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Ann Arbor 200

AADL Talks To: Steve Vangelatos, Owner of Long-Running Angelo's Restaurant

When: January 11, 2024

Steve Vangelatos
Steve Vangelatos

In this episode AADL Talks to Steve Vangelatos, owner (since 1980) of Ann Arbor’s long-running and beloved Angelo’s restaurant, which was opened by his father, Angelo Vangelatos, in 1956 and closed in December 2023 after 67 years in business. Steve shares stories about the restaurant's origins, growing up and working with his father and mother in the family business, some of his favorite memories, the legacy of Angelos's famous raisin bread, and the song "Angelo's" by Dick Siegel.

Transcript

  • [00:00:08] AMY CANTU: Hi, this is Amy.
  • [00:00:09] EMILY MURPHY: This is Emily. In this episode, AADL talks to Steve Vangelatos, owner of Ann Arbor's long-running and beloved Angelo's Restaurant, which closed in December 2023 after 67 years in business. Steve shares stories about the restaurant's origins, working with his father and mother and some of his favorite memories. Well, thank you so much for joining us today, Steve. Let's start out. Where were you born?
  • [00:00:38] STEVE VANGELATOS: Ann Arbor, Michigan. I've been here my whole life.
  • [00:00:41] AMY CANTU: What neighborhood?
  • [00:00:43] STEVE VANGELATOS: Like I said, I was born in the Old St. Joe's Hospital, which is right across from the restaurant. My first home was on Washington Street. It was real close. I was walking distance from downtown and went to Bach elementary school, Slauson, and then Pioneer.
  • [00:01:00] EMILY MURPHY: What are some of your memories of Ann Arbor as a young child?
  • [00:01:04] STEVE VANGELATOS: Well, when we were living on Washington, we could walk uptown -- when we were old enough, obviously. We could run up town to Main Street and spend time up there once we were old enough. So we got to run around. And Washington Street is just right outside of downtown. It's a neighborhood where there's sidewalks and houses next to each other and neighbors and friends that lived on the same street. It was, like your typical neighborhood growing up.
  • [00:01:31] AMY CANTU: I want to show you this photo, Steve. I think this is you.
  • [00:01:35] STEVE VANGELATOS: Slauson.
  • [00:01:36] AMY CANTU: Yeah, Slauson junior high, of flag football team champions.
  • [00:01:40] STEVE VANGELATOS: Slauson was right up... Downtown was to the left of where I lived, and Slauson was to the right, just about the same distance. So it was really close.
  • [00:01:49] EMILY MURPHY: The restaurant was also close?
  • [00:01:52] STEVE VANGELATOS: I guess it was walking distance, but we just usually didn't walk there, but we could have, but it was a little bit farther away.
  • [00:02:00] EMILY MURPHY: Did you pretty much grow up in the restaurant?
  • [00:02:02] STEVE VANGELATOS: I sure did. Ever since I was old enough, and my father would let me come down there, I was down there. I grew up in in the building that the restaurant's in right now. Me and my two sisters were born right across the street. My dad -- when you had babies back then, it was a little different. The father wasn't as involved as they are now, so my mom could literally be up there having me and my two sisters and my dad could stay at the restaurant and just go up there afterward, do what he had to do, then come back to the restaurant. It was real convenient when you're having babies when you worked right across the street.
  • [00:02:35] EMILY MURPHY: Absolutely. What was one of the first jobs that you were given?
  • [00:02:40] STEVE VANGELATOS: Washing dishes. As soon as I could reach the dish shelf, that's when I was starting to wash dishes.
  • [00:02:47] AMY CANTU: I imagine you had -- all through growing up --you probably had friends come over to the restaurant?
  • [00:02:52] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah, I wanted to be there as much as I could. As soon as I was old enough I'd get there as much as I could, especially if I wanted to see my parents because they were there. In that day, the restaurant was open from 6:00 AM to 8:00 PM. They were there all day, so I pretty much, if I wanted to see them, I would come down there. Actually, my grandma, my yaya -- we were Greek -- they actually lived with us, and she raised us while they were at the restaurant.
  • [00:03:21] AMY CANTU: Wow, that's really interesting. I would love to get a character sketch of your dad and your mom. Can you talk a little bit about them and the origins of the restaurant?
  • [00:03:30] STEVE VANGELATOS: Well, my dad is a Greek immigrant. He came over in 1951 and got jobs in restaurants. Basically, that's why he was here. His first job was, I think at Curtis' restaurant on Main Street, which was a popular chicken restaurant. Back then, there weren't as many restaurants as there was Ann Arbor. There weren't nearly as many. He worked there, and I'm sure he cooked and probably did anything he could. I think he actually slept in the basement at first. Mr. Curtis took him under his wing and mentored him and taught him, and then my mom, at the same time, was working in restaurants in Ann Arbor too. I think it was Thompson's Pizza on Main Street, I think, somewhere. She was working there. Somehow, they met, and they were married in 1954, I think. Then two years later, they scraped together the money, and they opened up the restaurant. Actually bought it from another Greek person in Ann Arbor who's name was Angelo.
