Silvio O. Conte
American politician from Massachusetts (born 1921)

Silvio Ottavio Conte (November 9, 1921 – February 8, 1991) was an American lawyer and politician. He was a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives for 16 terms, representing the 1st congressional district of Massachusetts from January 3, 1959, until his death in Bethesda, Maryland, in 1991. He strongly supported legislation to protect the environment, as well as federal funding of medical and scientific research.
Early life and education
Conte was born to parents who were Italian immigrants in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. He attended local public schools, including Pittsfield Vocational High School, graduating in 1940 and later worked as a machinist and pressman. He served as a construction mechanic in the United States Navy SeaBees during World War II from 1942 to 1944.
After the war, Conte went on to college, graduating from Boston College and Boston College Law School under the G. I. Bill of Rights. He was a member of the Boston College Eagles football and basketball teams. He earned his law degree (LL.B.) in 1949 and passed the Massachusetts bar.
He married Corinne Duvall in 1948 and they had four children together.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Silvio O. Conte” is american politician from Massachusetts (born 1921). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Silvio, Conte and American, not as a finished interpretation.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2286846. VIAF identifies the subject as 30356613. The Library of Congress control number is n94073601. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1921, 1991, 1959 and 1940.
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This entry incorporates text from “Silvio O. Conte” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.