The Foreign Service Journal, March 2015

44 MARCH 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL Before serving in Congress and as a three-time mayor of New York, the colorful Fiorello LaGuardia spent nearly five years in the U.S. Foreign Service. BY LUC I ANO MANG I AF I CO Luciano Mangiafico, an FSO from 1970 to 1991, is the author of two books, Contemporary American Immigrants (Praeger, 1988) and Italy’s Most Wanted (Potomac Books, 2007). He has also contributed articles to The Foreign Service Journal and the literary journal Open Letters Monthly , among other periodicals. OURMAN IN FIUME: Fiorello LaGuardia’s Short Diplomatic Career S auntering down the main street of Rijeka, Croatia—the Corso—the tourist comes across a building sporting a plaque in two languages, Croatian and English. The English version reads: Fiorello LaGuardia, Member of Congress and Mayor of New York City, worked and lived in this building from 1904 to 1906 in the capacity of Consular Agent of the United States to Rijeka. Yes, before serving in Congress and as a three-time mayor of New York, the colorful LaGuardia spent nearly five years in the U.S. Foreign Service. He was consular clerk and assistant to the U.S. consul general in Budapest from 1900 to 1903, then the consular agent in Fiume (now Rijeka) from 1903 to 1906. Both cities were then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Fiorello LaGuardia was born in New York City on Dec. 11, 1882. His father, Achille LaGuardia, an Italian musician and composer, hailed from southern Italy while his mother, Irene FS HERITAGE