In 1888, Alesandro Mastro-Valerio bought land here to attract Italian immigrants who had been living and working in hazardous conditions in many northern states, and through newspaper advertisements many Italian families purchased plots of 10 to 40 acres. The colonists lived a pioneer lifestyle in Belforest, clearing land, building homes, farming, operating general stores, and establishing a saw mill, a cotton gin, and packing sheds. In 1895, the settlers bought land for their first church, the Church of the Assumption, and Father Angelo Chiariglione, known as Padre Angelo, arrived in 1898 as its first resident priest; the Queen of Italy sent gifts to the new church for Italian Catholics. Thirty years after the colony began, many sons served in WWI and returned home to continue their ancestors' heritage, and two of those sons later became mayors of Daphne: Arthur Manci in 1952 and Victor Guarisco in 1976. The founding fathers of the Italian colony were Domenico Trione, Cesare Castagnolli, and Domenico Castagnolli in 1889; Cipriano Allegri and Paolo Napolillo in 1891; Michele Berga and Modesto Berga in 1893; Antonio C. DeFilippi, Giacomo DeFilippi, Giorgio Marco, Guiseppe Latini, Salvatore Latini, Camillo Rossi, and Romeo Tagliabue in 1894; Celeste Pintarelli and Vittorio E. Lazzari in 1896; Giacomo Rolando, Luigi Boni, Francesco Manci, and Epifanio Pilato in 1897; Angelo Corte, Constante Bertagnolli, and Giovanni Predazzer in 1898; Allesandro Bertolla in 1902; Antonio Polizzi in 1904; Agostino Guarisco in 1905; Giuseppe Drago in 1909; Giuseppe Cometti in 1911; and Calogero Guarisco in 1928. The Progressive Italian Benevolent Society, formed in 1913, bought six acres for the Italian Cemetery, where a large steel-reinforced cross was erected in 1918, Father Angelo's remains were placed in a crypt at its foot in 1940, and after lightning destroyed the cross and crypt around 1968, a granite cross was erected in their place.