As I was getting this here frame ready to ship to Mr. Pergolizzi (Sorry for the delay John, it's going out TODAY!), I had to remove the old steel seatpost. It's a 58.5cm c-t italian frame from the 60s that came to me as a completely original bike, and I believe the post is original. Total length of the post, not counting the area where the seat-clamp goes, is 120mm. This is quite short for a frame of this size, and suggests to me that it really was expected that for most uses, one would have very little seat-post showing when the bike was fitted correctly.
Chalk up another point for Grant P. Vintage content disclaimer: now I feel better riding my 58cm 60s Pogliaghi with only about 7cm of post showing. <g>
Charles Andrews
Los Angeles