Story by Renee Lapham Collins
Photos by Renee Lapham Collins and Maria Lindsey
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For Ray Gammo, the story of immigrants is the story of struggle, perseverance, and food. His earliest memories are of a mule, a cart, and bread baking in the Chaldean village of Tel Kaif in northern Iraq, where his mother ran a family farm and small factory until she was forced to flee with her family at the start of the Iraq-Iran war in 1979, when Saddam Hussein was coming to power. Gammo opened Riverside Deli in Dundee this past March, more than 40 years after his family left Iraq with little more than the clothes on their backs and a few dollars. Gammo’s memories of the village are as fleeting as the trip from Iraq to Italy and later to the United States. Yet the story of the family’s escape reads like the script from a movie.
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“My mother had to travel to Turkey to get visas and while she was gone, the babysitter she had left me with kidnapped me,” Gammo said. “She had to spend all of her cash as a ransom.” Fortunately, his mother was able to secure visas for herself and her family, and they escaped Baghdad two days before the embassies closed. “She was only able to get six visas for the U.S. and six for Italy,” Gammo explained. “She also got one for Australia for my uncle. She left everything behind, her gold, her possessions, everything. We escaped with just a little money and the clothes on our backs.” Gammo, and five of his family members, went to Ostellato on Italy’s eastern coast while his mother took the rest of the family to the United States. Gammo remained in Italy until 1983 when the family was reunited in Toledo. His brothers Mike (Mouyad) and Steve (Zuhair) had started markets there in 1979 and were wellestablished by the time the rest of the family arrived. Gammo started school in East Toledo at Good Shepherd Catholic School. By 1990, the Gammo family was living in Southfield at 13 Mile and Southfield Road, in the heart of the Chaldean community. “Life was good,” Gammo remembers. “I was going to public school at Southfield Lathrup, and it was pretty diverse there, but segregated. We had four wings — A, B, C, and D — we had the Jewish Wing, the Chaldean Wing, the Black Wing, and the Jock Wing. I had a beautiful high school experience. I finally learned what my own people were like, who they were. I made good friends and went on to Wayne State.” Gammo married a Muslim girl and had four children before the religious and cultural differences became insurmountable. “I grew up in a world of diversity, but our families wouldn’t let us be different,” he said. “We just couldn’t make it work. Now, we have shared custody and it’s better for all of us.” Gammo is active in St. Andrew’s Catholic Church in Saline where he has been a parishioner for many years. His faith is vital to his life. He has taught religious education and volunteers in various roles in his parish. He also travels frequently to the Chaldean Catholic Church in Southfield, where he grew up. In 1992, tragedy struck the Gammo family. Mike was shot and killed in an attempted robbery at his Collingwood Avenue store in Toledo. The gunman was a crack addict recently paroled from the Ohio prison system. “Mike was the second oldest
child,” Gammo said. “It’s ironic. My mom tried to figure out a way to protect her son from going to war, and then he was killed in a robbery gone wrong.” Gammo’s mother spent her life as an entrepreneur, in her village, in Baghdad, and in the United States. Her sons have followed in her footsteps. Gammo’s brother, Ronny runs a family market at Stony Creek and Willis roads while brother Andy manages the Village Party Store in Saline. Gammo has a successful career with Sprint, selling mobile devices and phone plans in a number of communities including Tecumseh and Adrian under the Alpha Wireless banner. He also has a Radio Shack franchise in Saline and in his new Dundee store, he has a mini Radio Shack tucked away in the rear of the building. Riverside Deli has the ambience of a tiny European market. Coolers line one wall, bracketed every few feet with tables of freshly baked breads and pastries, boxes of pastas, and jars of sauces. The coolers are stocked with dairy products like premium cheeses, as well as beer and soda. A modest wine closet features shelves of reds, whites, and sparkling wines and behind the counter is a deli with meats and cheeses. There are specialty foods, candies, and other confections along the front counter. The deli case is compact and not a single inch of
space is wasted. It’s a concept he hopes to take into all of the family’s stores. “The idea is to use and sell baked goods from the families who have landed in America,” he explains. “We are using their pre-made products in our markets for our sandwiches, selling their breads, cheeses, wines, jarred goods, anything that we can find that Italian families have made. “His
