Demolition began this week for a sprawling new CVS pharmacy at one of Gilroy’s busiest corners—and the site of its first salad bar.
The razing of the four tile-roofed buildings at the southwest corner of First Street and Wren Avenue to make room for a 14,700-square-foot CVS kindled memories of a long-gone but fondly remembered eatery and watering hole where for more than a decade deals were stuck and the city and its schools’ futures were planned, along with its legendary homage to all things garlicky.
“I still remember the night Rudy Malone came into the restaurant after a Gavilan College board meeting and said, ‘I’ve got a great idea, we should have a garlic festival,” recalled Sam Bozzo, who, with his wife, Judy, opened Digger Dan’s restaurant in 1974 and later brought in partner Ed Soares.
The restaurant hosted locals, tourists and celebrities such as Vincent Price and had Gilroy’s first salad bar. It served up its then-famous Golden Nuggets wontons—Judy Bozzo made 80,000 of them in all—for 14 years before the family sold the business, Bozzo, a former Gavilan College trustee, said Tuesday.
The eatery became a favorite gathering place of Gilroy’s school and city leaders, real estate and developer crowds and just plain folks who liked the cozy atmosphere and old-time mining theme accented by Tiffany-like lamps, stained glass, old barn wood and a redwood bar so thick it silenced the sound of dice games.
“The place really was like a Cheers bar, a lot of regulars came in,” said Bozzo, referencing the television show of that name.
He and others thought the garlic festive idea was “dumb,” he said.
Digger Dan’s patrons still ask Bozzo for their cheese fondue recipe. And the former restaurateur recalled that the Gilroy Dispatch owner in those days, Jerry Fuchs, was a customer. When Fuchs came in, he would always be greeted by one of the waitresses, who would jokingly ask, “How are things at the Gilroy Despair?” according to Bozzo.
Mayor Perry Woodward on Tuesday recalled working as a real estate agent in one of the buildings, and his excitement as a youngster when his mother took him for the first time to Digger Dan’s, the city’s happening place.
“I have some emotional connection to Digger Dan’s from when I was a little kid,” he said, adding “I am sorry at an emotional level to see [it demolished], but given the nature of that corner and the way it has been underutilized, I think the writing was on the wall as a prime location for another use.”
The restaurant years later was taken over by Bozzo’s son, David, and bore the family name. And Bozzo and his friend Gene Sakahara would go on to become perhaps the most enduring culinary act at the Gilroy Garlic Festival, with their humorous “SakaBozzo” cooking show.
Over the years, the buildings’ 15,600 square-feet hosted several other restaurants until about 2000, when the complex served patrons of several real estate firms, a church, professional offices, a health clinic and a fitness club. Eventually, two of the buildings became vacant and the developer and CVS floated plans last year to raze the more than 42-year-old structures for a new use.
Gilroy has a CVS across the street from the planned site, but it will be vacated when the new store opens. That is planned for late October, according to CVS corporate spokesperson Stephanie Cunha. She confirmed that, unlike the existing store, the new facility will feature a drive-through pharmacy.
“They are trying to get it up in six months, 180 working days. We are going to do our darnedest to do that,” said Ross Clayton, project superintendent for R3 Builders of Benicia. He has moved temporarily to Gilroy to oversee construction.
Clayton, who has built other CVS stores, said the Gilroy building will be bigger than the average CVS and will have some “nice looking” exterior design elements.
At Gilroy City Hall, planner Melissa Durkin said CVS will own the new building but it’s unclear if the pharmacy chain will also own the land, the property of D&J Hillview LLC, she said. The firm is headquartered in San Jose, according to an internet search. The parcel’s four lots will be merged into one for the new use, according to a city report.
As for trees on the lot, Durkin said a deodar cedar on Wren Avenue and a couple of trees along First Street will be kept; the others, including a towering cedar in the rear part of the existing parking lot, will be taken down to make room for the project and its 73 parking stalls.
A majestic, landmark oak, possibly 200 years old, that adorned the front lawn of the property off Wren Avenue, was taken down several years ago.
The project developer, David O’Donnell of Boos Development, did not respond to a request for more information. The firm is headquartered in Clearwater, FL.
However, city permit documents show the new structure and project layout will significantly alter the corner, its appearance and traffic flow.
For example, instead of an entrance and exit only on Wren Avenue, the new store will have them on both Wren and First Street. The project will also include a landscaped buffer along First Street. The building will be finished in stucco, have “tower elements” and will be adorned with trellises, arbors and brick wainscoting, according to city documents.
Sam Bozzo’s memories, including details of Digger Dan’s design elements, could fill a book.
In keeping the mining theme, there were mining carts on the lawn, the logo featured mining equipment and the eatery’s most popular appetizer was called nuggets.
Bozzo remembers the names of hostesses, waitresses, regulars—such as Luigi Aprea, namesake of the Gilroy elementary school, and the celebrities. One night it was one of the Smothers Brothers, “the smart one,” Bozzo remembered, and another night actor Vincent Price came in for dinner after an appearance at Gavilan College. Alerted ahead of time, Bozzo drove to Castroville to buy fresh artichokes for the film star, famous for his roles in horror movies.
And there were secrets too. Bozzo recalled one former schools superintendent who, he said, would get around the state’s Brown Act for public meeting by seating school trustees at different tables and shuttling back and forth between them to discuss official business.
“And I still remember the date we opened,” Bozzo said. “It was February 24, 1974.”
