Henry Liu, Contributing Photographer

The corner at Wooster and Brown Streets — home to New Haven’s Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana, or Pepe’s — became “Frank and Filomena Pepe Corner” on Friday.

The iconic New Haven pizzeria celebrated its 100th anniversary Friday morning with the unveiling of the newly named street corner.

Founded in 1925, Pepe’s originated New-Haven style pizza, or apizza — pronounced “ah-beetz” — which is known for its thin, charred crust, chewy texture and minimal use of melting cheeses. Pepe’s is one of the best known pizzerias in the United States and now operates 17 locations across the East Coast.

New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker, Rep. Rosa DeLauro and Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont joined New Haven alders, community leaders and members of the Pepe family Friday morning to unveil the newly named street corner.

Elicker began the ceremony by calling the dedication of the corner a “fitting tribute to a true pizza pioneer and his family legacy” who “put New Haven on the map.”

Referring to New Haven as a “pizza paradise” and the “pizza capital of the country,” Elicker praised the Pepe family for giving the “true gift” of apizza to the Elm City.

“[Pepe’s] shows how immigrants didn’t just adapt to American culture but actively created new traditions that became an integral part of it,” Elicker said.

Frank Pepe immigrated from Maiori, Italy to New Haven in 1909. After leaving the U.S. to fight for Italy in World War I, he returned and opened Pepe’s on June 16, 1925, with his wife Filomena.

Alder Ellen Cupo — whose district includes Pepe’s home base, the Wooster Square neighborhood — spoke of childhood memories visiting Pepe’s while growing up in New Haven. Cupo and DeLauro, a Wooster Square native herself, spearheaded the initiative to rename the street corner.

DeLauro echoed Elicker, calling the street corner the “capitol building” of the country’s “pizza capital.”

“Chicago knows nothing about pizza — they created a casserole,” DeLauro quipped. “And New York and New Jersey, well, what the hell?”

DeLauro highlighted the distinctive pizza options at Pepe’s, such as its perennially popular white clam pie. She also lauded “generation after generation dedicated to the craft” of Pepe’s pizza.

Lamont underscored Connecticut’s pizza fame with an anecdote from a Rolling Stones concert at Metlife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., recalling how Mick Jagger greeted the crowd with a shout out to first to New York, then New Jersey and finally to “Connecticut, with the great pizza!”

“Mick Jagger knows this is the best pizza in the world right here,” Lamont said. 

After the governor spoke, Elicker presented Pepe’s descendents with a proclamation, delivered fittingly inside a Pepe’s pizza box, honoring the pizzeria’s contributions to New Haven’s history and culture.

The ceremony concluded with remarks from two of Pepe’s grandchildren, before Anthony Rosselli, the eldest grandchild, pulled down a paper covering to unveil the new corner sign. 

The Pepe family members framed the occasion as both momentous and deeply emotional.

Among the teenage great-great-grandchildren of Pepe present — Ambrose, Fulton, Anastasia and Filomena Kinnare — a shared sense of joy and gratitude was palpable. For Ambrose Kinnare, “it’s just hard to describe what this means to all of us.”

Pepe’s has served pizzas to former presidents Bill Clinton LAW ’83 and Ronald Reagan, as well as famous performers Paul McCartney, Bill Murray, Danny DeVito and Meryl Streep DRA ’75.