From the mid-18th century to the 1960s, thousands of Italians emigrated to France, particularly to the Alpes-Maritimes and its coastal towns. The misfortunes, the destinies, the uprooting of single men and women or whole families, the transhumance, often on foot, of poverty across mountains, plains and villages to reach the promise of jobs, better living conditions, satiated hunger, a future for their children, and also a drive towards the homeland of human rights and freedoms – all this painful human history has not been written into the collective memory.

Gérard Geist is a historian and lecturer. After studying at the Lycée Masséna, he obtained a postgraduate degree in history from the University of Nice. A director of numerous public and semi-public cultural institutions, he has also taught, notably at the Sorbonne Nouvelle Paris 3 university. Mayor for 19 years (2001 to 2020) of the commune of Sainte-Aulde in Seine-et-Marne and Chairman of the Communauté de Communes du Pays fertois. He is the son of Henri Geist, who died in 2022, an archaeologist, founder and president of the Cercle d’histoire et d’archéologie des Alpes-Maritimes, pioneer explorer of numerous local archaeological sites and author of local history books.
Gérard Geist was born in Nice, the son of two immigrants. One from France to the Waldensian valleys in Piedmont in the 17th century for religious reasons, and the other, economically, from Piedmont to Nice in the 19th century.