at the airport with the wool threads? Everything filmed and photographed by the other car beside us? An interesting and amusing job!!!!!

As always happens along our lives, there are the most pleasant and less pleasant events. Time passing away, and many and many years passed over our friendship, but I must say that I remember the first ones and I forget the second ones.

I often asked myself if you were an excellent artist much more than a designer.

Your talent, your culture, your desperate desire for satisfaction, dissatisfaction, your personal deportment, fit perfectly to that of a Great Artist.

I remember your particular attitudes. The first; your blue eyes that shot vivid flares when satisfied; second; when a trouble aroused you, you used to stay static, on your tiptoes.

There are many moments that live in my mind, my dear Scaglione, of the common work we made together.

On 1992 we celebrated 80 years of Bertone Factory. The top event was the exhibition of the three BATs that came from USA: admiration, astonishment, consideration by all the people!

My dear Scaglione, with this my letter, I wish to give you my great satisfaction I received from all the people who looked to your wonderful cars. The three BATS that went in a tour around Europe, now are going back to USA to the current owner who had been so kind to lend them for our anniversary.

You must believe me, my dear Scaglione, that I remember you always and often time. I appreciate your work with me for my Bertone firm.

Faithfully,

Your Nuccio Bertone

Scaglione’s Final Years at Suvereto

After a few attempts to create his own design company in the early 1980’s and designing for Fiat a revolutionary BAT mass transit bus, this solitary genius retired from public life and died almost forgotten and stricken by lung cancer in his Suvereto apartment in 1993, surrounded by his loving family.

Giovanna sadly shares with us these heart wrenching details:

“After the Intermeccanica period, Ing. Mailander (Fiat Grandi Automezzi chief) called my Babbo. Ing. Mailander asked him to design a coach bus (a comfortable one for long voyages), both aerodynamic and cozy.
“Babbo began his work and developed very interesting and futuristic drawings (even now I keep some notes on it). But unfortunately his great frustration over the outcome of the Intermeccanica situation contributed to his fall into a great depression… and that condition would not let him to concentrate on his new task.

“He had three very intense months on the project – very sad months – and he felt he could not go on with his new task. He went back by Mr Mailander telling him he would have to end his work. Mr Mailander understood his psychological condition and said, ‘Mr Scaglione, there is no one else who could realize this project; I will put your study into my desk…when you think you can go on with it, you have only to come here and have them back’.

“But unfortunately this didn’t happen with great regret to my Babbo and this took part of his life away.

“When my dad got sick and was near death, we had a little red boy cat we named “Papouse” (which means “child”) I found him coming back from my place of work, shivering and soaking wet from head to tail. He could not have been more than a month and a half old, with some of his tail hair cut off from top to bottom.

“Little Papouse cared for and loved Babbo very much. When Daddy was ill, this adorable little kitten placed himself at the bottom of Babbo’s bed and never moved from its place and never left him alone. I could tell you a thousand things; we would have to write another article together, believe me.”

The end of his life came in the family’s second floor house at Via Roma, 1 in Suvereto…a medieval walled city not far from Livorno.

Giovanna added: “I have no photos of these places. We didn’t love very much to make photos. But in my mind everything is always vivid. Sometimes memories are clearer than a photos and always much more sweet.”

Giovanna’s Parting Observations

“For many years after my father stopped working, people believed that he had died, and his name had almost disappeared from the memory of enthusiasts. It’s all thanks to trade magazines and Alfa Romeo, with whom I got back into contact with a few years after my Babbo’s death, that the memory of Franco Scaglione lives on. From memorials to publications and to events devoted to him, I make it my daily commitment to ensure that this special person is never forgotten, and not just by me as his daughter.

“He was a truly unique man, both at work and in his private life. He never laid down the law; he always explained why things needed doing. Determined, yes, but in spirit, and never tedious: it was impossible not to admire him and to like him.

“And now… I want to thank all my readers, with all of my heart for their patience, and I hope for their pleasure to follow me into this story about my father. Through the help of my dear friends Robert, Renzo, Vladimir and Ulrich, I tried to explain my father’s character, not only as a designer but especially as a man and as a wonderful father.

“Over the years there has been very, very little information conveyed about Babbo from the personal standpoint – until now!
Well, now I hope you have met and become familiar with his real nature and his real personality.

“I think it is always a pleasure to have the possibility to know a person in all his natures and his everyday behavior. Thank you very much for your attention, and please accept my friendly GRAZIE MILLE !!!! to everybody.”

Sincerely,

Giovanna Scaglione

Acknowledgments

In advance preparation for the writing of this feature we five Alfa Romeo enthusiasts first collectively assembled the well- known Alfa Romeo heritage site www.AutodeltaGoldenYears.com. We used the benefit of our memories and the art of good old-fashioned investigation while conducting many interview segments with our friend Giovanna Scaglione.

Data, photos, documents and letters used for this narrative are from Centro Documentazione Storica Alfa Romeo (Dott. Marco Fazio), books and old private correspondence with late Maurizio Tabucchi and the archives of our friends who were great Autodelta drivers and mechanics (Gian Luigi Picchi, Alberto Ponno, Michael Seger and Luca Perboni).

The story was cross-examined with correspondence left by Mr. Scaglione. We have added some vital information and never-released factual content thanks to a kind Swiss gentleman who in times past was heavily involved in the racing glories of Europe. We like to call him- “An Old Friend in Formerly High Old Places”. He was lucky enough to meet and became friends with the major technical brains and drivers over many decades. Now, in his “second youth” and with his rich archive, he is remembering facts and events of that heroic era, but continues to insist on his privacy and anonymity.

So, thank you R.R.P. (though somebody will certainly recognize who you are). We all hope that your memory and kind sharing will be of future help to our team in putting together a greater mosaic of those beautiful days.

And finally, we owe a sincere debt of gratitude to Dott. Massimo Grandi, preeminent professor of automotive design, noted historian and internationally-recognized writer from the University of Florence for reading our manuscript and extending his kind words and beautiful illustrations.

If you are interested to learn more about the technical achievements and the actual construction of the 33 Stradale or are interested in the evolution of Alfa Romeo racing activities from 1964-1984 please visit our worldwide Autodelta heritage site…supplied in three languages:

www.AutodeltaGoldenYears.com

Thank you for visiting!

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