The Sancho neighborhood is located in the Western Recife, capital of Pernambuco State, in the Northeastern Brazil. It has an area of 63.9 hectares and about 11,199 inhabitants. This small neighborhood is surrounded by five neighborhoods: Curado, Totó, Guanabara, Tejipió, and Coqueiral. It is difficult to identify to which neighborhood residents belong since streets start in one neighborhood and end in another, as is the case of its main avenue, Padre Ibiapina. The three most important points of Sancho are located on this avenue: the Otávio de Freitas Hospital, known as Sancho Hospital; the Chácara (Farm) “Paraíso,” the oldest in the neighborhood and; the Igreja de São João known as the Church of the Rooster (thus called for celebrating the “Rooster’s Mass,” a Catholic mass celebrated at midnight on Christmas Eve).
The name Sancho was inherited from the former owner of a beautiful farm, João Ribeiro Sanches. In the past, families visited this place, surrounded by trees and various types of vegetation, to breathe a pure and healthy air. Located on a small hill, it allowed visitors to rest in a tranquil setting. Precisely because of its pleasant climate, a retirement home was built there, which American military personnel used as a place for convalescence during World War II. With the end of the War, the home became the Otávio de Freitas Hospital, then used to treat tuberculosis patients. However, locals referred to it by the name of its neighborhood, and that is came to be known.
The Igreja Matriz do Galo (formerly Chapel of São João) is on Father Ibiapina Avenue and is one of the most important points of the neighborhood. It was built by the Vilachans, Colaço Leites, Pessoas, Gibsons, and others, headed by Francisco Ferreira Vilachan, a merchant of beef jerky turned jeweler.
On this avenue is also located one of the first farms in the neighborhood: Chácara Paraíso, in which, according to former residents, peacocks, horses, sheep, helmeted guineafowls, and other animals were raised. Currently, however, its owners use the Chácara only to summer, leaving the property to be looked after by caretakers.
In 1873, the construction of the former railway station “Great Western” was authorized to connect Recife to the municipality of Limoeiro. The new railroad facilitated the transportation of passengers and cargo, helping Pernambuco and the Northeast to grow. At that time, the Sancho neighborhood also grew with the construction of houses in large farms, such as Vilachan’s, Colaço Leite’s, Pessoa’s, and Gibson’s, among others.
In 1950, the station closed its activities in Brazil and was succeeded by the Rede Ferroviária do Nordeste, now Rede Ferroviária Federal S.A. (Federal Railroad Network, S.A.) (RFFSA).
Despite the new buildings and condominiums that modified the old scenery, Sancho still keeps traces of a time when you could breathe fresh air in a quiet environment.
Recife, October 13, 2016.
* This text is part of the Interacting with the History of Your Neighborhood project, a partnership between the Joaquim Nabuco Foundation and the Manuel Bandeira Readers Training Program.
sources consulted
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FREIRE, P. e SHOR, I. Medo e ousadia: o cotidiano do professor. Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra, 1986.
CARVALHO, Isabel Cristina de Moura. Educação Ambiental: a formação do sujeito ecológico. São Paulo: Cortez, 2008.
SANCHO. In: RECIFE. Prefeitura. [2016?]. Available at: http://www2.recife.pe.gov.br/servico/sancho. Accessed on: 10 out. 2016.
SANCHO (Recife). In: WIKIPEDIA. [São Francisco: Wikimedia Foundation, 2016]. Available at: https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sancho_(Recife). Accessed on: 10 out. 2016.
how to quote this text
OLIVEIRA, Monaja Cristina Maria de; VERARDI, Cláudia Albuquerque. Sancho (Bairro, Recife). In: PESQUISA Escolar. Recife: Fundação Joaquim Nabuco, 2016. Available at: https://pesquisaescolar.fundaj.gov.br/en/artigo/sancho-neighborhood-recife/. Accessed on: month day yeat. (Ex.: Aug. 6 2020.)