Dina Scoppettone

"I was born of Italian immigrant parents from Italy. My father came to this country in 1909 and he worked on the railroad." With these opening lines, Dina Scoppettone recorded the events of her life. On Feb. 9, 2006, at the age of 92, she went from her home in Enumclaw, WA. to be with God and her husband, Jim.

Born in San Jose, CA in 1913 to Amerigo and Magenta Tognetti, Dina was one of five children, Fred, Bruna, Anso and Dino. As a young girl, her parents along with many of their Italian friends, moved to Bonny Doon where there was work at the San Vicente Lumber Company, but it wasn't long before Amerigo brought this family back to San Jose where the children spent many happy hours on the big front porch on Lorraine Avenue. And lucky too that she returned to San Jose, for it was there, in the sixth grade, that she met the boy that would become the true love of her life.

The years turned like picture pages in an Easter book; the egg man and the vegetable truck honking out front, sodas at the corner drug store, and Papa's toscano cigars wafting through the fig trees in the back yard. Then sweet seventeen arrived and there he was again. James Scoppettone was studying law at the University of Santa Clara when he proposed to Dina, and thus began the family that says goodbye to her today.

Over the hill to Santa Cruz for the man who would become Police Judge in the little town by the bay in 1943. He's still remembered today as the only judge to sentence sometimes errant Santa Cruzans to a month of Sundays in church.

For sixty-five years, Santa Cruz was home to Dina until 2001, when she moved to Enumclaw, a small town southeast of Seattle to be with her two daughters. In the growing up years for her children, Jim, Jr. Bud, Dick, Anita and Linda, she sowed the seeds for what would be-come her greatest legacy, sharing her love with each and every person she ever met. Her love of God, much like her husband's, was the well-spring that began her journey of a thousand friendships, with people like the third Musketeer, Elsa Morgado Dina and her daughter Anita rounded out the trio, and her third "daughter", Lynn Armanini Ponz-ini.

Her grandchildren, who always got the best of her love, were four-teen in all; Sharilyn, Greg, Marcia, Dina, Lara, Dino, Nick, Chris, Mi-chael, Theresa, Gina, Kristen, Sydel and Sally; and great grandchil-dren, twelve, Chyna, Bryan, Sophia, Anna, Nadia, Peyton, Bailey, Hunter, Sophia, Megan, Colin and Evan.

Her children and their spouses, Jim and Sherry Scoppettone, Dick and MiMi Scoppettone, Anita Carlson, and Ron and Linda Knodel, and Dina's sister, Marian Allegri and her children Don and Joanne, and brother, Dino Tognetti and his daughter, Nadine, her nephew Gene Tognetti and niece Barbara Brakenhoff all invite her friends to pay their respects on Thursday, February 16, from 4 to 8 p.m. at Benito and Azzaro Pacific Gardens Chapel on Cayuga Street in Santa Cruz.

On Friday, February 17, a Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at Holy Cross Catholic Church, 126 High St. in Santa Cruz, beginning at 10 a.m. The committal service will follow at Holy Cross Mausoleum, 2271 7th Ave. in Santa Cruz where she will be laid to rest beside her loving husband James. After the service, all are welcomed for lunch at Peachwoods in Pasatiempo. Please make a contribution to your favorite charity in her name.