Despite being a multi-million dollar actor, Mark Wahlberg remains one of the most down-to-earth Hollywood stars who has never forgotten where he came from. So, when the conservative actor turned up at a Massachusetts grocery store, his actions stunned shoppers.
Mark Wahlberg returned to his hometown of Quincy, Massachusetts, and he found himself at the Stop & Shop grocery shop. Wahlberg worked there as a teen and will never forget the experience. A video of his return to the store was posted to his Instagram page.
“Right here, this is where the whole hustle started,” Wahlberg said as he stood in the parking lot. “I was bagging groceries, $3.65 an hour, while I was right up the street getting my driver’s ed,” he continued. “Same day I turned 17, I got my driver’s license, I bought a Pontiac (expletive) for $200 from Lappen’s Auto Parts. We’re going to see if I can get my job… if I can get my job back.”
“Remember, it started right here at Stop & Shop,” Wahlberg said as he pointed toward the supermarket. The Patriots Day star then walked inside the store to meet some of the customers. “It’s bagging groceries time. I’m getting my job back,” he told the customers at the checkout as he bagged their groceries. “The oranges are a little heavy for the paper. You want double or single?”
“Get out of here!” said a female employee who was stunned when she saw Wahlberg bagging groceries. Another added, “Doing some serious good in this world, this young man.” Wahlberg also joked with the employees. “I’m telling Jeff to get me my job back,” he said.
Customer Raymond Li was getting his morning coffee at Stop & Shop when he was surprised to see Wahlberg. “I looked around the corner and I was like there’s no way I am looking at Mark Wahlberg bagging somebody’s groceries,” Li told WHDH. “Everybody was super excited, they have staff there who were jumping out of their registers trying to go up to him to get a picture,” he said. “He was a very nice and down-to-earth guy.”
As a teen, Wahlberg was quickly identified as the “kid from the wrong side of the tracks.” The Boston native credits his dramatic life transformation to the parish priest who mentored him and helped him get “back onto the straight and narrow.” Despite his success in the entertainment industry, he has never forgotten his roots.
Wahlberg, who was born and raised in Massachusetts, discussed how the Boston Marathon bombing affected him. “It filled me with such pride to call myself a Bostonian. I kind of beat my chest for reasons other than what Larry Bird did, or the Patriots do. This love and strength is so powerful, and knowing that we can still come out after a horrible event and radiate this love is special for me,” he told People Magazine in 2016.
Wahlberg grew up in the Dorchester area of Boston as the youngest of nine children, and he was devastated in 2021 when his mother Alma died after a battle with dementia. “She was an amazing person,” Wahlberg told EXTRA after her death. “She taught us all through all the difficulties that we had and face… She was very proud that we turned our lives around.”
Mark Wahlberg is one of the few Hollywood stars who left California and moved his family to Nevada. He was looking to remove his kids from the limelight and the “woke” culture of Tinsel Town. Wahlberg also starts every day in prayer. According to Fox News, Wahlberg has long broken with Hollywood and spoken publicly about his devout Catholic faith, including releasing his daily routine in 2018 detailing a 2:30 a.m. wake-up that kicks off with prayer at 2:45 a.m.
“I pray to be a good servant to God, a father, a husband, a son, a friend, a brother and uncle, a good neighbor, a good leader to those who look up to me, and a good follower to those that are serving God and doing the right thing,” Wahlberg said. “I never would have been able to change my life and have the success and love that I have in my world today without my faith.”
