Maxine Giannini

Born in 1929, Maxine Giannini,nee Yellin, was raised in the Weequahic section of Newark,N.J. She studied art at the Newark School of Fine and Industrial Arts and the Brooklyn Academy. At the same time, she studied piano privately. Having begun her training at five, she later became a student of Clara Husserl who herself had been taught by T.Leschetizky. As an adult she continued her piano studies with Robert Goldsand, Mitchell Andrews, Genia Robinor and Seymour Bernstein. She studied composition, theory and music history at the Gallatin Division of N.Y.U. graduating in 1984. Having opted for a profession in music rather than art, she became a piano teacher in New Jersey. In 1955 she married Ugo. Together they had two children.

Upon Ugo's death in 1993, Maxine discovered both his letters and his drawings which had previously been unknown to her, even though at the end of his life, Ugo had suddenly and for the first time begun to talk with her about the war. Stunned by the beautiful prose of the letters and keenly aware of the unique interest of the drawings, Maxine organized a series of exhibitions of the drawings, both in Paris(Mona Bismark Foundation) and in the United States. Copies of the drawings were also shown in a pavilion at Omaha Beach at the occasion of the 50th anniversary of D-Day. The success of these exhibitions coupled with the revived interest in World War II (witness such films as "Saving Private Ryan"). led her to compile this book, combining the letters,the drawings, and the late war paintings of Ugo Giannini. Maxine has become "an accidental historian" of the 29th Division and of WWII.