Do You Believe In Magic? — A North End Anthology

Step onto a magical time-traveling carpet to Boston’s Italian North End in the transformative 1950s-70s era, a time shaped by the advent of the telephone and television, by a rebellious spirit personified by Elvis Presley and Marlon Brando, by Abstract Expressionism, school integration, feminism, the Pill, and Playboy magazine.

Despite this buffeting of the wide world outside, quotidian life in the North End went on without interruption. “Do You Believe in Magic" gathers and weaves memories of thirty North End residents of that era. Enjoy favored stories that describe a pulsating Italian community with its vibrant personalities, evocative vignettes, and timeless photos, and salivate at the home kitchens, restaurants, coffee shops, and food-dispensing pushcart vendors calling out: “Cowoda, cowoda!”