Well-liked member of Masontown community dies
Being late to your own wedding because you’re selling a car is not usually the recipe for a long marriage – let alone one that goes 39 years without an argument. But then again, Francis “Sam” Rossini was never one to turn down a chance to help someone out, which is why those who knew him remember the longtime Masontown area tax collector and shop owner as a considerate, helpful, affable and sometimes thickheaded man.
“He did a lot of people favors. He was that type of person,” said his wife, Arlene Rossini, who said she never did give him a hard time about being late for their wedding.
Getting along with people came easy for Sam, who died yesterday at age 64.
He was a well-known and an even more well-liked fixture of the Masontown area, where people either knew him from his 12 years as tax collector or had frequented Rose Motors, which was as much a mechanic shop as an old-timers’ hang out.
“The old-timers would have their coffee, and it was a place they would like to come and hang around,” Arlene said.
Sam was in many ways a man defined by his work and the relationships he made there. Arlene said years ago a man from New York broke down in the area and her husband fixed his car so he could get home. From then on, the New Yorker would keep coming back and buy cars from him, she said, even though he lived hours away.
“He was the type of person who would give people a break,” she said. “He wasn’t really interested in being rich as a business owner. He was more concerned with the person and trying to help them out.”
Even after last Christmas, when he contracted Polymyositis, a rare disease that causes white blood cells to attack muscle tissue, Sam remained a fixture at the shop, which was adjacent to his tax collector’s office.
“With the disease you can’t do anything,” Arlene said. “But he went work every day. He walked with a walker and my son would take him to work every day. He was hardheaded and determined to not let that get him down.”
His brother Vic said he and Sam spent all of their lives repairing or selling automobiles, and though the disease hit him hard, he was “hardheaded enough” not to let it stop him.
“He’d just sit and yak with the guys, but at the same time he was there everyday,” Vic said. “Even though he hadn’t been able to work for months, he was there.”
Sam was at work on Friday, the day before he died. He had been doing well with the disease, but he had developed swelling in his legs during the week, Arlene said. They were awaiting results of a cardiogram and other tests he underwent that week, but he passed away before those results ever came.
“[Losing Sam] was very, very, very, very hard,” Vic said. “He was coming along fine about two weeks ago and he took a turn for the worse, and everyone he called to try to get some help – nobody had any answers.”
Before his illness made it impossible to continue, Sam was very active in the community. He was a fourth degree member of the Knights of Columbus of Masontown and a past grand knight; a member of the Masontown Italian Club serving as treasurer and trustee; and a member of All Saints Roman Catholic Church, a former church council member and a holy name member.
“He was very active in organizations,” Arlene said. “He missed that recently when he got sick.”
Sam was also an avid baseball fan who was a part of the Masontown Little League All Star Team in 1954 that played in the Little League World Series. Vic still remembers that during that game, on the day his brother turned 13, the announcer led the crowd of thousands in singing “Happy Birthday” for Sam.
Arlene said Sam was a long-suffering fan of the Pittsburgh Pirates, and when he passed away, he was wearing an All Star T-shirt from the game in Pittsburgh this past week.
Vic said it was hard to see his brother brought down by the disease, but he never lost heart – or his desire to work.
“He took it pretty tough at first, but at the same time he said, ‘if we’re supposed to beat it, we will and, if we aren’t, we won’t,'” Vic said. “But he tried every day. Believe me, he tried.”
(Editor’s note: A viewing is scheduled at the John S. Maykuth Jr. funeral home in Masontown on Monday from 6 to 9 p.m. and on Tuesday from 2 to 4 and 6 to 9 p.m. A prayer service will be held on Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. in the funeral home followed by a Mass of Christian Burial in All Saints Roman Catholic Church at 10 a.m.)