  • [00:04:36] EMILY MURPHY: He kept the name.
  • [00:04:37] STEVE VANGELATOS: Well, my dad's name is Angelo. His name was Angelo. He didn't have to change the signs. He purchased the restaurant at the time, just the restaurant, not the building, not the property. That's when they opened up the restaurant. They both worked there, like I said, seven days a week from 6:00 AM to 8:00 PM. I think I remember... What happened is, as soon as lunch was over, my dad would come home for a couple of hours to take a nap or rest, and then he'd come back, and then my mom would come home, and then she'd go back, and then they both would come home.
  • [00:05:11] AMY CANTU: It wasn't always just a breakfast and brunch restaurant?
  • [00:05:13] STEVE VANGELATOS: No. That happened when I took over because at that point, I had gotten married, and I thought... I talked to my father, I said, "Listen, I can't be here all day long." I said, "I can't." I think we were one of the first restaurants in Ann Arbor that went just breakfast and lunch. Actually, I mean, we were the one of the first restaurants in Ann Arbor that went non-smoking at that time. This was just a decision I made. He agreed, and so we just started opening for breakfast and lunch. Now there's all restaurants that do that, but I think we were one of the first ones that actually did that.
  • [00:05:50] EMILY MURPHY: How did your regulars respond to that?
  • [00:05:54] STEVE VANGELATOS: The breakfast and lunch was the business, really. Dinner was okay, but it wasn't like the breakfast and lunch. To be honest, I'm not sure how they took it, but I know there were regular people, 'cause a lot of people my father would talk about later on were people that came in the evenings. But they just, at that point, my dad was a little bit behind the scene, so they just just took it.
  • [00:06:17] AMY CANTU: Well, so...but you're famous for your breakfasts and brunches so that probably helped.
  • [00:06:23] STEVE VANGELATOS: I can't remember how--nothing like we are now or when we closed, but back then, that's what basically built the restaurant.
  • [00:06:33] AMY CANTU: I read that when your parents were there, nobody wrote anything down. They just yelled the order. There was no window.
  • [00:06:44] STEVE VANGELATOS: There was no POS systems and printers like we have now. Yeah, they would basically yell, they would call the order. The menu was a lot simpler than it is now. You can tell by looking at one of those. My dad was -- for having a third grade, I think, third grade education -- was a very smart guy and very intelligent and that he picked that stuff up well once he started. He managed to speak pretty good English after he came. But yeah, that's how they did it. She would just shout it in, and he would pick it up and people would come to the register and tell my mom what they had, and she would punch it in and.
  • [00:07:19] AMY CANTU: Add it up on the...
  • [00:07:20] STEVE VANGELATOS: You couldn't do that now. You couldn't do that in the last 20, 30 years. But back then, you could do that.
  • [00:07:28] EMILY MURPHY: Did you have a favorite thing on the breakfast menu? Did it change?
  • [00:07:33] STEVE VANGELATOS: Did I have a favorite thing?
  • [00:07:34] EMILY MURPHY: Yes, you.
  • [00:07:34] STEVE VANGELATOS: To be honest with ya, I can't remember what I ate. I don't think I ate much. Indeed to this day, I didn't really... Even though I'm there all day long, I don't really actually sit down and order things and eat down there because I'm just so busy. There's favorites I have now, but back then, basically, it was your basic pancakes, French doughs, eggs, potatoes, omelets. Basically, that's all it was.
  • [00:07:59] EMILY MURPHY: Yeah. What are your favorites now?
  • [00:08:03] STEVE VANGELATOS: If I have to eat down there, and I think I did just before we closed... Actually we had a breakfast down there the day after---we closed on the 23rd. That next Saturday, typically, every year, we have this annual breakfast with myself and some friends of mine, which, one of the guys, me and him have been together every Christmas Eve morning for the last 38 years or something. We'd go to different restaurants and we would pick a restaurant. This year, we did it at Angelo's because we were closing since we had stuff leftover, so we ate there, and I think I had corn beef hash and eggs.
  • [00:08:39] AMY CANTU: I have a question. What changed when you took over the restaurant? Like, what were you hoping to do, other than, of course, the hours that you just mentioned?
