[citation needed] The last decades of the sixteenth century saw the rise in the small coastal villages, such as Cannitello and Pezzo, inhabited mostly by sailors and fishermen.

The Health Council of the city of Reggio Calabria had ordered all boats not to approach the port of Messina and instituted guard duty on the coast to enforce the ordinance.

The Health Council of Messina denied the epidemic, so as not to interrupt the trade with the continent; however once the alarming news coming from the Sicilian town was heard, the spokespersons were not considered trustworthy and four citizens, two noble and two civilians, provided surveillance for Fossa, which then numbered no more than seventy people and Pezzo with perhaps two hundred and Acciarello, a village recently formed as a result of the exodus of the Azzarello family of Messina just because of the plague.

Throughout the month of April, confusing news of the Messina situation arrived in Naples, so the government did not take the necessary steps, while the epidemic grew enormously in that city.

Hearing the news, the two mayors of Reggio, Genovese and Giuseppe Antonio Melissari wanted to investigate the matter; so the governor, Diego Ferri, from historical sources described as a bad-tempered man and authoritarian ruler, recently appointed, sent Fossa two of the best doctors of the region, Saverio Fucetola and Francesco Marrari.

Then the armed men returned to Reggio and the next day with artillery burned the entire village, with houses, animals, boats, trees, and quantities of oil and wine set on fire, even the Church of Maria SS.ma delle Grazie di Pezzo where it was believed that the plague had taken refuge.

Ferri ordered Carlo Ruffo, Duke of Bagnara and Lord of Fiumara di Muro to provide for them, as the Fossa people were still part of the Fiumanese feud.

But even the Duke did not care about them: he first denied the plague, and pretended to be irritated by the act performed by the Reggio against his employees, then dumped these charges on the University of Fiumara, promising reimbursement of expenses.

The turning point in the history of the area occurred in the late eighteenth century, when Rocco Antonio Caracciolo, wealthy landowner and silk entrepreneur from Fossa, wanted to remove the hamlets of Fossa, Pezzo, Cannitello, Piale and Acciarello from the then University of Fiumara di Muro, thanks to the good offices of the Bourbon court of the Kingdom of Naples, in order to give political and administrative unity to small communities that are distant from each other however rivals.

He, moving from Naples to the conquest of Sicily (where King Ferdinand IV had taken refuge under the protection of the English, an army which was camped near Punta Faro in Messina), arrived in Scilla on 3 June 1810 and remained there until 5 July, when the great Piale encampment was completed.

The French troops were present in the strategic territory of Villa throughout the first fifteen years of the nineteenth century ; this constituted a negative element for the majority of the population and for the local economy.

In fact, the Napoleonic government constantly imposed extraordinary expenses on the municipalities of Villa and Cannitello for the maintenance of the troops stationed there, which often harmed the flourishing commercial activities of the city, such as the spinning mill of Rocco Antonio Caracciolo.

In general, however, the French also brought some good news to the Kingdom, which was maintained after the Bourbon restoration, such as public schools, post offices, banks, telegraph and (not least) legislative codification.

During his presence, Murat also took care to eradicate the banditry present in the area, entrusting this task to General Charles Antoine Manhès, who obtained good results.

Between 1823 and 1825 the National Road (present-day State Route 18) was opened, while in 1830 the Fontana Vecchia was completed, the primary source of water in masonry placed at the service of the town, which today remains the oldest building existing in the city.

The heights between Piale and Cannitello were the scene of the clash between the troops of Garibaldi and the Bourbon generals Melendez and Briganti 23 August 1860 in those same days he landed on the beach in Santa Trada Porticello and a contingent of 200 partisans.

Between the end of the eighteenth and the first half of the twentieth century Villa San Giovanni was particularly famous for the breeding of silkworms and its mills, of which now only a few ruins remain of the 56 that operated in ancient times.

But soon came the mechanization and with it, after the unification of Italy, the northern and foreign investments of entrepreneurs, such as Milan Adriano Grass and the English Thomas Hallam and his nephew Edward J. Eaton, who parted company with activities in Villesi spinners.

At its peak the Dei factory gave employment to about fifty workers, as well as the lumberjacks and truck drivers who transported the wood, which came mainly from Aspromonte, but also from Sicily, Sardinia and Greece.

Economic losses were incalculable: the whole town was destroyed, together with the port with its new infrastructure, the station and the rail, and most of the mills, while others were severely damaged; all the churches and public buildings collapsed.

In the early thirties the city center was largely rebuilt, as evidenced by the Municipal Palace (Palazzo San Giovanni), the Central Elementary School, the Church of the Immaculate Conception and the many private buildings dating back to the late twenties.

But the hardships for the Villese population were notable, as the centralization of the municipal offices in the capital involved additional work (then burdensome and lengthy) for the simplest administrative acts.

The government, by decree of January 26, 1933, restored self-government to Villa San Giovanni, including from that date the territory of Cannitello (up to 1947 and also Campo Calabro and Fiumara).

The centrist list won by a large majority, mainly because of the fear, widespread in those years in Italy, that a leftist victory would bring the country into the orbit of the Soviet Union.

Another important work of social housing was the village of UNRRA piece, consists of eight buildings, for a total of 32 lodgings, built with international aid grown on the organization of the United Nations.

On 21 March 1964, the Prefect of Reggio authorized Francesco Spatolisano, the legal representative of the Aspromonte Beer SpA company, to start industrial production at land between Piale and Cannitello, but the project declined and was not completed.

The n / t Zancle of Caronte & Tourist with lighthouse of Punta Pezzo "The transition from monopoly to competition, if brought some economic benefit to the city of the Strait in terms of employment, certainly created big problems for citizenship.

The quality of life he was greatly compromised in the sense that if the State Railways had maintained a monopoly on the transportation, Certainly you would have had the deconcentration of berths rafts (note, naval units destined for the ferrying of vehicles).

For years, to try to remedy these problems, it was suggested to move the boarding of private companies into a new home south of downtown Villa, directly connected to the junction of the A3, thus avoiding traffic jams and pollution caused by the passage of wheeled vehicles.

The journey begins at Cape Pelorus, the extreme limit of the channel on the shore of Sicily, and ends at the beach of Pezzo:athletes then crossing a stretch of sea of more than 3 km long.