Roger M. Coleman

Roger M. Coleman passed away on November 7, 2020 in Bluffton, S.C. at the age of 81. He was born April 20, 1939 in Brooklyn, N.Y. and just celebrated 51 years of marriage to his wife, Gladys, this past June.

Roger, the youngest of three brothers, grew up in Brooklyn and attended St. Francis Preparatory School. He and his family moved to Oakdale, N.Y., when he was in his teens. He studied diesel engineering as a young man, but moved into banking in the 1960s and went to night school, earning a Bachelor's from Queens College and an MBA from Fordham University.

He and Gladys married in 1969 and settled several years later in Malverne, N.Y. He worked during his nearly 40-year banking career  in New York City, New Jersey and Long Island, first with Chemical Bank and then with Midland Marine Bank/HSBC. He retired in 2004. He had two children, Joseph and Linda, from an earlier marriage.

Though he spent his professional life in banks, Roger was the consummate handyman. He hung wallpaper, painted indoors and outdoors, and refurbished kitchen cabinets and countertops. He renovated the bathrooms. At Christmas, he set up an elaborate arrangement of antique toy trains and tracks ­– complete with small houses and a snow-dusted landscape – beneath a well-decorated tree. He once took over the garage for weeks to remove, repair, and restore the engine of a 1967 Pontiac.

Roger was an avid follower of sports. Football, baseball, basketball, tennis an golf – he watched it all. As an old Brooklyn Dodgers fan, he had a soft spot for underdogs: he became a Baltimore Orioles fan after they lost to the New York Mets in the 1969 World Series. He and Gladys traveled widely over the years, visiting nearly all the countries of Europe. They went on cruises up the coast of Alaska, down the Danube, and through the Panama Canal.

In recent years, they bought a house in Bluffton and moved there permanently in 2016, allowing Roger to concentrate on a lifelong – if often frustrating – passion: golf. The back of their new home looked out over the rolling greens of a golf course.

He is survived by Gladys, his older brother Gerald, his children Joseph and Linda, and his grandchildren, Ema and Sean. A small family ceremony is planned for this week. In lieu of flowers, gifts may be made to Alzheimer Disease-related charities. A list of such organizations can be found at: https://www.verywellhealth.com/leading-alzheimers-and-dementia-charities-and-organizations-4145316.

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