Mcnamara, Emmet J. Jr.

TROY- Emmet Joseph McNamaraJr, 92, passed away on Friday, November 18, 2022 after a brief illness.

Born and raised in Buffalo, Emmet was the beloved son of the late Emmet J. and Elizabeth Campbell McNamara; loving husband of the late Patricia Neelon McNamara; devoted brother of the late Margaret M. McNamara and the late Elizabeth M. (Harry) Yates II; and cherished father of Kathleen M. McNamara (Lawrence Lichtenstein). He is also survived by nephews Bradford Neelon and Michael (Kathryn) Neelon and family.

A graduate of Canisius High School, Emmet earned his B.S. from Canisius College and an M.Ed from Buffalo State College. He served proudly in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. As an academic and career counselor at the Cooperative College Center, an extension of the State University of New York at Buffalo now known as the E.O.C, for 21 years, he helped students of all ages and was the center’s UUP faculty/staff representative. Emmet fulfilled his dream of settling in the west of Ireland, having found the most wonderful thatched cottage and community in the village of Rostaff, Co. Mayo, where he and Patti filled their home with new and old friends and family amid much laughter, singing, and love. After Patti’s untimely death, Emmet joined sisters Peg and Susie and daughter and son-in-law Kathleen and Larry in travel adventures while returning every year to Rostaff. Humble and generous, wise and witty, Emmet valued compassion, imagination, social justice, history, selflessness, spontaneity, and his family and dear friends with uncommon devotion. As the Irish say, Ní bheidh a leithéid arís ann: There will never be another like him.

A memorial Mass and celebration of life for both Emmet and sister Peg will be held at St. Michael’s Church, 651 Washington Street, Buffalo, NY on Friday, March 17, 2023 at 10:30 AM. Memorials, if so desired, may be made to the Dean Karen Tidmarsh ’71 Scholarship Fund, Bryn Mawr College Development Office, 101 N. Merion Avenue, Bryn Mawr, PA, 19010.