Dr. Francis X. “Frank” Keeley Sr.

Dr. Frank Keeley had so many children, they wore name tags in order of birth to greet some of the mourners at their 98-year-old father’s funeral.

Lisa Keeley-Cain – No 4 of eight – says her dad had long ago wished for a large family. When he married Marie “Mimi” Keeley – who passed just months before he did at 94 – Frank embarked on a journey toward the kind of blessings absent in his own youth.

His mother died before he was 5, and his father when he was 18. It was a hard Depression life in Philadelphia: Frank slogged through snow to deliver newspapers; hitched rides; and often subsisted on half a cheese sandwich, according to his obituary.  

Despite its tribulations, it was the kind of classic American upbringing that made sturdy men of boys – men like Frank who became the Greatest Generation.

“Times were tough,” said Keeley-Cain. “But I think that’s what made him who he was. I think he felt like poverty created the man. So he didn’t think of himself as unfortunate.”

Things got better. Frank had a private gastroenterology practice and was chief of staff for 20 years at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Camden. He taught at Thomas Jefferson University and was a trustee at the former University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

But there was one thing Frank was still deprived of: time. He was so dedicated to his patients, he often kept his family waiting – for dinner, for baseball games, for school plays. 

“We called it Keeley time,” his daughter said. “But he was very good at diagnosing his patients by listening to what they had to say. He took his time. His staff and patients were like his second family.”

A 50-year-career in medicine brought Frank some of the benefits he couldn’t have imagined as he pushed himself through that snow so long ago: a house at the shore, a sailboat and eight kids who all went to college. 

In his case, it wasn’t just a cliche to say he never forgot where he came from: He often expressed how thankful he was for his life. So when anyone asked Dr. Frank Keeley how he was, they would get the same answer:

“Never better.”

Sources: Legacy.com, Healey Funeral Home 

Nancy Pellini Morrow

Nancy Pellini Morrow had many loves in her life besides family: her Italian roots, her Catholicism, her garden, the library, her cookbook collection.

The last of those could, in fact, fill a library. 

The youngest of five children, Nancy spent hours in the kitchen of her family’s Massachusetts home with her mother Giulia, not only cooking familiar recipes but helping the latter learn English, according to Nancy’s obituary. 

Her father Aldo – a tailor who once made a suit for Woodrow Wilson – kept an expansive garden and also raised chickens. Among Nancy’s youthful rebellions was to free some of those birds once she realized their fate.

She yearned to dress like her high-school friends and not like the daughter of a tailor who made clothes for her. But she kept her mother’s wooden pasta board, rolling pin and Italian ravioli press.

At her elementary-school library, Nancy earned 25 cents to glue pockets on the back of books. For the rest of her life, she collected so many titles, her husband Rick had to build custom shelves to hold them.

“She was always reading,” her obituary notes, “and planning to read more.”  

Reading helped Nancy form some of the strong opinions about right and wrong that she carried into adulthood. There were “lively discussions about politics and religion,” and her obituary describes how Nancy would look prejudice and intolerance in the eye and not blink. 

But her strong views “made her easy to respect and love,” her family noted. “We will all miss Nancy terribly for the rest of our lives.”

Sources: Hinski-Tomlinson Funeral Home, Legacy.com 

Inside the obits
The love of their lives

Love is often noted in the obituaries, sometimes by accident in a person’s life, or somehow meant to be. Here are four people who found it.  

Nicholas “Nick” Bender was only 32 when he died, but it was a short life with great impact. A former teacher, he took his own experience at an addictions program into ministry. He earned a bachelor’s in pastoral studies, and it was at college where he instantly connected with his wife Rebecca. She was, his obit notes, the love of his life. 

Arline Marie Barski was a passionate quilter and a church volunteer for many of her 93 years. It was more than 75 years ago that she met the love of her life, Stanley Barski, in 1949. They got hitched after his discharge from the Navy and began their life together in Camden County. Their union produced seven children. 

Charles Eugene Cottingham was born in North Carolina 85 years ago, and moved to Philadelphia in his youth. It was there that the oldest of seven children met the love of his life, Ida, after they were matched by his sister. His obituary notes that they shared “54 years of love, partnership, and devotion” while raising two daughters.

Ricky Dottoli Sr. found joy in simple pleasures: poker, pool, the Eagles. And family. That part of the 61-year-old’s life began with his wife, Donna, followed by four children. Donna died in 2006 at only 41, but Ricky’s obituary makes it quite clear: “She will forever be the love of his life.”

Sources: Legacy.com, Costantino-Primo Funeral Home, Leroy P. Wooster Funeral Home, Bradley Funeral Home, Jackson Funeral Home.  

The Good Life appears twice a month. To suggest someone who recently passed away for a tribute, email Christina Mitchell at cmitchell@donnelly.media. Please describe in a few words something about the person’s life.