Rodney Mark Jaros, 85, of Southbury, CT and longtime resident of Danbury, CT and Chappaqua, NY died peacefully on Friday, June 28, 2024 while surrounded by his family. Mr. Jaros was the loving husband of the late Mary (Raedy) Jaros.

Mr. Jaros was born on June 13, 1939 in Waterbury, CT; a son of the late Kasmir and Helen (Rupp) Jaros, they lived in Waterbury, CT until he was nine and then moved to Terryville, CT where his father, a chemical engineer, worked at Eagle Lock for a short stint until he started his own electroplating business. From a young age, Rod (his preferred nickname) understood the value of working a job to make his own money. From shoveling snow off his neighbors walkways to working at the local bowling alley, his most challenging job was becoming a newspaper delivery boy in which he would deliver the Hartford Courant on his bike, which was particularly time consuming. A mischievous pre-teen, he decided to take the old family Chevy on his route one day. Stopped at an intersection, a police cruiser who knows him tells him to take the car home immediately! Rod was an avid writer as well as reader and he documented this and many other stories of growing up in Terryville in his autobiography entitled Learning Curves–An Early Years Memoir.

At fifteen, Rod was sent to Williston Northampton School (formerly Williston Academy) for high school. He would spend the next four years there engaged in activities such as Baseball, Basketball, and Glee Club. He then went on to study at Fairfield University where he graduated with a Bachelor of Social Science in 1961. Rod also obtained his Masters in English at Trinity College in Hartford and his Masters in Library Science from University of Hartford.

On February 17, 1962, Rod would marry his hometown crush, Mary Raedy, in Terryville. She was the love of his life. Rod and Mary raised three children together. Initially in West Covina, CA for just one year where their eldest was born, they moved back east to Chappaqua, NY in Westchester County where their children called home and attended primary and high school. After the children graduated college, Rod and Mary moved to Danbury, CT where they lived until Mary’s passing in November 2022 where Rod lovingly cared for her during her difficult struggle with dementia. Rod and Mary enjoyed sixty years of marriage.

An English teacher turned librarian, Mr. Jaros worked over 30 years at Horace Greeley High School in Chappaqua, NY where he also lived and raised his family. Upon retirement, Rod worked several years in the library at The Wooster School in Danbury, CT. During summer months, Rod and his late wife, Mary and children summered in Cape Cod for decades. During some of this time they owned and operated a small inn in Eastham until they built a home near Nauset Beach in East Orleans where they would spend most of their summers, until eventually moving to Osterville. When he and his wife were not on the Cape or at their home in Danbury, they spent their winter months at their home in Saint Lucie West, FL where Rod enjoyed many a day walking out their backdoor to play his hand at golf, where he admittedly was not so good at! When not playing golf, Rod created a successful online golf newsletter called ‘Different Strokes’ in which there were many thousands of subscribers. He also found tremendous joy in spending time with his grandchildren especially attending their soccer, lacrosse, and track meets over the years.

He truly embodied the idea of a “renaissance man,” mastering hobbies from furniture making; sailing the family boat on Pleasant Bay in Cape Cod; reading voraciously books of all genres but especially classic westerns; becoming a licensed pilot; playing the flute, clarinet, saxophone, guitar, ukulele, and even the harmonica. If you needed a deck put on your house, Rod was the man to design and build it – with or without a hot tub! Known as a car guy, a lover of sports cars, he also enjoyed restoring a 1954 Chevy pickup with his son Matthew.

Mr. Jaros is survived by his three children: Kristin Boylan and her husband, Timothy; Mattew Jaros and his wife, Emily Wong; and Mark Jaros. Mr. Jaros is also survived by four grandchildren: Hannah, Luke & Finn Boylan and Tyler Jaros, as well as his sister Melanie Donnelly and brother-in-law Andrew, sisters-in-law Stephania Dedman, Margaret Butler and her husband Dennis, and 11 nieces and nephews.

Family and friends will be received on Thursday, July 25, 2024 from 5:00 PM to 8:00 PM at Kane Funeral Home; 25 Catoonah Street, Ridgefield. A funeral mass will be celebrated on Friday, July 26, 2024 at 10:00 AM at Saint Mary’s Church; 55 Catoonah Street, Ridgefield. Interment will take place privately.

Newell Smith Doty (80) of Hendersonville, NC, was called to his heavenly home on Saturday, March 30, 2024, surrounded by his wife and three daughters.

