Louis J. Sapienza, the owner of East Hampton Masonry Supply, died on Jan. 8 at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital. He was 70 and had lived with heart disease for several years, his family wrote.
Mr. Sapienza began his career in the masonry industry after college in the mid-1970s, and started his own business in 2013 after a long tenure with Southampton Brick and Tile in Southampton and Wainscott.
“His dogged determination and keen ability to connect with people, coupled with his dedicated, hard-working staff, were instrumental in establishing a successful business and brought him tremendous joy,” his family wrote. “He loved working with customers in his masonry yard, driving around and moving things with his forklift and bucket loader, and especially loved making deliveries of gravel or sand in his well-used dump truck. Lou was always there to give someone a helping hand. If something needed fixing, he would get the job done, and probably found the part in his dump truck.”
Mr. Sapienza enjoyed traveling and always made it an adventure. “He was fearless, and if there was something you wanted to see, Lou was bound and determined to find it,” his family said, remembering his quest to find Sapienza University on a trip to Rome so that he could buy sweatshirts as Christmas gifts for his siblings. He found it after a harrowing taxi ride, but the university did not sell sweatshirts.
“Lou was passionate about food, cigars, and wine, but most of all loved his dogs, Joey and George,” his family wrote. They also recalled his “calm, even-tempered personality.”
Mr. Sapienza was born on Nov. 23, 1952, in Everett, Mass., to Louis J. Sapienza and the former Margaret Coogan. He graduated from Riverhead High School and the University of Hartford in Connecticut.
He lived in Springs and, before that, in Southampton.
He is survived by his partner, Dawn Trettner of Springs, and by eight siblings, Susan Egan of Venice, Fla., Judy Thilberg of Mattituck, Louisa Sapienza Kiendzior of Shelburne Falls, Mass., Carol Underwood of Laurel, Margaret Bokinz of Jamesport, Patricia Sapienza-Brown and David Sapienza of Riverhead, and Lawrence Sapienza of Bridgewater, N.J. His brother Joseph died in 2009.