Book Provides Record of American in Italy During WWII

WEST BRANCH - Seventy years ago Joe Panozzo was a 15-year-old kid in Italy helping American pilots and soldiers hide as World War II raged on.

Sixty years ago he was fighting for the United States Army in Korea.

A year ago, Joe had a stroke. A month ago, two smaller strokes means that he probably won't walk again, that he'll likely spend the rest of his life at Crestview Nursing and Rehab Center in West Branch, that his memories will fade away.

But, if there's one thing Joe can count on, it's his wife, Josephine, who lives near the rehab center. She visits him daily and gets the credit for prompting him to write down the stories he used to tell.

"We thought he'd be coming home," Josephine says, looking forward to their 62nd wedding anniversary Oct. 14. "He was that well. No problem with his short-term memory. Then he had two smaller strokes."

Diagnosed with diabetes a decade ago, Joe's right leg was amputated below the knee in 2003. He says it was due to frostbite while in Korea, but used a prosthesis to get around until the stroke.

"I'm grateful for what I've got," Joe says. "I've got a good wife. A good family. Nothing to complain about except that."

He holds one of his books, "An American in Jeopardy," published in 1985 about his life in Italy from 1939 to 1946. Beside it sits "One Man's Journey to War," published in 1999, about his experiences in Korea.

Joe wrote his stories in longhand, Josephine typed them out, they self-published the books.

"You read this," she says, handing me the first book, "and you'll understand why he wrote it."

Every day Josephine reads the newspaper to Joe. She'll bring him spaghetti one night, a steak the next. He is her hero.

Born in Chicago to parents who immigrated from Italy, Joe was 12 when the family returned to the homeland in 1939. His parents hoped to sell property but war broke out and they couldn't leave. Fortunately, they lived near Meledo in northern Italy where the war took place mostly from the air.

"I'd watch the bomb bay doors open," Joe says. "I'd follow the fall of the bombs. It was worrisome."

As an American citizen - Joe fills his book with references to his loyalty and yearnings to come home - he had to act like he fit in. But, as an American, he wasn't any safer.

"The war was still unknown, the outcome. You can think you'll make it, but you don't know."

When a plane was hit, Joe watched for parachutes and went to them. He'd morn the dead fliers, help find medical help for the wounded, hide those who had survived.

"So many of them were shot out of the sky," he says. "All they had was the memory of a parachute coming down on top of them."

In 1946, Joe finally came home. His brother would wait another year; his parents until 1952.

Joe met Josephine DeBenedetto in 1947 when they worked for the same company in Rockford, Ill. They married in 1950, just a couple of months before Joe was drafted for the Korean War.

"I never thought about him getting killed," Josephine says. War had just become part of life.

For 45 years they lived in Rochelle, Ill., (he was mayor from 1991 to 1995) coming to West Branch in 2006 to be closer to their son, Joe. (Their other son, Angelo, died in 1991.)

While he cherishes his Italian ancestry, Joe detested Italy so much that he didn't return for 25 years, and then to work on his book.

"I'm American, true blue," Joe says. "Everything in my life has been a blessing in some way."