Ferrara, September 17, 2026 – <strong“If someone got lost in the fog on the Great River, he was there. If your boat stopped and it was night, you called. And he would come to lend a hand. He had a big heart, he was there for everyone. He was my father, he was everything to me.”
Andrea Poggioli, 46 years old, remembers his father in tears, Giuliano, 70 years old. For everyone the man of the Po, with those big mustaches, the smile, a lifelong fisherman, hand on the boat’s helm, only the sound of the engine breaking the silence along that giant he loved.
The illness, the rush to the hospital, and the death
“He was born in Ferrara on February 9, 1956,” the son still recounts, he passed away the other day. He was cutting the grass, felt unwell, rushed to the hospital in Padua.
“The surgery lasted hours, he didn’t make it. He wanted to donate his organs, give life, it was his greatest wish. But due to the severe heart condition, the other organs were also compromised.” A life written in the current, on the water, sunrises and sunsets. “He had gone to Turin to work – the son continues –, he was a metalworker, had worked at Fiat with my mother. Then the return to the city, to those banks he loved so much.”
The man of the river
Man of the river, fisherman and builder of those ‘woods’ with which he sailed, the bow cutting through the water. “The first boat he built lasted 30 years, indestructible. He built others, the one we still use is his work.” In 1980 his son Andrea was born, in 2011 his grandson Ludovico. Both carry on the legacy, a family raised with a great friend, the Po. Gentle in the summer shallows, arrogant when that dark wave comes from the north, the rain pouring down, swelling the giant’s back that shakes scaffolding and boats, floods the floodplains, glares fiercely at houses and streets.
“Fishing with my son: he taught him everything”
“We grew up with him, that’s how ‘we came up on the Po’. And when my son, his grandson, was born, he took him on the boat, they were always together, fishing, he taught him everything.” And he left everything to that boy who was left without his beloved grandfather. “We are river people and here we set up a base camp, under a bank. We meet, families, young people, we have barbecues. And he was the first to lend a hand, helped plant the stakes. Everyone here loved him, they love him.” Because those mustaches, the smile, still live in the current, the face fading before the bow. “The other day, at 9:45, I lost my dad, who gave everything to everyone.” The pain that carves Andrea’s words, memories he clings to. A life together, feet on the boards of a boat, under the bridges of life. “I will always carry him with me, in my heart, fishing together. What he taught me will never be lost.”
