During the Italians of Colorado documentation project (2002-2007) I met with numerous families to record the Italian American experience in our state. During those interviews, many community members shared documents, artifacts and photographs. In addition to first communions, family portraits and wedding photographs, there were several baseball images like the one printed here. A recent research project on Colorado baseball taught me much about the rich history of the sport here; did you know that Colorado’s the first recorded baseball game took place in 1862? Or that by the late 1880s, baseball teams in Colorado included amateur (non-paid teams), semi-professional (some players paid to play) and professional teams (all players on the roster paid to play)?
Between 1900 and 1910, around 200 baseball teams were playing ball in Denver alone. Many teams were sponsored by towns, businesses, an individual or family. These teams offered players an outlet for leisure time, along with the chance to earn extra income. For their sponsors, the teams were a form of paid advertising; teams wore the sponsor name on their uniforms in exchange for clothing, equipment and pay.
Italian Americans not only played baseball in Colorado, they also supported many teams. Pictured here is the Piro Mercantile team, sponsored by Eugene Piro, owner of Denver’s Piro Mercantile. Located at 3759 Lipan Street in north Denver, the building that formerly housed the Piro Mercantile still stands today. Many north Denverites remember the building as the old Subway Tavern. Pass by the building today and you can still see the letters E and P over the door—the initials of former Piro Mercantile owner Eugene Piro.
Born in 1884, Eugenio “Eugene” Piro was a native of Aprigliano, Italy, a town and comune in the province of Cosenza in the Calabria region of southern Italy. In the early 1900s, he emigrated to the United States, settling in Denver around 1910 where he is listed in the Denver City Directory as a bartender employed by Rosario Veraldi. An early Denver vegetable peddler, Veraldi in time raised enough capital to farm land in Denver. He also owned a mercantile business that likely offered customers a variety of goods, including produce from his farm; a model Eugene Piro eventually adopted.
In 1911, Eugene Piro (age 28) married Italian immigrant Isabella Carmella Rizzo (age 18). Together the couple had ten children: Mary, Roxy, Virginia, Samuel, Eugene Jr., Frank, Joseph, George, Albert and Elizabeth.
By 1914, Eugene Piro had opened his own saloon with Peter Anania. Piro & Anania was located at 3537 W 38thAvenue (today Panera). A business venture short lived thanks to Colorado Prohibition, by 1918, Piro was selling soft drinks in Denver. Two years later, Eugene Piro opened the Piro Mercantile. By 1930 he was operating a truck farm and by 1940, working as the Assistant City Market Master in Denver.
Eugene Piro died in Denver in 1941, he is buried at Mount Olivet Cemetery. By: Alisa DiGiacomo
