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The Sicilian Judge: Anthony Alaimo, an American Hero
Judge Anthony Alaimo s life is a metaphor for quintessential American courage, hard work, patriotism, compassion. This biography does not dwell in the realm of metaphorical; it plunges us into the day-to-day life of an immigrant family struggling in the depths of the Depression to become Americans, of an immigrant son putting his every dream on hold to pursue a greater love of country. It carries us into the madness of air warfare, the horror of a screaming crash into the frigid North Sea, the terrible realization and burden of living with the knowledge that you survived when everyone else died.
The son of illiterate, but deeply religious Sicilian immigrants, US District Court Judge Anthony Alaimo shined shoes and cut hair in Jamestown, New York, to pay for his college education. (He was the Golden Gloves boxer attending the quiet Methodist College.) As a POW, he participated in the world-famous Great Escape, and later broke out on his own, making his way through German lines into Switzerland.
A mother s love, religious faith, and ferocious patriotism transform an impoverished immigrant boy into one of the Greatest Generation heroes. This book takes us inside the incandescent life and tumultuous times of Judge Anthony Alaimo, WWII bomber pilot, POW, and indomitable escape artist, whose fidelity to the law is equaled by his compassion and outrage at injustice.
The son of illiterate, but deeply religious Sicilian immigrants, US District Court Judge Anthony Alaimo shined shoes and cut hair in Jamestown, New York, to pay for his college education. (He was the Golden Gloves boxer attending the quiet Methodist College.) As a POW, he participated in the world-famous Great Escape, and later broke out on his own, making his way through German lines into Switzerland.
A mother s love, religious faith, and ferocious patriotism transform an impoverished immigrant boy into one of the Greatest Generation heroes. This book takes us inside the incandescent life and tumultuous times of Judge Anthony Alaimo, WWII bomber pilot, POW, and indomitable escape artist, whose fidelity to the law is equaled by his compassion and outrage at injustice.
282 pages, Hardcover
First published November 1, 2008
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
August 28, 2022
Highly biased because the subject of this biography is my great uncle, however, the book itself does a lot of justice to both the man and his story. If you’re looking for a biography that both covers an amazing life, and also keeps the biography’s subject human, than I would highly recommend. Also *spoiler* my great uncle was a pretty cool guy.
November 10, 2014
The life of Anthony Alaimo is inspiring and at times almost impossible to believe. Coppola, a former Newsweek reporter who calls Georgia home, clearly respected the hell out of this man and you will too after reading this bio. If this press clip from just after his death doesn't want to make you know more about Alaimo, well, you're hopeless:
U.S. District Court Judge Anthony Alaimo wasn't some judge who delivered generic up-or-down decisions from an unfeeling bench. He helped shape the very culture of the legal profession and the judiciary in Georgia. If you heard the man's life described, you almost would think you were hearing the plot of a movie. When Alaimo died Dec. 30 2009 at age 89, Georgia lost perhaps its most eminently fair jurist. Atlanta civil rights attorney Robert Cullen, who had argued many cases before Alaimo, described the judge in later years as "something of a folk hero in the white and the black communities. He was an extraordinary jurist who did extraordinary things."
Augusta attorney John C. Bell Jr. summed up the high points of Alaimo's career as "shining examples for the bench, the bar and every soul lucky enough to claim that title 'citizen of the United States of America.' "
Alaimo came to America as a toddler in 1922 with his Sicilian immigrant parents, and in Jamestown, N.Y., he grew into a young man who embraced hard work and solid moral values. He cut hair and shined shoes to help put himself through college. And like many patriotic young men of the Greatest Generation, he served his country in World War II, as a B-26 bomber pilot.
We mentioned a movie plot before. Alaimo was the only member of his flight crew to survive when his plane was shot down in 1943. While imprisoned by the Germans, he helped fellow prisoners tunnel to freedom in a daring breakout that was immortalized in the 1963 film "The Great Escape". He engineered his own great escape from another prison camp in 1945.
