Anthony Verrilli
Anthony R. Verrilli passed away on March 29 at the age of 90. He was a resident of Maplewood Senior Living in Danbury.
He was born on March 15, 1923 in Bridgeport, the son of Anthony and Josephine Morzello Verrilli.
After graduating from Harrison High School, Class of 1941, he attended University of Missouri at Columbia, where he was a member of Delta Sigma Pi and Beta Gamma Sigma. His studies were interrupted by service in the U.S. Army during World War II. After being honorably discharged in 1945, he returned to college to finish his studies. He received a B.A. in Business Administration and Dairy Bacteriology in 1946. Mr. Verrilli also attended Harvard Law School and the University of Michigan Law School.
Longtime area residents will remember the Verrilli family dairy company, Green Meadow Farms, on High Street in Rye, where Tony, as he was called, worked before and after school, and during the summer delivering milk and eggs while in high school and college.
On July 4, 1953, he married Jeanne Elizabeth Bailey at the First Presbyterian Church in Mt. Vernon. This summer they would have celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary.
The couple raised their family in Rye. They later moved to Heritage Hills in Somers, where Mrs. Verrilli still lives.
Mr. Verrilli managed men’s retail clothing stores, including Frost Men’s Shop, Roger Kent, and Wallach’s. After reading his obituary, an old customer called the family to express his condolences and told them, “Every one of my good suits I bought from your dad.”
In 1979, he changed careers and joined Houlihan Parnes as a commercial real estate broker. In 1990, he founded his own firm, Verrilli Realty.
Mr. Verrilli will be remembered as a man who loved spending time with his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchild. His hobbies included making Super 8 films and videos of family, as well as writing novels, plays, and poems.
“One of our fondest memories,” said his daughter Ellen Stevens, “is the Sunday morning bike rides he took us and our friends on in Rye.”
In addition to his wife, Mr. Verrilli is survived by his three children: Mark Verrilli and his wife Candida Miele of Manassas, Virginia; Ellen Stevens and her husband Dacy of Rye; and Ronald Verrilli and his wife Pamela Haub of St. Louis; seven grandchildren; and one great-granddaughter. He was pre-deceased by his sisters, Rose and Gloria.
The family received friends at a memorial wake at Graham Funeral Home on April 13.
Donations in his memory may be made to the Rye Nature Center, where Mr. Verrilli loved to go on family hikes.
Nicholas Raho
Nicholas Constantine Raho, of Rye, and Watch Hill, Rhode Island, died on April 6. He was 92.
Born on November 25, 1920 in New York City, he was proud to say he was a native New Yorker. The oldest of three sons of immigrant parents, he was his mother’s translator and his father’s business assistant. A schoolteacher spotted his intelligence when he was in eighth grade and encouraged him to take the competitive exam for Townsend Harris Hall in Queens. He often said this changed his life.
He went on to graduate from CCNY and started his own business, Legion Chemicals that became White Cross Laboratories, Inc., an international chemical and pharmaceutical trading company.
He married Christina Marie Cutolo in 1949. The couple settled in Scarsdale for 20 years before moving to Rye. They raised three children.
During his lifetime, Mr. Raho supported many charitable causes, both local and more distant. Among them are the Rye Free Reading Room, to which he donated funds for a technology center; the Rye Nature Center, where he was a founding member of a camp for inner-city children; Church of the Resurrection, Inner-City Scholarship Fund, Missionaries of Charity, the Sacred Heart School in Uganda, where he provided the funds to add a floor to the multi-purpose building; Convent of the Sacred Heart; and Portsmouth Abbey. He was a Knight of the Holy Sepulcher.
Mr. Raho is survived by his daughter, Mary Julian and her husband Tom of Rye; a brother, Joseph of Glen Ridge, New Jersey; and nine grandchildren. His wife and two sons, Peter and Joseph, pre-deceased him, as did his brother, Liberty.
A mass of Christian Burial was celebrated at the Church of the Resurrection April 10.
Donations in Mr. Raho’s memory be made to Inner-City Scholarship Fund, 1011 First Avenue, Suite 1400, New York, NY 10022.
George Anderson
George Hugh Anderson passed away in his sleep April 9, in Philadelphia, after an arduous battle with cancer. He was 60.
He was born at United Hospital in Port Chester on January 30, 1953, to Evelyn (Oliver) and Samuel G. Anderson III.
He attended elementary and high school in Rye, where he had many friends, several with whom he maintained lasting friendships. In high school, his favorite activity was participation in school plays. In the summer before his senior year, he studied abroad in Nairobi, Kenya, through the AFS study abroad program. It was an experience that he never forgot and often spoke of fondly.
Following graduation from Rye High School, he attended Emerson College in Boston where he majored in Theater. He remained in Boston to try his hand at local theater before becoming a college admissions officer at his alma mater.
Mr. Anderson loved working with students and traveling around the country to encourage them to attend college. After several years working at Emerson, he went on to college administration positions with Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts; Trinity University in San Antonio; Connecticut College in New London; and Bradford College in Haverhill, Massachusetts, where he was Dean of Admissions.
After retiring from college administration, he moved back to Rye, where he bought his first Jack Russell terrier, “Contessa,” who lived to the age of 19. Thus, began his love affair with the breed and the start of a small business as a responsible breeder of Jack Russell terriers. Subsequently, he moved to rural Maine where he had room to expand his business. Over the years, he became active in Jack Russell trials where his terriers often took ribbons. He and his dogs became well known in the world of Jack Russell breeders, a close-knit community that, along with his family and other friends, provided him with tremendous support and encouragement during his brave battle with cancer.
Mr. Anderson loved the quiet, rural life in Maine, where he was not only able to devote himself to his “fur babies” as he called them, but also to cultivate his passions. His gardens were his pride and joy, and he loved cooking and baking for others. He took great pleasure in entertaining friends and family, and preparing feasts fit for kings and queens. He had a longtime desire to open a restaurant, which he envisioned as combining healthy southern cooking and seafood.
Most important to him were his family and friends. He took great pride in the accomplishments of his many nieces and nephews, often posting news of their achievements on Facebook. He also counseled those in the younger generation on the value of education, encouraging them in their endeavors and praising their successes.
He was looking forward to attending the May graduation of one of his nieces this spring from Temple University, and was quite pleased that he and she were members of the same honor societies. One of his proudest achievements was locating a “long-lost” nephew and helping him to connect with his large, extended family, who welcomed him with open arms. It was something that Mr. Anderson’s mother had always hoped would become a reality, and he was determined to make it happen.
Mr. Anderson leaves behind a loving and devoted family: his four siblings, Annie Anderson (George) Davis, Margret Anderson (Robert McDonald), Samuel Anderson IV, and Marion Anderson; an aunt, Mary Oliver Eldridge; an uncle, John Jasper (Shirley) Oliver; his best friend, Jim in Maine; and numerous cousins, nieces, nephews, and extended family members. He will missed by all whose lives he touched.
