Cora Slocomb Savorgnan di Brazzà: An Artisan of Peace and Social Justice

This chapter has to be read as a precious testimony written in the first person, both from its author (Idanna Pucci), and from her maternal great-grandmother Cora Slocomb Savorgnan di Brazzà (New Orleans 1862 - Rome 1944): the long quotes from the latter give the reader the impression of hearing her voice. This American woman, who in 1887 married count Detalmo Savorgnan di Brazzà, introduced the art of making lace in order to improve the peasant women’s conditions in the northern Italian region of Friuli. She founded various Cooperative Lace Schools which reached the highest level of quality, and succeeded in her struggle for the abolition of American tariffs on foreign lace. Designer and producer of dolls and toy animals, she transformed the fortunes of a small shop that produced biscuits, turning it into a big factory that is still in operation today; she also bred a new white violet that received important awards. As already said, Cora was the first president of the Italian Female Industries, the extraordinary organisation that we have just described. Through her rules of life, spread out in her schools and also applied in her own family, we understand her philosophy and the ideals to which she aspired. In 1895 she launched an American campaign against capital punishment, in order to help a young women immigrant to the USA from Southern Italy, and she succeeded. Two years later, she designed the peace flag, and actively contributed to the first international peace movement. Sadly, from 1906, for 37 years, Cora lived in isolation because of a mental illness.