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Antonio Stoppani
The father of Italian geology.
Antonio Stoppani was born in Lecco, in a house in XX Settembre Square, on 15 August 1824. In 1835 he entered the Castello seminary to study grammar and soon, feeling the vocation for the priesthood, he moved to the seminary of Monza. In 1848 he became a priest. Actively participates in the Five Days of Milan and subsequent war events. He also became interested in studies of geology and paleontology, with particular interest in Brianza and the Rhaetian Alps.
After the liberation of Milan the Stoppani was readmitted to the previous offices and in 1861 he was appointed Extraordinary of Geology at the University of Pavia. In 1867 he was a geology teacher at the new Polytechnic of Milan. In this period he wrote a great deal of scientific work. His most famous work was Il Bel Paese, a book formed by a series of very special parlor conversations about our country. Passionate mountaineer, in 1874 he was elected as the first president of the Milan section of the Italian Alpine Club. He died in Milan, due to a heart attack on 2 January 1891.
