Americo Richard Lombardi

“Willow weep for me….”

Rick Lombardi passed away on June 30, 2021, at the age of 92. He was born on September 2nd, 1928 in Beverly, Massachusetts, the child of immigrant parents from San Giovanni Incarico, Italy, and lived most of his life in Massachusetts and Connecticut. He was married on April 30, 1955, to the love of his life Alice Marie d’Entremont, and became the patriarch of a large, loving family.

He became a civil engineer specializing in water quality, the first in his family to attend college at Northeastern University in Boston. He ran his own successful consulting practice ARLombardi & Associates for 25 years until his retirement. He served in the United States Air Force, ending his military career as a Captain. He was a past President of the Rockville Rotary Club, and a lifelong member of the ELKS. He played ferocious golf, as the scoreboards at the Old Lyme Country Club and Isla del Sol in St. Petersburg Florida will attest – his name is listed over, and over, and over….

He was never without a book. He drank sweet white wine. He loved apple pie and blueberry pie, and his wife’s cooking of the Italian dishes his mother had taught her to make for him; and he was an expert watermelon tumper. He loved watching his beloved Red Sox win and the UCONN Husky women’s basketball team. He loved the lush fecundity of the New England summer; and in his later years would go to his house in Old Lyme and sit in the shade, book in hand, and “supervise” the grandsons doing yard work.

He loved music, particularly jazz and swing. He joined the musician’s union at 15, snuck into the bars to play saxophone and clarinet in big bands while the older men were all off to WWII; and supported himself through college that way. When they were snowbirds in St. Petersburg, Florida, he quickly took charge of organizing the monthly concerts and dances for the community there. His love of music never left him. The quotes are from one of his favorite songs, “Willow Weep for Me,” which every once in a while he would sit down and plunk out on the old upright piano.

“Bend your branches down, along the ground, and cover me…”

Above all, he loved his family, and we loved him. He and Alice were married and inseparable for almost 66 years until her death in March. He is survived by his daughters Mary Beth, Lisa, Liane (Brian Flanigan) and Janine (Wayne McCready), son Richard (Rhonda), and son-in-law Brian Sullivan; grandchildren Tyler, Cameron, Ian (fiancé Samantha) and Francesca Mack, Lincoln (Laura), Emma (Isaiah Bennet), and Marina McCready, Luke Lombardi, Patrick and Kyle Sullivan; great-grandchild Jessa McCready; and numerous nieces, nephews, cousins, and children of same. He was pre-deceased by his wife Alice, his parents Salvatore and Luisa, his sisters Viola and Theresa, his brothers Joseph and John, and his youngest daughter Regina Sullivan, with all of whom he is enjoying a reunion in heaven. He is also, no doubt, playing in the angel band, and showing them a thing or two about how to swing it.

There will be a wake at Fulton-Theroux Funeral Home in Old Lyme CT on Thursday July 15 from 5-7pm followed by a Mass of Christian burial at Christ the King Catholic Church in Old Lyme on Friday July 16 at 11am. There will be a burial next to his beloved Alice in Duck River Cemetery, Old Lyme. Anyone wishing to honor his life and memory can do so by sending a contribution in his name to Connecticut Hospice in Branford Connecticut.