Born to Allen Render Doty and Ruth Greene Smith Doty on June 20, 1943 in Providence, RI, Newell grew up in Longmeadow, MA with his brother, Paul ’64. He attended Williston Academy of Northampton, MA, Washington and Lee University and American International College, where he met the love of his life, Veronica (Ronnie), on a blind date.

Ronnie and Newell were married on August 21, 1965 and together, they raised their daughters, Kristin, Katherine (Katie), and Elizabeth (Betsy), in Rochester, NY. Newell was an insurance executive with Aetna Life and Casualty for 27 years before being drawn to the North Carolina mountains to fulfill his dream of running a B&B. He and Ronnie owned and operated The Orchard Inn in Saluda, NC, for nearly 5 years before his retirement.

An active outdoorsman, Newell was a lacrosse player in his youth and enjoyed running (17 marathons and many mini-triathlons), fly fishing, hiking, and golf. He served others as a former EMT, training his dog Hershey to be a therapy dog, and working with the backpack program at his Church, St. John’s in the Wilderness.

Papa New, as he is affectionately known by his 6 grandchildren, will be forever remembered as a loving father and grandfather, who prioritized family time, never missed an opportunity to cheer on his grandkids, and kept us all laughing with his quick wit and corny jokes.

Newell is survived by his wife of 58 years, Ronnie, his daughters Kristin (daughter Molly) of Flat Rock, NC, Katie (husband Robb and children Abbey, Logan and Caroline) of Birmingham, AL, and Betsy (husband J.D and daughters Lyla and Paryn) of Edwards, CO. The family would like to thank the incredible staff at Tore’s Home for their devotion and love of Newell and Four Seasons Hospice, who treated him with compassion and dignity.

In lieu of flowers, donations can be made in Newell’s honor to Memory Care of Asheville, NC and St John’s in the Wilderness of Flat Rock, NC. A service of celebration will be held on Saturday April 13th at 11:00 in the morning at St. John’s in the Wilderness of Flat Rock, NC. Hallelujah, He is Risen Indeed!

Henry Samuel Hacker (“Hank” to many of his closest friends), beloved father, grandfather, cousin, uncle, friend, lifelong scholar and New York sports fan, died peacefully on June 6, 2024, in Boston, MA. He was 81.

Henry was born on December 26, 1942, in New York City, and was raised in Beacon, NY, where his parents, immigrants from Austria who escaped Nazi persecution, settled in response to a call for doctors to fill a void left by World War II. After graduating from Williston Academy, Henry was awarded an English Speaking Union scholarship and traveled aboard the RMS Queen Mary to spend a gap year at Sutton Valence School in England, an experience that ignited his enduring passion for British culture. While at Sutton Valence, Henry made lifelong friends from both sides of the Atlantic and would return often to visit the school throughout his life. From there, Henry went on to graduate from Yale University and Cornell Law School.

Henry’s professional career was diverse and prolific. His early years were spent in investment banking at Dean Witter and from there he began a long tenure as a corporate lawyer in private practice, first at Skadden Arps when the firm was still in its infancy and later at his own firm. In 1995, Henry left the legal profession to become Chief Operating Officer for the popular menswear brand Alexander Julian, helping the company grow rapidly through creative licensing opportunities. He parlayed that experience into his own lifestyle and branding consultancy firm, Hacker, Dolan + Partners, and spent the remainder of his career helping clients, including fashion designers, musicians, artists and other creative people, monetize their talent. Clients and colleagues recall Henry as a skilled negotiator and a man possessing a keen intellect and unimpeachable honesty, integrity and character.

A thruline in Henry’s life was a passion for history, art and amassing collections, not merely for his own satisfaction, but to preserve items of cultural and historical significance for future generations. He donated generously throughout his life, and in an interview, he once observed: “If you give your collections to a museum, you can always go visit them.” While this lifelong pursuit had the humble origins of collecting baseball cards as a child, Henry’s collections would go on to be featured in museums throughout the world. He donated his 6,000 item baseball card collection to the Hudson River Museum in New York and his collection of over 500 British transportation posters resides in permanent collection at the Yale Center for British Art. The British poster collection was featured prominently in an exhibit titled “Art for All: British Posters for Transport” at Yale, the Wolfsonian in Miami and several other international museums.

