Phillip Lesbirel

The Alleyway Phillip Lesbirel

They lived in the alleyways of New York; immigrants from the world, unwanted by their own or cast out due to their beliefs. They found work and homes in the squalid alleyways around the wharfs of the New York docklands, often sharing rooms with more than one family. Michael was an Irish immigrant, 23 years old and a laborer, working the docks or construction wherever work was a vailable, but the stco market crash of 1929 and again in 1931 saw work almost dissapear. With a friend, he hitched a ride by train to Nevada and the contruction site of the huge dam project; later to ne called the Hoover Dam. The story follows his life from 1931 through to the early 1960's and goes from his life of poverty, to his growth in wealth from a construction company he starts, back to Ireland where he decides to live the simple life. The story is as much his and it is of his growing family; of romance and friendships made and lost.