City business ground to a halt for an hour Monday afternoon to pay homage to 100 year old Frank Lia, a former city employee whose dapper dress earned him the nickname the “little mayor,” on his birthday. Dressed in a wrinkle-free sky blue suit with matching fedora, Lia smiled, waved and shared cake with more than 100 city officials, municipal employees and friends who packed the City Council chambers for the event. Although Lia said Monday that he had made some of his closest friends in the 11 years that he worked in the city clerk’s office, he did not punch in at City Hall for the first time until 1989 when he was 89 years old. Prior to becoming a municipal employee, Lia served as a newspaper boy, a Bethlehem Steel yard worker, and a longtime bartender at Gentleman Jim’s, a West New York pub. But it was the stories he told of the 38 bouts he fought as an amateur boxer on Jersey City’s Franklin Street that people most remember him for. “I fought 38 times,” Lia said as a handful of onlookers gathered around his wheelchair Monday waiting for the punch line they knew was coming. “Got knocked out 38 times!” Even before he came to City Hall through a city-run senior services program which provides the elderly with part-time jobs, Lia was known as the “Downtown Mayor” or the “Little Mayor” because he always was dressed in a fine suit with every hair in place. But City Clerk James Farina, who has ran the office that Lia was assigned to since 1984, said that Lia’s dedication to his job would have earned him the title even if his dress had not. “He was assigned to come in for only four hours a day and distribute the mail,” said Farina just before a ceremony where he handed Lia a copy of the city key to thank him for his service. “But he would come in at 8:30 in the morning and stay until all the mail was passed out. Snow, sleet, rain, it didn’t matter. He was always there, even if some of the regular employees could not make it. Sometimes if the mail was late he would call down to the post office and ask them where it was. He took great pride in what he did.” Others at the gathering said that Lia’s nickname was emblematic of the caring way that he took care of as many Hoboken residents as he could regardless of his financial situation or theirs. Helped the down-and-out “He helped me when I was really down and out,” said John Bertocci as he crouched down next to Lia and grabbed his arm before the official ceremony began. “He treated me like one of his sons when I was 40 years old and feeling suicidal. This man has really helped me.” In addition to receiving a key to the city, Lia also received a medal from Freeholder Maurice Fitzgibbons and a proclamation from Mayor Anthony Russo. The overwhelming show of support was so strong that one attendee at the ceremony even jokingly asked Lia if he would consider running for mayor in next year’s elections. “If I’m still around,” he responded with a sly smile. Lia lived in the same house at 458 6th Street for 93 years until moving to the Knights of Columbus Columbian Arms Building at 514 Madison St. in 1993. Farina said that if Lia’s legs had not grown weak with age that he expected the little mayor would still be distributing mail at City Hall today. Several months ago, Lia’s legs forced him to give up the job. “A person is not judged by how much they have loved, but by how much they are loved,” Farina told Lia, as he pointed to the throngs of people who had come to the ceremony. “This man knew all our parents, all our uncles and many of our grand parents,” he told the crowd. “When he was born, Hoboken was just a prarie.” Also attending the ceremony were Lia’s two daughters, Lucille Tobin and Catherine Ripke.
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