Fra Noi Embrace Your Inner Italian
The Cesare Battista Lodge #27 has a long and proud history of serving the Italian-American community of Northwest Indiana.
Formed in 1919 as the Loggia Cesare Battisti Musicale, the group soon joined forces with a large Chicago-area fraternal organization that morphed into the Italo American National Union, which eventually merged with the Italian Sons and Daughters of America.
After decades of meeting in halls throughout the area, the lodge built a clubhouse in 1956 in East Chicago, and then a new, multi-million-dollar facility in 1989 in Schererville.
Dubbed Villa Cesare, the new clubhouse boasts three banquet rooms, a commercial kitchen, indoor bocce courts and an outdoor gazebo. The club has a busy calendar of events that includes a St. Joseph Day dinner dance, Mother’s Day and Easter brunches, a Festa Italiana and a New Year’s Eve party.
To show their pride in their country, state and ethnic heritage, the club has begun raising funds through a paver project to install flagpoles bearing the flags of America, Indiana and Italy near the entrance to the facility. To purchase pavers, contact Frank Basso at 219-934-0868 or cbass@att.net.
