Ronnie DeMay grew up on Chicago's far North Side, but he spent his childhood hearing stories about his family's "old neighborhood" halfway across town — the Little Italy around Taylor Street, where his great grandparents settled nearly a century ago.

He still visits the neighborhood to enjoy an Italian meal with his wife or to see his grandma's old three-flat on Loomis Street. But Ronnie says these visits are tinged with sadness over the loss of a once-vibrant Italian community that today brims with Asian restaurants, cupcake shops and national pizza and sub chains. Overall, he says, it "feels lacking compared to [Little Italies in] New York and Philadelphia and other places I've visited."

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Source: http://interactive.wbez.org/