Dave Newhouse: Any way you cut it, family’s tradition is strong
By Dave Newhouse
Oakland Tribune
There’s something about family tradition that feels natural.
Perhaps it’s a togetherness that embraces values, decency and home — a backyard Fourth of July barbecue that never ends.
Joe the Butcher has the strongest sense of such tradition. He retired as a butcher the last day of February after working full-time in the trade for 48 years. Now 74, he’s put down his knives, hung up his apron, walked out from behind the meat counter for good.
Only Joe Scalise Jr. can’t say goodbye to the meat itself. Family tradition won’t allow him. So he’s passing down that tradition to sons Johnny, Jimmy and Patrick, who will sell the Papa Scalise brand sausage to various food outlets.
The sons will carry forth the tradition of not only their father, but also their grandfather, Joe Scalise Sr., who opened an Alameda butcher shop in 1935. And great-grandfather Luigi was a meat-cleaver, too. You just can’t let all that history disappear like a family scrapbook in a fire.
And so Joe Jr., known to Alamedans as Joe the Butcher, will work two days a week distributing the family Papa Scalise brand sausage.
"My whole family, including uncles, was in the meat business," said Joe Jr. "When we had family gatherings, it was ’meat talk.’ My wife would go crazy, but that was our life."
Then Encinal Market, where his butcher shop was located, was sold recently. Thus his path into retirement was eased after having logged the longest individual family run as a butcher.
Luigi Scalise, grandfather of Joe Jr., came to America from Calabria in southernmost Italy. He settled in Weed, near Yreka, because there was work in the lumber business. In 1933, Luigi moved his family to the East Bay. In 1935, Joe Sr. opened a butcher shop at Chestnut Market in Alameda. His three sons helped out whenever they could from the time they were boys.
Joe Sr. retired in 1968. Joe Jr. and brother Ron took over the father’s business before Joe Jr. left to open a butcher shop inside Star Grocery in Berkeley, and Ron headed out to Blackhawk to be a butcher. Their brother Louie had a butcher shop in Hayward.
In 1989, the Encinal Market butcher shop became available, and Joe Jr. returned to Alameda. Even though he had a degree from Armstrong Business College in Berkeley, he would be a butcher forever.
"I didn’t question it," he said. "That’s what I was here for. But I enjoyed my life working. It was the people I met, the young boys I hired, some who were troubled. I straightened them out to be good citizens. That gratified me the most."
There also were numerous customers he gave meat to who couldn’t afford to pay him.
"He’s an honorable person," said Pat Scalise, Joe Jr.’s wife of 50 years. "People knew that they were going to get an honest, quality product from an honest, quality man."
Joe Jr. received endless compliments about his service and the quality of his meat.
"Scalise meats never skimped on quality," he said. "We just made people happy. We were friendly, gave people the big hello. It was a homey feeling. They were glad to come in."
Son Patrick described the friendly atmosphere as " ’Cheers’ as a butcher shop. It’s a family business that’s been around for 74 years. It’s unbelievable."
"That’s not around anymore — the relationships," noted Joe Jr. "Supermarkets are good, they’re pretty. But fathers and sons, family stores, they’re not around any more."
The Scalise family, and Papa Scalise sausage, are still around. And they’re not going away, even though stiffer competition, such as Trader Joe’s, has made it rough the last few years.
Joe Jr., unlike his father, didn’t expect his three sons, who worked for him part-time growing up, to succeed him in the butcher trade. All three graduated from college: Patrick, now 38, from the University of San Francisco; Jimmy, 42, from Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo; and Johnny, 41, from San Francisco State. Older daughter Julie, 49, graduated from UC Berkeley.
All four graduations, plus weddings, on a butcher’s paycheck.
"He set an example," said Patrick. "He had such pride. You’d never come in and not see his store looking good. He put employees before himself. He was really committed to every day, 100 percent."
Joe Jr. was so committed he worked six days a week, which meant he missed numerous weddings and his sons’ football games if they fell on a Saturday.
Now the sons have come together, from non-butcher businesses, to continue the family meat tradition. And all because of the father’s sterling example.
"There is a little bit of responsibility on us," said Patrick. "You have to try to carry the torch. You just can’t walk away from it."
We don’t know yet if Joe the Butcher’s grandchildren will tote that same torch. But don’t bet against it. People love sausage.
