Bild: Radio Bremen | Heike Kirchner
In Bremen, there is an Italian ice cream parlor with a long tradition in almost every district, but Marco Ferrari’s has the longest history.
Marco Ferrari has been running his ice cream parlor in the Steintorviertel for almost 20 years, and is the fourth generation of the family to do so. The story of his ancestors is so moving that the Bremen cultural scientist Daniela Dethmann wrote a master’s thesis about it in 2004. It is also a piece of Bremen’s history, in which the history of Italy also plays an important role.
Eisdynastie Ferrari / Chiamulera
Early 1900: The first Italian ice cream maker comes to Bremen
The ice cream dynasty was founded by Giovanni Chiamulera. He came to Bremen in the wake of a wave of migration from northern Italy in the early 1900s. From there, many impoverished farm workers moved north and offered their gelato – Italian ice cream. Many stayed close to home. A large number settled in Vienna, others in Munich. Giovanni Chiamulera traveled further north, to Bremen. Here he was the only Italian ice cream maker. He opened his café diagonally opposite the town hall. Clear traces of Chiamulera’s first ice cream café, and thus the first ice cream café in Bremen, can still be found directly on the market square. The word “ice cream” can still be seen in large letters on both sides of the entrance to the Raths confectionery.
Against all odds
But: Bremen in the early 1920s was a difficult place for immigrants. Bremen was not cosmopolitan at the time. Giovanni had a hard time. The state archives have a whole file on the “case” of Giovanni Chiamulera. Bremen merchants wanted to get rid of the busy Italian ice cream maker. There were numerous complaints and reports. Chiamulera left Bremen at the start of the First World War. Italy was an enemy of the war. After the war he returned. The merchants defamed him as a “troublesome foreigner”, which was a legal term at the time. The Senate wanted to deport him, but Chiamulera resisted. He tirelessly wrote one letter after another to the Senate. He simply did not give in.
Image: State Archives Bremen
His second wife, who was German, was very important to him at the time. She was able to help him a lot to settle in Bremen. Maria Reinicke married the widowed Chiamulera and his five children. She then fought with him for her new family. And with success! The Italian Consul General got involved. The case went all the way to the Foreign Office. In the end, Chiamulera was allowed to stay. And with it, Italian ice cream in Bremen.
New beginning after the war
Image: Gerald Sorger | Karl Heinz Suchefort
Chiamulera opens further branches in Obernstrasse and on Sielwall. During World War II, a bomb destroys his café in Obernstrasse. But with the arrival of the Americans in Bremen, the reconstruction of the ice cream business begins. At first, Chiamulera even supplies the American army. Under the management of his three sons, the Chiamulera company opens further branches in Neustadt and Gröpelingen.
In the 1950s, Germans discovered the south and Italy for themselves and a golden age began for Italian ice cream parlors. The trend lasted for a good 20 years. It ended in the 1970s with the advent of industrial ice cream.
The next generation is already in the starting blocks
Ferrari family with father Pietro on the right and son Marco in the middle.
Image: Marco Ferrari
In 1972, Chiamulera at Steintor became the Ferrari ice cream parlor. Esther, the granddaughter of Giovanni Chiamulera, took it over with her husband Pietro Ferrari. Her son Marco grew up here and has been running the business since 2006. It was his decision to continue the dynasty and give up his law studies to do so. For him, it is a great responsibility to maintain the quality and continue to run the ice cream parlor, but also to bring in innovations. But it also fulfills him to carry on such a long tradition from generation to generation. The family tradition may continue with Marco Ferrari’s son Luca, who already knows the ropes at the ice cream counter and loves ice cream like his father. Ultimately, however, he is free to make his own decision. Marco Ferrari is not worried about demand. Unlike in his great-grandfather’s time, Italian ice cream is now an indispensable part of Bremen.
Those: outside and inside.
This topic in the program:
buten un binnen, 6 August 2024, 19:30
