Joe (Giuseppe) Marchini, who founded California-based J. Marchini Farms specializing in radicchio and Italian specialties, died Dec. 28 surrounded by family. He was 84. Joe in a fieldMr. Marchini’s farming career may have ended with radicchio, but it all began with tomatoes. His parents, Florindo and Elisa Marchini, made a long and uncertain journey from Lucca, Italy, in the 1920s.

They settled in Le Grand, CA, where he met Carlo Giampaoli and founded the Giampaoli-Marchini Co., a grower-shipper of the Live Oak Brand of tomatoes. As a boy, Mr. Marchini enjoyed being outside and watching his father farm, so it was practical for him to grow an 11-acre crop of tomatoes at age 13. In the 1960s, Mr. Marchini was offered his father’s shares of ownership in the Giampaoli – Marchini operation and started farming on his own.