A bakery in the Modiano market

Sisters K. and Z. were born and raised in the historic centre of Thessaloniki. They are about 65 and 70 years old respectively. During their narrative, the two women speak of how their mother’s family made it to Greece from Smyrna. What is particularly impressive is the description of how these two women’s grandparents got separated after the mass exodus from Smyrna, but finally managed to reunite.

Beyond the story of their ancestors’ arrival in Greece as refugees, the two narrators discuss their grandfather’s commercial activity in the fish and coffee trade both in Greece and in Smyrna, leading to his involvement in the food trade in the Modiano market ever since the beginning of its operation. Through talking about their grandfather’s commercial activity, the two sisters’ narrative describes a time period that constitutes a turning point for the development of the urban fabric in the cities of Northern Greece, according to Karadimou-Yerolympos et al. This development occurred through the settlement of refugee populations in Northern Greece and ‘intensive efforts aimed at reinforcing the “Greek” character of the local cities by means of their modernisation and westernisation’.

With regards to Thessaloniki in particular, an extensive redesigning of the city was undertaken after the Great Fire of 1917 (see also XTT013). Spatial organisation was shaped by the settlement of refugees, who mainly moved towards larger urban centres which offered better employment prospects, but also by the government’s intent to transform Thessaloniki into a city of international importance after the Great Fire of 1917. Seen through this lens, buildings like the Modiano market seem to lend the city a certain air of modernised prestige, resembling to an extent the markets found in large urban centres of western and northern Europe (such as the gallerias of Paris, which have been in operation since the beginning of the 19^th century).

Mazower mentions that the Modiano Arcade was built in the heart of Thessaloniki’s commercial centre to house initially the fruit and vegetable market, but ended up housing also the meat, fish and general food market. The arcade was conceived and constructed by the architect/engineer Eli Modiano and has been operating as a food market continually since 1925. Even though the market had been immensely popular with customers for decades, from 2000 until 2019 business slowed down considerably, leading to several food stores inside the arcade being converted into restaurants. Nowadays, the Modiano market is undergoing reconstruction and is scheduled to resume operations in 2022.

This is a transcribed extract from the two sisters’ interview:

 ‘Our ancestors were Asia Minor refugees and our mother’s family was from Smyrna.

When the Asia Minor catastrophe happened, the whole family did not escape together. They were a large family, so my grandmother left with some of the children and my grandfather stayed behind. My grandmother and the children disembarked on Naxos. My grandfather left Smyrna using Foreign Legion papers he had got from a relative. So he used French papers and went to Piraeus because that was his job back in Smyrna [trading with Piraeus].

 […] One more thing about Smyrna: they set fire to the side of the street where our grandfather’s family lived. Grandfather left and stayed on the opposite side with a relative. They did not burn the opposite side because Italians lived in some of the houses that were between the French and the Italian consulates, so they spared that side of the street. My grandfather went into hiding and stayed with an Armenian neighbour, living in fear. He used forged papers to escape because, by then, all ships [carrying Greek refugees] had left. He pretended to be a French citizen. My grandmother had taken some jewellery with her by sewing them into their clothes and hems. One of my aunts was fair and blonde and they rubbed coal dust on her face so that she wouldn’t stand out. Then they got on the boat […].  

My grandfather was a coffee and fish trader and did business with Athens, Piraeus and Smyrna. That’s why he got off the boat in Piraeus, he had business associates there. My grandmother wrote a letter from Naxos, a telegram actually, to my grandfather’s associate and my grandfather happened to be there when he got it, as he had already disembarked in Piraeus. That’s how the family got back together, my grandfather happened to be there when his associate got the telegram and he turned to my grandfather and said: “Christos, this is from your wife!” My grandfather was shocked. 

He answered the telegram and the rest of the family came from Naxos to settle in Piraeus. They stayed in Piraeus for a couple of years, but not in any of the refugee camps. They rented a room, whitewashed the walls […] and my grandfather set up the whole family there until he could figure out what he would do professionally. My grandmother had a couple more children in Piraeus and then, my grandfather took them to Thessaloniki. They didn’t stay at the refugee camps there either.    

With Thessaloniki as his base, he resumed his trading activity. In Smyrna, he had his own fishing boats and sold fish. They had to leave it all behind, they couldn’t take anything with them, even though they were quite wealthy, but he managed to rebuild his fortune and buy new boats. They stayed in Krini for a while and then moved down to the centre and lived on Tsimiski Street and then on Morkentaou Street. From there, they moved to Palaion Patron [Germanou] Street where they stayed until the death of our grandmother who died at 42. She had had two children in Thessaloniki, so all in all there were four daughters and two sons. My grandfather kept working as a trader. When the Modiano market was up and running, he rented six shops and got into retail, while also keeping his wholesale business. In wholesale, he did business with Kavala, with small trawlers, with Alexandroupoli and Volos and sent merchandise to Athens, too. Even during the German occupation, those shops remained in operation. He was one of the first traders to set up shop in the Modiano market in 1924.

Our grandfather kept trading from Thessaloniki until he died in 1948. He had an office in Salamina, too, at the fish auction market. After his death, his two sons took over the business and in the end, kept three stores in the Modiano market, because there was interest in the market from other traders too. It was a food market and that was Eli Modiano’s legacy; that it would keep operating as a food market’.