WHEELING — In 1944, Sicilian immigrant Anna Figaretti started making spaghetti sauce for her neighbors and selling it out of her garage.

Now, more than three generations later, Figaretti’s Restaurant in Wheeling has been named the best Italian restaurant in West Virginia by LoveFood.com, an honor that was recognized by U.S. Senator Joe Manchin who read a proclamation before the U.S. Senate last month recognizing the business and its longstanding tradition in the Friendly City.

Tony Figaretti, who still stays very active today in overseeing much of the business, and his son Dino, who is owner of the restaurant, said they feel extremely honored to be recognized as the best Italian restaurant in the Mountain State by the LoveFood website and by Manchin.

They believe the success of the business can be attributed to a great product that began with Tony’s grandmother decades ago, combined with decades of hard work by many family members which continues today.

Dino Figaretti said he believes that you have to have a “tremendous love” for the restaurant business to make it a success.

“It’s not an easy business to come into. It is a lot of hours. You have to have a great love for it in order to keep running with it,” Figaretti said.

He said he owes a tremendous amount of his success to both of his parents, who taught him many skills.

He said his father provided him the “roots” and knowledge to succeed in the business and his mother, Tina Figaretti, who was a very integral part of the old restaurant, also helped provide him with a tremendous work ethic. He said his son, Enzio, who currently works part-time at the restaurant, seems to be very interested in carrying on the family tradition someday.

Manchin provided the Figaretti family with a copy of the proclamation he made as part of the Congressional Record honoring the long-time business. The introduction of the proclamation reads: “Mr. President, I rise today to honor Figaretti’s Restaurant in the scenic Northern Panhandle of West Virginia. Figaretti’s was recently named the best Italian restaurant in West Virginia. In my home state, this honor means so much more than just good food.

It’s a testament to our state’s value of family, heritage and traditions.”

Manchin also said, “West Virginians know their priorities. What has stayed constant throughout history is our commitment to our loved ones, keeping our traditions alive, and passing our knowledge of diverse heritage on to the next generation. …These are the values that have made West Virginia stand out in our nation, and these values are also present in the legacy of excellence at Figaretti’s.” Manchin, who said he has enjoyed many meals with the Figaretti family over the years, went on to congratulate Dino Figaretti, his wife, Michelle, and their son Enzio for the special recognition.

Tony Figaretti said there is a tremendous amount of family heritage and tradition associated with the business. He said after his grandmother began selling her own recipe of spaghetti sauce to neighbors and eventually to a few area grocery stores in the early 1940s, her five sons: Jack, Mike, Tony, Joe and Frank all, one by one, eventually got involved with the family business.

“It just kept getting bigger and bigger, so the five brothers got their heads together and decided, ‘hey this is doing well, so let’s start a restaurant,'” Figaretti said. He said his father, Frank “ChiChi” Figaretti, originally worked for a local coal mine before deciding to join his brothers in the family business. “So it was in 1948 when the brothers opened their first restaurant in Elm Grove, and it was tough … but they made it,” he added.

Figaretti said the original restaurant was located in Elm Grove where the current Eagles fraternal organization is located. “They operated that and the five Figaretti brothers made a living out of it — which was tough to do but they did it,” he said. Figaretti said he began working for his family at the Elm Grove location as a young high school student around 1960.

He said it was in 1977 when a new restaurant was built in back of the Elm Grove location, but it was over the next several years that the family tragically lost all five brothers over a short period of time.

“I did my best to keep it going. But I made up my mind in 1992 that we just couldn’t keep it going without the brothers at that location,” Figaretti said. He said after the restaurant closed in Elm Grove he took a safety job in Indiana, always having the intention to come back and reopen a Figaretti’s Restaurant in the Friendly City. It was only about a year-and-a-half later when Figaretti said he raised enough money to come back and open a new Figaretti’s restaurant in the Clator section of Wheeling.

He said one of the greatest gifts of his life was having his two sons, Dino and Tony Jr. eventually join him with running the two separate family businesses after they attended college in the 1990s. He said Dino joined him with operating the restaurant, while Tony Jr. operated the spaghetti sauce business. Figaretti said his oldest brother, the late Joe Figaretti, was also very instrumental with the spaghetti sauce business until it was eventually turned over to his son Tony Jr. in the late 1990s. “He was such a big asset with everything,” Figaretti said of his brother.

He said his son Tony Jr. also helped build the spaghetti sauce business into something “that the family is very proud of” to this day. He said Figaretti Spaghetti Sauce is sold in more than a dozen states, including many Kroger and Riesbeck’s stores and is sold over the internet and shipped to customers over the country.

Figaretti said after his son Dino took over operations of the restaurant that he pretty much “took the football and ran with it.”

“He worked hard,” Figaretti said. “Two years ago I turned the businesses over to both of them. Dino Figaretti is the owner and operator of this restaurant and Tony (Jr.) is the owner and operator of the manufacturing plant. I’m a very lucky guy. It was like a gift from heaven to have two sons … doing what they’re doing,” he said. “I still hang in there every day with them … but if they get stuck with something they come to me and I’m very proud of that. … To be successful today, especially in the restaurant business, you’ve got to be there and you’ve got to put in long, long hours. … My grandmother gave us the product, my dad ran with it, I ran with it for a while, now my two sons are running with it and we are very proud of that,” he added.