Joseph J. Lucas Jr., 76, Was Hartford Physician

Joseph John Lucas Jr., a physician who practiced nearly four decades in Hartford, Conn., before retiring to Chilmark eight years ago, died in the company of his closest family members on Feb. 4 due to complications related to Parkinson's disease. He was 76.

Joseph was born April 14, 1929, in Garfield, N.J., to Anna Szott Lucas, an immigrant from Prussia, and Joseph Lucas, a native of Yonkers, N.Y. Young Joseph spent his childhood in Schenectady, N.Y. While he was a schoolboy, World War II broke out, and Joseph used to lie awake at night listening to radio dispatches from the front. When U.S. troops landed in Italy, Joseph developed a fascination with that country and often pondered what life might be like there, ultimately deciding he needed to go to find out.

He was graduated from Villanova University in 1952 with a pre-medical science degree. Then, fulfilling his radio dreams, he set sail for Italy to study medicine at the University of Rome. While there, he lived in an apartment on the Corso Trieste with three other American medical students. This foursome shared ownership of a Fiat 500, and crammed into it on weekends and holidays to explore the country. Often they ended up at the ski station of Terminillo in the Appenines outside of Rome. Despite the heavy wooden boards that passed as skis, the uncomfortable lace-up boots and the unwieldy cable bindings, Joseph developed a lifelong love for skiing during that time.

Back on Corso Trieste, some plotting was going on. Unbeknownst to young Joseph, a gregarious young Romana named Vanda Fanelli lived with her family in the apartment above. She told her friend, Anna Venanzi: "There are four American students living downstairs. I'm going to jump out the window to meet them!"

Though she never made that jump, one day Vanda made a leap of another sort. She spotted Joseph in the elevator and hailed him. "Do you want to come to a party tonight?" she asked. Though shy, he accepted the invitation from the young Vanda, who would turn out to be the love of his life. Two years later the couple married. At 7 a.m. on Monday, Nov. 14, 1955, they exchanged vows in the third chapel on the left of St. Peter's Basilica.

In 1957 Joseph was graduated from the University of Rome with a degree in medicine. The couple returned to his home town of Schenectady, where Joseph completed his internship at Ellis Hospital. His first appointment was to the University of Nebraska, where he served as a resident in internal medicine through June 1961. It was during this time that their first daughter, Elizabeth, was born.

In 1961 the young family settled in West Hartford, Conn., fulfilling another dream of Joseph's: to live in New England. There, he opened a private practice in internal medicine and soon became a staff physician at Hartford's St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center. It was during this period that the couple's daughters Monique and Jacqueline were born.

Joseph's practice thrived, and he developed a specialty in geriatrics. Ultimately, he became medical director of two convalescent hospitals, Hughes Convalescent and Lorraine Manor, in West Hartford. And for several years he taught at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine in Farmington.

As a young family, the Lucas clan continued to indulge Joseph's passion for skiing. He and Vanda would pile the girls into their Buick sedan almost every weekend and head up to Butternut in Massachusetts, or to Stratton, Magic or Sugarbush in Vermont. Later, as his love of the mountain life intensified, Joseph began taking the family on ski trips farther afield, to the Rockies and Europe.

The family also traveled often to Italy to see grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. They spent summers in Rome and at Vanda's family home in Le Marche. And in the winter they skied in the Dolomites and the Alps -- this time cramming the girls and Vanda's sister into a later model Fiat to make the long trip north from Rome to the mountains.

At the same time, Joseph always stressed the importance of education for his three daughters. He and Vanda sent the girls to Renbrook and Ethel Walker schools in the Hartford area. And when the girls went off to college, Joseph and Vanda made countless trips around New England and to Washington, D.C., to support them in their educational pursuits.

In the late 1980s, Joseph and Vanda began visiting Martha's Vineyard. They loved the quiet wooded lanes and wide beaches. In 1990, they bought a house off Tea Lane in Chilmark. Though they still had the practice in Hartford, Joseph and Vanda spent as much time as possible on the Vineyard. Joseph adored the simplest tasks around that house -- painting, mowing the lawn, planting the garden and doing battle with the deer and wild turkeys.

In 1994 he closed the office in Hartford, but continued to serve as medical director at the two convalescent hospitals. With a reduced schedule, Joseph and Vanda were able to travel to see their growing brood of grandchildren: Andrew on the Vineyard, Kristina and Kevin in California at the time, and Esmé and Adriana then in Prague. And with daughters in California and Europe, Joseph and Vanda had the opportunity to explore regions and countries they had never had the chance to visit.

In 1998 Joseph retired from the hospital jobs as well, and he and Vanda moved full-time to the Vineyard. They continued to ski and travel. And while on the Island, they always enjoyed simple Italian repasts washed down by a hearty Chianti or a light Frascati. Joseph kept plenty busy working in the garden and watching football (the Patriots and the Giants, of course) and ice hockey (the Bruins, please). Last fall, Joseph and Vanda celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary with all of their beloved children and grandchildren in attendance. Vanda and Joseph both declared the pizza to be almost as good as that which they used to share on the Corso Trieste while courting.

A memorial service for Joseph was held Feb. 6 at Our Lady Star of the Sea Church in Oak Bluffs. He is survived by his wife, Vanda Fanelli Lucas; daughters Elizabeth Randall of Chilmark, Monique Conroy of Easthampton and Jacqueline Lucas of Port Chester, N.Y.; his mother, Anna Lucas, of Schenectady, N.Y.; two brothers and one sister; five grandchildren, and three sons in law. They will all miss him terribly. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations in Joseph's memory be made to Hospice of Martha's Vineyard.