PORT TOWNSEND — Jason Boyette cooked 68 pizzas single-handedly Sept. 5 in Port Townsend’s only wood-fired oven before staying late to roll dough for what he knew would be another busy day over the long Labor Day weekend.
That’s when he felt a familiar pain in his chest, prompting him lie down on the floor of The Tin Brick in hopes that the pain would fade. But it didn’t.
Not long after returning home and falling asleep beside Amanda Timentwa, his partner of 16 years, the 40-year-old father of three went into cardiac arrest.
He was airlifted that night to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, where he died nearly two weeks later.
“I’m still blown away by Jason’s passing,” said Harry Doyle, who in March 2014 opened the popular pizza and Philly cheesesteak spot in the basement of the First American National Bank building along Taylor Street in the heart of downtown Port Townsend.
“Jason was my first employee,” Doyle said, “and we learned how to cook pizzas in that wood-fired oven together. I’ve never met anyone who took so much pride in what they did.”
Timentwa, who had worked at the restaurant since July 2017, said The Tin Brick was like Boyette’s second home.
“That restaurant was like his baby,” she said, recalling how he would sometimes fall asleep there after long days that began with building up the fire and rolling out the scratch-made dough at 7 a.m. “He put his heart and soul into every pizza he made, and the customers loved him for it.”
The wood-fired oven has been sitting dormant ever since Boyette locked up late that Saturday night, and it’s likely to stay that way, at least for the foreseeable future, said Karen Best, who owns the building, the restaurant business and the Coldwell Banker Best Homes realty office on the main level.
“I’ll probably list the business for sale, at least for a while,” she said. “It’s a fully furnished restaurant, but I know it’s unrealistic that someone will want to operate a business in that space during COVID.”
In April 2019, after working seven days a week for five years, Doyle said he was feeling burnt out and ready to move on, so he closed the restaurant in hopes of attracting a buyer.
That’s when Best began receiving calls from customers.
“They thought I was the meany who shut it down and told me I was letting go of two very special people in Jason and Amanda,” she said. “I called Jason in, and he impressed me so much with his passion for pizza and that business. I said, ‘If you want to stay on and run it, I will work on purchasing it.’ I wanted him to eventually own the restaurant.”
Boyette, who had been planning to leave for Alaska within a week to work on a fishing boat, jumped at the chance to stay, Timentwa said.
Best entered into an agreement with Doyle to buy the restaurant, which was held up by the lack of a liquor license in her name.
But, come June, Doyle reopened regardless and began showing Boyette all he needed to know to run things himself.
“I tried to do everything I could so that he could take over, because he had earned it,” Doyle said.
Boyette, Timentwa and three other employees ran the restaurant until the spread of coronavirus spurred a statewide shutdown, closing the business until May.
Ironically, on the same day the shutdown took effect, Best received her liquor license and officially took ownership of the restaurant.
Like many restaurants, especially those with no outdoor seating, The Tin Brick struggled in the current environment.
“It had never been my life’s goal to own a restaurant,” Best said. “You have to admire the restaurateurs in town who are managing to survive during COVID.”
On Sept. 21, Boyette’s family, friends and many of his regular customers gathered in the basement-level restaurant to remember Boyette and the business he loved.
“To be down there and have his friends and family there,” Timentwa said, “it just felt like we were home.”
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Jefferson County senior reporter Nicholas Johnson can be reached by phone at 360-417-3509 or by email at njohnson@peninsuladailynews.com.
