Birth Anniversary: Battista «Pinin» Farina — November 2, 1893

Battista Farina was born in Turin on 2 November 1893, the tenth of eleven children of Giuseppe and Giacinta Vigna, who had come to the city from Cortanze d’Asti. The Piedmontese nickname stayed with him for life: Pinin, the little one. At twelve he went as an apprentice into the body shop of his elder brother Giovanni, and he left it in 1930. On 22 May that year, before a Turin notary, Carrozzeria Pinin Farina was constituted with a capital of one million lire; the plant on corso Trapani covered almost ten thousand square metres and put ninety men to work. On 6 June 1961 a decree of President Giovanni Gronchi turned the nickname into the family name, Pininfarina.

Dates verified on the Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (Treccani).

Full biography on Cultural Heritage Online: Battista Pininfarina (1893–1966).