There was a turning point.

The cover title with its photographic synopsis for this issue of The Pula Arena It is certainly not the introduction to a fairy tale, but the treatment of a painful page in history, our history above all, a compendium of facts and events endured by the Julian-Dalmatian people. September 15, 1947, Monday: at midnight the following day, the Treaty of Paris would come into force. 138 pages, which concluded with the words: Done at Paris in the French, English, Russian, and Italian languages, this tenth day of February, nineteen hundred and forty-seven.

February 10 – September 15, 1947, a watershed moment in history and in too many lives: that blink of an eye that turned the clock to September 16, 1947, marked a new chapter, whose pages would be overlooked for too long. Perhaps even to this day, because while Remembrance Day has cleared away many shameful cobwebs surrounding February 10, 1947, and the Treaty of Paris, the date of application of its provisions remains largely ignored. The city passed to Yugoslav administration, and the Allied Military Government was transferred to Trieste on the steamship "Pola," which departed the city of the arena for the last time at 12:30 a.m. on September 16. Over the previous seven months, a biblical exodus had emptied the city, leaving behind those who had chosen not to leave and the so-called "indispensables," the officials charged with assisting the Allies in the administrative transition to the new powers. A note of bitter curiosity reveals that the last car with an Italian license plate was registered on August 28 of that year, with the code PL 3271. A historic photo survives, immortalizing the moment when American Colonel Baltzer handed over the keys to Fort San Giorgio to Yugoslavia's representative Motika, charged with taking control of the city of Pula.

With the upcoming elections for the board of directors of the Italian Association of Pula and Istria – Free Municipality of Pula in Exile (AIPI-LCPE Odv) highlighted, this month's issue also features a wide variety of news and current events: history and memories, ongoing programs, curiosities, and traditions.
Happy reading and see you next time.

Viviana Facchinetti
your director

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