Calle Párroco Julio Morate

Behind this name is a neighborhood priest. Julio Morate Gutiérrez arrived in Chopera while Arganzuela was still recovering from the Civil War, and on October 12, 1940 he was named first priest of the newly created parish of Beata María Ana de Jesús. He had to start from nothing, in a devastated working-class area with no church. His first base was not a church but a rented space on nearby calle de José Miguel Gordoa. That room served for everything at once: a chapel for saying mass, a meeting place for the elderly, and a classroom where the neighborhood children were taught to read and write. Morate later arranged the purchase of land for the parish school and, in 1943, began work on the permanent church. His work left enough of a mark that both the street and the local health center ended up bearing his name. Today a clinic at number 3 repeats it every time a Chopera resident books an appointment.