I was born in San Carlo in the province of Ferrara on 8 April 1894 into a peasant family. When I finished school in 1912 I had the chance to satisfy my desire to go to America the following year and settled in Brockton, Massachusetts.

In those days I regarded myself as a socialist, not really out of reasoned conviction but simply lest I give the impression that I was a conservative. During summer 1914, at an Italian-American picnic, I made the acquaintance of a man considerably older than me who told me that he was an anarchist and offered me, to read, a book that he said that he had enjoyed reading. In fact it was Kropotkin's Memoirs which held my attention, for I discovered in it feelings and ideas that it seemed had always been a part of me. I went on reading what he lent me and took out a subscription to Cronaca Sovversiva which, in a very short space of time, had become essential reading for me. The war in Europe was just beginning at the time and there was widespread revulsion at the horrors being perpetrated. I had occasion to hear a few talks given by Galleani and to make the acquaintances of persons of my own age living in the Boston area. In April 1916, with all of the zeal of the convert, I accepted the post of administrator with Cronaca Sovversiva. Towards the end of 1915 I had even made so bold as to send an article to that weekly paper and it had been published, albeit completely revamped by the editors.