- Date Of Death: September 23, 2018
- State: Connecticut
Ferranti, Ida
Born in 1921 in a Manhattan tenement to Italian immigrants Gerardo Preziosi and Giovanna Cencetti, Ida brought passion and drive to an early career in nursing and was on the vanguard of a generation of women starting to consider professional achievement as an alternative to a role in the home. The oldest of five children and a self-described bookworm, Ida’s first love was school, and to her last days one of her proudest accomplishments was her near-perfect 99 on the Regents exam in history during her senior year in Newtown High School in Queens. She earned a diploma as a registered nurse at Flushing Hospital School of Nursing, received specialized training at the University of Pennsylvania School of Anesthesia, and worked for several years in the emergency room at Bellevue Hospital.
Ida enlisted in the army, hoping to go to Europe, but instead was stationed at Halloran Hospital in Staten Island.
She earned a bachelor’s degree in science (biology) at NYU with an eye toward a career in medicine, but her life took a turn when she met an Italian intern, Redento “Tino” Ferranti, while assisting him in delivering a baby. They married in 1954 and within a year had their first child. Ida was the breadwinner in the young family, pulling in $500 per sleepless weekend hospital shift while Tino interned. By 1959, with three children, the couple moved to Connecticut, first to East Haven and then to North Haven, and had three more children.
Music was a constant source of inspiration for Ida and though she came up in the big band era, as a teenager going to see Frank Sinatra at the Paramount in Times Square, she kept up with the times, bringing her young children to see the Beatles and even insisting years later, into her 80s, that her now middle-aged children come with her to see the likes of Eric Clapton and Les Paul. She is survived by her children, Marc, Peter, Paul, Mary, Tom and John; and by grandchildren Nico, Nancy, Michael, Max, Giovanna, Tino, Trevi, Lilly, Leo and Luca.
