Melissa Prospero If you want to learn about Italian wine there can’t be many regions better to visit than Montepulciano, Tuscany, just one of the places Melissa Prospero’s travels took her before she joined her parents’ Pleasantville winery more than a decade ago, and where she is now vice president. A great ambassador for the wine trade generally, Melissa travels all over the U.S. and internationally, buying grapes and promoting the various brands. The winery’s Sweet Melissa (red wine) is named for her, but as she says, “Every girl named Melissa can relate to the wine.”
Virginia Rometty The extraordinary Ginni Rometty worked her way up from systems engineer at IBM to become chair, president and CEO, the first woman to head the company. On the way up, the Armonk resident has served on the board of directors of AIG, and remains on the boards of overseers and board of managers of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Ranked in the top 10 of Fortune’s Most Powerful Women in Business for the last 10 years, on the international scene Rometty cochaired the Davos Economic Forum in 2017. What’s that they say about all work and no play? This American powerhouse is a scratch golfer, as well as an avid scuba diver.
Rabbi Deborah Salomon The charismatic Deborah Salomon founded her religious school, Hebrew Wizards, in 2004, first operating out of her house and then a variety of rented locations until finally snagging a permanent home in a former rug showroom in Cos Cob in 2017. The school waves goodbye to traditional Jewish teaching methods, instead aiming to captivate the minds of its young students through song and dance, field trips and games. And the school is not limited to Jewish kids, but offers activities for children of all denominations. If anyone can bring communities together, it is surely Rabbi Deborah.
FASCINATING WOMEN
Trish Regan Author, television personality and Fairfield County resident Regan was a host for CNBC and Bloomberg Television before moving to Fox News, where she hosts “Trish Regan Primetime” for the Fox Business Network. A former Miss New Hampshire, the glamorous mother of three studied voice in the New England Conservatory of Music and has a Bachelor’s Degree in history from Columbia University. Her 2007 documentary “Against the Tide: The Battle for New Orleans,” won her a Best documentary Emmy Award nomination in 2007.
Avideh Safaei Executive director and financial adviser at J.P. Morgan Securities, a wealth management division of J.P. Morgan, mother of two and Scarsdale resident, Avi has been recognized by Forbes as one of America’s Top Next-Gen Wealth Advisors. The highly approachable Avi was recently a guest speaker at a WAG spring event luncheon, where she encouraged more women to invest, but tempered her enthusiasm with a cautionary note about the high possibility of an upcoming recession. Don’t say you haven’t been warned.
JULY 2019
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