  • [00:08:48] STEVE VANGELATOS: The menu. If you saw the menu that was before me and then when I came in, most of the stuff that on the menu I brought on. I don't think my dad knew what an egg's benedict was or a crabcake benedict or a deep-fried French toast or portabella benedict or anything like that. I added all the benedict and the corned beef hash and the lox, you know smoked salmon, which was very popular, all that stuff that you probably see a lot of different places. But that was all brought on once I got on there.
  • [00:09:22] EMILY MURPHY: When was this? How old were you when you stepped into the leadership role?
  • [00:09:26] STEVE VANGELATOS: I graduated in '76. I went to Eastern for a couple of years. I knew this is what I wanted to do, but I went there because my friends were going. I wanted to get the experience, and my dad said, That's fine. I was there for two years, and then my dad's health started to fail a little bit, and I figured, Well, if I'm goin to do it. I might as well do it now, I think it was 1980 when I actually came in there full time.
  • [00:09:53] AMY CANTU: I had read that you renovated -- I think it was in 1990? You took over, tore down an adjacent building.
  • [00:10:02] STEVE VANGELATOS: One thing my dad -- I really appreciate this -- buying the property was very important. Coming over like he did and was an immigrant, at one point he had I think seven pieces of property that he had purchased. Fortunately, eventually he bought the building the restaurant's in, the house next door, the house behind it, the little parking lot across the street, and then the house at the corner. When we did the remodel, I had a house behind me and a house next to me. We tore the house behind me down as the parking lot, and then we remodeled the business and extended on between the two houses. Between the building and the house we put addition on there then we enlarged the place.
  • [00:10:45] EMILY MURPHY: You said that you knew that this was what you were going to do. Did you know that since you were a kid?
  • [00:10:52] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yes. People asked me that. I think I did. Somehow, I don't know, maybe I'm giving myself too much credit, but I could see the potential down there, and one thing I always remember. I mean, when my father bought the place from this person, Angelo -- his name's Angeol Mallis, Greek guy -- he laughed at my dad, said he thought he was a sucker because he bought, he sold the rest and he went up -- I don't know if, you probably don't remember this place, actually where the Duncan Donuts is going in right now, it was called Mallis Coffee Cup. That's what he opened. He basically turned over the place we had to my dad and he opened up a little little restaurant in the corner and it's been The Cloverleaf ever since, and some other things, and my dad would tell me how he thought he'd gotten one over on my dad. I used to have the actual receipt that he paid him for the business, and I think it was like $8,000. Something like that. That's why I stuck in my head, and I could see there's potential down there because I mean, even back then, before it is now, the hospital was up the street, the Victor Vaughan was across the street. The U of M hospital was up the straight, and I just just thought maybe it someday that this would all pay off.
  • [00:12:09] AMY CANTU: It's amazing that -- and I was thinking about this the other day -- there aren't many restaurants in that area.
  • [00:12:19] STEVE VANGELATOS: We had our own little island there. I mean, at one point there was up the street, a couple blocks away. There used to be a little pizza place, and then there was Kana restaurant which I think is now Pacific Rim, but they were just a couple blocks away. But other than that, there was nothing within a mile.
  • [00:12:35] AMY CANTU: You were known for always having lines out the door and people waiting and even though it wasn't a very big place, people were willing to wait and I think that had its own reputation.
  • [00:12:47] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah, it got a reputation real quickly. I remember those lines in the old restaurant. Like I said, it was a lot simpler, everything was simpler. There was maybe two servers, and sometimes just my dad in back and sometimes a part time dishwasher, I mean, that's how they did it. When I closed, I had 22 employees. You always had to have a dishwasher, and I had four servers, and a hostess and a cashier and four or five people in the kitchen. It's a lot different, but the lines never ended. The only difference was back then, they would line up in a single line all the way down the street and around the corner but when we remodeled, we have the little lobby, that's where they would just crowd in there and then eventually, they would just people just spread out. We had outdoor seating a couple few years later, and they just spread out all over, and then we have the coffee shop next door, so they would go there, so you never really saw straight lines. Back then, you'd see straight lines all the way around because like we do now, people would come in and give us their name and how many and we'd say, we'd call you. Back then, it was just you waited in line till it was your turn at the door, and my mom would say, "How many?" They'd say "two" and then they'd see you at the next table there was two. There was never any name taking. There were never any lists. That all started later on when things progressed to where they were now.
  • [00:14:11] AMY CANTU: I have a question about your raisin toast, raisin bread. That was a very early...
  • [00:14:19] STEVE VANGELATOS: When he first opened it, he wasn't making homemade bread. That story, people ask me... And back then, even though he was making home bread, but it didn't seem that important, so nobody actually sat down with my dad and said, "Ok now, how did this happen?" So once he passed, that's when people started asking that question and different people had different answers. Some people say it was my grandmother that gave him the recipe. Some people say it was a customer that came in, said, hey, you ought to make your own bread and then one day, he thought, Well, I'll just throw some raisins in it, and that's how they got raisin bread. I'm not exactly sure how the bread started cause I know when they first opened they didn't make homemade bread. They just had your basic -- I can remember just loaves of store bought bread. That started, and it's just progressed into what it is today.
