(credit where credit is due to Wikipedia's very long lists of notable Italians & Italian-Americans + various other responses to Katelyn Burns' original post)

Tomie DePaola (1934-2020), beloved author & illustrator;

...and if Dr. Anthony Fauci drops dead tomorrow I'll nominate him too, but naming holidays after living people is weird.)

(see also:

Mario Savio (1942-1996), civil rights icon;

Salvador Luria (1912-1991), Nobel-winning microbiologist;

(Cons: Literally plotted with fellow atom bomb creator Oppenheimer to poison the entire-ass German food supply; Opp decided it wasn't worth it if they couldn't kill at least half a million people. 🙃)

Enrico Fermi (1901-1954), legendary physicist. One of the four fundamental forces of nature used to be named after this guy.

(Local notes: Born in Rome.)

Ettore Boiardi aka Chef Hector Boyardee (1897-1985), who helped feed US troops in WWII & normalized Italian food in nondiaspora home cooking.

(Local notes: Born in Emilia-Romagna; Ohio loves this man.)

Bonus round!:

Anna LoPizzo (1878-1912), martyred in the Bread & Roses Strike. Unfortunately not much is known about her life.

(Local notes: She was born in Sicily, & is buried in Lawrence, MA.)

(Local notes: Mother Cabrini was born in Lombardy, which at the time was part of the Austrian Empire; there used to be a church named for her in Scituate, MA, but it closed in 2004.)

SAINT FRANCES XAVIER CABRINI (née Francesca Saverio Cabrini; 1850-1917), the first US saint.

Columbus wasn't exactly canonization material.

Bonus: Verrazzano (to the best of my knowledge) committed no recorded atrocities!

(Local notes: He was Florentine; yes, this is the bridge guy.)

GIOVANNI DA VERRAZZANO (1491-1528), aka the first European on record to sail along North America's Atlantic coast (from Florida to New Brunswick).

Columbus just raped & pillaged his way around part of the Caribbean & called it India.

Wakefield’s deliberate falsification of data in this study resulted in his removal from the UK medical register and a lifetime ban from practising medicine in the UK.

Happy Fuck Andrew Wakefield Day!

That looks like a young Cooper's hawk. Do you remember how big it was? Cooper's hawks range from crow-sized to duck-sized, depending on sex; American kestrels are a bit smaller, robin-sized.

birda.org/wp-content/u...

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Cooper...