In this week’s digital extra, third generation bread maker Martin Balboni discusses the changes to the old neighborhood over the years and where he sees the operation going heading into the future.
Visit Balboni’s Bakery, an Agawam institution for over 100 years, in our full feature on the shop.
Read the full transcription:
Martin Balboni, Balboni Bakery: Totally changed from what we used — from what we — it was back then when I was a kid. It was — this was an enclave of basically French, Italian-American, and Yankee people. And it was centered around the mills, the paper mills.
And one thing about the bakery, people used to walk to work back then. And they’d walk to work, to the mill, and come back on their way home, stop here, and buy their bread. So, it was really a convenient — convenience for the people in the community.
Continuity means that it’s been going since 1912 and who knows, maybe in another 100 years somebody could buy and make another copy. But it’s in the family, it’s in the blood, and that’s where it is.