  • [00:15:12] AMY CANTU: An institution. So are we going to still get raisin bread or is the raisin bread...
  • [00:15:16] STEVE VANGELATOS: You know what? I'm getting that question a lot asked and to be honest, the last six months have been so crazy because of the closing. I was so busy, and the last especially in December was even worse. I was literally baking bread -- and I'm the only person that bakes bread. I'm the only person that's ever baked the bread besides my dad and I've done it -- I do it seven days a week, every day and there's very few occasions when I didn't make it and if that was the case, if I had to go somewhere, it'd be somewhere, I would come in the next day before and make so much of it that they would just have to make a very little amount just to have some fresh bread. It was a couple of times when I had to have carpal tunnel on both wrists because of making bread. At that point I was back way before. I should have been, but I had somebody helping me, and I was right next to him and doing it. But the last -- especially in December -- I was making bread from three in the morning till 12 at noon, and it didn't seem to be enough. It came down to the last day. We were open the 23rd, and I knew it was going to be a big day and so I actually came in at 10:00 and I baked bread until almost 4, 5, 6:00 in the morning. I had it stacked up everywhere. I've never made that much bread at one time. That was going to be the last time I was going to make it. We ran out. At the end day, we barely made it have a couple of loafs here and there. I had two bags of flour left and that next Monday, my wife said, You know, I promised people bread, and I said, I don't have it. I said, Okay, so I went in after -- we were closed now, everything's done -- but the bakery was still intact, I went in the next day and I made a batch of raisin bread, gave it to some people, called some people if they wanted, I gave it to them. My wife took some and then -- this was about a week later -- I had still one bag of flour left, and I thought, What should I do with that? Knight's Market sold my bread. They would pick up -- three times a week, they'd come to drop off hamburgers and they'd pick up loaves of raisin bread and they sell it in the market. So I went down to Knight's and I said, Listen, I got one bag of flour left. I said, I'm about ready to take the bakery out. I said, but I'm going to bake this bread. I'm going to give it to you and I'm not even to charge you. I'm just going to give it to you. You guys can sell it and they said, Great, we'll do that. So I baked the bread and I took 20 loaves to them, 20 middle loaves to him at 10:00. I was like two Tuesdays ago, and by 11:15, he called me up and said, Do you have any more? Because it's gone. I had about 10 more loaves I had, so I said, Sure and they came picked those up and sold those, and they sold all of those. I put it on the website, and I put it on my Facebook page, that I'd be making one last batch of raisin bread, and the Knights would be selling it and just from that, they came down and it was gone, and they sold it. That's going to be the last time unless something -- I mean, people ask me, "Why don't you just bake bread?" I said, Well, that's exactly what I'm trying not to do. [Laughter] But to be honest with you, lately, I've been thinking -- I'll see a place and I'll go, Wow, maybe I could maybe get a little space and maybe bake bread three days a week. My son, maybe something he might be interested in doing, and we can set him up to do that, and maybe we'll sell bread for three days a week or maybe during the holidays, or maybe I'll find a ghost kitchen during the holidays, bake it and sell it. I'm thinking, Well I might get myself into something that I don't want - that I'll be sorry for. Just right now, there's no plans on making it again, unless I make it at home and I've never made it...I've never reduced it down to low. People have asked me. Actually, because I've spent so much time next to my mixer which is probably the oldest piece of equipment that we've had -- I think it was there before I was -- I paid some people and took it to my house and it's in my garage, just sitting in my garage, and just going to sit there till it's somebody else's problem to get rid of it.
  • [00:19:15] EMILY MURPHY: It makes me feel really good to know that mixer is still in existence.
  • [00:19:18] STEVE VANGELATOS: I mean, I could have sold it. It was worth a lot of money, but I just said I'm going to take it home and put it in my garage, and it just sits there and we used to hang stuff on it, and that's what's going to happen, but I'm not going to sell it. I'm just going to keep it there.
  • [00:19:30] AMY CANTU: You might...you might be looking at that for a while and then decide "Ah, well..."
  • [00:19:34] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah.
  • [00:19:35] AMY CANTU: You never know.
  • [00:19:36] STEVE VANGELATOS: I took the whole big bread table and I'm going to cut that back and actually make a bench in the garage and I'm going to sit the mixer next to it just like I had for this many years and no plans of doing anything else with it.
  • [00:19:48] EMILY MURPHY: But you know there'll be a market if you ever decide you want to get back in.
