Midolo’s Bakery

154 Wooster Street (demolished)

Carmelo Midolo and unknown worker, c. 1930s–1940s. Courtesy James "Chico" Midolo.

Carmelo Midolo, “the singing baker,” emigrated from Sicily. He was famed for his “casatelli” or Easter bread. When customers went in to buy bread, he was known to throw in extra biscotti and freselles and not charge. He knew everybody had a big family. He delivered fresh bread to Wooster Street homemakers early in the morning for lunches for husbands, sons and daughters, singing up and down the street, his voice carrying up to the third-floor tenements. There are still Wooster Square residents who recall his motto, “Chi mangia ‘o pane ‘e Carmelo, non muore mai,” Whoever eats Carmelo’s bread never dies.

Text source courtesy Anthony Riccio, The Italian American Experience in New Haven.