Breathtaking San Gaetano, Nobel Prize, and American Stars No. 1

San Gaetano 

The history of San Gaetano dates back to the Late Bronze Age. With just 150 residents, it is the smallest hamlet in the municipal area of Caorle, but perhaps the most suggestive. The most significant is its historical past, linked to the presence of the Franchetti barons, who chose this remote corner of the Caorle lagoon to make it a “self-sufficient” management center on the genus of Alvisopoli and the communities that flourished in the 19th century.
Baron Raimondo Franchetti made it the heart of a vast agricultural center. More familiar, however, the attendance in the 1960s years of  American stars – Ernst Hemingway and Henry Fonda. They were guests of the Franchetti manor house and even more. Ernest Hemingway got the Nobel prize for literature for the Novel “Across the river, among the trees” where San Gaetano and its fishing valleys were immortalized. And Henry Fonda married in fourth marriage with Afdera Franchetti.

Ernest Hemingway is an American author (1899-1961) and Nobel Prize winner for Literature in 1954.

The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them.

Never go on a trip with anyone you do not love.

Never think that war, no matter how necessary or how justified is not a crime.

Ernest Hemingway

Hemingway dedicated some of the most beautiful pages of his book “Across the River and Into the Trees” published in 1950 to the lagoon; in it, he also tells the story of the love of the protagonist for Renata, a noble 20-year-old Venetian lady.

Each year takes place in Caorle – The Papa Journalist Award. For one week in Caorle, promotes writing, its originality, and encourages the passion for the journalistic profession both for those attending the masters and journalism schools and for students of Italian universities, to whom the annual competition is addressed.

Ernest Hemingway arrived in San Gaetano for the first time in the winter of 1948, as a guest of Baron Raimondo Nanuk Franchetti (brother of Afdera Franchetti), with whom he shared a passion for hunting and a deep friendship.

Afdera Franchetti (born c. 1931) and Henry Fonda  (May 16, 1905 – August 12, 1982) 

Henry Fonda &
Afdera Franchetti

Afdera Franchetti is an Italian baroness, descended from an old Jewish family of Venice which intermarried with the Rothschild family and who eventually converted to Roman Catholicism.

Adfera Franchetti is the sister of Nanuk Franchetti, a friend of Ernest Hemingway. Afdera is the most famous wife of Henry Fonda. They were introduced by Audrey Hepburn in Italy while Fonda was filming War and Peace with Audrey and Mel Ferrer. Henry and Afdera were married for 3 years.

The laguna of Falconers and the mouth of the river

Near Bocca di Volta the Lemene River receives the waters of the Commessera Channel and then flows into the Nicesolo channel. Going downstream the Lemane enters the lagoon and finally flows into the Adriatic Sea near the entrance of the port of Falconer. 

The environment and the landscape here are characterized by the present e of thick rushes along the Nicesolo river banks from a habitat of great importance for wildlife. The rushes consist exclusively of common reeds (Phragmites australis) and are home to various flower species of interest, such as the rare Kosteletzkya pentacarpos. The rush is also home to a number of animal species – and to birds in particular – because it represents a reproductive habitat of critical importancece.

The Casoni

The casoni are ancient houses whose main characteristic is the use of natural raw materials as a construction material. In the past, their structure and interior organization were functional to families living mainly on hunting, fishing and harvesting. The floor plan of a typical cason is an eccentric – shaped ellipse, the reed walls are inclined and converge with above, were bundles of reeds intertwine in a characteristic style. The load-bearing structure is made of sturdy posts to which beams of a smaller diameter are tied lengthwise.

The interiors feature a fireplace next to the entrance door, a table in the middle of the room and beds at the far end. The original cason had no windows and relied on airflow from the entrance door. The floor consists of packed earth, nevertheless, the casoni were inhabited up until the middle of the 20th century.

Sources: Wikipedia, Photos: Pixabay, Live by Web