  • [00:19:52] STEVE VANGELATOS: Both my wife and I decided when it happened that for two years we're just going to just step back and just take it easy and not think about, cause I've got people wanting to open up... "Why can't we open up an Angelos? Let's open up an Angelos." I said, Well, if I wanted to open Angelo's, I'd stay right where I am. Because the location. I mean, they're building a hotel across the street for Christ's sake. I mean, you couldn't ask for a better place to be if you want to open a restaurant. I said, for at least two years, we're just going to just take it easy and not deal with anything like that. Maybe after two years, if the right person comes along with the right experience, money, and I know they could do it, I could possibly see maybe reopening. But it would depend on a lot of things. Like I said, I'm not in any hurry, it's nothing I need to do.
  • [00:20:44] AMY CANTU: Okay, but you heard it here. We might not have seen the end of Angelo's.
  • [00:20:48] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah.[LAUGHTER] Yeah, it's possible, but like I said, right now, there's no plans. Yeah, there's no plans.
  • [00:20:55] EMILY MURPHY: It sounds like you need a break.
  • [00:20:57] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah.
  • [00:20:57] EMILY MURPHY: That's a lot of baking.
  • [00:20:58] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah. Me and my wife just have to just back off from the restaurant business for at least a couple of years.
  • [00:21:06] AMY CANTU: Where do you go to eat your breakfast? [LAUGHTER]
  • [00:21:08] STEVE VANGELATOS: Well, I don't. [LAUGHTER]
  • [00:21:13] AMY CANTU: You'll have to find a place.
  • [00:21:14] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah, breakfast is my favorite meal. I enjoy going to dinner. I don't, haven't done too much lunch, but breakfast is one of my favorite meals. If I'm away, whenever I'm on vacation, which doesn't happen very often, but when we're closed, it's something that I enjoy doing.
  • [00:21:35] AMY CANTU: I'm sure you've answered this question 1,000 times too, but I wanted to hear your take on the Dick Siegel song.
  • [00:21:41] STEVE VANGELATOS: No, that happened -- I can't remember exactly where that happened -- it was back in the '70s. I think I should know this, I should know that date because... I've been seeing Dick a lot lately and spent some time with him and it came out... You know we heard it came out and even back then, I was like, That's fun. We knew he'd sing at places and people would come in and say, we heard him singing the song. I think what happened was the song came so popular, that's all he got asked to sing sometimes. [LAUGHTER] I think it started to get a little on his nerves so he kind of stepped back for a while, and he'd come in -- he was a customer, he came in. Actually, he dated a few of the servers he met actually in Angelo's. Then he got on the radio station, 94.7 "Over Easy.: They actually came in one time, him and the woman that does that and played live in the restaurant one time years ago. It's been play on that radio show for God, how many years it's been? It's up to this day, they still do it. Actually I found when I was cleaning my office, I found a t-shirt that had the 94.7 Over Easy and he had signed it, and and the woman had signed it, too that I didn't even know I had, but I pulled it out of my office when I was going through stuff. Then and then it came to the point where we were closing, and then Dick approached me and said he wanted to come in the restaurant and play live. I said, Anything you want. Just tell me when. Whenever you want to do it, for as long as you want to do it. As many times you want to do it. You just tell me, I'll pull out tables if I have to -- anything you want to do. At this point, worrying about losing business or turning tables wasn't important to me. Actually, in December, he came in, I think it was God, the 17th or week before? And they walked in at about 11:00 and him and the three, two other guys, and they played and played a song a couple of times and walked through the restaurant and then sat down and had breakfast.
  • [00:23:41] AMY CANTU: That's nice. Your parents must have like the song, too.
  • [00:23:44] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah. My dad understood it that much. I don't think it was a big deal to him, but [LAUGHTER] I am sure my mom more, so. Then Dick comes to me and says, Listen, we want to have a farewell party at the Ark. And I said, Dick, that's what you want to do, that's fine with me because the people at the Ark are on board. I said, and I've never been to the Ark -- and this is a new Ark. I don't think I was at the old one either -- but so I said, that's great and so they scheduled it, and I actually went online, and I bought like 36 tickets just for my employees because everybody wanted to go, family wanted to go, so I bought all the tickets, passed them all out, and that night came, and I was a little apprehensive, because he told me because, I'm going to bring you up on stage. I'm thinking that's not something that I really enjoy. But at this point, there's nothing I can do about it. The guy's wonderful. We got there, almost all my employees, most of my family, a lot of my friends, customers. When we first got there, people were coming up to me and telling me stories and thanking me and congratulating me. Then the show started, and he's incredible. I enjoy listening to him. Then he brought me up on stage, and he actually -- which was really nice -- he gave me a first edition album of "Snap," and he signed it. Then he gave me a nice plaque -- it must have been a CD cover -- with my dad's picture on it that he presented it to me. It ended up being a great evening, wonderful evening. Most important people to me were there, and everybody enjoyed themselves. I think one of the most incredible things that happened is we were leaving, and I was thinking, Wow, I'm hungry, but where can we go? My wife actually said, Let's go to Fleetwood. I saw she was the last person in the world that I would ever hear say, I want to go to Fleetwood. [LAUGHTER] We walked down there with the people I was with and we had breakfast, and then being a great evening. Actually, Dick came in the next day. I talked to him again, and then actually came in the last day we're open. He never needs -- he doesn't wait in line. He's got a free pass to everything, so 'cause he's just a great guy. He's Ann Arbor. He's so important to Ann Arbor. He's been her for so long.
