Instead of criss-crossing the main routes of Glasgow, what does a bus driver do in the 1980s when he can take a few weeks holiday? Well, if his name is Michael Fallone, he picks up his camera, fires up his VW Polo and criss-crosses Europe instead. And while en route to enjoy the best of pasta, ice cream and tiramisu in his ancestral home of Italy, he encounters a smorgasbord of continental load shifters that he has never seen the like of before.
Bob Tuck tells his story – the Busman’s Holiday. Images by Michael Fallone.
TWO MONTHS ago, we opened the first chapter about Michael Fallone by asking whether you believed in destiny or whether you felt that life was what you make of it. We explained how, back in the early 1980s, Michael had got into photographing load carriers around Glasgow and since then we have shown you a very small selection of Michael’s priceless records of road transport history.
We come back to that same query over destiny as we delve deeper into the Fallone background. You may guess that his surname originates from Italy, and you may not be surprised to hear that Michael’s grandparents on his dad’s side came to Glasgow (in search of work) in the late 1800s.
His dad (Michael senior) was actually born in Scotland but, strangely, Michael’s mother, Elsa, was born in Italy. And destiny, it seemed, brought her to Glasgow – first to find work at the Singer Sewing machine factory in the 1950s – and then (in time) to meet her husband to be.
