1953 YALE FRESHMAN CREWMAN’S PHOTOGRAPH & SCRAPBOOK ALBUM OF ITALIAN NOBLEMAN FERNANDO ALVAREZ DE TOLEDO

A protégé of Dr. Josef Albers, earning the first degree in Design Engineering from Yale, in 1957

1953 - YALE [cover title]. [New Haven, CT/ Newport, RI/ Washington, DC, etc.]: [Fernando Alvarez de Toledo], 1953-1955. Vintage photograph album and scrapbook with more than 300 Yale, Yale Crew, and related photographs, pieces of ephemera, clippings, and miscellany. Oblong album, decorative paper-covered boards (measuring circa 11.25 X 7.25 inches), paper cover-label (title in manuscript: “1953 - YALE”) with many hundreds of items mounted to both sides of 51 leaves (i.e. 102 pages), string-tied. Many of the items are neatly identified in Fernando’s hand. Materials in the album include over 240 photographs, plus approximately 57 items, including multiple crew programs, tickets to football games, theater & music programs, 1953 Freshman Matriculation Dinner menu, “1957” felt numbers, Freshman Christmas Party, Cinerama postcards, Yale Rowing Crews 1954 Pennsylvania Railroad Menu, 1955 Yale Crew Pre-Season Guide, and Newsletter, etc., plus newspaper clippings. Richly illustrated with vintage black-and-white photographs of his room, friends, and fellow students and Crew Team members, travel, practice, and competitions, winter scenes around Yale campus, the 1954 “Yale Snowball Riot” (including photos of an unnamed student hitting a policeman with snowballs, and “Wrestling with a Cop,” getting captured and put in the police car, and escaped into the crowd), views of the Crew Team at Gales Ferry on the Thames River, making and raising their “1957” crew flag, views of events in Newport, RI, ephemera from performances at the Newport Casino, views of storm damage from the historic 1954 Hurricanes Carol & Edna, numerous photographs of Fernando with his trusty 1929 Model A Ford, trips to New York City, Richmond, VA, Washington, DC, etc. Also among the approximately 57 pieces of ephemera (not counting newspaper clippings) are 2 pages dedicated to cocktails at the 21 Club, and a ticket to a “Midnight Dinner Ticket” to the debutante ball at the Waldorf Astoria in the Grand Ballroom (the 19th Annual Debutante Cotillion and Christmas Ball), program and tickets to the Carioca Ball Rio Carnival at the Biltmore Hotel (Brazilian Cultural Society), program for the 1956 Radcliffe Freshman Chorus Concert, and Harvard Glee Club concerts, etc. Ephemera from sporting events are from the 1953 Yale Harvard Football Game, Princeton Yale Hockey (his first hockey game), the E.A.R.C. (Eastern Assoc. Rowing Club) 1954 Sprint Championship Regatta in Washington, DC, the Navy Crew team, 1954 Tennis Tournament at Newport, RI Casino, Bladder Ball Game on the old Campus 10/54, Colgate Yale football, Princeton Yale- Yale Bowl, 1955 Army Yale Hockey, 28th Carnegie Cup Regatta at Princeton, 1955 Colgate Yale, Brown Yale, and Princeton Harvard, Yale RIP Hockey, etc. I was only able to include a tiny fraction of the over 100 pages of photographs and ephemera, so there's much to discover. Wonderful condition all around, with wear and soiling to covers and few leaves, photos, pieces of ephemera, etc. The album is exactly as I found it, with some photos and tickets detached and loosely laid in. Some of the menus and tickets can be removed, while others are permanently mounted. This was Fernando Alvarez de Toledo’s album, Italian citizen, nobleman, and Yale student. Fernando Alvarez de Toledo (1934-2016), Duke of Bivona and Count of Caltabellotta, died on the island of Capri, Italy, his ancestral home. He was born at the Palazzo Bivona, the family home in Napoli, the son of Count Ramiro Alvarez de Toledo and Laetitia Cerio of Capri. He inherited his father's titles of Duke of Bivona and Count of Caltabellotta. In 1940, as World War II loomed, the family escaped to Argentina, where Fernando learned the second of his six languages. In 1945, they moved to Concord, MA. He graduated from Fenn School, Middlesex School, and was a protégé of Dr. Josef Albers, earning the first degree of its kind, in Design Engineering, from Yale University, in 1957. For thirty years he worked for Owens Corning Fiberglass designing products and facilities around the globe. He and his family returned to live in Concord, MA in 1982, where they had first settled in the US. He went on to co-found ACT Medical, where he pioneered medical device technology, and held 39 registered patterns, including devices that help shape modern medical practices and saved countless lives. He was a Master rower, and a long-time member of the Cambridge Boat Club and rowed competitively around the world until age 75. He was an avid collector of antique automobiles, and kept his first car, his Model A 1929 Ford, in his collection for over 40 years. His land conservation efforts included supporting Walden Woods in Concord and the Norman Bird Sanctuary in Newport, RI, with both of these places holding a special place in his heart. He was an active member of the Centro Caprense Cerio, the foundation named in honour of Ignazio Cerio, Fernando's great-grandfather, on Capri housed in the Palazzo Cerio. A funeral was held in the ex-Cathedral San Stefano on Capri and was followed by an interment in the family crypt there. He leaves his wife of 55 years, Mary-Margaret, a son Federico of Capri and a daughter Livia of Newmarket, NH [much of the above is from his obituary from the Middlesex School’s annual report, the exclusive high school he graduated from].