Sergio Vedovato

Sergio Vedovato, a former senator of the Italian Republic and president of the Province of Novara in the Piedmont region of Italy, is now retired and enjoys writing what he calls “little stories about the family ancestors” for his grandchildren. Batiste Gamara, killed in a Union Pacific coal mine near Kemmerer, Wyo., in 1915, was his great-uncle.

Batiste Gamara, 19, emigrated from the Italian Piedmont to New York in 1907. He mined copper and coal in Pennsylvania, Michigan and, finally, near Kemmerer, Wyo. There, tragically, he was killed by falling coal in 1915. His great nephew tells his story.