As a teenager, Domenic D’Ambrosio stamped envelopes for his cousin Pat Coppola, a School Committee candidate in Cambridge.
“He came with his mother, Anna, to our headquarters at the Royal Pastry Shop. It was his start in politics. He loved it,” Coppola recalled. “Dom worked harder for a candidate than any person I have ever known, and he had a natural connection with people.”
That instinct was evident during Raymond L. Flynn’s successful 1983 campaign for mayor of Boston. Working as North End coordinator, Mr. D’Ambrosio suggested that Flynn sing Italian songs at rallies in the neighborhood.
“He’d hand me the words, I’d sing a couple of them and get a standing ovation,” said Flynn, who recalled that City Councilor Fred Langone of the North End, who also ran for mayor in 1983, quipped: “I don’t mind getting outspent, but I don’t like getting outsung.”
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Mr. D’Ambrosio, who was a campaign organizer for numerous Democratic candidates, most recently Mayor Martin J. Walsh and US Representative Seth Moulton, died of heart disease June 13 in Tufts Medical Center. He was 64 and lived in Lynn.
On the House floor, Moulton paid tribute to Mr. D’Ambrosio, calling him “a dedicated public servant, a tireless local volunteer, and inspiring advocate for the people in his community,” and adding that “whether they were old friends or someone he was meeting for the first time, Dom’s compassion for others was contagious.”
In a eulogy at Mr. D’Ambrosio’s funeral, Moulton said that “in politics, I’ve learned quickly, the vast majority of people talk a big game and play a small one. Dom talked a big game and played a huge game — every inning of it.”
Mr. D’Ambrosio, who lived in Medford most of his life, worked in Flynn’s administration as coordinator of public events from 1984 to 1994, and was the event and concert coordinator at the Hatch Shell from 1999 to 2005.
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He graduated from Boston College High School and from Boston University with a bachelor’s degree in biology. In 1977, he played his first major role in a political campaign, as North End coordinator for Rosemarie Sansone.
At the time, Sansone lived on North Street in the North End, near Etna Pastry, which Mr. D’Ambrosio’s parents ran until 1983. Mr. D’Ambrosio was the early morning baker and official greeter. As a youngster, he attended St. John School in the North End so he could work at the bakery.
“They were known for their cannoli, and many famous people went there, so Dom kept an autograph book,” said Sansone, who won that Boston City Council election and is now president of the Downtown Boston Business Improvement District. “He knew people from all walks of life, and I was told if you wanted to get elected, you needed to know Domenic D’Ambrosio.”
Alex Bok was Sansone’s Back Bay/Beacon Hill coordinator when he met Mr. D’Ambrosio in 1977, and they became lifelong friends. Bok, president of Boston Baseball Field of Dreams, which is trying to bring a minor league baseball franchise to Malden, said his friend “had an infectious, positive nature, but Dom was also hard-nosed and a realist, and when he threw himself into a new campaign or project, it was as if he’d been in that community or neighborhood all his life.”
Mr. D’Ambrosio had been director of special events and community relations for Boston Baseball Field of Dreams since 2012.
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In a eulogy, Bok said that “throughout his career when the rest of us saw our enthusiasm flag . . . Dom’s indomitable spirit inspired many of us to feel recharged.”
Mr. D’Ambrosio was a property manager for Burnside Management in Boston from 1981 to 1983. He attended Northeastern University’s paralegal certificate program and worked in that capacity in the late 1990s for the Boston firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. He also had been a member of the Democratic State Committee and Democratic City Committee of Medford.
On the Esplanade, Mr. D’Ambrosio managed about 80 seasonal events, issuing permits and keeping records for walkathons, concerts, and celebrations.
As a staff writer in Flynn’s administration, he produced about 350 proclamations a year.
“He was a perfectionist who became immersed in every event and in getting the job done with professionalism and courtesy,” Flynn said. “He brought great credit to the City of Boston.”
While Mr. D’Ambrosio was Boston’s celebrations coordinator, he supervised more than 200 celebrations annually, including the Boston Celtics’ 1984 and 1986 NBA championship parades, along with Columbus Day parades, the Shriners national convention, Italian festivals, and Bastille Day at the French Cultural Center.
Sansone said Mr. D’Ambrosio could make nervous politicians comfortable when they appeared in a parade for the first time. “He’d place them behind the most popular band so they thought they were getting the applause,” she said.
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Mr. D’Ambrosio’s happiest moment at a parade occurred on Columbus Day in 2013, when he married Kelly McEnaney. Riding in a Super Duck boat and a trolley, the wedding procession stopped in front of Old North Church in the North End, where the couple exchanged vows before a justice of the peace.
Behind a banner that read “Kelly & Domenic . . . Just Married,” the newlyweds then walked to Lewis Street for a more traditional ceremony at the Fishermen’s Club.
A tribute to Mr. D’Ambrosio is planned for Aug. 13 on the first night of the Fisherman’s Feast in the North End. A service has been held and burial was in Oak Grove Cemetery in Medford.
“We were married for 609 days and every one of those days he made me feel loved,” Kelly said. “Dom carried a picture of his mother and showed it to me the first time we met, at an event at the Museum of Fine Arts, and he took the example of her generosity and ran with it. It mattered a great deal to him that people be taken care of and that he made a difference in their lives.”
Marvin Pave can be reached at marvin.pave@rcn.com.