Lucille Flagello organizes casino trips in South Palm Beach.
Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star
Lucille Flagello had no idea about the new home and community that were waiting for her when she moved to South Palm Beach in 2006.
“All I knew I was going to a nice warm climate with blue skies,” says Flagello, 75. “My husband bought the place a couple of years before we retired. We used to visit here.”
The Flagellos lived in Suffern, N.Y., not far from Tuxedo Park and the pharmacy where Joseph Flagello Sr. began working in 1961 and later became owner.
Bears, raccoons, wild turkeys, deer and red foxes would visit their back yard in New York.
After her husband died in 2005, Flagello moved to South Palm Beach.
“He died one month before our 45th anniversary,” Flagello says. “He was only 65 years old.”
The town of South Palm Beach is just 5/8 of a mile long and is bordered by the town of Palm Beach to the north and the town of Lantana to the south.
With 3,000 residents during the winter and between 800 and 1,000 residents during the summer months, it has a small-town feel Flagello really appreciates.
“There’s always something going on. It’s fun. It really is,” Flagello says of her Florida hometown. “You walk in the street and people smile at you and say hi.”
Flagello loved the friendliness of her new community so much that she jumped in to support it.
She is co-chair of Community Affairs Advisory Board, organizes the town’s monthly casino trips to the Hard Rock Casino, and was co-chair of the town’s 60th anniversary celebration, which was held at Mario’s Ocean Ave., 225 E. Ocean Ave. in Lantana.
Flagello started attending town hall meetings with her son, Joseph Flagello Jr., not long after she moved south from New York.
“That’s how I got involved,” Flagello remembers, from her fifth-floor condo with views of the ocean and Intracoastal.
Flagello embraced the change from New York with one exception.
“The one day I don’t like being in Florida is Christmas. No matter how you decorate a palm tree it doesn’t feel like Christmas to me. Otherwise, I am happy here the rest of the year.”
— Lucy Lazarony
Q. Where did you grow up and go to school? How do you think that has influenced you?
A. I grew up in Brooklyn and I went to St. Athanasius elementary school. I went to St. Michael’s Academy in Manhattan for high school. I had good parents who gave me good advice and that was a good combination with what they taught me in school. After I graduated high school, I went to Woods Secretarial School in Manhattan. For college, I did go to Pace. I had 2½ years of that.
Q. What professions have you worked in? What professional accomplishments are you most proud of?
A. I was a private secretary in an advertising agency, Ted Bates Advertising, and when I worked there they were the fifth largest. After I got married, we moved to Suffern, N.Y., and I worked at the Washington Avenue School for the director of elementary education and then after that I worked for my husband and that was at the pharmacy. I did invoicing and I did all the ordering, other than prescription items. I really enjoyed working at the advertising agency. I got to know products coming out. I worked in marketing and merchandising there.
Q. How did you choose to make your home in South Palm Beach?
A. The community gave me a feeling of being in a special place.
Q. What is your favorite part about living in South Palm Beach?
A. Everyone is there to help. They’ll come do whatever needs to be done. If you have a problem, you have more than one friend. Everyone is so nice here. I have friends here that we’re so close we’re like family.
Q. What’s your favorite part of organizing casino trips for residents and how many people typically go along?
A. I enjoy going to the casino and I took over from somebody who was doing it before me. She couldn’t do it (anymore) and rather than seeing the trip go belly up I said I would do it. It’s always the third Tuesday of every month. The bus company won’t pick up unless we have 10.
Q. What music do you listen to when you need inspiration? When you want to relax?
A. I’ll listen to Frank Sinatra who is my favorite, and when I was in grammar school I was in the Tony Bennett fan club because the girl in my class, (her) father was his manager. When he wasn’t on the road, he would come to our meetings and sign autographs.
Q. Do you have a favorite quote that inspires your decisions?
A. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
Q. Have you had mentors in your life? Individuals who have inspired your life decisions?
A. My parents. My parents would do anything for anybody if they needed help and they did.
Q. Who/what makes you laugh?
A. Funny comedians. I have some friends who will talk, who are not trying to be funny, they are just funny in the things that they say.
Q. Is there something people don’t know about you that they should?
A. I can’t do it now but I took dancing lessons from when I was 4. I took piano lessons from when I was 6. I did have a concert in Carnegie Hall in New York when I was 15, three boys and myself. I opened and closed it. I played the piano.
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