For workers at one Boston restaurant, former Mayor Thomas Menino wasn’t just the mayor, he was a regular.
Menino was very dear to the workers of Santarpio’s Pizza in East Boston and the restaurant in turn was very special to him.
“He enjoyed coming here. He brought his family here,” said Frank Santarpio. “He enjoyed coming here and he was comfortable.”
The mayor was a regular at the pizza shop. He would often stop by for lunch with co-workers, wife or grandchildren and he threw many political parties there. The mayor would often bring a pizza home for his son Tommy, a police officer.
As for his go-to meal: cheese pizza, sausage barbecue and Pellegrino to drink. “I used to bring him some bread and cherry peppers,” Santarpio said.
Tony Costanzo has been a server there for more than 30 years. He got to know Menino so well that he knew just how to put a smile on his face.
“If he came here with a scowl on his face, I knew something was bothering him, I would play Frank Sinatra. He would smile from ear to ear,” Constanzo said.