Shortly before noon yesterday, Joe Chiodo stood with his back against what used to be the window counter in what used to be his bar. The windows were boarded, scrawled on the outside, "Bye Joe, we love you!"

The doors of Chiodo's Tavern opened for the last time in 58 years at 11 a.m. for an auction of all of the stuff that used to hang on the bar's walls and ceiling. The line was so long it mazed from the door to the far end of the bar and back again, serpentine-style, so people waiting to register to bid could be in from the cold, and still there was a long line on the sidewalk waiting to get in.

As people filed past the diminutive publican in his canvas fishing hat, they shook his hand as if he were the survivor in a funeral reception line.

His neighborhood dive -- as wide as a standard garage and not much longer than an 18-wheeler -- was a legendary meeting place in a yellow-frame, 19th century hotel. The property faces West Eighth Street at the end of the Homestead Grays Bridge. Anchor Properties of Cincinnati is tearing it down and replacing it with a Walgreen's.

"It hasn't hit me yet," said the 87-year-old Chiodo, holding his cane like a kickstand and staring at the line. "I can't believe this. This is beyond my expectation."

The auction by the Three Rivers Auction Co. was held in a three-gabled white tent in the adjacent Subway parking lot. It was expected to last six to seven hours.

After registering inside, people filled the tent. They packed into the back from where, on tip toes, you could barely see each item held up for bid and, along a clothesline, all the bras that had once hung above patrons' heads.

At 1 p.m., Patrick Wood of Whitehall brought his prize into the registration room to pay. "I got the Mystery Sandwich recipe," he said breathlessly. His winning bid of $450 included the browned, cardboard sign that advertised "Chiodo's Exclusive 'Italian' Mystery Sandwich, a meal in it's self." People who remember eating it describe it in such different ways that the original recipe, rolled tightly and bound by sealing wax, was obviously altered, and often.

"They started this at $15,000," Wood said. Even at $450, it's pricey, he agreed, "but I could open a restaurant and sell the Mystery Sandwich."

He seemed serious. It's still a mystery to most people because he didn't open the seal.

Jan McSorley, of Squirrel Hill, specifically wanted to get a German beer stein that her grandfather had given Chiodo in the late '40s. The stein depicts people in tights and tunics frolicking among trees. Her winning bid was $190.

"My grandfather worked for Mesta Machine, which helped rebuild Europe after the war," she said. "Each time he came back, he brought something to donate to Joe's bar."

Piles and boxes of stuff sat on and under rows of tables behind the auctioneer, who rattled like a machine gun as he sold German gas masks, bayonets and guns, a doughboy's helmet, miners helmets, Steelers memorabilia, photographs, lamps, an old stop light, old signs, cash registers, hockey sticks, dolls, hats, a drum, ice skates, statues, gee-gaws and parts of things that defied definition. Some of this cache had hung from the bar's ceiling, but much was stored upstairs, where Chiodo never rented the 13 rooms.

Al Lucchini spent many lunchtimes and evenings at Chiodo's when he worked in the U.S. Steel Homestead Works. His wife, Kim, works for the auction company, and he helped take everything down from the ceiling.

"I wore a painter's mask," he said. "There were things under things under things under things, like those Russian nesting dolls."

Chiodo's friends and regulars have long called him a rich man because so many people hold him dear, but he went a little ways better yesterday. A trap door sold for $225, a Mae West jacket for $120, an alligator jaw for $110, a '20s-era leather football helmet for $200 and sets of four beer taps for $150. And that was all within the first hour.

Chiodo said he thought everyone, at least most people in the world, had been in his place at some point when the taps were flowing, many hundreds of them hundreds of times. A few old friends called to say they couldn't make it out but good luck.

"Nudgie, how are ya?" said Chiodo into Homestead Mayor Betty Esper's cell phone. Nudgie is Esper's brother. Chiodo's brow puckered. "Aw, c'mon down here and spend some money."

Nudgie was watching the football draft, but an estimated 750 people registered to bid and brought in tow another 200-250 people, some the children of Chiodo's regulars.

"Joe," said a young man, reaching for Chiodo's hand, "my father's been bringing me here since I was born, so thank you."

Chiodo remained in the bar when the auction started but soon made his way out. The auctioneer announced his presence inside the tent, and the crowd erupted in applause. During much of the action, he sat on a bar stool near the auctioneer. A bid number hung from the rail where he hitched his heels.

About 25 people with seemingly no interest in bidding stayed in the bar. They stood along the old shuffleboard table, drinking coffee and hot chocolate. They talked and laughed in clusters the way people always had done in Chiodo's. Except this time, they could see the wavy, tin-stamped ceiling and its peeling caramel-colored paint.

And this time, last call would be the auctioneer's.

orginally published online here: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05115/493908.stm