While good-natured and affable among friends, Pinedo had a natural tendency toward shyness that caused him to seem reserved, even a bit uneasy and stiff at public functions.  More often than not, however, his calm, studious expression, well-groomed appearance and ramrod-erect posture combined to present the classic depiction of a refined and genial Latin aristocrat. 

   Pinedo's name was, in fact, inscribed on the registers of nobility, the title of Marquis having been conferred upon him by His Majesty, Vittorio Emanuele III, the King of Italy, in recognition for the prestige and glory he had brought to his country. 

   He also received a sobriquet, “The Lord of Distances”, bestowed upon him by Benito Mussolini after the Neapolitan flyer had succeeded in touching down on virtually every continent, save Antarctica, in a series of unprecedented, tour-de-force demonstrations of the feasibility of global air travel. 

   Yet, flying the Atlantic twice in an era when few dared to attempt it once, and breaching passages through regions forbidden to all but the bravest were feats that demanded more than the "cold tenacity and consummate skill" ascribed to Pinedo by the Fascist prime minister.  Challenges were never thrust upon him as often as he thrust himself toward challenges.  His irrepressible initiative allowed the outside world a glimpse at the feverish passion for adventure that blazed beneath his temperate demeanor.

   Figuring, as it does, so intimately into the consciousness of every Neapolitan, (Pinedo was born in Naples in 1890), the sea had been an important factor in his life from the moment he was old enough to wander along the piers and dream of visiting the lands of minarets and magic carpets that his boyhood imagination placed just beyond the horizon.  He joined the navy as a teenager, and even after he volunteered for air duty in 1917, Pinedo remained forever a sailor at heart.

   The vehicle that permitted him to be at once both sailor and airman, of course, was the seaplane, and when, in later years, he became a vigorous proponent of intercontinental flight, he focused his enthusiasm exclusively on maritime aviation.  Seaplanes were employed in each of his great aerial odysseys, and when not flying them, he spent much of his time eloquently declaiming their praises. 

   Pinedo's was by no means a voice crying in the wilderness. It was a common conviction back in the 1920's that the future belonged to maritime aviation.  With water covering two thirds of the Earth's surface, aircraft that were as much at home on the waves as in the sky seemed best suited for opening intercontinental air routes, especially those over the oceans where a forced landing would not necessarily mean disaster.  Any reasonably straight and unobstructed stretch of water was all the machines needed for a runway, and in an age when airports were not yet integral to every major municipality this was perhaps their most notable asset. 

   "Civilization is built on water", went Pinedo's oft-heard sermon, "The world's principal cities are mirrored by seas, rivers or lakes.  Why not utilize these immense, ready-to-use, natural air strips in place of costly airports?"

   He confidently envisioned the seaplane's eventual role not only as the primary provider of worldwide air service, but also as a common conveyance for individual commuters who would take off each morning from suburban ponds and moor their flying boats in marina parking lots along city harbors.

   The correlation between sky and sea, not surprisingly, were blended early in his military career. As an ensign fresh out of the academy, Pinedo saw action at sea, serving destroyer duty in the Aegean during the Italo-Turkish War in 1911, a conflict which saw the Italians launching the first military deployment of aircraft in history.  Intrigued, he later signed up for a spot in the Royal Italian Navy's air division, sped through his training in forty five days, and spent most of the First World War flying reconnaissance.

   Pinedo was stationed again at sea for a brief time after the Armistice, but was soon back in the cockpit, making milestone flights to the Netherlands and Turkey in the early post-war years.  By then, his technical talents and organizational skills were well known, and in 1924 he was transferred from the navy to help structure the newly created Regia Aeronautica.

   Here Pinedo was guaranteed a prestigious and secure future as a high ranking staff officer.  But this wasn't what he wanted.  He saw only a series of desk jobs ahead and he dreaded the tedium of bureaucratic life.  Already in his mid-thirties, he was yearning for a chance to get back in the sky.   Barely a year on the job, he requested and received a leave of absence to embark on a program of demonstration flights built on three purposes.

   His first was to bring about the evolution of long distance air travel from concept to reality.  The second was to do so through the exclusive agency of the seaplane.  The third was to demonstrate his country's ability to lead the way.  It was principally this third purpose, which so closely matched the policies of the Royal Italian Government under Mussolini, which won the approval of his proposals. 

   Il Duce, in fact, declared him Messaggero d’Italianita’, a winged envoy to all parts of the world, whose heroic deeds exemplified the indomitable resolve that could henceforth be expected of the New Italy.  Always a staunch patriot, Pinedo accepted the role readily.  To the millions of Italian immigrants who labored in the distant lands that he visited, he carried a message of pride and encouragement.  For everyone else, his daring exploits bore testimony to the Italian Kingdom's resolve to play second to no other nation, in the air or on the ground.