Ernesto Lourenço S. Azevedo, a merchant that was already settled in Faial, owned a handicrafts store on the Infante Square (the "Bazar of Fayal manufactures & products") that traded in local products. He sold embroidery, lace, straw hats and baskets, feather flowers, cutwork and many other items made by local craftsmen. He participated in the 1888 Lisbon Industrial Exhibition with these products, receiving the event’s gold medal and diploma for the quality and diversity of his products.
The turn of the century led Ernesto Azevedo to the Tenente Valadim Street, acquiring one of the buildings which today is part of the space known as Peter's. Calling it "Azorean House" and continuing to sell handicrafts but also drinks, this new establishment provided the owner with the enormous advantage of being closer to the port and, therefore, to all the activity it generated as the only place through which people and goods could leave and enter the island.
in "ÀS LAPAS: Contos e Narrativas Faialenses”, Horta, 1988
In 1918, Henrique Azevedo transfered the Azorean House to the next-door building located to the north, keeping the same business but changing its name to "Café Sport", thus naming the coffee house after his passion for sports, as he usually practiced soccer, rowing and billiards.
Henrique Azevedo pioneered some of the great features that are still typical of Peter's today: the choice of furniture (the same type of furniture is still used), an eagle as the symbol and gin and tonic as the much appreciated beverage.
At the end of the 1930s, José Azevedo, Henrique's son, started helping in Café Sport while also working on the English ship HMS Lusitania II of the British Royal Navy. This ship had been anchored in Horta since 1939 after being hit by a depth bomb.
During his period working for HMS Lusitania II, José developed strong ties with the crew of the ship, to a point that one of the officers, due to the similarities between his son and José, missing his son and as a way to mitigate his homesickness, asked him if he wouldn't mind being called "Peter". The name stuck. Even the local Azorean started calling him by his new nickname and, for the rest of his life, José Azevedo became "Peter".
In 1944, with the beginning of the war, "Peter" ended up abandoning his post at Lusitania II, starting to work full time at Cafe Sport to help his father, Henrique Azevedo, due to the large influx of ships that were arriving at Horta during this period. Castaways, wounded and sick, people looking for shelter, others in need to refuel and repair their vessels, others simply to rest for a few days.
It was within this context that "Café Sport" became a point of reference for all who passed by Horta, providing friendly help for all those who required it, independently of the matter, technical or humane, for all nationalities, creeds and races.
Few years passed, the war was over and most people brought by it to Faial were already gone. In the late 50s, a new type of visitors began to arrive in Faial: recreational sailing boats… and so it begins, the bonds created with these adventurers, who left everything chasing a dream, became the reason behind "Café Sport"'s - current worldwide recognition among travelers and yachtsmen.
With time, "Peter" became not only the name by which the owner of "Cafe Sport" was known, but also the designation of the institution that has been providing help to the international sailing community for the last few decades.
In 1975, the Café Sport moved to an annex building to the north, under a commercial agreement with a regional company. It was in these new and larger facilities that some aspects of the coffee house were changed; the eagle that was outside as a symbol was moved inside and placed in a high position above the bar.
A whale carved from sperm whale bone is now outside symbolizing the Café; it was a gift by craftsman M. D. Fagundes, who supplied the establishment with those artifacts. It was also in these facilities that the flags which José Azevedo received as a gift started to be exhibited and hanged on the walls (symbols of the yachts or clubs to which they belong).
The move to new facilities came to an end in 1983. With the acquisition of the building where the Café had started its operations, Peter’s moved to its current facilities with the look that it currently features.
José Azevedo kept the family tradition and aspect of the business and associated his son José Henrique Gonçalves Azevedo to the management of the establishment. José Henrique had already devoted his holidays to work at the coffee house since 1967, receiving his grandfather and father's heritage and mystique, along with the friendly and personal way of welcoming guests that is typical of Peter’s Café Sport.
But it was not until 1978 that he devoted himself full time to the company, and it was largely due to his commitment that Peter’s Museum came to life in 1986 after the adaptation of the top floor. It is a real gem visited by thousands of tourists and it is the apple of the eye of its owners. Simultaneously, coinciding with the decrease in the manufacture of handicrafts from ivory and whale bone, a new line of souvenirs was launched, advertising Peter’s and disseminating its new image: the whale.
The establishment always had a fundamental feature: it was a family business, occupying the father, Ernesto Azevedo, and two of his sons: Ernesto Lourenço Ávila Azevedo and Henrique Lourenço Ávila Azevedo, who would eventually be the continuator of family tradition and the heir of " Azorean House ". Later, the coffee would be handed over to José Azevedo, Henrique’s son, who, as a young child, distributed household beverages to the homes of foreigners in straw baskets.
The twenties added an important new element to the development and consolidation of the Café Sport; from 1921, Dutch tugboats were stationed at the port of Horta. The difficulties of navigation in the North Atlantic in winter, the poor technical condition of ships and the lack of a more accurate and early weather forecast made navigation dangerous, and there were frequent requests for assistance from vessels caught by bad weather. Horta was one of the harbors where Dutch tugs were positioned, providing support and assistance to ships in difficulties. Stationed in Faial in the winter during the so-called "low season," a time when movement at the Café Sport tended to decrease, the crews of the Dutch tugs were an important part of the coffee house’s business, as they preferred it and became regular and good customers.
At the beginning of the war, HMS Lusitania II of the Royal Navy traveled to Horta. It had lost the stern due to the premature explosion of a depth bomb. The ship moored in the port during the whole World War and was used as the base for the distribution of communications to ships that performed military missions in the North Atlantic. Peter’s name was born in Lusitania II. A senior officer who worked there and who was the head of the ammunition service and was in charge of the ship’s maintenance became friends with José Azevedo. Thinking that he resembled an absent son, the Englishman began to call him by his son's name, Peter, arguing that by doing so he would think that his son was close to him. From the Englishmen to the Portuguese, the name Peter started to be used as fast as indelibly, supplanting the baptismal name of José Azevedo.
The sixties brought to Faial and to its port a new type of visitor: the crewmen of pleasure craft that, for defying the dangers of the seas on boats that were sometimes tiny, received the nickname of "adventurers" in Faial. The increasing demand of Horta by these crewmen resulted from a combination of multiple factors, ranging from its strategic location in the Atlantic and the natural conditions and attractiveness of its bay to the unusual ability of its people to welcome and to be helpful and hospitable, creating and strengthening bonds with foreign visitors. But crucially the dissemination among the international yachting community of the excellence and attractiveness of the port of Horta benefited from the numerous written testimonials that several generations of adventurers recorded in books. And the number of yachts that arrived at Horta increased every year, registering their visit to this port with a painting on the breakwater’s wall and, from 1986, at the marina itself which was built to meet this growing demand of yachtsmen for Horta.
When showing what happens to yachtsmen who frequent his bar, José Henrique passed two of the slide photographs on paper. It was then that an employee of the Café, who was deaf and mute, when approaching the image identified that a human figure (hair, eyes, nose, mouth, and beard) formed in the resentment of the wave, calling it ...
Cruising world, august 1988
The National Geographic Magazine Vol. CXIII nº6 junho 1958
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