Dr. Philip Buffa

Dr. Philip Buffa is a retired dentist with a passion for Italian culture. His parents, Antonino and Josephine Baiada emigrated from Carini, Sicily to the Bay Ridge neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York. They owned their own business selling imported olive oil, working long hours to provide for their family and instilling in them the value of higher education, pride in their heritage and devotion to their Roman Catholic faith. He received B.S. in chemistry from St. John’s University, an M.S. in polymer chemistry from Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute and A DMD from Tufts University. He lives with his wife, Maria, in Garden City, New York. They have three children and five grandchildren.

What else Burns left out

Dr. Philip Buffa June 9, 2026 0

Rosario Iaconis did a splendid job in the March issue of illuminating the vast Roman legacy overlooked in Ken Burns’ documentary “The American Revolution.” Also conspicuous by their absence from the popular PBS series are the many Italians who played pivotal roles in the birth of our nation. Iaconis made mention of the seminal contribution Filippo Mazzei made to the Revolution, noting that Thomas Jefferson derived “all men are created equal” from a 1774 essay penned by his dear friend. There’s so much more to that story. A Tuscan physician, Mazzei moved to America in 1773 to establish agricultural experiments, …