Ninth Street in South Philadelphia
-- provided by OPENAIR-MARKET NET. Send comments and anecdotes about the Italian Market to <mar@interaccess.com>.
I fell in love with this place. It's a classic. I felt grounded; at home. Memories filled the air. It was like a period piece movie set, only this is for real. Philadelphians should be proud and honored to have this market - a beauty.
- Steve Balkin (Roosevelt University)
These photos were taken on February 10, 1996 during the 3rd International Public Market Conference.
(26K)...
the warmth of the fire barrel, a timeless sensation -- a multi-generation
experience. Is it 1900 or 2000?
(35K)...
the neon lights, the push carts, the gorgeous produce.
(23K)...
this market is basic like bread, the staff of living, an essential
part of a feast.
(28K)...
it's the awnings, weather worn through lifetimes of use, like
the wrinkles on my grandmother's face -- for me this really captures
the character of the place.
The best vendor chant at this market:
Every bean with a bang. Every bang with a bean.
Put it on the pot. Let it get hot.
Put it on the grill. Give it a thrill.
-- Carmen
From Joanna Wharton <moonhorsestudiojdw@worldnet.att.net> 20 May 1998
I was raised a few blocks away from the Italian market at ninth street and your photos evoked a multitude of smells, sight and sounds that filled my childhood. We went at least once a week to purchase goods from the exotic to the mundane but the real boon of those trips were the encounters with the characters that served the ramshackle outside stands and stalls. Being a city kid there was minimal direct contact with nature but the market presented unique opportunities to touch and see animals both live and dead ...the rawness of our need to clothe and feed ourselves and the starkness of the cost of that quest...I came in contact with these brutal but necessary facts every week...not exactly a spiritual peak experience with nature but a lesson in economics anatomy, art, math, social studies, and psychology to name a few. As a teen I even dated a young family member of one of the bigger commercial stores and that brief experience pulled me into the private world of life on ninth street. It is interesting to me that my grown sons who have had brief sporadic contact with ninth street have a strong fascination with it as well, in fact one sent me this email webpage to enjoy... It seems to me that The World of Ninth Street hasn't changed very much in the past 40 years and so remains a kind of touchstone and constant for me that pulls me back instantaneously into another younger time.
(C) S.M. Balkin, OPENAIR-MARKET NET. This website was inaugurated February 29, 1996
Return to the Reports Page of the Public Market Conference