Benjamin Victor Pedrotti

Benjamin Victor Pedrotti, a Santa Rosa restaurant owner known by generations as "The Salami Man," has died. He was 85.

Pedrotti and a partner founded Benjelmo's Delicatessen in the Montgomery Village shopping center in 1971, said his daughter, Diane Pedrotti of Santa Rosa.

During the deli's more than 20-year run, he developed a reputation among customers for giving a slice of salami to every child who came in, his daughter said.

"It was kind of a standard thing," Pedrotti said. "It would keep the kids happy while mom shopped."

Pedrotti, who closed the deli in 1993, died Sept. 28 from complications of congestive heart failure. A memorial is planned for Oct. 27 at Pleasant Hills Cemetery in Sebastopol. The time is to be announced.

Pedrotti was born in 1926 in Crockett, the son of a first-generation Italian hardware store owner and Italian-born stay-at-home mother. He had two brothers and two sisters.

After graduating from Swett High School in 1944, he enlisted in the Navy and became a SeaBee, serving first in the Pacific Theater during World War II and later in the Korean War.

He witnessed such momentous events as the signing of the Japanese surrender in World War II.

Pedrotti returned to the Bay Area where he met and married his wife of 25 years, Katrina Schneiders, who died nine years ago. They had two daughters, Diane and Debra Hull of Reno.

The family moved to Santa Rosa in the early 1950s. Pedrotti had several occupations. He worked for years at the Union Oil Company and sold cars for Oldsmobile and Chevrolet dealers.

In 1971, he and partner Elmo Barbieri opened Benjelmo's. They cooked their own meats and pastas and served many sandwiches to students at nearby Montgomery High School.

His daughter said he was a great cook and lived by the motto that the customer is always right.

"He was a typical Italian," she said. "He had a handlebar mustache and sideburns. And let's just say we weren't a skinny family. He was round."

Pedrotti sold the business in 1978 and bought it back with his daughter Diane in 1988. He closed the deli in 1993 due to health reasons.

In his retirement, he traveled to Europe and Mexico and attended his grandchildren's Little League games. He was the unofficial "mayor" of the Villa Restaurant, also in Santa Rosa, his daughter said.

"He was bigger than life," his daughter said. "He was my best friend. He could love me like no other and frustrate me to no end."

In addition to his daughters, Pedrotti is survived by three grandchildren and numerous nieces and nephews.

— Paul Payne