Gaetano's Produce Store

                                 
                                    San Francisco and Birth of a Business
                                           ©2009 by Rexino Mondo

                                         

                                                            Gateano's produce store in San Francisco.
                                                                        Gateano is on the right

Gaetano found a broken pushcart at the junk yard, worked on it until he got it in one piece, found wheels in another spot, put them all together, went to the wholesale market, bought his produce and said, “I’ma now ina business.” Every day, early in the orning, Gaetano moved from one street to another in San Francisco yelling, “Presente la frutta fa bene eh—get-tah youra fresh-a, fresh-a vegi!” Whenever he’d tell the story, he’d break up laughing. “You see-a. He was gonna put the poor thing out, how tu say, misseria? Mi pay ten dollar for-a old sway back horsa. Got more biga wood cart at junkiyard. Mi business grow more and a mora.”

One day a man came to see him. He said he was interested in helping the little guys. He loaned Gaetano enough money to have his own small produce store. He, too, was Italiano. The man’s name was Amadeo Peter Giannini, founder of the Bank of Italy (now Bank of America). Giannini and another banker visited Gaetano almost every day, sitting on crates and eating Gaetano’s grapes, but not the good ones. With their penknives, they would cut off the spoiled part of bad grapes and one by one toss them into their mouths as they told all the stories from the old world to the present, laughing and trying to top each other. Stagecoaches, the Pony Express, opera houses, gangsters, and saloon girlie shows. San Francisco’s Wild, Wild West held many stories, including the unforgettable 1906 San Francisco earthquake.


When the 1906 earthquake hit, Gaetano was seen running down the railroad tracks out of town as fast as he could. He said the tracks were bending and bowing out of shape as he ran and the shaking was worst than Mount Vesuvius. When the fires started, Gaetano was one of the men who helped move Giannini’s money and bank’s contents across the bay. Giannini and Gaetano became best friends. Gaetano’s business started to grow.


Back in New York, on April 11, 1908, the ship San Giorgio from Messina docked at Ellis Island, where Santa, age eleven, and her sister Anna, age sixteen, the duke’s daughters, were anxiously standing in line for hours as they waited to be examined. Their eyes were as big as saucers, taking everything in, and they gibbered on in Italian as they waited to see Papa’s America and feel his hugs and kisses once again.


In San Francisco, Amadeo Giannini was introducing Gaetano to the stock market. In time, Gaetano owned a fleet of trucks and was selling wholesale in three other states. With a baseball bat and his fist, he was constantly beating off racketeers who wanted protection money.


A sweet young woman came to his store, often in a flirtatious manner. Being a healthy young Italian bull, what was Gaetano to do? They started seeing each other after the store closed. Then came a diamond engagement ring, followed by a big Italian wedding. Angelique Messoni looked very attractive in her long wedding gown. Gaetano was in a tailor-made tuxedo. All his customers, a huge delegation from Chinatown, and all his Italian relatives attended. It didn’t take long for his new bride to start complaining. She was angry because Gaetano would go to bed at nine o’clock each night and get up at five in the morning to get to the produce market for the best buys. Angelique wanted to go partying all night and dance until dawn. While Gaetano was at the market, she ran off with Gaetano’s best man at his wedding and was never heard from again. Gaetano received an annulment through the Catholic Church.