Joseph Nemec Jr.

1940 - 2022

Joseph Nemec, Jr.
July 15th, 1940 - January 4th, 2022
Joseph Nemec, Jr., 81, of Old Greenwich, CT, passed away in his own home on January 4, 2022 after a fifteen-year battle with Parkinson's Disease. Better known simply as "Joe," he was the third of four siblings, his elder sisters being Jara and Marie, his younger sister Lida. Born in Prague, Czechoslovakia to Joseph and Marie (née Karlikova) Nemec on July 15th, 1940, he spent the first nine years of his childhood in the house his parents owned on Betlémské námestí, a square in Central Prague, across from the Betlémské kapli or Bethlehem Chapel, where the early Protestant Jan Hus preached. The rise of Communism radically altered the trajectory of Joe's idyllic childhood: his father was a member of the Czech army prior to Chamberlain's capitulation and the Nazi occupation and, following it and until the advent of Communism in Czechoslovakia, an entrepreneur who opened a driving school in the Czech capital that made him a small fortune. But his vocal anti-Communism left the entire family in danger, and he defected, followed soon after by Joe, his three sisters, and their mother, who crawled across the border in the middle of the night on Christmas of 1949. Given refuge in France (via Switzerland) in 1950, they lived in Nice, learning French and eventually winning citizenship in Canada in 1952, to where Joe emigrated at the age of 12 together with his parents and siblings. Residing in Montréal, Québec and eventually in the village of Rawdon in the hilly Lanaudière region, Joe joined the Canadian Army in his university years and rose to be first in his class at the Collège militaire royal de Saint-Jean, the then francophone West Point of Canada, located some 40 kilometers south of Montréal, toward the Vermont border. A change of interests led him to leave a military career for engineering. He won a scholarship to pursue his education in the United States at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and, beginning in 1961, earned what he fondly referred to as the "triple crown": B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from MIT, the doctorate in Civil Engineering (working on concrete creep with applications to solid fuel for rockets), conferred in 1967. On July 1, 1967, Joe married Jutta "Judy" Magnus, and they had three children, Joseph (1969), John (1971), and Michael (1973). After graduation, he landed his first job as a Lecturer at McGill University, where he taught from 1967-1970. Subsequently, he again changed careers and found his calling, working at Booz Allen & Hamilton for more than thirty-five years (1970-2006), all but the first years out of the New York office, where he quickly became a partner (after only three years) and played an instrumental role in the company's growth into a consulting powerhouse. His tenure at Booz Allen culminated with his longstanding position as Senior Vice President, and over the years he was responsible for running Booz Allen's New York Office, the entire Commercial Business, the I.T. consulting practice when it was first developed, and all of North American operations. He designed and spearheaded a "One Firm" initiative toward the end of his career, which sought fully to integrate Booz Allen's Commercial and Government consulting practices. Upon retirement, Joe served on the boards of Black and Veatch and Florida East Coast Industries. The former created an award in Business Ethics in his name. Joe is survived by his beloved wife Judy, his three children, five grandchildren (AJ, Meryl, Rowan, Finlay, and Barrett), and two of his sisters, Jara Burnett and Lida de Fougerolles. (His third sister, Marie Nemcová Banerjee passed some weeks before him, on October 31, 2021.) Remembered most for his lavish generosity, ceaseless determination, love of travel, and love of family, he was a devoted husband, father, grandfather, brother, uncle, and friend. A funeral was held for him on January 14th in St. Clement Church in Stamford, Connecticut. He was laid to rest in a family plot in the Fairlawn Cemetery in the Catskills town of Prattsville, NY. "In lieu of flowers," please send donations in Joseph Nemec's name to support Person to Person of Darien, CT or to the Child Guidance Center of Southern Connecticut of Stamford, CT.