Frank Chiocca was tending bar for what would be his last shift. His Chiocca’s Park Avenue Inn opened for business on June 18, 1964. It closed for good at the end of that last shift on Nov. 29, 2004. As Chiocca answered a question from a customer the telephone rang.

It was another old friend, calling to pay his respects. With the sun setting on what was a crisp autumn day Chiocca was reflective, yet upbeat, in the midst of his five o’clock crowd, such as it was, for the last time.

Someone ordered a sandwich. Watching his 79-year-old hands carefully constructing a simple sandwich was worth studying; he was a polished craftsman. According to Chiocca, in 1964 a bottle of Richbrau, which was then brewed and bottled about a half-mile from his Fan District location, cost a quarter. He chuckled, “Forty years! I didn’t have two nickels to rub together when I got here.”

Still, the food-and-drink biz had come quite naturally to Frank Chiocca.

After returning to Richmond from service in the Italian army during World War I, his father, Pietro Chiocca — whose two older brothers were already running a Broad St. restaurant on the northern rim of the Fan District called Jimmy’s — became a partner in Silvio Funai’s restaurant downtown at 327 E. Franklin St. The building, which no longer exists, had previously been a public library. In 1937 “Pete” Chiocca bought Funai out and renamed the place Chiocca and Son.

Before they left to serve in uniform during World War II, Pete’s four sons — Andrew, Joe, Mario and Frank — all worked in his restaurant, which was across the street from the Richmond Newspapers building.

In 1947 Joe opened his own eatery at 2915 W. Cary St. It was in the building that now houses The Track; he called it Chiocca’s. In 1952 brother Mario followed suit by opening his own version of a Chiocca’s at 425 Belmont Ave. Mario’s children, Tim and Carla, still operate that basement tavern today, much the manner it has always been run.

In 1961 Pete Chiocca closed the original downtown Chiocca’s. Using the typewriter with which he had created the daily menus for years, Frank then put together a few recollections of his father’s place to help columnist Charles McDowell with a piece he wrote paying tribute to the passing of a favorite haunt.

According to McDowell’s account, Frank’s history recalled, “… the prohibition days, the bawdy girls who would occasionally saunter in to catch the eye of a medical student, a lawyer, an artist, musician, and perhaps even a newspaper man. …and the ever-present gas pilot light at face level near the tobacco case, for lighting one’s cigar or cigarette.”

Chiocca’s Park Avenue Inn’s signature sandwich was known as “The Masterpiece.” It featured an anchovy sauce based on Frank’s mother’s recipe.

“All things come to an end,” Chiocca shrugged with a smile. “Forty years; it’s been a good run.”

– words and photo by F.T. Rea