Tranquillo Italo Conte

1930 - 2019

Tranquillo Italo Conte

Reno - Tranquillo Italo Conte, 88, died on April 29, 2019 in Reno, Nevada.

Tranquillo was born November 29, 1930 in Klamath Falls, Oregon to Pietro and Italia Conte. When he was just three years old, he and his younger brother, Angelo, were sent to live with their paternal grandparents in Cavaso del Tomba in northeastern Italy, where the brothers would spend the majority of their childhood.

Writing of his time there, Tranquilo describes a life of living off the land, and of hard work. "I felt fortunate that our grandparents had about five acres of good farm land. We worked the land from sun up to sun down, seven days a week. They raised chickens, rabbits, a cow for milk and butter, and pork for salami." But as Tranquillo entered his teen years, that life was interrupted by World War II, which brought, poverty, danger and fear. In 1944, German troops invaded and took control of Cavaso del Tomba,taxing the inhabitants' limited resources and cruelly punishing any resisters.

On Christmas Eve, 1946, the next chapter of Tranquillo's life began as he and Angelo began the journey back to America. Their father had remarried, and sent for them to join him in Weed, California. They left Cavaso by bus, then boarded a cattle train to Genoa (all the passenger trains had been destroyed in WWII) finally boarding the Marin Perch, an American Red Cross ship, for the passage to New York. They arrived, in Tranquillo's words, "more dead than alive," at Ellis Island nine days later.

Through the kindness of Red Cross agents there, the brothers' first meal in America was a hamburger, and with a note pinned to their shirts, they were placed on a train with the ultimate destination of Sacramento. They arrived there 21 days after their departure from Italy. The brothers never saw their grandparents again, much to their regret, but later in life were able to return to their childhood home and visit their grandparents' resting places.

Once back in the United States, Tranquillo settled into his new life, getting to know the father he had not seen in 13 years, learning a new language, working for the Long Bell Lumber Company, and serving in the U.S. Army during the Korean War. In 1957 he moved to Reno and found work at the Veterans Administration (VA) Hospital, first as a cook, and then as a VA police officer, retiring after 30 years of civil service.

In Reno, Tranquillo also met and married Maria Guidotti, who had emigrated to the U.S. in 1957 from San Benedetto del Tronto, Italy. Tranquillo and Maria raised three children, Rose, Pete, and John. Tranquillo appreciated Maria's skills in the kitchen, writing, "My wife...is an excellent Italian cook. Whenever we invite someone to our home for a meal, we don't care what nationality they are---once they step inside the house they are automatically ITALIAN."

Tranquillo filled his retirement years planting vegetables, growing fruit trees, creatively landscaping his northwest Reno home and, pricelessly, writing of his experiences in Italy as a young man.

Tranquillo was devoted to both of the countries that he loved and called home: Italy where he spent his formative years and learned not only the beautiful lessons of what the earth can give us, but also the horrible lessons of war and privation; and America where, with hard work and the memory of those lessons of the Italian countryside, he built a happy, meaningful life, not only nurturing his family but also serving his country. Tranquillo was a true Italian-American, and his light will be missed.

Tranquillo is survived by Maria, his wife of fifty-nine years, their children Rosie Poer of Henderson Nevada, Pete Conte of Reno, Nevada and John Conte of Maricopa, Arizona and three grandsons, Christopher, Kavin and Joseph.

A military service will be held for Tranquillo at the Northern Nevada Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Fernley, Nevada on Friday, June 7th at 1:00 p.m.