John Maria Gatti

Who was John Maria Gatti?

Sir John Maria Emilio Gatti was an Anglo-Swiss theatre manager, restaurateur and businessman who was also a promininent Conservative politician in London local government.

Born as Joannes Maria Aemilius in Dongio, in the canton of Ticino, Switzerland, he was the eldest son of the entrepreneur Agostino Gatti. The Gatti family had built up a large family business in Westminster, including the Adelphi and Vaudeville Theatres, a string of cafe-restaurants and the Charing Cross and Strand Electricity Supply Corporation Ltd, which supplied power to most of the West End of London.

Gatti was educated at Stonyhurst College and St John's College, Oxford, before being called to the bar at the Inner Temple. He married Lily Mary Lloyd in 1897 and they had seven children. In the same year his father died, and he took over the family businesses along with his younger brother Rocco Joseph Stefano Gatti.

His business interests, in particular the construction of electricity infrastructure, led him to become interested in the local government of the capital. In 1903 he was elected to Westminster City Council as a representative of the Charing Cross ward.