Leopold Saverio Vaccaro

Leopold Saverio Vaccaro was an Italian-born American surgeon and scientist, born on 2 February 1887 in Rionero in Vulture, who emigrated to the United States in 1902. He trained at the Medico-Chirurgical College of Philadelphia, graduating in 1916, then worked as a staff surgeon at munitions plants run by DuPont, served in the Delaware National Guard and travelled to Chile to carry out medical research. In 1921 he was made Chevalier of the Crown of Italy for raising a quarter of a million dollars to help rehabilitate Italy after the First World War, and he later joined the staff of Pennsylvania Hospital and the medical faculty of the University of Pennsylvania. He wrote on medical and historical subjects and took an academic interest in Leonardo da Vinci.