Today is Republic Day in Italy. Republic Day (Italian: Festa della Repubblica) marks the referendum of 1946, which resulted in the creation of the Italian republic.
Italy became a nation on March 17th 1861, when most of the states of the region and the two Sicilies were united under King Victor Emmanuel II, hitherto king of Sardinia. The father of Italian unification was Count Camillo Benso di Cavour, the Chief Minister of Victor Emmanuel. Rome stayed under the rule of the Papacy for nearly 10 years and became part of the Kingdom of Italy on September 20th 1870. This is the final date of Italian unification.
On June 2nd 1946, in a referendum on the monarchy, more than 12 million Italians voted in favour of the birth of the Italian Republic. Male members of the royal family were sent into exile because of their association with the fascist regime and were only allowed to return to their country in 2002. Italy’s constitution now forbids a monarchy to ever rule again.
Not kosher…
Today is the birthday, in 1941, of William Guest, singer with The Pips. Their first hit single was a version of ‘I Heard It Through the Grapevine’ in 1967. With Gladys Knight had the 1973 US No.1 single ‘Midnight Train To Georgia’, and the 1975 UK No.4 single with Gladys ‘The Way We Were’. Guest died on 24th Dec 2015 of heart failure at the age of 74. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwbmufPphP0
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