Ustica, the Diamond Years

Between 1971 and 2005 on a small sicilian island in the Mediterrean sea, north of Palermo, an extraordinary phenomenon developed. In just over 30 years, a surprising parabola of the locally known "Hit and Run" game took place, which is more widely known as baseball. In the peak of this event, during the 90s, the small island of about a thousand inhabitants hosted two sport teams: Ustica Baseball Club and Ustica Softball Club, both at their respective national levels. A sporting and social ferment that led, among the ranks of the Italian softball national team, a Ustica's athlete at the Sydney 2000 Olympics. Throughout the years, this phenomenon attracted the interest of journalists, baseball professionals and enthusiasts, which made Ustica famous as the Island of the Baseball.