Elia Biancardi wanted to raise $50, maybe $100, to aid FAITH Food Pantry after hearing of all the good it has done, especially during the pandemic. Instead, a raffle for a fig tree that traveled all the way from Avella, Italy, ended up raising $1,145.

Biancardi posted the tree giveaway on June 11 on the Gardeners of Newtown, Newtown Neighbors United, and What the Fig Facebook groups.

“The response was incredible,” said Biancardi. “Everyone was not only happy to help the FAITH Food Pantry, but shared intimate stories of family and childhood memories tied to fig trees — such as the grandpa who grew them in their yard or the uncle who would let them pick a fig when it was perfectly ripe.”

According to Biancardi, 62 people donated. While 99% of the donors were from Newtown, there were donors from as far away as New Jersey — and three people each purchased more than $100 worth of tickets.

Terry Ferris, a food pantry volunteer, called the raffle an “amazing effort.”

“This will buy so many groceries,” she said.

On June 30, Biancardi’s 88-year-old mother, Francesca, picked the winner: Tara Bach. That is when the story got even more interesting.

Bach snapped up her raffle tickets with the hope of winning the tree as a birthday gift for her father-in-law, Thom Bach, Sr., who hails from Avellino, Italy. Avellino, just a half-hour drive away from Avella, she said is “close enough to Naples that Mount Vesuvius is ominously visible.”

“We were so blown away by the generosity and wonderful response that we have decided to propagate a few more trees and give them to the top three contributors,” said Biancardi. “So in addition to Tara Bach, Chef Plum and Angela Papcsy will also get a tree once they are propagated.”

According to Biancardi, he and his family immigrated from Avella in 1969.

Biancardi’s father, Francesco, passed on his love for figs, so when Biancardi and his wife, Heidi, moved to Sandy Hook in 1993 to start a family, along came a few fig trees.

The mother tree belonged to Biancardi’s grandfather, Saverio D’Avella, and his uncle, Pietro D’Avella. The mother tree’s age is unknown, Biancardi said, but when he last saw it in 2014, “a 12-foot ladder barely, barely reached the lowest branches.” Biancardi’s uncle, Giacomo D’Avella, brought over a cutting in the ‘70s and gave Biancardi a small offspring that is now more than eight feet tall.

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Jim Taylor can be reached at jim@thebee.com.