More Things That Live on the Bookshelf - And A Bit of Sicilian History Too

Continuing on from the earlier post, here are few more things that live on our bookshelves.

These 2 little Kachinas have been in Heather's family a long time - they belonged to her grandmother.

My younger brother works for the Montana Highway Patrol.  

We found the next one, a bear with a fish, while on a trip to Montana a few years back.

Several years ago I was involved in the construction financing for the Hyatt Regency Resort in Huntington Beach, California. This model of an old Woody was one of the mementos of that project.

The problem with having a lot of stuff is that after a while you forget where some of it came from. We think this next one was from a trip to New Mexico about 18 years ago. Or, like the one after it (a replica of a find at an Italian archeological site), it could have come from a museum store.

The next few came from trips to Italy.  I've had this little Leaning Tower of Pisa on my bookshelf for over 32 years. I got it during a quick trip to Pisa one afternoon while I was attending school in Florence, in 1980.

Our cousins bought this for us in one of the seaside towns in Sicily, in 2006.

We brought a couple of interesting things back from our 2006 trip to Italy. That trip included a visit to the town of Salaparuta, Sicily, where my father was born.  The original town was completely destroyed by an earthquake in January of 1968.  The ruins were left in place, and the town was later rebuilt in a different location.  This next object may seem a bit odd to some - it's chunks of marble from the floor of the ruined church where my father was baptized. 

Construction of the Sicilian Baroque church, dedicated to Santa Caterina de Alessandria, was started in 1610 and completed in 1762.  Previous churches on the hilltop site date back to the 12th Century.  Here's a shot of the front steps of the church.

Here's a shot of what was the interior.  You can still see the two-tone marble floor.  Even in ruins this was an impressive building, all the more so when you consider how small the town was.  I doubt there were more than 2,500 inhabitants in Salaparuta at its height, and today it's probably more like 1,500, if that. 

You can click here to see some galleries with more images from our 2006 trip to Italy.