Former Pittsfield Mayor Remo Del Gallo, who chaired the city's Democratic Party Committee for almost half a century and who ran a restaurant that served as a popular watering hole and political hangout for even longer, died Tuesday, according to family members. He was 94. Del Gallo, who had been living at Kimball Farms Nursing Care Center in Lenox, had battled congestive heart failure for many years, according to his son-in-law, Albert Ingegni III, who is Kimball Farms' executive director.

Del Gallo, the first Italian-American to be elected mayor of Pittsfield, served in the corner office from 1965 through 1968, when the city was much bigger than it is today. Del Gallo, first elected to the City Council in 1962, also served on several city boards and commissions after his term as mayor, including a long stint as chairman of the city's Board of Community Development.