By Steve Sears

In 2020, Pompton Plains resident Gabe Vitalone lived his lifelong dream of singing the National Anthem at Yankee Stadium.

How do you follow up something like that? Well, by turning 100 years old, that’s how!

“How on earth do you summarize 100 years?!” Vitalone exuberantly asks. “When I was born, I remember we were in a cold water flat. We had no electricity, my father used to have to light the gas, and the man came around at night lighting the street lights at twilight. The was no supermarkets, no electricity, and to go from there to where we are now, it’s just unbelievable.” He then pauses, and continues. “When I look back, happy things seem to leap out.”

A big part of that happiness is his family. Vitalone has been married to his lovely wife, Evelyn, for 68 years, and the couple are parents to three children, Nancy, Peter, and Christopher, and grandparents of two granddaughters, Ava and Emma. “I’ve always said my daughter (Nancy) is my clone,” Vitalone says. “She went into teaching also. We both love teaching.”

In fact, Vitalone says the most significant thing in his life after his family was going into teaching. After attending Fordham University in the Bronx (his tuition was $300 per year), he was a teacher for 43 years, 34 of those at William Paterson University. He directed a nursery school, taught physical education to kindergarteners, and was “at the blackboard” in elementary all the way up to secondary education classrooms. “It was, first of all for me, a joy. I loved what I did, especially on the college level. I couldn’t wait to get into my classes. Sometimes I shudder now when I see the difficulties they’re having with teaching courses. I was lucky enough to teach that, when I got in front of the classroom, it belonged to me, and it was up to me to do my job. As I said, I loved every minute, and as a result of it, most of my good friends now are all former students.” During his time as a teacher, Vitalone coached football, basketball, and baseball, and also started and coached the cross-country team at William Paterson. “I did a lot of running myself,” he adds. “That was my alter life. I started running to stay in shape after I left coaching, and I ended up running for over 30 years in the New Jersey State Senior Championships, and eventually went to the nationals five times.”

As May 31st and his 100th birthday approached, Vitalone was not keen on a celebration. He was interested in a simple dinner out, but his children and his friends instead wanted something a little grander. The latter scenario won out, and Oakland’s Route 202-located Portobello Italian restaurant was the place. “We had it outdoors,” Vitalone says. “We had a beautiful day. I’m really ecstatic about it, because we had members of the family there, and I come from a big family. My grandmother had 14 children, so I’m loaded with cousins. They hadn’t seen one another for years, because as we get older, you don’t visit as much. And to watch the joy! And then of course, some of my former students were there, and then friends of my children were there. It was just a joyous, joyous day!”

And that wasn’t the only celebration. Wayne’s Our Lady of Consolation Parish, where Vitalone has worshipped for years, also feted him. “Unbelievable!” he says. “It was at the Saturday afternoon Mass, and it was just unbelievable. I really got choked up there. Father Mike (Lombardo) was outstanding. We were parishioners right from the very beginning, before the church was even built. It was a big part of our lives as we were growing up. The church has always been very important, and religion has always been important to us.”

“My life has been so full,” Vitalone says, who on Friday, June 3 attended the Fordham University reunion, he one of the “Golden Rams,” someone who had graduated the university over 50 years ago. “I graduated from the college 78 years ago. I was the oldest graduate there, and had a great time that night.” He also recalls fondly the times when as a youngster he used to go see Babe Ruth play right field in the original Yankee Stadium. “We always sat in the right field bleachers. The seats were .50 cents. That’s what led up to the singing of the anthem, which I still treasure very, very much. I still can see myself, standing there when they were interviewing me at the stadium behind home plate, and I’m looking out at the beautiful stadium. There was just a small group of us who were there for the interview. I couldn’t believe it. I looked up at the scoreboard, and it said, ‘The Yankees Welcome Gabe VItalone’. And I thought back to my childhood days as well.”

Gabe Vitalone says there are two important lessons he’s learned in life, and he wants to pass both on. “Be who you are,” he says. “I have been charmed. The good Lord has given me talents. So, be who you are, be yourself, and be good to one another. You can do that in many ways, and I think it starts with how you deal with people and how you greet them, and how you make them feel about your meeting. If you’re reaching out to them, it makes it easy for them to reach out to you.”