by Anthony Imbrogno, Heritage Committee member
Bridgeland-Riverside’s history is as a working neighbourhood. Unlike in Mount Royal or Hounsfield Heights, you can find historical commercial buildings intermixed among the residences. Many of these businesses from the early 1900s are located along 4 Street NE. This was the first trail to Edmonton and part of the Old North Trail, an ancient Indigenous trading route spanning a vast expanse from Yukon to Mexico.
One of Bridgeland-Riverside’s historical business was Roma Grocery (217 – 4 St NE). It was in an Edwardian Commercial style building completed in 1910, during the boomtimes. The area, now partly within Crescent Heights and Bridgeland-Riverside, was sparsely populated at the time. Calgary annexed it in 1907. When the Calgary Electric Streetcar Railway was built along 4 St, the area underwent significant development.
Roma Grocery was built by Antonetta and Domenico Gasbarri to house their grocery store on the main floor and family above. They had immigrated from Italy in 1909 and were supposed to be heading for California, but they stopped to visit friends and fell in love with the city.
The building is one of the last remaining Edwardian buildings in the neighbourhood. It was built with brick, since Calgary’s sandstone era was coming to end because of the many brickworks being established to meet the demand from Calgary’s population growth at the time (from 4,398 Calgarians in 1901 to 43,706 in 1911).
The block is a two-and-a-half storey building with a hipped roof, meaning all sides slope gently downward to the walls. Its brick façade storefront has symmetrical window placements and a parapet with corner pilasters and brick cornices (in plain English, the roof line has a low protective wall along its edge with columns at the corners and brick mouldings).
Several additions to the south and west were added over time. In 1924, a residence was built next to it for Flavia Gasbarri and Francesco Santucci. Francesco arrived in Canada after a falling out over the guarding of some sheep. A garage to the rear was added in the 1970s.
Roma Grocery on the northern edge of the 4 St commercial corridor represents the beginnings of our neighbourhood and the contribution of immigrants and working families to the fabric of Calgary.
Courtesy of Glenbow Library and Archives Collection
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