For many years, Peter Pizzino - who still lives in the Milwaukee area - operated Baywood Tailors in Shorewood and Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin, establishing a reputation as a fine tailor and employing some hundreds of people in custom sewing and alterations. He closed his store and retired for health reasons in 1999.
Tom Montag is a Wisconsin poet and essayist and the author of a memoir about growing up on an Iowa farm, Curlew: Home (2001), a collection of poems called The Big Book of Ben Zen (2004), the recently released collection of essays, The Idea of the Local (2007), and several other books.
Peter's Story
is Pizzino's first publication and Montag's first collaboration of this sort. The authors' partnership was established in late 2003, and came to fruition after four years of working together on the true story of Pizzino's early years.