Ann Volkwein

Arthur Avenue is the Little Italy of the Bronx. It's a three block area where businesses have primarily been run by the same families for sixty years or more. Volkwein takes us down the street introducing us to each of the owners and gives us a short history of each store. Some are meat markets, some bakeries, some restaurants. There are photographs and recipes from each one. Although the neighborhood has changed through the years, the families that have moved to other parts of the city still come back to do their shopping on Arthur Avenue and are part of the reason the businesses have continued to thrive. But when a shop owner considers a customer part of his family, how could you "take your trade", as my grandmother used to say, anywhere else? For those of us who live too far from Arthur Avenue to shop there, it's comforting to know such places still exist.… (més)