The City of Lackawanna is known for its history as a steel manufacturing mecca. If you are forty years old, or older, and you grew up in Buffalo, then you probably have memories of the steel plant belching foul yellow smoke into the air. When I was little I would hold my nose as we drove by the plant, which thankfully was not very often. The city’s buildings were a lot dirtier, and the waterfront was an industrial eyesore.
While those memories are quickly fading, there are those who still remember it well. Especially those who grew up in and around Lackawanna. For some, there are stories that still need to be told. Stories of economic wealth and hardships. Lackawanna was a different ape of Gold Rush – men flocked with their families for an opportunity for work, especially around the times of the Great Depression.
Now a book has been published that recounts the life of Ralph J. Galanti Sr., a prominent Lackawannan who migrated from Italy to find himself in a foreign land – a land of steel making and the ethnic communities and political atmosphere that surrounded it. From Our Lady of Victory Basilica and Father Baker to the resolute citizens (with hearts of gold) that lived in a world where steel was king (City of Steel), here is a book, authored by Ralph J. Galanti Jr. and Joanna B. Nervo, that will take you back in time to a land that helped to make this city what it is today.
The book is fictional, but loosely based on some actual people and events.
Published by No Frills Buffalo. Book can be purchased at www.nofrillsbuffalo.com or visit local bookstores Talking Leaves; Dog Ears Bookstore; The Second Reader; Monkey See, Monkey Do; Lift Bridge Books in Brockport and Buffalo Street Books in Ithaca.