Rocco J. DeMasi, 78

January 16, 2022

Rocco Joseph DeMasi, beloved husband, father and brilliant doctor was born a day shy of Valentine’s Day in 1943 in South Philly to Nazzareno Vincenzo DeMasi and Louise Rose DeMasi (nee Galante), “Rock” or “Rocky” graduated Valedictorian from South Philadelphia High School in 1961 and entered the SPHS Alumni Hall of Fame in 2006. Since elementary school, people knew him for his quick, clever wit – often times lightening an otherwise dreary moment or inappropriate time – exhaustive vocabulary and Oxfordian grammatical capabilities. He would have loved that his obituary contained the word “jejune.”

He took his impressive talents to Temple University where he earned his M.D., and then moved to York, PA where he opened his private practice in Internal Medicine and Rheumatology. He was president of the York County Medical Society and active in the Keystone Peer Review Organization (KEYPRO) before moving to Chicago to take a medical director position with Aetna and complain about how cold it was. Later, he moved to just outside East Lansing Michigan to work for Correctional Medical Services as a regional director and continued to complain about the cold. For his retirement, he relocated back to Central Pennsylvania where he lived in Mount Joy. For the record: he found Mount Joy to be cold.

Rocco loved to travel – often to Italy to visit his relatives, he read almost every book ever printed, especially on topics such as Clarence Darrow and Harry Houdini, and was quite the Bridge player. Later in life he tried fishing, but was much better at playing Bridge. Throughout his life, he was fond of classic pieces of Americana such as Howdy Doody, the Lone Ranger, the original Superman cartoons and musical groups from the doo-wop era. On the rare occasion that he hit a golf ball, he sliced it, and he enjoyed cross-word puzzles and other activities that challenged his intellect. He shared jokes with exuberant abundance since long before the advent of email.

He also loved cooking and experimenting with cooking and telling his wife how she should cook and then going and buying kitchen gadgets that he would never use to cook. Indeed, Rocco loved all sorts of technological gadgets and would often buy them on Amazon. One time, he even used one.

Rocco is survived by his loving wife, Diane Fetrow DeMasi, who stuck by his side through the wonderful times and the less than wonderful, on their incredible journey together, an older sister Kathleen (Joe) Rizzuto and a younger sister, Josephine (Al) Carr, his sons Vincent (Rachel) and John (Leidy Montoya), his granddaughters Daniella DeMasi and Stefania Montoya, his nieces and nephews Lisa (Iannone) and Joe Rizzuto, Jon Robert Seidman and Andrea Seidman, Dianna (Montague) and James DeMasi, and his sister-in-law Maria DeMasi. His younger brother, Anthony DeMasi, pre-deceased him.

His family loved him and will miss his smile, brilliance and charm.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that you make a donation in Rocco’s name to the Occupational Therapy department at Elizabethtown College.

Gifts can be made payable to Elizabethtown College, Office of Development, 1 Alpha Dr, Elizabethtown PA 17022 and note “In Memory of Rocco Demasi” or donors can go online at www.etown.edu/give and note “In Memory of Rocco Demasi” in the comments section.