Ross Andrew Gagliano

Ross (Rosario -- named after his paternal grandfather) was born July 3, 1938 in Birmingham, AL. He is predeceased by his parents, Saverio (Sam) and Lucy (Musso) Gagliano and his loving and devoted wife, Dorothy Ann (Petry) Gagliano who shared fifty wonderful years with him and departed nine years and twenty days ahead of him. Their deep and abiding love for one another and for their Lord Jesus Christ our Savior ensures they are reunited in Heaven. He is also predeceased by his sister Lucy Elizabeth (Gagliano) Haynes and his son-in-law from Memphis, TN, Mark Alan Ricketts, who recently lost a brief, heroic battle with ALS in Parker, TX.

An older brother to three siblings he adored, Ross is survived by Carl Samuel (“Sticks”) and Virginia (Durden) Gagliano, of Auburn, AL, Sam Emidio, Jr. (“Little Star”) and Judy (Ross) Gagliano, of Birmingham, and brother-in-law Ronald “Ronnie” Haynes, of Mobile, AL. His other “little sister” and beloved wife’s sibling, Susan (Petry) Ray, resides in Newborn, GA.

Ross is also survived by three children who loved him desperately: James Andrew and wife Tiffany Nicole (Reis) Gagliano of Cornwall-on-Hudson, NY, Lisa (Gagliano) Ricketts of Parker, TX, and Jonathan Ross and wife Wendy Lynne (McCay) Gagliano, also of Birmingham, AL.

Poppa dearly loved and doted on his eleven grandchildren (in birth order): Kristen Leigh Brinkley (husband John), U.S. Army Captain Zachary Ross and his wife, First Lieutenant Mary (Thompson) Ricketts, Anthony James Gagliano (fiancé Brianna Cazorla), Dr. Erin Ann Ricketts, DVM, Alexandra Leigh (Gagliano) Arduino and husband Kevin, Christopher Jason Park, James (Jae) Samuel and wife Katelyn Nicole (Klug) Ricketts, Jenna Blake Park, Claire Ellen Ricketts, Kaitlin Ann Gagliano, and Avery Anna-Elizabeth Martin.

His legacy includes God’s blessing of twelve great-grandchildren -- between the tender ages of seventeen (Wini) and Dominic (8 months). He met each of them and loved them all dearly.

Ross, a “child of the Great Depression” as his wife, “Dorothy Margaret,” sweetly referred to him, was also known growing up as “Little Ross” (named after his Poppa) and “Goose” -- for his basketball prowess. He attended high school at Birmingham’s John Herbert Phillips High School, graduating in 1956. He then received an appointment to the United States Military Academy, where he graduated near top of his class in 1960, serving as Brigade Sergeant Major his senior (firstie) year. Well-respected and universally liked by his classmates, he was known as “Garp,” singing in the Cadet Glee Club, and playing center on Cadet basketball team – where he once held Academy’s single game record for rebounds (22, against the Coast Guard Academy).

Commissioned as a U.S. Army Officer and branched into the Signal Corps, he met the love of his life, Dorothy, while stationed in Fontenet, France, where her father, Francis J. Petry, a World War II and Korean Conflict combat veteran was stationed. They were married in the French city of Poitiers on April 27, 1963. Ross then spent the balance of his eleven-year military career securing a Master’s degree at the Naval Post Graduate School at Ft. Ord (where James and Lisa were born), serving a combat tour in Vietnam between 1966-1967, and closing out his Army chapter while posted to West Point as a professor of Mathematics (where Jonathan was born). In the Summer of 1971, a new civilian, he piled his family into a station wagon and headed south.

Settling in Decatur, GA, this served as his family’s home base for 48 years and where he and Dorothy raised their three children, while he earned a Ph.D. from Georgia Tech, concurrently conducting research and teaching graduate students for fifteen years. In 1985, he made the difficult decision to transition to Georgia State University (GSU), helping “birth” and evolve the fledgling Computer Science department – which some, he recalled, thought a “passing fad.”

He retired from GSU in 2000, devoting himself to his wife and a lengthy “Honey Do List,” and the singular quest to chronicle his beloved father’s life and times. Several years of research and writing, a labor of love, led to the self-publishing of “A Symmetry of Spirit,” an ancestral devotional to his Sicilian heritage and his family’s roots, as viewed through the eyes of his father, Sam, a figure he revered and described as “an ordinary man who did some extraordinary things.” His Dad, Sam Gagliano, known as “Professor” to legions of Alabama piano students and marching band members he guided across the years (Leeds High School, for one), also proudly served as assistant director of the 140th Army band of the Alabama National Guard.

His Roman Catholic faith was very important to Ross. He and his wife (a convert) were devoted Catholics, guided and instructed by their faith, and longtime members of Saints Peter and Paul R.C. Church and St. Thomas More R.C. Church – both located in Decatur, GA. This faith sustained him through Dorothy’s difficult health journey following a breast cancer diagnosis in 1998. Her brief recovery and rebound were God’s blessing. But the difficult and unexpected sudden loss of his wife in 2013 didn’t result in a wavering of faith. His trust in God unshakable.

Ross will forever be known as a committed patriot, passionate Catholic, defender of the American values he cherished, and fierce protector of his brood. Whether you knew him well or you met him by happenstance, he would give you the shirt off his back. This isn’t folklore. It’s how he lived his life -- a life of selflessness. His epitaph is simple: He was a damn good man.

The family will receive friends at the following visitation, Rosary, and funeral services: Visitation is Thursday, January 12, 2023 at 6:00 p.m. at St. Francis Xavier Roman Catholic Church, 2 Xavier Circle, Birmingham, AL 35213, followed by Rosary at 6:30 p.m. Funeral Mass will be celebrated following morning, Friday, January 13, at St. Francis Xavier at 9:00 a.m., with inurnment at Elmwood Cemetery at 10:30 a.m., 600 Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, Birmingham, AL 35211, a Mercy Meal will follow the inurment at St. Francis Xavier Roman Catholic Church at 11:30 a.m.

The family asks that in lieu of flowers, Ross would have much preferred you “pay it forward” by making a donation to either the American Cancer Society or the ALS Association in his memory and in keeping with his penchant for charitable works and helping support those in need.