The Italian Air Service to December, 1939 – December, 1941 Pioneering Flights:

Francesco de Pinedo, 1927 flight to the Americas in a Savoia Marchetti S.55 Balbo’s 1930 formation of S. 55 Flying Boats to Rio 1934 flight by Lombardi and Mazzotti in S. 71 tri-motor land based plane. Crashed north of Natal. Covers were forwarded by PanAm 1938 (January 24-25)

“Sorci Verdi” flight from to , picture postcard Senegal 2f., addressed to Rome signed by Col. Biseo, Capt. Moscatelli, Ten. Mussolini ,and Capt. Paradisi; another card bearing Senegal 2f. and dated Dakar 27-2-38; fine. Two unique cards from this little known flight.

http://harmers.com/pdf/4766/ha rmers_catal_4766.pdf Harmer’s Auction Wednesday, 19th. December 2007 http://issuu.com/qui-filatelia -- the Lino Lensi exhibit http://www.ilpostalista.it/aerofilatelia_015.htm Rome-Rio Italian Airline

Date taken:1941

Photographer:

Hart Preston

http://images.google.com/hosted/life/7fddd9031e86622d.html http://disneyandmore.blogspot.com/2008/11/walt-disney-and-animation-artists-in.html Bruno Mussolini

Attilio Biseo

Company begins with two general managers, veterans of the sorci verdi flight; the Rio GM was Carlo Ponzi who had mingled to his advantage with Italian politicians in Rome after his deportation from the US in 1934. Ponzi died in a charity hospital in Rio in 1949. Ponzi, after LATI, lounges on a Brazilian beach with his memoirs. http://www.jefsewell.com/post/54135398030/charles-ponzi-after-deportation-forgotten-but-not Route Maps

Miskevich, “Air Mail Through South America to the ,” Beith, The Italian South Atlantic Air Mail Service 1939-1941 German Postal Specialist, March, 1994, pp. 109-119 http://issuu.com/qui-filatelia -- the Lino Lensi exhibit http://issuu.com/qui-filatelia

Notice published in Rassegna delle Poste e delle Telecomunicazioni, 1940, fasicolo 6, paragraph 534, pp 876- 877, noting the difficulties of communicating with countries in Central and South America on the Rome, , NY route due to sequestration and censorship at Bermuda and indicating that the “national” line Rome-Rio would be used for letters to those countries as well as for Mexico. http://www.issp.po.it/fonti/rassegna.htm See article, Airpost Journal, Vol. 85, September 2014, pp .390-394

http://www.post-und-geschichte.ch/site/uploads/pdf/artikel_homepage/ch_vice_versa/lati.pdf

See article: Pezzillo, “Season’s Greetings,” Airpost Journal, December, 2002, pp.463-465

http://www.rossica.org/v_gallery/_pdf/Evolution_Siberia/The%20Evolution%20of%20'via-Siberia'%20Mail.%201899%20- %201945%20Frame11.pdf

http://www.collectorsclubchicago.org/pdf-doc/evolution_of_via_siberia_mail.pdf WWII German false passport Sub-Lt. Kummer of the Graf Spee travelling As Max Werner, via Chile, Peru, , (reprint?)

Item sold on Ebay by: dr.edmund-von-thermann, an eBay member since Dec 04, 2007, based in ,

Service Suspended/Return to Sender End of Service:

The Secret History of MI6: 1909-1949 by Keith Jeffery

The LATI and the North-American Project to control the Brazilian aviation market by TANIA QUINTANEIRO Departamento de Sociologia e Antropologia da UFMG Mestre emhttp://www.readcube.com/articles/10.1590/S0104- Ciência Política 87752007000100013?locale=en

Hitler's Secret War in South America, 1939--1945: German Military Espionage ... By Stanley E. Hilton A Basic Bibliography

Beith, “The LATI South Atlantic Air Mail Service 1939-1941,” Air Mail News, numbers 127 (October/November 1985) and 128 (January/March 1986)

Beith, The Italian South Atlantic Air Mail Service, 1993

Boyle, Air Mail Operations during World War II, American Air Mail Society, 1998

Cusworth, The Italian South Atlantic Airline, 2012

Cusworth, Towle, West, “Chile and Condor – LATI Service,” Chile News, April 2002, Vol. IV, No 78, pp. 700-707

Davies, Airlines of Latin America since 1919, Putnam ,1984 and A History of the World’s Airlines, Oxford, 1964

Gentilli, “Pioneering on the South Atlantic, Italian Style: The History of LATI,” The Putnam Aeronautical Review, December 1990, pp. 232-243

Miskevich, “AirMail Through South America to the United States,” German Postal Specialist, 1994, pp. 109-119

Pezzillo, “The South American Service of LATI,” The Airpost Journal, January 1990, pp. 7-17

Vigliar, Renato, LATI, Linee Aeree Transcontinentali Italiane, Dicembre 1939-1941, 1979 (available from APS library)