"If there are more Communists in Reggio Emilia than in the whole of England, it is all due to Valdo Magnani." That was how the comrades of the Red Belt felt about the up & coming secretary of their best-organized provincial federation.*
Slight, sallow Valdo Magnani, 38, college-trained in economics and philosophy, had joined the party in 1936, fought in Fascist Italy's army (as an artillery captain) until Mussolini's downfall, then switched to the partisan anti-Fascist forces. In 1946 he emerged as Reggio Emilia's ace Communist organizer. Militant, tireless, persuasive, he gained 10,000 new...
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