'A magical place': Working-class Sault Ste. Marie neighbourhood celebrated in new book

A retired lawyer from Sault Ste. Marie is celebrating the working-class neighbourhood in which he grew up with a new book, The West End: A Magical Place Created by Giants.

At the turn of the 20th century, Sault Ste. Marie's West End was home to many European immigrants who came to Canada in search of a better life.

Frank Sarlo's grandfather first emigrated to Chicago from Italy, but ended up in Sault Ste. Marie with the promise of work on the railroad.

"He came to this area, and then ended up being at the paper mill and worked for the rest of his life there," Sarlo said.

When his grandfather first settled in the Sault's West End neighbourhood, his family was still in Europe.

"When he saved enough, he brought over his wife and my father and one other child," he said.

"My grandmother with two young children came 11 days by ship and then three days through the forests of northern Ontario to come to Sault Ste. Marie."

In the early days, Sarlo said, there was not enough housing available for all the newcomers looking for work, so a lot of them lived in tents.

"They had to go through squalor when they first came here," he said.

Sarlo said Algoma Steel, the city's major employer, eventually built boarding houses for its workers.

He recalled the West End as being a small area, just over one square kilometre in size, but many of the descendants of those workers went on to have successful careers as lawyers, doctors, business owners and educators.

Sarlo remembers being out "from morning to night" when he was a child.

"And sports was our life," he said.

Famous names from the West End

The West End produced a large number of professional athletes, relative to its small size.

NHL players include Tony and Phil Esposito, who both grew up in the neighbourhood, along with Lou Nanne, Gene Ubriaco and Don Grosso.

On Nov. 14, Sarlo is hosting an event at the Marconi Multicultural Event Centre in Sault Ste. Marie to celebrate the West End.

Ubriaco will be coming in from Chicago to be a keynote speaker, and the event will serve as a fundraiser for Sault Ste. Marie's Group Health Centre Trust Fund.