Category Archives: Chapbooks
Everybody Eats Mozzarella – Recollections of John Amato, Sr.
Generations of hungry customers have come to Fiore’s House of Quality at 414 Adams Street in Hoboken to purchase a little bit of heaven: the deli’s signature fresh mozzarella. Visitors to the shop—first opened in 1929 by Alphonse Fiore, then run by his son, Joseph, then purchased by John Amato Sr. in 1965, and run today with one of Amato’s sons, John Jr.—demand the Fiore’s sandwich-makers put “mutz” on everything, including, in what was once nearly a culinary affront, on a tuna sub. “Oh, if the original owner were here, you come in here for a sandwich like that, he would have changed it,” John Sr. laughs. “’You wanna ruin my business? Get out!’”
But the goal of the Amatos, father and son, is to please their customers. They know their product is irresistible. They will add it to whatever sandwich the customer orders; they sell it by the pound, and make smoked mozzarella, too. Fiore’s offers a selection of different meats and hard cheeses, but their “mutz,” in a town packed with delis offering mozzarella, is legendary. “Once they taste our mozzarella, we’ve got them,” John Sr. says. “We made a good friend.”
Everybody Eats Mozzarella is the 38th chapbook in our Hoboken Oral History Project, produced in collaboration with the Hoboken Public Library.
John Amato, Sr.An Urban Village – Recollections of Tom Newman
Tom Newman, his wife Suellen, and their growing family arrived in Hoboken in 1968, to find a place that was “a kind of urban village,” where people knew each other and their kids played in the street. The Newmans set down roots at Second and Garden Streets—where they still live—and began to work on neighborhood projects. To tackle the area’s problems with substandard housing and unfair renting practices, they helped found the First Ward Block Association. Tom was later elected to the city council and served nine years, all the while working as a furniture refinisher and eventually, as a furniture designer; among other projects, Suellen founded the Hudson School and was its director for many years.
“The key thing, I think, is community,” Tom later remarked about what drew him and his family to Hoboken. “People live, work, fall in love, have friends and enemies, succeed or fail on a little stage of their own making. It’s a scene that breeds characters. Everyone has their story.”
An Urban Village is the 39th publication of the Hoboken Oral History Project, which highlights the life stories of longtime Hoboken residents. The project is sponsored by the Hoboken Historical Museum and the Hoboken Public Library.
Tom NewmanBilly Geib – I Get Homesick If I Leave for Three Days
Billy Geib—everyone knows him as Billy—has deep roots in Hoboken. At just about every corner of the city he can conjure stories about what happened there, from “Murder Hill” near Stevens Institute, where he and his friends risked their lives sledding, to the clothesline poles he climbed to re-attach laundry lines for moms at Eighth and Park, to his stint shoe-shining at the American Hotel alongside members of a big family that lived in his building—seven wild kids, he recalls, who also had a pet monkey.
In I Get Homesick If I Leave for Three Days Billy remembers the places he worked, the people he knew, and, with his lifelong love of animals, the cats, dogs, and birds he rescued in the city.
Maria Peggy Diaz – And Then I Started Reading Books
Maria Peggy Diaz grew up in Hoboken. She describes how reading books when she was young opened up her mind, and helped her imagine worlds of possibilities for her life. As part of her service in the Navy, she was trained in firefighting, and it became a career goal. In 2002, she overcame tremendous odds and obstacles to become the first Latina firefighter in Hoboken. She was promoted to captain in 2011. We are thrilled to document and share her inspiring story.
Milca Guzman – All the Salsa!
Milca Guzman and her family arrived in the United States from the Dominican Republic, and after a few years in Boston, made their home in Hoboken. Milca recalls the lively city of the 1970s, where about 40% of the population was Spanish speaking. Residents danced in the streets to music pouring out of windows and men played dominos on the sidewalks. But it was also a time of fear and danger for tenants like Milca, as threats of arson mounted in the gentrifying city. Milca recalls those hard times and also her abiding joy in her family, the children she keeps safe as a security guard in the public schools, and her love of the city she calls home.
Dom Castellitto – Salt Yeast Flour & Water
Dom Castellitto became a baker because he fell in love with Florinda Policastro. Her father, Leopoldo Policastro, owned Marie’s Bakery in Hoboken, and after Dom saw her outside her school, he says, “I made myself a home in the bakery there.” He had been working as a plumber, but soon learned the baker’s arts. Dom, and the man who would become his father-in-law, were both born in small towns near Naples, Italy, and every day they offered rustic round loaves and short “French” breads to local families, restaurants, and delis—breads that had been baked in ovens built by their countrymen around the turn of the last century.
Rose Orozco – The Basic Goodness of People
When people get together in Hoboken to help one another—whether in an extreme crisis like Superstorm Sandy, or to fulfill day-to-day needs and forward community projects—you will find Rose Orozco there. A former ER nurse and current volunteer for nonprofits including St. Matthew’s Lunchtime Ministry, Fund for a Better Waterfront, and the Hoboken Historical Museum, and a member of the Rent Leveling Board, Rose enjoys encounters with Hoboken residents old and new.
Rose speaks about her engagement with the people of this city: “When we’re talking about the people of Hoboken, when they know there’s something [that needs to be done], they do something.” She told us, “I do believe in the basic goodness of people. I really, truly do.”
Joe and Steve Truglio – Whatever Goes On My Table…
Truglio’s Meat Market, a beloved neighborhood butcher shop at the northwest corner of 10th and Park, and the family who runs it, keeping Hoboken traditions alive, are featured in our latest Oral History chapbook.
Ann Palumbo Monaco – Palumbo’s Tavern
A neighborhood watering hole, Palumbo’s Tavern catered to “locals who were friends with each other, who would come after work, or would just come in to talk. One of my uncles was a truck driver, so occasionally his co-workers would come and Grandma would have something for them to eat. It was just like a meeting place, like Do Drop In. And if they came in just to chat, they didn’t have to have anything to drink. [They were] just there to get the latest news, and updates, whatever was going on in the neighborhood.”.
—Ann Palumbo Monaco
Tom Hanley – They Were the Dregs of Society, But..
I always loved being a longshoreman. I was always proud of being a longshoreman. Because I’m gonna tell you about longshoremen, they were the dregs of society, but there were a lot of good men. Like when I was a young kid and I’d start to go astray, they would try to steer me in the right direction. “Hey. Kid. Come here. I wanna talk to you.” There were a lot of good men.
—Tom Hanley, October 14, 2016