Within two years of opening the establishment, the Panopoulos brothers applied for a licence to sell liquor in their dining lounge. Inspired in part by this Americanized Chinese cuisine, and with no proper training on making pizza, Panopoulos started to experiment. Personal Life and Later YearsOn a brief return to his native Greece, Sam Panopoulos married Christina Lymberopoulos in 1967. In a CBC Radio interview, he said that, for him “it was just another piece of bread cooking in the oven.”On 8 June 2017, Sam Panopoulos died at the University Hospital in London. Posthumously, in honour of Sam Panopoulos’ enduring legacy, 20 August, his birthday, is observed yearly as International Hawaiian Pizza Day.
