In Memoriam
Thomas D. Gill, Jr.
Tom Gill died on June 9, 2025. Here are the following remembrances:
Obituary
The Boston Globe
July 1, 2025
Tom Gill
1964 Yale gratuation
Thomas D. Gill, Jr., of West Palm Beach, Florida, beloved husband of Joanne (Jody) S. Gill, passed away on June 9, 2025.
Born in Hartford, Connecticut, he was the son of the late Judge Thomas D. Gill and Marie T. Gill. Tom was raised in West Hartford and graduated from Kingswood Academy before earning his undergraduate degree from Yale University.
Following college, Tom served four years in the United States Navy, volunteering as a swift-boat commander on the Mekong River in Vietnam during his final year.
Tom Gill
50th Yale reunion
Upon returning to the United States, he attended Columbia Law School, then clerked for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He began his legal career with Day, Berry & Howard in Hartford and, in 1982, moved to Boston to open a new office for the firm, where he became managing partner and remained until his retirement.
Throughout his life, Tom was deeply committed to civic and cultural organizations. In Hartford, he served on the boards of the Hartford and Connecticut Architectural Conservancies and as president of the Hartford YMCA. In Boston, he served as a director of the Boston Lyric Opera and Beacon Hill Seminars, and as a trustee of the Boston Athenaeum. He was also a trustee of the Society of the Four Arts in Palm Beach, Florida.
An avid sailor, Tom, alongside his wife Jody, cruised and raced across the globe, crossing both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Of all his sailing adventures, he most cherished his time in the waters off Maine near the family's beloved vacation home on Islesboro.
Tom is survived by his wife, Jody; three stepsons, Peter C. Forkner, Adam H. Forkner, and Benjamin S. Forkner; and three sisters, Kathleen G. Miller, Barbara E. Gill, and Margaret A. Gill.
Essay, 50th Reunion Book
by Tom Gill
May 2014
Four years in the Navy (destroyer and swift boat), followed by three in law school and a federal appeals court clerkship. Twenty-five years at a large New England law firm in its Hartford and, later, Boston office. Liked my firm and practice, but retired at 55; never looked back.
Two wives, both lawyers. Happily married to the second. Three stepsons, four grandchildren. Homes in Boston and Maine. Generally healthy and fit, with the usual age-appropriate infirmities, chiefly orthopedic.
A rewarding life on the whole, after accounting for the vicissitudes of one kind or another we all must face in 71 years. Sadly, I was defeated by my most daunting challenge: the afflictions of alcoholism and depression in a loved one, ending in her death.
Memories of Yale mixed, with no lasting friendships formed. Years after, I would have three partners from our class and one from ’65, who became good friends as well as colleagues. Yale’s most enduring effect may have been simply that the recollection of wasted opportunity was always a spur to greater effort in later life. The formative experience of my life would prove to be the years I spent in the Navy.
My wife and I have traveled widely in retirement, almost always involving hiking, biking, or sailing; the last loomed largest, amounting to some 50,000 miles of cruising, racing, and ocean sailing, including Pacific and Atlantic crossings. Also have taken many literature, history, and arts courses, live and on line, and joined assorted non-profit boards, all in the cultural arena. Opera is a special love. And good wine. Cigars, alas, are a thing of the past.
I wind up content and optimistic, with a full life I very much hope to extend for a reasonable additional period. I’m a physicalist, not a dualist, and not religious. I do think about death from time to time, but don’t brood about it. I like to apply the QTR (quality time remaining) principle to decisions; I find it permits a generous amount of self-indulgence. I don’t think in terms of a legacy beyond whatever skills and insights I may pass on to the next two generations of family. It does not trouble me in the least that when they are gone I’ll be forgotten.
And now for a glass of wine before dinner.
