He settled first in Milwaukee, and the same year found a job as a greens keeper on a golf course at Glencoe, where he met a friend with whom he had served in the Italian army in World War I. The friend had been to Marion, Illinois and he persuaded Bennie to come here.
From 1921 to 1928, Mazzara worked here in the coal mines. It was five years before he was able to send enough money home to bring his wife and daughter to America. Then in 1928, he was hurt in a mine accident.
He turned to collecting and selling junk to maintain himself and his family. One day he picked up a catalog with a picture of a pushcart which could be bought for $14. He ordered it and used it in his junk business.
Among the acquaintances he made in Marion was W.T. “Army” Robinson, restaurant operator, who manufactured tamales. Bennie became a peddler of tamales which he bought from Robinson for five cents and sold for ten cents.
When Robinson quit making tamales, Mazzara and his wife began making them in their home kitchen in 1930. They bought a machine from a tamale manufacturer at Anna named Allen from whom they obtained a recipe for tamales. Later they developed their own recipe which made their product a popular item.
Bennie’s daughter, Mary (Mazzara) Harlan explained, “The recipe is a family secret, but basically, it includes beef, chili sauce, corn meal and broth.”
Originally, the tamales were wrapped in corn shucks bought in bales from California, a five month supply at a time. However, in World War II that source of supply was cut off. And the Mazarras turned to local farmers for whom they would shuck corn in return for the husks.
“Sundays and holidays we spent shucking corn and washing husks for tamales,” Mrs. Harlan recalled.
Since tamales were not in great demand in the summer, the family enterprise was expanded in 1932 by the purchase of a cart and pony used to peddle ice cream throughout the city.
In the depression years, Mazzara obtained a slightly smaller mold for his tamales and cut the price in half. The lower price was continued until a friend from Chicago convinced him that a nickel was too cheap for his product. Bennie raised his price to a dime, but he reverted back to a larger mold and increased the size of his tamales.
By 1949, after two bouts with pneumonia, Bennie was advised to get off the streets. He bought the two story brick business building in the 400 block of North Market Street.
He opened a restaurant specializing in Italian foods called “Bennie’s Hot Tamales and Pizza” in one room of the building and rented the other street front rooms. He operated the restaurant at 409 N. Market Street with the help of his family for 14 years.
In 1961, his daughter Mary and her husband Gilbert Harlan bought the restaurant and Bennie retired, although he and Mrs. Mazzara continued to make tamales in their home, assisted by Mary and Gilbert.
Although their age and the state of Bennie’s health dictated discontinuance of the tamale business, the end of the supply of tamale wrappers precipitated the decision to quit. Mary Harlan said that with the coming of mechanical corn pickers, corn husks were no longer available. Tamale makers turned to paper wrappers, but because of the exclusion of fat in the Mazarra tamales, a specific kind of paper wrapper was required. The manufacturers would sell large quantities only and the Marion tamale makers would have to buy a six to eight year supply to stay in business. They did not wish to commit themselves that far ahead.
Mrs. Harlan recalls that her parents for years got up at 4 A.M. to start the day which saw her father on the streets selling their products from 9:30 A.M. until 11 P.M. She and her brother and sister were up at 5 A.M. several days a week to work with them until time for school.
“His main purpose in life was to send us three to college”, said Mrs. Harlan recalling that her father had no opportunity for an education in Italy and was 21 before he could write his own name. Bennie sent both of his daughters and his son to college and was very grateful to the public who helped him realize his main purpose in life.
Mary and Gilbert Harlan operated Bennie’s until about 1985, when they sold it to John and Lynn Hill.
The Hill’s moved the restaurant a short distance to the old Marion Furniture Mart (a.k.a. Williams Furniture Store and Winter Bargain House) location at 309 N. Market St. to gain a larger space. As of this writing in February 2013 the business is still thriving in this location.
(Data extracted from Glimpses of life article by Homer Butler in the 1970’s; supplemented by Sam Lattuca on 02/20/2013)