Franco Cesana was a Italian Jew born on September 20, 1931 in the northern city of Bologna, shortly before Mussolini came to power. In 1933 Mussolini's "racial laws" were introduced and Franco was expelled from public school, and had to go instead to a "Jewish school" jury-rigged in a local synagogue. His father died in 1939 and he moved in with relatives. Soon after Mussolini was overthrown, the Nazis invaded Italy, and Italian Jews had to go into hiding or be sent to the concentration camps. The Cesana family hid in the mountains and Franco, who was 12 at the time, joined the Justice and Liberty partisan group. Not much later, he was shot by Germans on a scouting mission, and his body was returned to his mother on his 13th birthday.