By Ted Sherman | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
Years ago, Stephen N. Adubato Sr. ordered up a fake tombstone inscribed with his name and the epitaph he insisted he would take to the grave: He was not a nice guy.
The tombstone was kept on display in his office, as a reminder.
“Nice guys,” he said with disdain, “are those who sit back and do nothing.”
The North Ward Center Inc., a non-profit community service organization he started up in the wake of the city’s 1967 riots, announced Adubato’s death on Friday, saying that he “left a legacy of hope and opportunity for thousands of people.” No cause was given. He was 87.
“He was an original. A character to some, a teacher to others,” said the center, now headed by his daughter, Michele. “He was fondly called “Big Steve” by hundreds of children, and the name stuck, because in many ways he was larger than life.”
A potent, behind-the-scenes force in New Jersey politics whose unseen influence could be felt all the way from Newark City Hall to the Statehouse in Trenton, Adubato was a central political figure, and often a polarizing one, in the state’s largest city and beyond; an old-school power broker who delivered votes — and elections — to those he favored.
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