The Willow Glen Resident

Photograph courtesy of Cookie Curci-Wright

Adapted from Film: Like other Avenue businesses, the Garden Theater Building has changed with the times, but it still anchors the shopping strip.

Remember When

Early shop owners set a standard of friendliness

By Cookie Curci-Wright

Mr. Crawford waved hello as I passed by his barber shop. His faithful customer George Desin sat smugly in his barber chair, puffing away on his familiar cigar while his thinning gray hair was being neatly trimmed.

Next door, at the Pronto Pup Creamery, Dad was flipping burgers on the hot fry grill. In the window of the Village Shoe Store, Andy and Alberta Trapani restocked their widow display for the new fall season. Further down the street, Bobby, a clerk pushing a broom, smiled hello as he dusted off the sidewalk in front of Bergmann's department store.

The year was 1952, and as I walked down Willow Glen's business district, I happily recognized every clerk and storekeeper by name. I spent most of my childhood years patronizing their shops, and in return these businessmen and women were all regular customers at my dad's creamery.

I enjoyed my status as the daughter of a Willow Glen business owner, privileged to know everyone along the Avenue and to be known in return. I was only 9 when Dad opened his shop. I was 30 years old when he sold it. A good part of my life in the 1950s and 1960s was spent among Willow Glen's faces and places--people like Vivian Lawrence of Lawrence's Drug Store; Bud Lima, manager of the Garden Theater; Andy and Alberta Trapani of the Village Shoe Store, Conrad Bergmann of Bergmann's Department Store; Helen Stickles at the 5 & 10 Store and Pat Pooler of Pooler's Jewelry Shop.

This was a time when a short ride to Willow Glen brought residents to the family doctor, dentist, dress shop, dime stores and drugstores--all the necessities were close at hand.

By 1970, things had changed. Dad's soda shop and most of Willow Glen's early business tenants were forced to close down. New freeways were taking customers to other areas and to other doctors, clinics and plush shopping malls. These new malls left out local shops hard-pressed to meet the competition.

Since then, Willow Glen has gone through a lot of changes, with each new generation leaving a part of its own unique heritage and culture behind.

It's been 45 years since Dad opened the Pronto Pup Creamery. Some of his original customers have come full circle now in their shopping needs, forsaking the overcrowded, impersonal shopping malls to return to the convenience of stores close at home. Today, restaurants and coffeehouses have replaced the soda shop trade of the '50s, and antique shops now fill the spaces left by five and dimes and drugstores. But take a walk along our business district any afternoon or Friday night, and you'll see that same, wonderful 1950s togetherness taking place again in cozy coffeehouses and eateries like Starbucks, The Coffee Roasting Company and La Villa Deli (a surviving shop from the 1950s). Chattering customers line up daily at La Villa Deli, just as they did when I was a kid. In aromatic coffee shops, business is conducted over cups of hot Arabian mocha java, and friendships are rekindled with each sip of cappuccino. And kids still love comic books and baseball cards, only now they buy them at Mike's Coliseum at 2050 Lincoln Ave., where friendly J.K. minds the store.

Like a lot of residents, I've stopped shopping at malls, preferring to take my business closer to home, where clerks know me by name, and the faces that serve me behind the counter are familiar ones--like the folks at Able Printing, where I'm guaranteed a big "Hi, Cookie" the minute I walk in the doorway. Shop owners George and Candie Naegeli, father and daughter, greet me with smiles and friendly banter, a privilege I enjoy as a regular customer. I also receive a big nudge and wet-nose welcome from Misty, the shop's lovable pooch, who spends her day greeting customers with a wag of her tail. This family-run business has been in existence for some 34 years in Willow Glen. The Naegeli's are a large family, and on any given day, you may find Karen, Candie, Jan or Joe behind the counter with dad George.

We may not have a Lawrence's Drug Store any longer, but we do have the next best thing: Walgreens at 2585 Almaden Road and Koch Lane. Behind the counter at this bustling drug and variety store is longtime cashier Palma Nichols. To me, Palma represents that old-fashioned friendliness I grew up with in Willow Glen, when clerks believed the customer was always right and delivered service with a smile. Like these clerks of the past, Palma knows many of her customers by name, something you'll rarely find at a large shopping mall. Palma, who's maiden name is Cassibba, was raised on her family's Almaden ranch, just south from Walgreens, and is a native of the valley. Like most longtime residents, Palma shares a special love for our area and a unique enjoyment for working here. That's probably one of the reasons Palma was voted Walgreens' most popular cashier in the nation last year.

And when it comes to banking, American Savings Bank at 1285 Lincoln Ave. satisfies our every need, including the desire to know our bankers and tellers by name and to have them know us in return. As a lifelong resident of San Jose, bank manager David Cirulo makes a concentrated effort to welcome and acknowledge his banking clientele with a warm greeting. And he encourages this same attitude among his tellers and accounts department. A handshake and a smile are all part of Dave's job as manager, but his genuine care and concern for his customers comes from years of knowing the people he serves.

Dad, and Lincoln Avenue's early businessmen, set a standard of friendliness that happily, almost 50 years later, is still going strong in our cozy community of Willow Glen.

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