He Loved His Store: Sam of Sam’s Market
Sam Ascolese in front of his market at 30th and Dune Drive circa 1952.
Editor’s Note: In our Spring 2022 issue, we published a feature highlighting Avalon’s Neighborhood Grocers. We were surprised by the response from our readers. So many great memories about the stores and the people who operated them. Although it’s been decades since he operated his grocery store in Avalon, so many people had great memories of Sam Ascolese of Sam’s Market. We were fortunate enough to sit down with Sam’s daughter, Marie DiPeso, and learn even more about Sam, his market and the Ascolese family.
Imagine Marie Ascolese’s surprise in September 1952 when the Philadelphia seventh-grader asked her mother about attending a neighborhood friend’s birthday party the next month. “My mother said that I wouldn’t be able to attend,” Marie still clearly remembers some 70-plus years later. “’Why?’ I asked,” she said. “My mother said that we wouldn’t be here, we were moving to Avalon.”
Marie was surprised. Surprised because her family had only been to Avalon once, about a month earlier, on their first-ever family vacation. Marie’s dad, Sam, was a huckster. He sold fruit and vegetables directly to customers, at their homes. His route was near the family’s home in the Logan section of Philly.
It had been a difficult year for the Ascolese family in 1952. Sam’s wife Jennie had been ill during the winter. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons they decided to take their first family vacation: Sam, Jennie and their three children Marie, Sam Jr. and Ronnie. Perhaps they just needed to get away.
Sam Ascolese collected silver dollars. He used his silver dollars to book their vacation in Avalon, far away from the sweltering heat of the city. They may as well have been going to South America. No one in the family knew anything about Avalon. Ascolese might have been influenced in his choice by his brother who loved to fish. He especially liked fishing in Avalon. It seems that based on his nautical recommendation that Avalon is where the family would spend their first family vacation. And more.
Ascolese arranged to rent part of a twin-house structure across the 25th Street Bridge on Harbor Avenue. Unbeknownst to him, the house had a historic past because it is believed that both homes were originally built to care for the men brought to Avalon to build the railroad that would prove to be so valuable to the development of the Seven Mile Beach.
“We had fun in that house,” Marie still remembers. And she was happy to learn that despite all the changes in town, those houses are still helping families create great memories in Avalon in 2023.
We can’t be sure, but since the family was probably on a budget, they probably didn’t visit The Sportsman’s Tavern just down 24th Street on Dune Drive. Today, that location is known as Bobby Dee’s Rock’n Chair Tavern and ironically, it is owned by Sam’s daughter Marie and her husband Bob DiPeso. Perpetuating Sam’s legacy, it is operated by Marie and Bob’s son and daughter-in-law. Sam planned his family vacation with the assistance of a local realtor. Today, Marie’s daughter, Teresa DiPeso, helps other families pursue their dreams as a realtor in Cape May County with listings in Avalon and Stone Harbor.
Marie remembers the one day that probably changed their lives forever. “My mom and dad liked the beach down in the 40s. I’m not sure why, we had to cut through the woods to get to the beach there,” she says. “On the way to the beach this one day, we stopped off at a little store located at 30th Street and Dune Drive. My dad sent me in for some suntan lotion,” she explained. The shop, owned by a mother-daughter duo of Emma Highfield and Edna Fertek, sold beach novelties, snacks, candy and served as an outlet for items hand-knitted by the two owners.
“My dad came in just as I entered the store and sent me back outside,” Marie explains. “I hadn’t seen the ‘For Sale’ sign in the window, but apparently my dad did.”
No one knows for sure, but that bottle of suntan lotion probably sealed the deal. The Ascolese family moved to Avalon on Oct. 14, 1952. “My parents were initially surprised by the seasonality of Avalon,” Marie points out. “It was tough. We had to learn how to save during the summer season in order to sustain the family and business all winter.”
The Ascolese kids attended Catholic school in North Wildwood at St. Ann’s. “Tuition and the bus fee were difficult,” she says. “I think that it was Father Flanagan who loaned my parents the money so that we could attend. Then, in the summer we’d repay him. Of course, we’d need to borrow again in the fall. It wasn’t easy, but we managed.”
The family lived in the small home attached to the rear of the store – two bedrooms and one bathroom for a family of five. Eventually, as the business grew, they would add a third bedroom and dining room to the living quarters.
The market itself also expanded over the years. Initially, Sam purchased meats already butchered since he lacked experience as a butcher. Eventually he’d learn that part of the trade and added a walk-in refrigerator case for meats – offering a full line of fresh butchered meats and poultry. Several readers commented about the amazing sandwiches that Jennie made. The market was stocked with canned goods, bread, milk, candy, and Sam always brought in fresh produce from local farms located offshore. The store was small, but you could probably find whatever you needed there. It was one of Avalon’s complete neighborhood grocers.
Marie went on to explain that the store was a family operation: “We all pitched in. I was the cashier at 12 years old.” Marie had a buzzer next to the cash register. When it got especially busy, she could beep to signal her mother to come help. The store was open 7am until 11pm, seven days a week, all year. The family lived in a home attached to the rear of the store. “We’d often get a knock at the back door, which was our front door, after we closed when someone needed something that couldn’t wait,” she added. The customer always came first.
Sam and Jennie Ascolese were also community-minded. Sam is often acknowledged as Avalon’s first fire police. So many memories of seeing Sam dash from his store’s front door when the siren rang – still wearing his butcher apron – and directing traffic with a fire helmet on. “My mother would just shake her head,” Marie says with a smile. “Shaking her head, she’d say, ‘One day he’s going to get hit by a car.’”
Ascolese was way ahead of the curve on customer service. Serving customers from the front door of their home when the store was closed, convenient hours year-round – a family could easily prepare three meals a day with staples provided by Sam’s Market.
Always striving to exceed expectations, Ascolese soon added home delivery. Customers could call orders in before 1pm. Marie explains that 1-3pm “was our slow time during the day. Once the orders were called in, I’d ‘shop’ and gather them. My dad would then deliver the orders. He always instructed us to ask if we could carry the bags into the kitchen.” Marie would “graduate” to delivery driver once she obtained her own driver’s license. Once the Ascolese children were grown, their dad employed local teens in the store.
Ascolese was often described as a people person. “I worked for Sam one winter,” says Bob Penrose, a retired builder and building inspector and president of Avalon’s Historical Society. “I loved working there. Sam was the nicest person. What a great person to work for!”
Ascolese’s kindness also extended to other grocers in town. Marie remembered asking her dad if he was concerned about the opening of the new Avalon Supermarket just two blocks away.
“No,” he comforted her. “Competition is good for all of us. It will be fine.” Sam’s and Avalon Supermarket both went on to thrive on Dune Drive for more than 25 years. They often assisted one another when they ran short of a certain item. “We had a really good relationship with our competitor just down the street,” Marie says. “We helped each other out often.”
The kindness and customer service must have paid off because Sam Ascolese successfully operated his market for nearly four decades in Avalon. He died in 1997, 23 years after Jennie.
“My dad loved our customers,” adds Marie. “He loved Avalon, and he loved his store.”
The keys to his success.