THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, July 11, 1996 TAG: 9607090117
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 08 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY SAM MARTINETTE
CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: 164 lines
SOME REGULAR CUSTOMERS would say that sitting at a newspaper-covered hardwood table on the outdoor deck overlooking Knitting Mill Creek, cracking steamed crabs and drinking beer on a sultry summer day, is the best way to get to know O'Sullivan's Wharf.
Others might argue that wolfing down a jumbo cheeseburger with fries at lunchtime, while a couple of tables away a group of military officers hold a Hail and Farewell ceremony, is a good way to get the feel of the place.
Then there are the regulars who come in every afternoon around 4 and sit at the horseshoe-shaped bar. Some are retired and come to see their friends - to them O'Sullivan's Wharf is like a clubhouse where they can chat away the afternoon. Business people stop by for a drink and some free hors d'oeuvres after work before heading home to Larchmont, Colonial Place or Ghent, sharing stories with carpenters, college students and the occasional politician.
In the early evenings, the restaurant fills with families from the nearby neighborhoods, sometimes three generations dining together. Finally O'Sullivan's shifts into its late-night mode, featuring live music, usually acoustic, and it fills again with a crowd that ranges from 20-something college kids to the professors who teach them.
Simply put, O'Sullivan's is a neighborhood tavern that just happens to serve a neighborhood encompassing a medical school, a university, a military staff college and housing areas ranging from lower-middle class to the extremely wealthy - and serves it so well that it is almost always busy. The restaurant seats approximately 200 (when the weather is good and the outdoor deck is open), and the crowd is as diverse as the cast of a modern ``Canterbury Tales,'' which you might well hear being discussed at the bar, between debates about sports or local history.
On any given afternoon there might be a group from the medical school celebrating their residency assignments, whooping it up out on the deck, or an admiral offering a solemn toast to a retiring chief petty officer, while at night young dating couples share space with aging hippies, sitting elbow to elbow with shipyard workers, media types and college students. If it's a melting pot, these people won't melt. O'Sullivan's is brimming with characters.
Owner Victoriano C. ``Buddy'' Caramillo Jr., 39, is the glue that holds the whole collage together. He took over the former Mack's Barge in April of 1983 while still a student at Old Dominion University. By the time he got his degree in finance in 1984 he was renovating what he remembers as ``a nice neighborhood dive with a gravel driveway and a pool table'' as a centerpiece. ``Most of the windows were painted over, and when you walked in it had that clammy feeling, like walking into a basement,'' Caramillo said with a laugh.
First Caramillo enlarged the kitchen. Then he added the outdoor deck. By early 1987 there were lines of people waiting to get in, so he added a side room. Last year the deck was partially enclosed. ``I think we're at the point of saturation,'' Buddy Caramillo said. ``I don't want it to get too big.''
But the physical renovations are only a part of what makes O'Sullivan's Wharf unusual. The heart of the operation is the management and staff, many of whom have been around for a long time. Take bartender Janet Colombrito, on hand for seven years, general manager Joe Bambery with five years service, or daytime cook James Brehon, who's been along for the whole ride, since '83.
``When I first opened up, people said it was a really bad location,'' Caramillo recalled. ``They said it was too far away from Ghent, too far away from Larchmont, and too far away from ODU, and that no one would come here to eat. But I found that if you put good food on a plate and provide a quality drink and good service they would come. Now we get people from Williamsburg, Portsmouth, all over, and it's mostly by word of mouth.''
Ted Anthony, 67, has been coming to the Colley Avenue restaurant since the 1950s, when it was called Capn' Frank's, then the Shamrock Inn. Now retired from the Ford Plant in Norfolk, Anthony makes a point of stopping by around 3 in the afternoon to see his pals. ``It's like family,'' Anthony said. ``Most of the guys I know are all retired and about the same age. We have a few beers together, and it's a damn good place to eat. Then we clear out and the families come in for dinner, and later the college kids come for live music.''
Ray Beach, 74, is a retired jeweler who also stops by of an afternoon to visit. ``Quite a few people I know come in here,'' Beach said. ``I like it when I can look down the bar and I know all but a couple of them by name.''
``To me it's just the atmosphere,'' explained musician David Carter. The 37-year-old Virginia Beach resident has been playing at O'Sullivan's for 11 years, and still does an occasional Thursday night gig. ``O'Sullivan's is a place where there are really no lines drawn, and everybody gets along. You can be a college student just off an intramural football game or a lawyer coming from court, and it doesn't matter what your status is. You go in there and age disappears. I have friends there from 21 to 70.''
