Together at last

One day Debbie Savigliano was chatting on the phone with her cousin, Vanessa, who lives in West Philly. The two asked each other what they would do if they won the lottery.

Savigliano, a former South Philly resident who now lives in Boynton Beach, Fla., said the first thing she would do is transfer her father, Joseph Di Tondo, from a Yeadon cemetery to one in Florida.

"It’s always been a dream of mine," said the 38-year-old this week. In April, Jim Guercio, of Gangemi Funeral Home at Broad and Wolf streets, made her dream come true.

Joseph Di Tondo had just turned 50 when he lost his life in a car crash Oct. 15, 1978, just over the Walt Whitman Bridge in Blackwood, N.J.

The Packer Park resident was going to pick up daughters Kathy, now 45, and Linda, now 44, from a dance recital. He made a U-turn on the Black Horse Pike and was killed when his vehicle collided with a speeding car.

"The accident was both their faults. He shouldn’t have been making a U-turn and the guy shouldn’t have been speeding," said Savigliano.

Di Tondo also left behind two other children – son John, now 40, and Stephanie, now 33.

Widowed at 36, Italia Di Tondo had to raise the couple’s five children, ranging in age from 7 to 17.

"Needless to say we were traumatized, especially us younger children. I was only 11 when this occurred. There was no way to comprehend the finality of it all and how life without my father would affect me for years to come," Savigliano said.

Italia Di Tondo felt it best to make a new start so she moved her children to Florida where her sister lived.

Leaving their patriarch behind in Holy Cross Cemetery in Yeadon was a tough decision, Savigliano recalled. In time, the family came to love their new life in Florida, but felt an emptiness with Joseph so far away. Savigliano is married to husband Michael, 40, and they have three sons: Michael Jr., 11, Nicholas, 6 and Matthew, 2. Italia, now 64, remarried in June 1986.

Visiting Joseph’s grave several times a year did not satisfy the close-knit family. They began contemplating relocating their loved one to Florida.

"We always felt so bad that he was there [in Philadelphia] and we couldn’t have him here," Savigliano said.

The family found out it would cost close to $12,000 to have Di Tondo relocated. Thus, their dream went unfulfilled for years.

Unbeknownst to Savigliano, her cousin Vanessa was married to a man whose cousin is Jim Guercio, of Gangemi Funeral Home.

The 50-year-old director lives on the 2500 block of Cleveland Street with his wife, Doris.

Vanessa’s husband, Jeff, asked Guercio to look into the matter. When Guercio did, he realized he could make the family’s dream a reality and he offered his services free of charge. When Guercio phoned Savigliano with the news, she was so overcome with emotion she told him she had to call him back.

"At this point, I’m trembling. I’m shaking to death. What I had dreamed about for 21 years is now going to be a reality," she said.

Savigliano conference-called her mother and her siblings, who have all remained in Florida. Upon hearing he news, they all broke out in sobs.

"The moral of this story is that angels live among us," said Savigliano. "This guy did this for another human being – and a total stranger."

"I just did it for family and the sense of having their father with them. I felt bad for the mother. I felt bad for [Savigliano] that her father is stuck here," said Guercio.

With approval from Gangemi owner Vincent Gangemi Jr., Guercio took care of all the paperwork from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, the state and the city. The cost alone to exhume a body from a Catholic cemetery is about $1,000, said Guercio.

He arranged for a scope of the gravesite to make sure the casket could be exhumed because, unless someone is buried in a concrete vault, which protects the casket from the weight of the soil and damage from the elements, their remains cannot be dug up, he explained.

Di Tondo’s casket had suffered severe water damage, so the funeral director arranged for a new casket free of charge.

On April 22, Di Tondo’s body was flown to Florida. According to Florida state law, a funeral director has to accept the body at the airport. Savigliano had arranged for a Florida funeral director to meet the body and, later that day – 26 years after her father’s original burial – Savigliano, her siblings and mother headed to Our Lady Queen of Peace Cemetery in Royal Palm Beach, Fla., to bury Joseph a second time.

"It was surreal. We just collapsed in tears. It was so emotional because this coffin, these remains of my father, went from Jimmy’s hands to mine. It took everything we had to walk over [to it]," she said.

The service featured a priest, flowers and photographs of Joseph.

"We already mourned his death. This was a celebration of his life. I thought he would be so proud to know that, after 30 years, we love him so much and wanted him here with us," she said.

After the burial, the family went for a quiet dinner. Halfway through, Guercio phoned to see how things had gone. "Unbelievable!" Savigliano said of the stranger’s continued compassion.

Di Tondo’s family insisted on repaying Gangemi Funeral Home in some way for its generosity, but Guercio would have no part.

The family even offered the funeral director Di Tondo’s Yeadon plot to sell or donate. For now, the plot remains empty, but the family is considering donating it to a needy person. They believe that’s what their father would have wanted, Savigliano said.

Guercio said Savigliano’s thank-you letter was all the repayment he could ever ask for.

"The letter she sent me was more than a thank you – it was worth more than a million dollars," he said.

Savigliano said she understands some people might think she’s crazy. Only those who have lost a loved one can know the significance of having something tangible to visit.

"You take for granted that you have a place to go to celebrate their life, keep their memory alive. For me it was important that my father’s legacy continue."

When Savigliano visits her father’s final resting place, she talks to him and keeps his gravesite clean.

"There is absolutely a closure, a release and a feeling like now it’s right. Now we’re all together," she said.