Ralph Palumbo , MD

Ralph R. Palumbo, MD entered into life September 30, 1932 in New Britain, CT. He entered into his eternal life January 18, 2019 when he gently left his physical body at his home in Denver, CO at the age of 86.

Ralph Palumbo grew up in New Britain as the only child of Raphael Palumbo and Rachel Greco Palumbo. Their small family was happily augmented by aunts, uncles and cousins. He grew up in the neighborhood as part of a wide, loving, not-so-small Italian family. Ralph graduated as Valedictorian from Berlin High School 1950. He was the first member of his family to go to college. One of his high school teachers in particular, recognizing Ralph’s abilities, had fortunately encouraged and guided him to continue his education.

Ralph worked his way through college and medical school, dedicating his summers to earning and saving money for tuition and expenses. As tight end for the University of Maryland Terrapins, he had the honor of playing on the winning side in the 1952 Sugar Bowl in New Orleans. Ralph’s Navy career later began during his senior year at Boston University School of Medicine, when he made a life-changing decision he never regretted. Ralph accepted the opportunity to cover his remaining medical school expenses by joining the U.S. Navy. While in medical school he was commissioned as an Ensign, but his only assignment was to study hard and graduate.

After graduating from medical school, Ralph was commissioned as a Lieutenant and was accepted to the Navy's elite Flight Surgeon program. He was sent to Naval Air Station (NAS) Pensacola, Florida, for flight training. While in Pensacola, he met and married Jean Boitnott, of New Castle, Virginia.

Ralph was subsequently assigned to Carrier Air Group 7 (CVG-7) based at Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and deployed with the air group aboard the legendary USS Independence (CVA-62) on its maiden deployment to the Mediterranean Sea in 1960/61. He made many memories during his service at sea, and would often share the stories of that memorable tour with others throughout his lifetime.

Following his Mediterranean deployment, Ralph was stationed in Rhode Island, where he and Jean welcomed a son, Christopher into their family. The next duty station was a return to San Diego, where daughter Christina (“Tina”) joined the family, after which the Navy sent Ralph back to Pensacola. From there, he accepted the offer to move with his family to Naval Station Fort Amador, at the Pacific entrance to the Panama Canal, serving as the Medical Officer for the 15th Naval District, and participating in the Navy’s tropical medicine program.

A year later, the family sadly suffered a great loss in Panama when Jean suddenly passed away due to an aneurysm, leaving Ralph a widower and single father to two small children. With Chris and Tina only 7 and 4 years old, Ralph was grateful to the Navy for encouraging him to remain in Panama for an extended stay, which provided a measure of familiarity and stability for the family. One reflection of his enduring gratitude was his frequent emphatic expression, (attestable by all who knew him) that “The Navy was very good to me.”

After an unusually long five-year tour of duty, Ralph and the children returned to San Diego in 1973. He then began another series of duty assignments, from the west coast to the east coast, with Ralph sometimes working in conjunction with the U.S. Marines to plan and provide medical support. Fatefully, it was during his stay at Camp Lejeune, NC, that Ralph was unknowingly exposed to the now-infamous contaminated drinking water there, which would ultimately cause his Parkinson’s Disease (PD), diagnosed years later in 2010.

Ralph’s last tour of duty for the Navy was in Texas, at Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, where, as a Navy Captain, he served as Commanding Officer of the Naval Hospital. After 25 years of service, Ralph retired from the Navy and established a successful private medical practice at Riverside Hospital in Robstown, TX. He maintained his private practice for more than 20 years until he closed it in favor of accepting an opportunity to run the wound care and hyperbaric unit at that facility, the final endeavor in his medical career.

It was in Corpus Christi that Ralph met Maureen. They met in December 1989 and married in a small chapel in the dunes, on South Padre Island on May 5, 1990. Their canal home on the Island was replete with love, friends and family, good food, and Irish Wolfhounds.

Ralph's “third retirement,” in 2008, was a move for him, Maureen, and their two Irish Wolfhounds (Rosie and Elena), to Canyon Lake, TX. There in the beautiful Hill Country they lived for ten years, enjoying life, the community, their family and friends, and their beloved dogs. There they hosted visitors, with Ralph treating them to many a home-cooked Italian meal.

Parkinson's Disease
It was in 2010 that Dr. Palumbo was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease.
Ralph and Maureen managed and adapted as his illness progressed over time, ultimately deciding to leave Texas in March of 2018 to relocate to Denver, CO. where they had the close family support of Kenneth and Esther McKeever, Paloma and Alo. Maureen, an RN and psychotherapist as well as Ralph’s loving wife, made the ideal partner with her “Rafael” as they continued to work together as a team to care for his health. Ralph Palumbo, a Navy veteran and physician, faced his diagnosis and his progressive, incurable illness, with courage and acceptance. And he fought back.
He exercised and pushed himself and never complained. Whenever he could not find the right word, or would lose a thought, he kept his response constrained to a natural sense of frustration and nothing more. Maureen loved him dearly as his wife, and she felt great honor and deep satisfaction as his care partner as well.

Ralph R. Palumbo is remembered by those who knew and loved him.

