Ralph Pisapia, who was cutting meat in his Paterson family store when he was 13 years old, later had two grocery stores in Hewitt. (
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For many years after Ralph Pisapia and his wife Gladys (Card) Pisapia opened their first “Ideal Food Center” store next door to Sam Bunting’s Service Station in May 1931, many Hewitt families shopped there. The location was near the intersection of Greenwood Lake Turnpike, Union Valley Road and Jersey Avenue. Later they had another store across from the current Greenwood Lake Turnpike Park and Ride facility where the popular butcher also prepared income tax reports.
Ralph, who died in 1985, remembered when Greenwood Lake was a ghost town with a public beach at the lake attracting people from other places for Sunday outings with their families. “Back in 1935 as many as 1,000 cars with families arrived at the lake for the day,” he told me in 1968.
Brad Bender, Bunting’s grandson, recalled that the Pisapia family originally lived in a small light green house behind the store with their back yard behind the Bunting service station. “The store had a grocery checkout counter on the left and a soda fountain on the right,” recalled Bender. “We would get ice cream cones, malted milks and more. Six round spinning stools that were bolted to the floor were commonly found in diners of the time. Across the rear of the store a meat case had lunch meats, steaks, chickens and the like. The walls were lined with shelves stocked with non-perishable items,” Brad continued.
“Many of the local people walked to this store. Most families of that time only had one car, driven by the man of the house for work commute. Nellie Richards, who with her husband Duke was caretaker of the Agnew Estate (later known as San Cap, a combination of names of two later property owners) made a daily trek down Warwick Turnpike pulling a two wheeled shopping cart,” he recalled.
When speaking with me in 1986 Ralph recalled three major fires in the section – Brown’s Hotel in 1953, Club 637, about 1961 and the Great Oakes Inn. He remembered the marina at the south end of the lake being operated by Frank Higgenbotham of Hewitt with his son Frank Jr. as lifeguard. The marina was leased from the Olcott family. The business ended when a lease was not renewed. Ralph saw A and P stores in Hewitt close twice before the latest closings of the chain. He explained how his business survived. “You must be an accountant – be able to advertise. You must sell at the cheapest price you can afford, and you must be skilled.” As a boy, Ralph watched how Campbell Soup salesmen created window displays for his family business windows in Paterson. “I was curious and shown how crepe paper was used for display tricks,” he explained.
When Ralph was 13, he was cutting meat in his father’s store on Market Street, Paterson. He came from a family of butchers. Uncle Nick with a store by the Paterson Armory, was one of seven family members who each operated stores at the same time. During World War II in 1942 Ralph served as a U.S. Army cook at Camp Lee, Va. At a meat-cutting demonstration class he laughed at the way the instructor was teaching and was asked if he had a better way. He apparently did because after Ralph’s demonstration, the teacher did it that way in the future and Ralph was told he would remain at the base for two years. I will be telling more about the Pisapia family in local history soon.
