There's an organization in Pittsburgh called the Italian Garden Project that seeks to preserve and teach traditional Italian home gardening techniques. For people around Pittsburgh, they do some cool garden tours during the summer and fall. They do a fig wrapping tour in November. I went a couple of years ago and had a great time.

Here's a recent post about figs from their website: http://www.italiangardenproject.org/fascination-figs.html. Some of my unknowns came from the people mentioned it. All very friendly people. There's also a video link at the bottom.

This is a fantastic idea and wonderful effort to preserve a fading heritage!

Being first generation here i saved the link and will read at my leisure.
Thanks.

Matt, great stuff.
Loved this particular video much:

That gentleman was born in Calabria, loves figs and has a dog named Bella. What's not to like?  

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjUqJqOcRso&feature=player_embedded[/video]

My father in law has been here many more years, but still sounds like he just stepped off the boat yesterday, lol. Thanks for posting this, it looks like a wonderful source for info for us newbies, also a great place to visit this coming fall, I think I'll be putting this on my calender. :o)

Matt...thanks for sharing that website, and that wonderful video...can't wait for the growing season to progress so the back yard can look like that again..."love them figs" !!      :)

Hey Matt,
 I subscribed to the mailing list. Mary that runs the Italian Garden Project, e-mailed me and wants to see my trees. She said her dad would also want to see them. Her parents must live near me. In New Castle.

Glad you guys liked the article. Art--you should check out one of the tours this summer. There are some really cool gardens, and they usually have pitzelles and espresso, too.

Mary and I communicated back and forth for a while and she came for a visit in early September after bringing her daughter out to start college at my alma mater (Cal Poly SLO).  She wrote me today to say she posted an article on her blog about her visit and I thought I'd share here: http://www.theitaliangardenproject.com/chestnuts-101.html

I'm trying to connect her to an older Italian friend who is quite a character and has a nice garden with many things he brought from Italy over the years.