``I've been coming in here since I was 8 years old,'' said Brian Hankins, 32, president and owner of Hank's Body & Fender Shop, just across Colley Avenue. ``The special part of it is that anyone can walk in, from 8 to 80, and everybody meshes. And everybody seems to know your name,'' he laughed. ``Like `Cheers.' ''
``Most of that comes from the top down,'' Carter explained. ``Buddy is an exceptional person, and he gives totally of himself to his customers, and that attitude is reflected in the environment. It's almost like a club.''
Hankins added, ``I probably eat there about three times a week. It's good plain simple food, with no razzle-dazzle. You get what you pay for. I've been going there all of my life and I'll probably go there all the rest of it.''
The menu at O'Sullivan's is heavy on seafood, offering seafood combinations, broiled or fried, fried oysters and soft-shell crabs in season, oysters or clams on the half-shell or steamed and more, as well as sandwiches, steaks, Greek salad, pasta, pork and poultry. The signature dish is a trash can lid of nachos, piled so high it looks like a mountain of chili, lettuce and fixings.
Caramillo should know what he's doing. He grew up in the restaurant business. ``My father had Trader Nick's in Virginia Beach, which is now Worrell Bros.,'' Caramillo recalled. ``Then in the '70s he had the Seabelle, the 257-foot, three-decker ship that was docked at the end of Pretty Lake Avenue and used as a restaurant.'' Family members later operated O'Sullivan's Harborside in Ocean View. Buddy Caramillo's professional career began at Carleo's Restaurant in Virginia Beach.
``I started in ninth grade, washing dishes, and worked my way up to prepping,'' Caramillo explained. He left the business and worked aboard a dredge in New Orleans, then sold real estate in Duck, N.C., tending bar at night, a job that helped him pay his way through college.
After he bought Mack's Barge and renamed it O'Sullivan's Wharf, he built his college schedule around the bar's hours. ``I would come in here and set up the bar and then go to school,'' he said. ``Then after I got off I would come back and work at night. Those were about 18-hour days. It was a good thing I was so young.''
Now the father of two kids of his own, Buddy Caramillo lives not far from the elementary school he attended in Virginia Beach. He stresses the word family in his approach to both life and business. He participates in a number of charity fund-raisers, including an annual golf tournament he sponsors.
``I look at the customers here as part of a family,'' he explained. ``In the wintertime 90 percent of our clientele is local. Even in summer about 85 percent is local. If it weren't for the locals we wouldn't be here.
``I employ about 70 people during the busiest months, and it's hard to get them all to be as friendly as I'd like all the time,'' Caramillo said. ``But if there's a problem I'll follow up on it with a call or a letter.''
``O'Sullivan's is pretty much a landmark,'' David Carter said. ``I play all over the state now, and every time I play, a couple of people come up to me and say they used to see me play there when they were at ODU. If I had to sum up O'Sullivan's in one word it would be `fun.' ''
``You feel like you're at home,'' Ray Beach added. ILLUSTRATION: [Cover, Color photo]
CHARACTER AND CHARM
Staff photo by MIKE HEFFNER
O'Sullivan's Wharf
Staff photos by MIKE HEFFNER
O'Sullivan's Wharf waitress Megan Shaughnessy brings out salads and
the signature dish, a trashcan-sized lid of nachos, piled so high it
looks like a mountain of chili, lettuce and fixings.
Owner Victoriano C. ``Buddy'' Caramillo Jr., 39, is the glue that
holds the whole collage of customers together. He bought the place
in 1983.
Midday patrons talk and down a brew before the dinner crowd arrives.
In the early evenings, the restaurant fills with families from the
nearby neighborhoods.
Scott King takes in a burger, fries, and a mug of beer on the rear
deck while reading a magazine on a recent weekday afternoon.
``The Steamer,'' in its Captain Sully size version, consists of
steamed lobster, crab, oyster, clams, shrimp and crawfish. It sells
for $22.95.
AT A GLANCE
O'Sullivan's Wharf
Where: 4300 Colley Ave.
Hours: 11 to 2 a.m. daily, with live music and no cover Tuesday
through Sunday.
Phone: 423-3746 by CNB