Fortune of the Whitaker Family in Italy (Essay Sample)

WHITAKER FAMILY IN ITALY
Student’s name
Institution
Course
Date
Whitaker Family in Italy
The Whitaker family can be traced back to Benjamin Ingham (early ages) and Joseph Whitaker in later years, who later became very rich courtesy of a Marsala wine business acquired from his grandfather. The birth of Joseph Whitaker can be traced back in Palermo, Italy, 1850. Thus, Joseph Whitaker was a Sicilian-English archeologist, ornithologist and a sportsman. He is famous of his birds of Tunisia work, in addition to being among the pioneers of US Città di Palermo, a Sicilian football club. Upon inheriting the Ingham Marsala wine business, Whitaker went on to inherit huge vineyards in addition to the Ingham's banking empire owned by his grandfather (Whitaker, 2015).
Joseph Whitaker married Tina Scalia and later went ahead and built Villa Malfitano in Palermo, an Italian mansion erected in a close proximity to Zisa Castle on the Via Dante. Tina was General Scalia Alfonso’s daughter who had traveled to Palermo few years before Risorgimento. One of their two daughters got married to General Antonio Giogio who was a War minister in Italy and is remembered for fighting the First and Second Wars in Abyssinia. This means the family was deeply rooted in the upper ranks of Italian culture.
Memorable projects
In the year 1871, both Benjamin Ingham and Joseph Whitaker declared their plan of building, jointly, a place of worship which reflected the type of worship that was being done in the Church of England for the purposes of serving the spiritual purposes for their fellow countrymen of protestant denomination residing or touring Palermo. The church is identified as the Holy Cross Church but still not known to a huge number of Palermo residents. Initially the land where the church would be erected was initially donated by Benjamin Ingham Jr., but everything was halted upon his death in 1872. However, his wife Emily Ingham carried on with the excellent work and the project resumed towards the end of the same year. Both Ingham’s and Whitaker’s families met all the church construction expenses. Following Joseph Whitaker’s death, Joshua Whitaker, his son, inherited the patronage and interest of the church. Upon Joshua Whitaker’s death, the mantle of leadership was given to his brother, and then to their niece Delia as the last surviving, eventually the patronage and interest of the church was passed to the Gibraltar Diocesan Trust (Whitaker, 2015).
Fortune of the Whitaker Family in Italy
Joseph Whitaker has been associated with a significant number of properties in Italy. The family is highly known for a fortune made in Sicily courtesy of producing and exporting Marsala wine. Benjamin Ingham is considered the main source of the Whitaker family wealth and had sailed and arrived in Sicily in 1809, where he focused on manufacturing and exporting wool and wine. Considering that he had no children of his own, he ended up transferring his wealth to Joseph Whitaker.
The other great fortune owned by the family was the Villa Malfitano. Joseph and his wife were residents of Palermo where they erected Villa Malfitano, Art Nouveau designed. Despite being a 19th century structure, Villa Malfitano currently preserves undamaged its priceless furnishings and valuable collections. The Agave cultivation was another key initiative that generated great fortunes for Whitaker family in Italy. Joseph Whitaker introduced farming of unyielding Agave var. the plant is believed to have originated in Mexico and thus requires warm climate for maximum yield. This enabled the family to partner with various textile industries. By the time Joseph died, he had accumulated wealth valued at approximately £12,000,000, and this