Long before coffee shops became a fixture of nearly every American downtown, Mobile had one that locals considered without equal: Festorazzis Coffee Saloon, a Royal Street institution that opened in 1873 and became a byword for the city’s 19th-century social life. The account below draws on the history recorded in Caldwell Delaneys Craigheads Mobile.
From Soldier to Shopkeeper
The saloons proprietor, Captain Silvester Festorazzi, was a native of Italy who settled in Mobile before the Civil War. In 1861 he organized the Southern Star Guards, a company made up largely of the citys Italian and Spanish residents, and served as their commander. The unit was attached to the 21st Alabama Infantry Regiment and saw action through the war, with nearly every eligible Italian and Spanish resident of Mobile said to have joined its ranks.
After the war, Festorazzi received a formal pardon issued in the name of President Andrew Johnson, restoring the rights he had forfeited by taking part in the rebellion. He returned to civilian life in Mobile and, in 1873, put up a new building on the west side of Royal Street between Dauphin and Conti streets to house his coffee business.
A Coffee Saloon Like No Other
In 19th-century Mobile, the term coffee saloon simply meant coffee shop, and the city had several. Andrew Dacovichs and John Lawrences were both well known, but neither, according to Delaneys account, was quite like Festorazzis.
Coffee was the house specialty. Captain Festorazzi bought his beans green, then parched and ground them himself, brewing no more than a gallon at a time even when business was brisk enough to require repeating the process throughout the day. Tea, chocolate and milk were also served, the milk poured into a tall glass set in a saucer with a spoon so customers could crumble cake into it.
The kitchen was limited by design. There was no cooking to order beyond a cold ham sandwich, which could be served fried, with toast on the side if a customer wanted it. Nothing else on the menu was served hot. Instead, every customer who sat down at one of the shops small marble-top tables was presented with two plates: one holding six varieties of cake, the other six kinds of tarts and pie. A slice of any of it cost five cents, while coffee and the other beverages went for a dime.
The cakes and pastries were all made on the premises, a detail Delaneys history credits with much of the shops enduring popularity among Mobilians of the era.
Before Mobile: A Confectioner’s Path from Lake Como
Festorazzi was born in 1819 in the village of Regolo, near Italy’s Lake Como. He trained as a confectioner and worked the trade first in Milan and later in Marseille before emigrating in 1850 to New Orleans, where he opened his own confectionery business. He arrived in Mobile in 1854 and started out running a confectionery shop at the corner of Dauphin and St. Emanuel streets, years before he built the Royal Street coffee saloon that would make his name.
Festorazzi’s standing in Mobile extended beyond business. In 1883 he was appointed to serve as Italy’s consul in the city, a post he held until his death in 1897. He sold the coffee saloon three years before he died, closing out more than four decades in the trade.
Regulars, and a Running Joke
Part of what made Festorazzi’s a fixture, Delaney’s account suggests, was the atmosphere: patrons lingered over coffee and cake much as Londoners once had in that city’s famous 18th-century coffee houses, trading opinions on the news of the day. One knot of regulars became known good-naturedly as the “Knocker’s Club” for their habit of grousing about local government. They arrived one evening to find a new hammer, tied with a black ribbon, mounted on the wall above their usual table.
A Shop That Outlived Its Founder
Mary Schaffer went to work as a waitress at Festorazzi’s while still a little girl, and by her own account was largely raised by Madame Festorazzi. She later married Charley DeBriere, and the couple eventually took over the business themselves, running it successfully for years.
Ownership of the saloon changed hands several times after that, with the DeBrieres at the center of nearly every deal. They sold the business at one point to former Mobile County Sheriff John E. Powers, then bought it back later at a lower price than they had sold it for. They sold it again, this time to A. D. Bennett, and again bought it back once he had had enough of running it. They then sold the saloon to another former sheriff, Thomas T. Palmer. When Palmer eventually decided to get out of the business, the DeBrieres, unlike the times before, declined to take it back.
By then the place had changed considerably from Captain Festorazzi’s day. Steak and eggs were added to the menu, followed by bacon and sausage, then fish and oysters, until the coffee saloon had gradually become a full restaurant serving everything from shrimp cocktail to charlotte russe. With the DeBrieres unwilling to return a final time, the business that Sylvester Festorazzi had built could not sustain itself and closed for good, ending its run as one of Royal Street’s best-known gathering spots.