In retirement, Henry’s indefatigable passion for scholarship and arts access led him back to school, where he wrote a thesis on the restitution of art looted during the Holocaust. At 71, he earned his third degree, a master’s in museum studies from the Harvard Extension School. In recognition of this feat, he was featured in the Harvard Gazette as a “stellar graduate” alongside other graduating Harvard students (most close to 50 years younger than him).

Above all else, Henry was a devoted and loving father and grandfather. As a vault of esoteric knowledge, he could always be counted on for help perfecting a high school, college or graduate school essay (often with an impending deadline); solving a particularly daunting corporate finance problem set; preparing for law school exams; or completing a Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle. He never missed an opportunity to watch one of his children’s various sporting events, and was known to spend his weekends driving countless hours across the Northeast (and beyond) to figure skating competitions, ice hockey tournaments and Middlebury football and Tufts lacrosse games. Henry was incredibly generous with his time and resources and always there when needed most, whether through a simple reassuring phone call, an emergency financial “loan” or even riding shotgun on a cross-country drive. He was a world class listener and advisor, and his children (along with clients, colleagues, friends and other family) were the beneficiaries of his practical advice, even keel and unfailing advocacy.

Henry’s family is grateful for the eight years he lived after receiving a kidney transplant from a generous deceased donor and for the care he received from many doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals. He is survived by his children, Michael, Matthew, and Katrina Hacker; their spouses, C.J. Hacker, Sarah Dmitrovsky, and Charlotte Hastings; grandsons Luke, Colt, Pete, and James Hacker; and many loving cousins, nieces and nephews and lifelong friends. In lieu of flowers, please consider registering as an organ donor when you renew your driver’s license or online at https://registerme.org/, or making a donation in Henry’s honor to the Massachusetts Organ Transplant Fund/New England Donor Services (https://neds.org/) or the Yale Center for British Art (https://britishart.yale.edu/get-involved). A memorial service will be held at a later date.

Charles Dickinson (Dick) Showalter passed away peacefully on March 17, 2024, in Pinehurst, North Carolina. Dick was born on September 3, 1927, in South Windham, Maine, the son of Arthur H. and Marguerite Dickinson Showalter. He was born on the kitchen table when the doctor was delayed one hour on the trolley. Dick spent his early childhood in South Windham and Waban, Massachusetts before moving with his family to Northampton, Massachusetts. He is a proud graduate of Williston Academy and Purdue University. Dick served with honor in the United States Army, 20th Combat Engineers 3rd Army during the Korean Conflict.

Following his military service, Dick married Charlotte Fry in May 1953. Soon thereafter they moved to Lockport, New York, where Dick joined his brother Arthur (deceased) and purchased the S.S. Gooding Co. in Lockport. They ran a very successful printing business for thirty-five years before selling the company in 1989.

Dick and Charlotte spent many happy years in Lockport where they raised their five children. He served the community as President of the Lockport School Board, Orleans-Niagara Board of Cooperative Education, Kenan Center, Lockport Town and Country Club and The Tuscarora Club.

Upon his retirement, Dick and Charlotte moved to Bonita Springs, Florida, for sunshine and year-round golf. They remained there until 2006, when they moved to Pinehurst, North Carolina. Charlotte passed away in 2007, after 53 wonderful years of marriage. Dick volunteered at more than 100 golf tournaments and spent years volunteering at the Reid Heart Center. He was always extremely active in his community.

Dick is survived by his five children, Susan Helander (John), Stephen Showalter (Maria), John Showalter (Nancy), Paul Showalter (Sharon), and Kim Showalter, as well as six grandchildren, Katharine Lange (Christopher), Alexander Rae, Stephanie Payne (Bill), Sarah Showalter, Lindsey Platts (Jordan) and Caroline Showalter (Anthony); nine great-grandchildren, David and Charlotte Lange, Landon and Liv Showalter, Lane and Henry Platts, Christian and Wyatt Payne and Paislee Showalter. He is also survived by his loving companion of 15 years, Sylvia Jansen, her daughter Heidi Spencer (Mark) and nieces Elizabeth Hubbard, Ann Buscemi (Peter), Nancy Clark (Peter) and Judy Slabyk (Steve) and nephew Ed Hubbard (Lynn).

A memorial service will be held at 4:00 p.m. Friday, March 22, 2024, at Boles Funeral Home, 425 W. Pennsylvania Ave., Southern Pines.

In lieu of flowers, donations to the Hospice Foundation of FirstHealth would be appreciated.

