Tag Archives: Fra Noi

When I was hired in 1990 to save Fra Noi, I knew exactly what I was getting myself into and what I had to do. That’s because I briefly served as its managing editor five years earlier, when it was ably helmed by one of my personal heroes, Jim Ylisela. Fra Noi had been bleeding red ink and readers for a while as a glorified newsletter for Villa Scalabrini when Fr. Cozzi, who ran both, hired Jim to stanch the flow. A gifted writer and editor, Jim quickly transformed Fra Noi into a newspaper of record for the Chicago-area Italian-American …

They say still waters run deep, and that’s certainly been the case lately with Fra Noi. We may appear to be moving at our usual pace, but since we announced plans last year to dramatically up our game, we’ve been toiling tirelessly behind the scenes to make that happen. By early next year, Fra Noi will boast a new look, new features and a wide-ranging digital campaign aimed at sharing our publication with the world. As we head into the home stretch of that transformation, the time is ripe to look back at how it all began. Fra Noi came …

We owe you one. In fact, we owe you so much more than that. When we asked you in July to help us raise $28,000 to technologically transform Fra Noi, we knew what it would cost to make the leap but we only dreamed we’d be able to cover it with a single crowdfunding campaign. Two months and more than 250 contributions later, we’ve not only met our lofty goal but also exceeded it because of your astonishing generosity. In sums large and small, your contributions surged in like a strong backwind. The grand total billowed beyond $30,000, with more …