When I saw this card, below, in my mailbox I was perplexed for a minute... was it a fancy new delivery service for fruit and veg, with a decidedly retro bent?
But I soon realised what it was all about, and was exceptionally excited at the prospect of seeing an homage to Sydney fruit shops run by Italians. Such a moment in time; such a trip down memory lane for me and those of my generation and younger.
Italian shops were indeed a retail icon in every
These fruit shops were an important point of social contact for many
Australians who had never met an Italian family before, and had never seen or
heard of things like eggplants, zucchini, garlic, spaghetti, sundried tomatoes,
olive oil and artichokes.
[Packing melons (no date)]
[Summer Hill 1954]
My own mother recounts a story where she'd pick up pasta at her local Italian green grocer slash deli and 'gli Australiani' would recoil in horror when they say raw pasta. "Ohhh, what is that? It looks like worms!" she told me they'd say.
[Giuseppe Firenze, Joseph Firenze (approx 7 yrs old),and Mary Favolor (age 39 yrs). Circa 1955].
[The Saffioti sisters, Francesca, Isabella and Giovanna Saffioti outside their shop]
[Packing melons (no date)]
[Summer Hill 1954]
My own mother recounts a story where she'd pick up pasta at her local Italian green grocer slash deli and 'gli Australiani' would recoil in horror when they say raw pasta. "Ohhh, what is that? It looks like worms!" she told me they'd say.
Fruit shops were started by the resourceful Italians, many of
whom came to Australia in the early decades of the 20th century; there were young single men [fine specimens of handsomeness - it must be said] or young married couples mainly from the Aeolian Islands,
Sicily and Calabria, who were prepared to work 18 hour days to make a small
business succeed in a new country. The drive of those Italians was unparalleled.
They came from predominantly rural backgrounds, and Sydney ’s suburban-based economy offered
opportunities to establish small businesses based on the family and compatriot
networks. Italians from the same town or village in Italy employed each other in their
fruit shops or introduced new arrivals to make contact with the fruit shop industry.
Of the fruit shops established in the 1920s and 1930s, some did not
survive the Great Depression. Others were able to maintain a steady clientele
and survived the Depression only to be confronted with the difficulties during
WWII, when many Italians living in Australia who had not been
naturalised were placed in internment camps for the duration of the WWII.
Some Italians were also targets of racism and had their shop windows
smashed during the war years. Some older Italians recall times when “we had
people who wanted to close our shop. But we also had wonderful Australian neighbours
who would knock on our door at night to ask if we wanted any help or any
shopping done”.
Italian fruit shops boomed in the postwar period with many thousands of
Italians arriving from other parts of Italy . But their decline was
signaled during the 1970s by the growth of shopping malls and large supermarket
chains. Sadly, the majority of them have disappeared but lucky for us a few
real gems remain.
Co.As.It.,
(Italian Association of Assistance) in collaboration with Australian Centre for
Public History (ACPH) at the University of Technology, Sydney, have worked
closely with the families of Italian fruiterers, ‘the gatekeepers’ of the stories
and images to record over 40 oral history interviews, collect over 250 heritage
photographs and precious items of memorabilia.
With the financial support from Fairfield City Council, City of Sydney , Sydney Markets Limited,
the NSW Heritage Migration Centre, Powerhouse
Museum and Signorelli
Gastronomia, you can come along and view this beautiful exhibition entitled Sydney’s
Italian Fruit Shops – The Original Green Grocer at Fairfield City Museum & Gallery.
The exhibition will be open to the general public from Saturday June 16 to Saturday August 4 2012 and they are encouraged to help celebrate and honour these amazing cultural and historic contributions made by Italian fruiterers and their families.
The exhibition will be open to the general public from Saturday June 16 to Saturday August 4 2012 and they are encouraged to help celebrate and honour these amazing cultural and historic contributions made by Italian fruiterers and their families.
In conjunction with the
exhibition opening, Fairfield City Museum and Gallery will be holding From
Italy with Love: a day dedicated to celebrating all things Italian.
You can have gelato, sweets and wood fire pizza cooked in the onsite pizza oven. Entertainment includes the Punch & Judy puppet show [so old school!], and traditional Italian music and games. From Italy with Love will be held on Saturday 16 June 2012, from 12 – 4pm. It is a FREE event. The official launch will be at 2pm by Frank Chiment, Vice President of the Board of Co. As. It
You can have gelato, sweets and wood fire pizza cooked in the onsite pizza oven. Entertainment includes the Punch & Judy puppet show [so old school!], and traditional Italian music and games. From Italy with Love will be held on Saturday 16 June 2012, from 12 – 4pm. It is a FREE event. The official launch will be at 2pm by Frank Chiment, Vice President of the Board of Co. As. It
The most exciting part? the exhibition, website and online register will leave a lasting
legacy for present and future generations of Australians who fondly remember
the Sydney Italian fruit shop that touched theirs, or their families’ lives. www.sydneysitalianfruitshops.com
You can actually include your own stories about fruit shops
in and around the Fairfield
area in the onine register; just visit www.sydneysitalianfruitshops.com
For more information about the exhibition or From Italy with Love, contact Fairfield City
Museum & Gallery on
02 9609 3993.
Love this story, and good on you for helping to keep our culture alive by promoting this! My dad opened the first Italian deli in the Hornsby area in the '70s and intro'd things like mortadella and prosciutto to the non-Italians. Now, prosciutto in particular is so widely used, probably more thanks to show like Masterchef hehe....
ReplyDeleteWow, Anna... that is brilliant about your dad! Yes, I think exhibitions like this serve to keep the Italian culture alive, and also show the new generations what our ancestors did and how hard they worked to set themselves up in Australia, in the process bringing a new awareness of the Italian culture [and yes, prosciutto and mortadella and pasta and olives and later, focaccia and sun-dried tomatoes and... well, I could go on and on!] to Australians.
ReplyDeleteI have just come back from the opening day and it really is a must to go and see... x