Old school. Larger than life. A character. That’s how loved ones remember Robert Petosa, a longtime restaurateur in Seattle and Snohomish County.
The son of Italian immigrants and the sixth of 10 siblings, he grew up in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood. Throughout his 71 years, he approached life in the style of his favorite Frank Sinatra song, “My Way.”
Robert Louis Petosa died Dec. 7 in Everett.
He is survived by his six children, Cheryl Petosa, Rob Petosa, Cindy Brengman, Jack Petosa, Dina Hayes and Kristi Sigel; sisters Patricia Audette and Claire Rhodes; brothers Leo, Nick, Michael, Vincent and the Rev. Joseph Petosa; his former wife, Mary Jane Dunham; 15 grandchildren, three stepchildren and many nieces and nephews.
He was preceded in death by his parents, Michael and Mary Petosa; his wife, Naomi; and brothers John and Tom Petosa.
“Bob was my best friend,” said his brother, Mike Petosa, who worked with Robert in the early 1960s at the Chicken Roost Cafe in Lynnwood. It was one of many restaurants the family operated over the years.
“There were as many as 14 or 15 (restaurants), all with different names and operators,” said Jack Petosa, Bob’s second-oldest son. The first one, The Creamery, was opened in the 1950s by Bob’s sisters Claire and Patti on Seattle’s Queen Anne Hill. In the ’50s, Bob Petosa was a football star at Seattle Prep High School.
Today, there’s a Petosa’s Restaurant in Monroe, a Petosa’s on Broadway in Everett, and several Claire’s Pantry restaurants, one on Main Street in Edmonds. There’s also Petosa’s Family Grocery in Edmonds, which was operated by the late Tom Petosa.
“He was a kitchen man,” said Rob Petosa, Bob’s oldest son, who began working with his father at the Monroe restaurant in the 1970s. “He had people running the front end, but 90 percent of his time was in the kitchen.”
Rob remembers “the good old days when everybody would come into the restaurant to cash their paychecks there on Friday nights. It was like he ran the restaurant and a bank. He was a very generous man.
“He and his friends would play a big pinochle game, and if somebody lost a lot of money he’d give it all back,” Rob Petosa said. “That’s the type of guy he was.”
Jack Petosa said he learned a lot from his father, including a strong work ethic. They were in business together at Petosa’s in Bothell before Jack bought his father out.
“He was very old school,” Jack said. “He basically demanded respect, and he got it from most people. He was very stubborn and forceful, but he was a neat guy with a lot of love in his heart. He loved to be around people.”
Daughters Cindy Brengman and Kristi Sigel remember their father’s fondness for music, especially the old standards of Sinatra, Dean Martin and other singers of his day.
Brengman, a caregiver to her father in his later years, recalled her father dancing with her at Canlis, an elegant Seattle restaurant, and singing “Volare.”
“He was always singing,” said Sigel, his youngest child. “He had a beautiful, raspy voice. You’d drive around with him and he’d be singing ‘Old Blue Eyes.’ He used to go to Las Vegas years ago and see the Rat Pack.”
Trips to Vegas, Reno and the Tulalip Casino fulfilled a favorite pastime.
“He was a gambler all his life,” Jack Petosa said. “He liked craps, blackjack. He played it all, and he liked the slots. In his prime, he’d go to Vegas or Reno once a month.”
More recently, Bob Petosa was a regular at the Tulalip Casino, where casino host Michael Wolf called him “our best customer.”
“He had an extended family at the Tulalip Casino,” Wolf said. “Even when he was losing, he was happy. He used to say he’d come in to donate.”
Brengman said “it was so much fun watching him and his brothers play cards. He would just laugh like a little kid.”
Six priests were in attendance at Petosa’s funeral Dec. 12 at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Everett, where his brother Joseph said Mass. The eulogy was given by the Rev. Leo Larrivee, a priest from Baltimore, Md., who knew Bob Petosa’s brother from seminary days.
“When you evaluate life, you think, ‘Did somebody do the best they could?’” Larrivee said. “He did the best he could, and the best of the best were his family and children.”
Larrivee spoke of Mother Teresa of Calcutta. When someone asked her once what it means to be a saint, the priest said, she answered that a saint is someone who “knows they’re a sinner but keeps trying.”
“Bob was always trying,” Larrivee said.
Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460 or muhlsteinjulie@ heraldnet.com.
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