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THE BRADENTON HERALD

Monday, September 28, 1998 Section: Local Edition: Final Page: L1 Column: Mannix about Manatee Memo: MEMO: Mannix About Manatee runs Monday and Thursday in the Bradenton Herald. Have a column idea? Please call Vin Mannix at 745-7055, write to him at Bradenton Herald, P.O. Box 921, Bradenton, Fla. 34206, or send e-mail to vmannix@KnightRidder.geis.com EVERYONE COMES TO LOU'S Vin Mannix, Herald Columnist The first time you stop at Lou's Cortez Market, you probably see it as just another convenience store along Cortez Road on your way to or from Bradenton Beach. Want a soda and a sandwich? Cigarettes?

Or you're out of dog food or detergent or diapers? No problem. "Everything a person needs," said Lou Nassar, the jovial owner, beaming over the counter he has worked behind for 20 years. Truth is, there is more to this store at 12203 Cortez Road than meets the eye. It is a neighborhood grocery in the old-fashioned sense of the term, a touchstone for this close-knit fishing village. A caring 55-year-old Palestinian Muslim, Lou Nassar is the reason. Schoolchildren come by to show him their report cards. "If the cards are good, I tell them, go have a treat, whatever you want," he said. "If they are not doing good, I have a talk with them." Young mothers bring in their newborns to show him. "Sometimes the first day they get out of the hospital!" And if a family is down on its luck and short on funds for food, he doesn't hesitate to help. "I cannot see people go to bed hungry." Nobody does, not even strangers. "With Lou," said cashier Mary Parker, a Cortez resident, "it's like we're all family." That was how neighborhood grocers did business decades ago. When people first came to America, especially to the big eastern cities, they often depended on the kindness and understanding of the corner grocer to get by. Lou Nassar is a throwback to that time. "Here in this country nowadays, you live sometimes 20 years in the same neighborhood and you don't know who your neighbors are," he said. "This town is a little different. It reminds me of the old days where I grew up." That was near Jerusalem in Palestine before it became the state of Israel in the tumult of 1948. Lou's family, who were caught amidst the fighting in their homeland, were merchants and farmers. They were poor. Everybody was. "But everybody knew everybody and took care of everyone and their needs," he said. "You grow up in a situation like that and it follows you." Danny Mora can vouch for that. He's 32 now, but can remember Lou's simple kindness from his boyhood days in Cortez. "You'd come in from fishing or get off the bus from school," Danny recalled. "You were hungry and only got a few pennies in your pocket, but he took care of you." Lou's human touch took a roundabout path to Cortez. He left Israel in 1961, spent two years in Bogota, Colombia, and two more in Miami. He sold clothing out of his car to farmers and migrants from Homestead to West Palm Beach and as far west as the Everglades. Lou saw a side of our country that surprised him. "Before I left home, I always thought of America as a rich country. But I found out there are poor people regardless of how rich the country is." Lou struggled, too. There were times when sales were zero, he had no income and had no food to eat. "I wished somebody would help me, but I found few who did. I had to depend on myself. Sometimes you have bad days." Rather than harden him, it made Lou more sensitive to the plight of others. "For him to come through what he's come through and still be a kindhearted man is a rarity," said his wife, Nancy, an Oneco native. "He believes if he portrays goodness it will make someone else be a good person." Those instincts shined when, weary of the cold weather after several years selling insurance in the Midwest, he came to Cortez in 1978 looking to start a business. Some family members had groceries in Chicago and Cleveland. So, Lou thought, why not Cortez? It did not take him long to feel the pulse of this historic fishing community, whose fortunes were subject to the whims of the sea. When fishing wasn't good, money wasn't coming in, and families had to be fed, breadwinners turned to Lou. It was the same after the 1995 net ban impacted their livelihood. "A lot of them hate to do it," Mary Parker said. "But they know they can come in and it's between Lou and them. They know he cares a lot and will help them out. It's still hard to ask for that help because people here have a lot of pride." But you can't eat pride. "They need a gallon of milk, a loaf of bread, a pound of hamburger meat, I let them have it," Lou said. "They don't make money fishing this week, hopefully they make some next week, or the week after. I help them. They help me." They did, indeed, after Lou suffered a heart attack a year ago while officiating a soccer game. They kept Nancy company in the store and did whatever she asked while he got back on his feet. "It told me we were really loved by the people in Cortez," she said. "People were very, very generous," Lou said. "They have been good to me." And vice versa.

Illustration: Color photos/Howerter: Lou Nassar and his wife, Nancy, work the counter at their store, Lou's Cortez Market, on Thursday afternoon. The Nassars have been in business for about 21 years and are a mainstay in the Cortez community. Lou Nassar indulges in some good-natured customer-teasing at his store, as his wife, Nancy, walks by.

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