NEW YORK – Students who come from more than 60 countries to John Cabot University in Rome to prepare for brighter future appreciate the “if you can make it there you can make it anywhere” sprit of quintessential New Yorker John Catsimatidis.

The University, which was established in 1972 and is a private, accredited American liberal arts university located in the capital of Italy, recently presented the Greek-American business mogul a “Distinguished Leadership Recognition Award”  at the Union League Club in Manhattan.

Catsimatidis, 66, ranks #272 on the “Forbes 400” list of wealthiest Americans and presides over one of the largest privately-held employer corporations headquartered in New York City.

His companies hold market leadership ranks in the fields of oil refining and distribution (including one of the Northeast’s largest deep-water terminals on Long Island, NY), residential and commercial real estate, and the grocery/supermarket sector.

According to former United States Representative Frank Guarini, the John Cabot University Board Chairman: “Mr. Catsimatidis was awarded this honor because his success and accomplishment in both business and philanthropy, is illustrious. The story of how John Catsimatidis immigrated to New York City as a small child 65 years ago with his hard-working, hopeful parents from Greece inspires all of us—especially students in Italy enrolled at John Cabot University in Rome.”

In his acceptance, Mr. Catsimatidis emphasized his unique connection to Italy

“I was born on the island of Nisyros which at the time was part of Ital –not Greece.  My Greek father worked for the Italian government for seventeen years, and Greeks and Italians often considered themselves ‘one people’!”

“My father worked two jobs including one as a busboy in the famous Longchamps restaurant chain.  Today I live in the Fifth Avenue apartment once occupied by the Chairman of Longchamps.  Only in America does the son of a busboy get to accomplish this opportunity.”