  • [00:26:02] AMY CANTU: A couple of Ann Arbor institutions.
  • [00:26:03] STEVE VANGELATOS: Yeah. He's great.
  • [00:26:07] AMY CANTU: I would like to ask you a little bit about... You mentioned all the buildings going up around where the restaurant was. What are your thoughts on the development of that whole area?
  • [00:26:19] STEVE VANGELATOS: At one point, when there was houses next door, across the street, even down the hill, the house next door, there used to be a train that went between the structure and the house next door where they brought coal up to the power plant. The house next door before we purchased it belonged to a really nice old woman named Mrs. Richards, which... She was always sitting on he porch. When we came down to the restaurant, when we were younger, we spent a lot of time over there with her sitting on her porch just watching what was going on. Then eventually things started to change. There was a gas station across the street. Clarence, this guy, Clarence owned it. Practically slept there. He towed cars too. He had the station and then the two houses next to it, and the one on the corner my dad owned. It was a parking lot. They used to have battles -- who could buy these places first. My father won one on the corner and then Clarence won the next two, and then the gas station. It was about 15 years ago, I can't remember the exact year, things started... There was talk being made about development across the street. Clarence was holding out. He wasn't ready to, he didn't want to sell. He was being real difficult to negotiate with, so I listened up and I was approached about the parking lot that I had across the street. At that point, I was setting back -- you know, I need the parking, basically. I can't really give up the parking. I was just kinda seeing what was going to go on, how was it happening. Finally, Clarence decided to sell, and I didn't want to hold it up, hold his deal up and cause him not to get his retirement, which he deserved, so I went ahead and sold the parking lot to the developer -- this was 15 years ago -- to a developer, which was planning on starting an office building within, you know, he had gotten the approval, he was ready to go, but right before the economy hit, and then he had some other issues, so they didn't do it. Basically, I was in that parking lot for 15 years, free of clear, no taxes, no maintenance, anything. We just continued to park there as if we still owned it, and the lot sat vacant for 15 years. Finally, a new developer took over and when I found out they were putting a hotel up, and this was still five years ago, I still wasn't ready to retire. I can't wait. If I could you asked me what I wanted to put in that lot, I'd say a hotel, thinking who would put a hotel there? They're putting a hotel there. [LAUGHTER] I said, Wow, I can't wait till that thing opens, 'cause I mean, it's going to be so much business. It took longer than it did and they finally got started a year and a half ago. They took the parking lot, and the deal was, I got eight spaces temporarily somewhere else, and then eventually eight spaces underground parking for my employees, which I'll never use. We had a pretty good deal, and I pretty made out on the deal, but finally, I started the hotel, so we've got something to watch there. That's been interesting. Then the university bought other house my mom had at the corner, about the same time, which they just tore down. Then the other two houses they bought they tore those down, so it's an empty lot. Then, like I said, we tore the house down to make a parking lot, and then that's pretty much how it is. A big, huge science building right up the street. I got to watch all of this being built -- a new structure. Now they're building a pharmaceutical college right up the street on Huron street. There's three, four super cranes within, you go outside, all you see is cranes, they probably hit each other.
  • [00:29:45] AMY CANTU: I know.
  • [00:29:49] STEVE VANGELATOS: One of the most... Really the only negative part of this whole experience has been is that people have said about, Well, the university's...you're giving up property taxes. You're taking property taxes off from City Ann Arbor. I understand that, but to me, I don't think Ann Arbor would be Ann Arbor without the University of Michigan. I have no problem with them buying what they're buying. My piece of property is the only piece that they don't own. Without that, it restricts them to...so it's been a plan for many years for both them and me. It just progressed and went perfectly as planned to where I am today with them in that whole area down there.
  • [00:30:35] EMILY MURPHY: How did you decide that it was time to retire?
