Florence, 13 January 2022 – “My son Ricciardo has prepared a wonderful trifle with the words’wishes dad‘. With the cream he drew us a nice 90 with the lily of Florence. We toasted at home with Italian sparkling wine: there were six of us, there family reunited. A wonderful party“. Happy, with his eyes always bright with joy, despite the fact that life was not so good with him. Strong and modest: Luciano Artusi has turned 90. Without rhetoric he is the historical memory of Florence, silent witness of beautiful popular traditions No one like him is a symbol of the most sincere, true city: a lady and not a shopkeeper.

Artusi: what do you plan to do in the next 90 years?
“I would like to reach 100 publications, for now there are 98 editions and 5 books. For me, writing and studying is always a celebration: of knowledge, of knowing, with the curiosity that has never abandoned me. greetings that have come to me from all over Italy: I still have to read 87. When I wake up I think about studying and writing: before putting down the pen and inkwell, I still have a lot to do “.

In Florence to say Artusi is to say Calcio Storico.
“Also for this I am grateful to life: in 1951 I entered the Municipality, the historic football sector. My first job is at the post office where the director of football in costume was the same as in this office. One percent talked about football in costume and 20 percent about taxes. I found myself in the difficulty of having to explain a game I knew almost nothing about. ”

Let’s talk about 70 years ago, right?
“Yes. For months I went to the National Library to study this beautiful Florentine. My office manager was Colonel Aldighiero Batini, father of your colleague Giorgio Batini, who gave me the task of following football in costume. I learned a lot. from him”.

How do you become Luciano Artusi?
“At the beginning I was a stopgap then slowly I have to take over the secretariat until with the 1960 trip to the Rome Olympics I was with the football subcommittee so much that Batini proposes me as director of the historic Florentine football”.

Remember the first “command to the voice”?
“It seems today even if it happened in 1960 in Rome in Piazza di Siena. I arrived after I had had the flags of the districts redone with the original colors by the cloistered nuns of Rosano”.

How long was he director of Calcio Storico?
“From 1960 to 2015, then they didn’t want me anymore. But I realized that being strong means being modest and without pride and that there remains the desire to get busy. Generously. Perhaps stupidly but with love”.

Good life dear Artusi. Magnificent Master of common sense.