Happy birthday, Angelo Catania, Class of 1943!

Angelo Catania, Class of 1943, celebrated his 92^nd birthday Friday, August 12 in Covina, California.

He’s not the oldest living Monongah High graduate, but there aren’t many older than him. Leo Kubiet, Class of 1942, who lives in the greater St. Petersburg, Florida area, is one older survivor. I doubt anyone is older than Amelia Zentz Shenasky, Class of 1938, who is 96.

Angelo Catania

If you know any MHS grad older than Amelia, email John Olesky at jo4wvu@neo.rr.com

It was Angelo who convinced his siblings and father Mandala Catania to make the move from Thomas Street in Monongah to Covina, which he discovered and fell in love with during his Army Coast Artillery training days of World War II.

Alex Catania, Class of 1944; Mary Catania Heywood, Class of 1945; Josephine Catania, Class of 1952; and their father, Mandala, much like the Conestoga Wagon families before them, joined Angelo, Class of 1943, in the expedition to a new land and a new life. For Mandala, widower of Schiro Catania, it was a reminder of his native Italy.

Angelo married a Monongah girl, Pauline Layne Catania, who passed away in 2001. Mary is the widow of Arthur Heywood, who passed away in October 2015.

Angelo’s sister, Carmella Catania Allard, Class of 1947, wound up in San Antonio because her husband, Omer, still was in the Air Force when the Catania migration took place. He retired after a pair of decades in The Wild Sky Yonder branch.

Alex died in 2007, Josephine in 2009. 

Alex Catania sponsored the Confirmation of Frank Franze, Class of 1950, who lives in Slidell, Louisiana near his daughters.

Angelo and Alex once owned and operated the Sinclair Station on U.S. 19 behind the Thomas Street homes’ row of garages and adjacent to the Lawrence and Regina Godby residence.

The Catania family lived on Thomas Street in the third house off Church Street. The Olesky family had the first house, the Mangino family the second. 

The Manginos also moved, to Philadelphia, in the 1950s. 

Happy birthday, Angelo! And many more!

 

If you want to add your congratulations for Angelo’s 92nd birthday, go to Mary Catania Heywood’s Facebook page and she’ll pass the kudos along to him.