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Business & Tech

Local Entrepreneurs Honored by Heritage Museum

More than 150 members of the community came out to support some of Kings Park's oldest, and most respected, businesspeople.

 The Kings Park Heritage Museum on April 14 inducted its newest members of the Kings Park Entrepreneur Hall of Fame, a program that honors locals who owned successful small businesses in the area.

More than 150 community members attended the dinner and ceremony.

Inductees this year were Al "Buzzo" Bruno, a Kings Park High School Class of 1967 graduate who owns Buzzo’s Music Store in Geneseo;  John and Louis Fontana, 1960 alums who manage a building supply company in Bayport; sweater designer Kathleen Anne Gerold, a 1975 graduate; George Kryssing, a NASCAR parts manufacturer who graduated in 1988; potato farmer Walter Nowick, Peter Marmorato, a 1963 alum who owns Marmorato Art and Stone in Kings Park; Joseph Merola, owner of former Kings Park landmark Merola's Deli,Vito Poveromo, a 1946 alum who owned a sewer-drainage supply company; Don Sagristano, who owns the San Remo Deli, and former developer Charles Vita. Merola and Fontana were honored posthumously.

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Each inductee received a plaque commemorating the honor and their names will be added to a larger plaque hanging in the Heritage Museum's Entrepreneur Hall of Fame.

Kryssing, who manufactures header and exhaust systems for NASCAR, thanked the Kings Park school system for his time there, singling out his former teacher, Leo Ostebo, who attended the event.

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"When I was a kid I had a learning disability but it was people like Mr. Ostebo, one of my favorite teachers who got me through," he said.

The younger Charles Vita, whose father was honored in the event, detailed the entrepreneurial spirit he saw in his dad.

"If there was a pile of dirt on the side of the road, my dad would try to build a home on it, he said.

Poveromo, who has never missed a Rotary Club meeting in 53 years, was the night’s oldest honoree. He recalled his potato picking days when he would be paid 4 cents a bushel and he and his brothers fished and hunted along the Nissequogue River.

"I come from a time when survival was everything. It is so important to tell the young kids to always survive, never give up. It always gets better with hard work,” he said.

Stephanie Sagristano said owning and operating the San Remo Deli was often taxing on the Sagristrano family time, but the recognition from the community means the world to him.

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