  • [00:30:38] STEVE VANGELATOS: Well, I promised my wife when I was 65 that I would retire, I would start to retire or get out. About five years ago, the university got word or heard something, and they approached me and we talked and at that point, I wasn't still wasn't ready. It was five years ago. I was perfectly fine. We just put it on the back burner. But they knew and I knew. Like I said, I turned 65 and literally got up one day and said -- and I know it wasn't a hard decision to make -- but I don't regret making it. It was my decision, only my decision. My wife didn't force the issue. She didn't say, Listen, you said 65. It's not that simple. You just can't say, "Shut the place down" because we wouldn't survive if we just shut it down.
  • [00:31:29] STEVE VANGELATOS: We approached the university again at that point, I approached them, and then we started talking and that was last December, November. We negotiated, took about six months, and then we came to an agreement. It was probably the worst kept secret in Ann Arbor. Because I think somebody in the university leaked it out to be honest. I really didn't say anything about it but I was getting people to come in and say, We heard you guys sold or some things that weren't even true or even remotely, even what I said. Then eventually, when they put it on the region's agenda, literally, the minute that was on the agenda, and they published that agenda, it was out and within 10 minutes, I was getting phone calls from the Free Press and MLive and the Michigan Daily and that's when it all started, and that's when I started getting way more attention than I really was expecting. I didn't realize that it was going to be, I knew it I'd get attention, that it was a big deal, but I didn't... I had no idea that it would be as big as it turned out to be. I literally have to have a website for people to go on and leave stories, and there's lots of them. I was getting emails and texts and phone calls. Everybody has a story. Like I said, 99.9% was congratulations. We understand why you're doing it. It's very few and like I said, most of them were just because you're taking money off tax roll in Ann Arbor. I said, Well, I know that, but it's just Ann Arbor and it's a university and like I said, I don't regret making the decision -- I never have and I don't think I ever will.
  • [00:33:13] AMY CANTU: You must have had a few sad customers though they just...
  • [00:33:17] STEVE VANGELATOS: Exactly, people cry. Then people wanted to take their picture of me. People wanted me to sign menus. Again, I would get emails, eventually we had a lot of stuff hanging in the restaurant, pictures and stuff. We were going to keep them and I got a letter from a guy that said, I was in there -- I don't know how many years ago -- and we sat in this booth, and that's where me and my wife fell in love. Now we're married. Now I was wondering is it possible you would sell me the painting that it's a painting of the restaurant? It's like a watercolor above the booth. At first I said, I was planning on keeping that stuff, but after we got that letter, I said, Sure I'll sell to you. He actually came in the last week we are open, and he took it. Like I said, that stuff, I feel good about it. I got so many paintings of the restaurant from the past, and then lately, it was on the cover to the Observer. That woman, wonderful lady, she was sitting across the street for months, just painting the restaurant. I finally went over there one day, and I said, I'd talk to her and I said, Listen, I said -- this was towards the end -- I said, When you're done, and at that point, she had sold four or five of them. I said, when you're done and you're selling them, let me know. I'd like to buy one. She said, Okay. Then she ended up selling like 11. Then she called me up, and she goes, I just finished three. I said, okay, I want all three of them. She says, Great. Wonderful. I said, But you have to make a couple of changes and for some reason, the one on the Observer, she left out the sign. She left out something on the side of the building and something in front. I said, you got to add all this stuff in. She said, Fine, I'll do that. Then she finally finished it and she showed it to me and she goes, You noticed anything about this painting? I said, it looks great. It's exactly what I wanted. She goes, No, you're in it. She has me sitting at a table outside. It don't look exactly like me, but you can tell it's me. She goes, do you want me to add you in the other two that I'm finishing up? I said, Yeah, put me in there because they're actually gifts. I have two sisters. I actually bought them each one. For Christmas, I gave them each one of her paintings or original paintings. I got three wonderful paintings, and I've got those, and I've had other ones in the past that people have done, and artists, so I've got plenty, but I'm a sucker for anybody that came to me and asked. Another person that there was a doctor up the street. His name was Alberti. He came in practically every day and sat at the counter on a stool. His family they were in just a couple two, three weeks before we closed. They wanted to buy a painting on the wall too, but she goes, Actually, what we want is we want a stool that my father, he sat there. I said, Sure. Once we close, I'll get you the stool. Sure enough we close -- I knew the stool he sat at most -- I took it. I just took it out, and she came in and picked it up last week and she was just so happy that they had the stool for father. He used to sit out it a lot, so and I actually got to know him and at that point, I wasn't spending much time out front. Most of my time in back. But he was one of the few people that I actually got to know because he reached out to me, so I got to know, I talked to him when he came in and I got to know him. I knew exactly who he was. He passed away about five years ago, so I was more than happy to give them the stool. People were stealing the menus. Towards the last couple of weeks, we're running short on menus. I almost had to go back to QR codes because we didn't have enough menus. People were stealing the silverware, people were stealing, anything they could take. At that point, I couldn't care less, but it was overwhelming -- the attention I'm still getting, not so much now. To people I'd say -- I was telling people I was coming in to do this. I think this is going to be the last thing I'm going to do. But, I have other people called me and like I told you about Liz and Margo filming. They wanted to come in one more time and catch the place as it is now, which is just torn to pieces. So they might do that. But anybody that wants to know anything about me, I'd just say, just Google Angelo's closing and you'll have 25 articles and pictures.