It is with a heavy heart that we announce the sudden passing of Charles Ricker Donnellan on May 5, 2024 at a care center in Sylmar, California. He was a resident at Sunrise at Sterling Canyon in the Assisted Care wing and had his own apartment for the past three years. While there, he gained the title of Jigsaw Puzzle Wizard. He was able to assemble a 1000-piece puzzle within a matter of four hours. Other residents were quite upset to find he had completed all the puzzles set up in the community room while they all slept. He did his best work at 4AM along with a cup of coffee until the puzzles were all completed. He was greeted with open arms at the breakfast table at 7:30AM.

He passed from several health complications, the most recent being liver failure.

He was flown to Hartford, Connecticut and a private internment was held on June 8, 2024 at the Union Hill Cemetery in Middle Haddam, Connecticut.

He is survived by two older siblings, Mary Ricker Leao-Martin, NSFG class of 1965 and Virginia Donnellan Eberhard, NSFG class of 1967.

William Frederick “Bill” Armstrong died Friday evening, May 19th, 2023 – a week shy of his 98th birthday – at Shrewsbury Crossing in Shrewsbury, MA, where he had lived for the past 14 months. His three children were with him that night and, while the last several years had had its challenges, his final days were peaceful.

He was born in Worcester on May 29th, 1925, and spent his early years in Shrewsbury and Worcester with his parents and two brothers. From the stories we have heard, those were good – and often boisterous – years, and up until the week he died, he enjoyed touring the streets of Shrewsbury. Following a stint in the U.S. Army, he returned home, spent a year at St. Mark’s in Southborough before heading to college at Harvard, where he met Nancy Rice who he married in July, 1950.

His middle years were focused on his career and on raising a family. His career focused on all things related to the manufacturing of felt and we never lacked for a felt tablecloth or a Christmas tree skirt. His jobs took him to Wrentham, MA; Newburgh, NY; Ridgefield, CT; New York City; and, finally in 1970, to Grafton, MA, after taking a job with the Felters Company in Millbury. During those years, he and Nancy raised their family and gave their children a wonderful upbringing, with lots of outdoor activities, Cape Cod vacations, ski trips to Vermont, animals galore, and holidays full of family and friends.

He was predeceased by his wife, Nancy (Rice) Armstrong, in 1975 and never remarried. He spent the last 50 years based in Grafton but maintained strong ties to Falmouth, where he loved to sail, golf, and vacation. He also enjoyed trips to Vermont where he served as the center for the traditional Thanksgiving Day football game, a role that he played into his 90’s. He was thrifty….really thrifty, loved animals (particularly dogs), and was very happy puttering around his yard, tending to the lawn, cutting down trees, and keeping his equipment in working order, without spending any money on it. If he could do it himself, he did. If it could be fixed with duct tape, it was. That willful spirit remained until the end, with him insisting that he did not need help and he could manage things on his own.

In addition to his wife, he was predeceased by his parents, Stuart and Dorothy (Bickford) Armstrong, and his brothers, Richard Armstrong and John Armstrong. He is survived by his children, William F. Armstrong, III (Becky McCullough), of Falmouth, MA, Abby Armstrong of Sharon, VT, and Halley Allen (Gus) of Holden, MA as well as by his grandchildren, George Armstrong, Emma Armstrong, Sarah Allen Neidhardt (Kyle) and Elizabeth Allen (Michael Boller), and his great granddaughter, Ada Elliott Neidhardt. He is also survived by his nephew, Stuart Armstrong (Mike Levesque), and his nieces, Leslie Armstrong (Jeff Bacon) and Susan Armstrong. He also always enjoyed seeing his numerous nieces and nephews on the Rice/Gainey side of the family when he was on the Cape.

Over the past few years there were many visits from friends and family and an abundance of kindness from the wonderful nurses and staff at Shrewsbury Crossing and Notre Dame Hospice, which made such a difference and for which we are so appreciative. Thank you very much!

Calling hours will be held at the Roney Funeral Home in North Grafton, MA from 4:00 – 6:00 P.M. on Tuesday, May 30th. He will be buried with Nancy in Falmouth at a later date. In lieu of flowers, please consider making a donation to Smile Train – https://www.smiletrain.org/ – an organization our father supported over the years.

Joel Schiavone, of New Haven, CT, died in hospice Monday, April 22, 2024, at the age of 87, after a period of declining health.
He is survived by his partner Emily McDiarmid; his children Allyx ‘88, Josie, Bryan, and Maxim Schiavone; and grandchildren Penn ‘20, Josie and Ripley.