Enrico Fermi was born in Rome, son of Alberto Fermi (Head of Division in the Ministry of Railways), from Piacenza, and Ida De Gattis, a teacher, originally from Bari. The two had married in 1898 and lived not far from Termini Station in Rome, at Via Gaeta 19. Enrico was the third, after Maria (1899) and Giulio (1900), who died prematurely on 12 January 1915 due to an abscess in his throat, during the anesthesia for the operation.