After graduating from Emory University with a law degree in 1948, he practiced with distinction in Atlanta and Brunswick. But it wasn't until after he was confirmed for the federal bench in 1971 that he began striking his greatest blows for fairness and equality.
Perhaps his best-known decision was in the historic 1972 Guthrie v. Evans case, which spurred sweeping prison reforms, starting with the then-notoriously corrupt, rat-infested, sewage-swamped Georgia State Prison at Reidsville. His decisions dramatically improved the security, safety and basic privileges of prisoners.
Closer to Augusta was the landmark Rogers v. Lodge case in 1982, which confronted election procedures that Alaimo found were unfairly diluting minority voting strength in Burke County - a decision reaffirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court.
He served as the Southern District of Georgia's chief federal judge from 1976 to 1990, assuming senior judge status the following year. And through it all, he set a pace and a tone in the legal community that stressed decorum, respect and, above all, justice.
Augusta attorney David Hudson counts himself among the fortunate who began practicing in front of Alaimo.
"We were expected to be professional, courteous and prepared," he said. "He was a marvelous mentor to all of us who learned to try cases the Alaimo way."
Sadly, the "Alaimo way" can no longer be witnessed firsthand, only hopefully emulated by others. This fine judge truly will be missed.
U.S. District Court Judge Anthony Alaimo wasn't some judge who delivered generic up-or-down decisions from an unfeeling bench. He helped shape the very culture of the legal profession and the judiciary in Georgia. If you heard the man's life described, you almost would think you were hearing the plot of a movie. When Alaimo died Dec. 30 2009 at age 89, Georgia lost perhaps its most eminently fair jurist. Atlanta civil rights attorney Robert Cullen, who had argued many cases before Alaimo, described the judge in later years as "something of a folk hero in the white and the black communities. He was an extraordinary jurist who did extraordinary things."
Augusta attorney John C. Bell Jr. summed up the high points of Alaimo's career as "shining examples for the bench, the bar and every soul lucky enough to claim that title 'citizen of the United States of America.' "
Alaimo came to America as a toddler in 1922 with his Sicilian immigrant parents, and in Jamestown, N.Y., he grew into a young man who embraced hard work and solid moral values. He cut hair and shined shoes to help put himself through college. And like many patriotic young men of the Greatest Generation, he served his country in World War II, as a B-26 bomber pilot.
We mentioned a movie plot before. Alaimo was the only member of his flight crew to survive when his plane was shot down in 1943. While imprisoned by the Germans, he helped fellow prisoners tunnel to freedom in a daring breakout that was immortalized in the 1963 film "The Great Escape". He engineered his own great escape from another prison camp in 1945.
After graduating from Emory University with a law degree in 1948, he practiced with distinction in Atlanta and Brunswick. But it wasn't until after he was confirmed for the federal bench in 1971 that he began striking his greatest blows for fairness and equality.
Perhaps his best-known decision was in the historic 1972 Guthrie v. Evans case, which spurred sweeping prison reforms, starting with the then-notoriously corrupt, rat-infested, sewage-swamped Georgia State Prison at Reidsville. His decisions dramatically improved the security, safety and basic privileges of prisoners.
Closer to Augusta was the landmark Rogers v. Lodge case in 1982, which confronted election procedures that Alaimo found were unfairly diluting minority voting strength in Burke County - a decision reaffirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court.
He served as the Southern District of Georgia's chief federal judge from 1976 to 1990, assuming senior judge status the following year. And through it all, he set a pace and a tone in the legal community that stressed decorum, respect and, above all, justice.
Augusta attorney David Hudson counts himself among the fortunate who began practicing in front of Alaimo.
"We were expected to be professional, courteous and prepared," he said. "He was a marvelous mentor to all of us who learned to try cases the Alaimo way."
Sadly, the "Alaimo way" can no longer be witnessed firsthand, only hopefully emulated by others. This fine judge truly will be missed.
December 31, 2017
Great story about a man who lived and served the people and the law of this country.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews