BETTAZZI, RODOLFO. — Teacher, educator, and apostle of action in the defense of morality, born in Florence on 14 November 1861, died in Turin on 26 January 1941. Residing in Turin, where he was professor of mathematics at the Liceo Cavour and the Military Academy, he founded there the first League for Public Morality (1894), followed by similar associations in Naples, Treviso, Milan, etc., and then, from 1903, by Youth Unions (Rome, Florence, Padua, etc.) composed of secondary-school and university students.
The struggle against pornography and the vice industry was coordinated by several national congresses (Turin 1902; Milan 1926; Padua 1910; Naples 1914), which also led to legislative measures. B., the driving force behind the movement, supported it through the struggle against the white slave trade, the establishment of the Opera for the Protection of Young Women and of the Abolitionist Committee (for the abolition of the legalization of prostitution), and the founding of the Nuova Crociata, alcoholism (v.). A compelling speaker and writer, he found in his wife, Marianna Bondi, the ideal mother of his large family and his collaborator in charitable work; she was director of the journal Matelda and a writer of educational stories. B.’s publications (chiefly lectures) all public morality (v.) and for the education of young people that he initiated, with particular attention to the education of purity. He also made a notable contribution to the development of Catholic Action.