And the stories have prompted quite a bit of interest.
Last week I got a series of emails from Marie in Canada who wrote that “my great granddad, Simon Robino, had a business making barrel organs.
He came to Manchester around 1897, was born in Italy but studied music in Marseilles.
He wrote a lot of music and there is a lot of information about him in the site run by Anthony Rea.** He was my nanna's dad and she was called Angelina Robino, she married my granddad, William Henry who was a policeman from Sligo, Ireland."
And more recently David told me that
"I can relate to the Italian quarter in Ancoats as I went to school in Ardwick and the various ice cream men who used to park at the school gates were called Carlo and Sivori etc. It was unusual for a Tech High School (St Gregory's RC) but it taught Italian as an O level option and various kids took it up as an easy option.. (Lets; see, Ronchetti, Crolla and another lad I remember doing well in it?!)"
Now I chose a picture which comes I hope closest to the memories of Marie and David. It featured in an earlier story http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/what-difference-half-century-makes.html
It was taken on a July day in 1958, the sun was shining and the pull of ace cream is all too evident.
Picture; Market Street on a Saturday afternoon in July 1958, A.P. Morris Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council m62093
*http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Little%20Italy
**http://www.ancoatslittleitaly.com/
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