Maureen Cassidy Palumbo:
Speak Softly Love
(Love Theme from ‘the Godfather"")

Speak softly, love
And hold me warm against your heart
I feel your words
The tender trembling moments start
We’re in a world, our very own
Sharing a love that only few have ever known

Wine-colored days warmed by the sun
Deep velvet nights when we are one

Speak softly, love
So no one hears us but the sky
The vows of love
We make will live until we die
My life is yours and all because
You came into my world with love so softly love

Ralph came into my life on a dark and stormy night on Padre Island, Texas on December 7, 1989. As I climbed the wooden stairs on this bitterly cold night to the bar above where a singles group was meeting, little did I real-ize that my life would change forever. Six months later, we made our vows in a private ceremony on South Padre Island.

I have so many special memories of our marriage and life together…
A glass of red wine shared on the deck of our home on the canal on Padre Island, TX.
Talking quietly with 2 or 3 current Irish Wolfhounds at our feet.
Pizza every Friday night - Ralph's wind-down from the work week.
Ralph cooking wonderful dinners every night
Ralph and I would dine and sit and talk, sharing our bottle of Pellegrino.
Vacations at the Hotel Presidente' on Cozumel with relaxing days on the beach.
Snorkeling together while feeding the ‘fishies.'
Margaritas and wonderful meals served by our friends at the hotel.
Deep Sea fishing on the Jean Machine in the Yucatan off the coast of Cancun.
Escaping Christmas chaos with a trip to Chile and Argentina
Going across the Panama Canal
Designing a home together (our Happy Hill House) built around the kitchen stove.
Even with that large a kitchen, I'd get in his way.
Ralph was the ‘Lord of his kitchen'.
Living in the Texas Hill Country sharing the best of both worlds for five years.
Moving full time to Canyon Lake spending our retirement time living the love we knew for each other.

Every birthday, he promised me ten more years. How could we have known that PD would take from us our lovely growing-old-together golden dream? Being his Care Partner through our PD journey was an honor and a privilege.
Together we were a powerful team. He gave me his total trust. He gave me his love. And he gave expression when necessary, as only Ralph could do!

Ralph was my best friend, my lover, my mentor.
We spent our days living the love we knew for each other.
“Vivi bene, ridi spesso, e ama molto""
And we did! We had fun.
We lived, we laughed and we loved.
We shared ‘a love that few have ever known.'
Those vows of love we lived.
I carry his love now in my heart until the day I die.
Te amo, mi amor!

Chris Palumbo:
What I would say is that he was kind of a cross between Ernest Borgnine and Jackie Gleason. He also had the sense of responsibility of Ward Cleav-er. He had a pretty witty (and sometimes earthy or even goofy) sense of humor. Whenever I hear a Dean Martin recording where he is joking his way through one of his songs, it reminds me of him. He was never petty and always took the high road. He loved cooking (especially Italian), Christmas, and Irish wolfhounds, and earlier in life, vegetable and orna-mental gardening, golf, watching football (he always rooted for the of-fense, anybody’s offense), fishing trips, charcoal-grilled steak and beer. Like most people, he didn’t always know what to do in any given situation, but he usually didn’t let that get him down as long as he could have some fun along the way. He was the eternal optimist. He hated to lose a bet and for a while there he firmly believed he was literally going to live forever. He was very proud of being a Naval Officer, and most proud of being a physician, but took his role as “dad” more seriously than anything else.

Tina Palumbo Alwin:
I think what Chris wrote was perfect, and my memories are just that, my memories. When I put them on paper they don’t do justice to who he was. How do you talk about one of your earliest memories of cooking with your Dad and him dancing like a ballerina in the kitchen because he ate 2 batch-es of rum balls? Or that he got Chris and I these frogs in Panama, probably so I would stop collecting the electric caterpillars, and he wasn’t sure if they were poisonous, so ""just don’t pick them up!"" Or that we shopped in the Sears catalog for clothes, and he let me get knee socks even though we lived in the tropics. I love him for these times we shared, and that he took the time to be a part of our lives and create these memories.
There is the story of the rip tide in Acapulco. I remember Chris just looking at me, probably excited he might be an only child, but my Dad ran so fast into the water until he got knocked over by a wave. I always knew he was there with good advice from a life lived with honesty and integrity.
I remember when:
Pop taught me to do a lay-up and his knees hurt for weeks.
His face caught on fire when he burnt the bee's nest so we wouldn't get stung.
He got on the scale and weighed 250 pounds so he threw the scale away.
He watched me play goalie in a field hockey game...that had to be scary.
Pop took us on the greatest vacation ever - Acapulco!
Thank you, Pop, for those memories and so much more. Love, Tina

Duncan McKeever
Ralph's grace and dignity while suffering the effects of Parkinson's always impressed me. Lifetime character traits persist through the most difficult times and loss of higher functions. Ralph accepted his situation in a way I never could. I also remember he often had a kind or clever phrase to brighten a conversation or put someone at ease. I'd heard them before, but he knew how to make them work. He made ""you're super-duper"" work, which I could see was the perfect, simple thing to say to a home health care worker who would miss him when he left Texas.

