Anna Maria Miele, long-term English desk chief, dies

(ANSA) - Rome, August 25 - Long-term former head of ANSA's English service, Anna Maria Miele, has died after a long illness in Rome at the age of 66.
    Miele spent her whole working life at ANSA after qualifying as a journalist in 1983 where she will be remembered for her personal warmth, her deep international culture - she graduated in philosophy at the University of Toronto and in foreign languages in Rome - and her devoted work in training many young journalists on ANSA's English desk, which she led from 2000 until her early retirement in 2010.
    Her passion for art and her generous and open spirit helped make her a crucial resource for foreign correspondents in Italy and a well-known face at the foreign press club.
    At ANSA, where she was hired in October 1985, she worked tirelessly to set up the features division at the end of the 1990s before moving onto the English desk.
    Thanks to her typically enthusiastic creative vision and capacity for inspiring others, the service changed radically under her lead, becoming a reference point for Italian and international news in English, especially in its online version.
    Anna Maria Miele will not only be remembered for her multi-faceted journalistic life but also for her passion for art, in particular 20th-century Italian glass masterpieces which she collected with her late husband Adalberto Vinciguerra, who died last year.
    Together with him, over many years, she created a precious collection of rare Venetian glass, plus other jewels such as a large amber amphora designed by Vittorio Zecchin and a splendid porcelain box designed by Gio Ponti.
    In all the collection totalled 180 pieces, which with her usual generosity she donated to the civic museum in the Marche city of Pesaro.
    Dignitaries from the town were among the friends, many of them former colleagues, who attended her funeral in Rome's Sette Santi Fondatori church Tuesday morning.
    As Anna Maria used to say: "Over so many years we learned that enrichment lies not in possession but in trying to see the secrets of the soul of those who created these objects".