  • [00:37:44] AMY CANTU: Now this interview, too.
  • [00:37:48] STEVE VANGELATOS: I'm closing so I have all the time in the world now. I said, We're just up there at the restaurant. I spent so much of my life building that place and doing so many things to it and now I'm taking it apart, which is a little tough because I'm doing stuff -- I'm going, Wow, I can remember when I put this in or when I had somebody do this for me or when I bought this, and now basically we're just ripping stuff out and selling it, giving it away, or trashing it. Some people walk in there and they see the place, they're going, my God, I can't imagine.
  • [00:38:23] AMY CANTU: It's a little bitter sweet, but no regrets, right?
  • [00:38:25] STEVE VANGELATOS: No.
  • [00:38:25] AMY CANTU: This is what you needed to do.
  • [00:38:27] STEVE VANGELATOS: No regrets, not at all.
  • [00:38:28] AMY CANTU: So what are you most proud of?
  • [00:38:32] STEVE VANGELATOS: The business itself, the reputation it's gotten. It's a restaurant -- we're not perfect; there's times when things haven't gone well, I regret things that have happened down there, what customers experience or have happened in the past -- but I think just the reputation. And I'm glad it's not my name, it's my dad's name and my mom, because they deserve all the credit. I'm very very fortunate that I was put in this position, even though I was working seven days a week. My wife, she's the one that sacrificed, because she basically -- we had two boys -- raised them and vacationed with them most time. Early, I did a few times, but basically, she was down in Spring Break, Florida. We had had a place in Siesta Key, which my dad bought and gave to us. She'd be down there every spring break with the boys and I wouldn't be. Once my boys got older, and she wanted to travel, so she would travel. She's been to Europe two or three times, but not with me. She was there with her friends or her family. We haven't done any traveling together. I have done very little traveling at all. In 1969, my dad took us to Greece. That's when we closed for the whole month of July. He took the whole family there once spent a whole month in Greece, and that's the last time I was there in '69. I think it's changed probably since then. We're planning on doing some traveling, but yeah there was a lot of sacrifice involved. Even at this point, like when I talked to my wife, one thing I do regret is I think I could have made better decisions when it came to my family and in that aspect. Because they're the ones that sacrificed, not so much me because I don't think my wife knew what she was getting into. When we met the restaurant was the old restaurant, and I'm not sure what she thought of it, but she went with it, and then she progressed to what it is now. I don't think she understood. I don't think she regrets it but I was able to live out my dream and at that point as my father passed, my mom, she was still my partner, but she said, this is 100% yours. You do what you want. Anything you want, you make all the decisions. I don't want to have anything to do with it, except she was like a figurehead still because she spent a little bit of time down there. But as the years went on, she spent less and less. She basically let me have 100% control and do what I want to do. I got to live out my dream. I feel very fortunate about that. But I owe that to my mom and dad and my wife for allowing me to do it. Like I said, I think my family sacrificed more than they probably should have. That's really the only thing I really regret. I think I would make different decisions now if I could do it over. If it affected the business -- it could, it would have, maybe it did, it would have -- but at this point, I don't think it would've made a difference.
  • [00:41:34] AMY CANTU: Well, we're certainly grateful that you stuck it out as long as you did. It's wonderful institution.
  • [00:41:41] STEVE VANGELATOS: It was just time to call it. My son didn't want to... I think he saw me, what I was going through, and he is in school. He actually stopped school for a while to work upstairs in the coffee shop with my brother-in- law who ran the coffee shop for years to help me and to decide if that's something he wanted to do. Before all this happened, I went to him, I said, Listen, if you want to take the restaurant, I said, I'm willing to help as much as I can. He said, No, dad, he says, I don't think it's something that I want to do. That made the decision.
  • [00:42:19] EMILY MURPHY: Well, goodness knows Ann Arbor is grateful for all the years of Angelo's. Thank you for taking the time to share them with us.
  • [00:42:24] STEVE VANGELATOS: Sure, I enjoyed this. This has been great.
  • [00:42:27] AMY CANTU: Thanks so much.
  • [00:42:28] STEVE VANGELATOS: Thank you.
  • [00:42:33] AMY CANTU: AADL Talks To is a production of the Ann Arbor District Library.