Kenneth McKeever
Well I always appreciated that Ralph took care of my mom and made her feel loved. I remember one time in the 90s when I drove to Corpus for a visit Mom was busting my chops about not being social enough and hang-ing out and talking. I wanted to lie down for a while. Ralph told Mom to leave me alone and let me rest. And, I appreciated that and got to take my nap.

Maureen:
Ralph (literally) and I will be eternally grateful to Kenneth and Esther for suggesting that we move up here to Denver. Their values are such that we would always have family and a home here for us even if I were to die first. We were embraced by their extended family and of course, Paloma and Alo kept us high on endorphins, laughter and love. This plan gave Ralph tremendous peace as we moved forward.

Michele McKeever
I’ll always remember Ralph in the kitchen. He was an amazing cook and loved to share his creations. He took cooking seriously, and when he was in the kitchen he could have a booming voice at times and was not afraid of salty language. But underneath it was always clear that he had a soft, kind heart, a big love for his family, and of course the food was always amazing.
He had a sharp mind, he was funny, and he loved to tell stories about times with his kids in Panama, the Navy, playing college football for Mary-land, and practicing medicine. He loved his trips to Cozumel, deep sea fishing, and he adored his Irish wolfhounds.
The thing I will remember most about Ralph though is how much he loved my Mom. Seeing them together and the love they shared is a memory I will always keep in my heart.
He is deeply missed by his whole family.
I'm sure he is planning an amazing dinner for us all in the afterlife.

Sarah, a friend of Ralph and Maureen, was asked to share some words in memory of who he was. Taking this request literally, she came up with the following words:

Navy: Duty, Honor, Loyalty
Solid Character, the Quiet Hero
Distinguished, a Man of the World
Responsible, Conscientious
Diagnostician, Healer
A Repository of Knowledge
Integrity, Resolute, a Rock
Wise, Strong, Sage
Pragmatic, Dignified, Composed, Humorous
Devoted, Romantic, Generous
Storyteller, Well-read, Cultured
Lovable, Stalwart, Gentle, Sentimental
No-nonsense, Fun-loving
Connoisseur, Epicure, Sophisticated
Affectionate, Warm, True

Ralph R. Palumbo, U.S. Navy Captain and Medical Doctor, also known as “Doctor P,” “Dad,” ""Pop"" ""Sonny"" and “PopPop,” will be missed and remembered by his beloved wife of 28 years, Maureen Cassidy Palumbo, his son, Chris Palumbo of Houston, his daughter Tina Alwin (Steve) of Fort Worth, his stepsons Duncan McKeever of Warsaw, IL and Kenneth McKeever (Esther) of Denver, and stepdaughter Michele McKeever (Jason Coomer) of Austin. He was the much-loved “PopPop” of Berkley Alwin McIntire (Travis) of The Colony, TX; Olivia Drew Alwin, RN, and partner Chris Rader of Dallas; Paloma McKeever, 7, and Alondra McKeever, 5-1/2, of Denver. He was delighted to have become a great-grandfather in April to baby Lincoln McIntyre of The Colony.

Ralph is welcomed into eternal life by his loving father, Raphael Palumbo (died 1975, age 79), his mother Rachel Greco Palumbo (died 1968, age 62), his Auntie Viv (Vivian Ann (Greco) Berry, died 2016, age 95. Auntie Viv was more a sister than an aunt to him, and by his first wife, Jean Boitnott (died 1969, age 36).

Ralph would also be welcomed by Rita Muellar, RN and Elva Berrara, RN who predeceased him. Rita would once again make him blush if you blush in the afterlife. Elva was his friend, office manager and nurse, a loyal and wonderful woman.

Captain Ralph R. Palumbo, MD, USN, Ret. will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington D.C. with full military honors. His internment ceremony is expected to take place late this spring or in early summer. Relatives and friends will be notified of the chosen date, and are most welcome to attend this ceremony honoring his life and Navy service. Honorary pallbearers will be Juan Sygal, MD, David Wilson, MD, Jan Birchall, MD, Paul Kreska, MD, Bill Davis, MD, Lieutenant
Commander Matthew Nicola, MD,USN, Ret., Lieutenant Colonel Robert E. Maupin, USAF, Ret., and Donald Cardenas, MD.

Madhavi Patt, MD worked with Maureen and Ralph and was available around the clock. She practices like Ralph Palumbo MD used to practice. She is a physician and a healer. Included in this medical team was Aaron Haag, MD, neurologist, and Sundeep Viswanathan, MD, cardiologist. Dr. V. provided excellent guidance enabling Ralph to live comfortably despite his medically induced cardiac complications. Special thanks to the Denver Home Helpers, Doreen Boyer and Karen Knoblock who enabled Maureen to do the one on one care for her husband as they had planned.

Memorial contributions in Ralph’s name may be made to:
Disabled American Veterans
VA Regional Office
155 Van Gordon St.
Denver, CO 80225
or
Tommy Dubuque, Founder
Comal County Parkinson Support Group
Lone Star Parkinson Society
614C IH35 South PMB51
New Braunfels, Texas 78130

Arrangements by Horan and McConaty
HoranCares.com