Jerry Gaston of Water Mill Dies November 8

Jerry Gaston of Water Mill died on November 9 at the East End Hospice Kanas Center on Quiogue. He was 85.

He was the son of Leroy Gaston and Helen Carpenter. He was born in Newark, New York, and he had three siblings.

As a young boy, he was cared for by Inez Nelson until he went into the service.

After graduating high school, he went into the U.S. Air Force, and served from 1955 to 1959. During his years of active duty, he was stationed in Westhampton and Nova Scotia.

He met the love of his life, Loretta Alice Sikorski, at a dance at the Polish Hall in Riverhead in 1956. The two were married in the rectory of Our Lady of Poland Church on December 27, 1956.

As newlyweds, they lived in an apartment in Riverhead for a couple of years. They moved to the family farm in Water Mill in the 1960s, when Loretta’s brother Russell became ill and their help was needed. Gaston split his time between work and helping his father-in-law, Chester Sikorski, as needed on the farm on Deerfield Road.

The couple was blessed with two children, Jerry Gaston Jr. and Maria Gaston. They spent many happy years together playing cards with the family, traveling to Daytona, Florida, and enjoying volleyball games in the backyard at the family home.

Gaston worked for 32 years at the Long Island Lighting Company, where he was recognized for his great service and attendance. He won the perfect attendance award in 1994 for 10 consecutive years of never being absent from work.

He and his son worked together for many years mowing and fixing equipment, and many neighbors recall seeing Gaston mowing his lawn often or picking up litter along the road. He loved being active and outside mowing, walking, or swimming in the summertime.

In addition to being a great husband and father, his family said, he was a wonderful brother-in-law and uncle. He helped teach his sister-in-law, Irene Sikorski, to drive when no one else would, and in the 1980s, he helped move his sister-in-law, Diana Pillsworth, and her children, Valerie and Andrew, back to Long Island from upstate.

Gaston was a man who was always in motion. If he wasn’t walking, mowing, or working alongside his son, he could be found watching old Westerns or television shows with his wife. Family members will miss him for his wit and great sense of humor, and most of all, they will miss seeing how devoted he was to his wife. Theirs was a love that people dream of, but few find, his family said.

He was predeceased by his parents, Leroy and Helen; his siblings, Robert, James, and Thelma Fancett; his in-laws, Chester and Alice Sikorski nee Wolinski; his brother-in-law Russell Sikorski; and sisters-in-law, Diana Pillsworth and Irene Sikorski.

He is survived by his beloved wife of 65 years Loretta Gaston; his son Jerry Gaston Jr.; his daughter Maria Cawley nee Gaston and husband Denis; niece Valerie Hanley nee Pillsworth and her husband James R. Hanley, along with their children Harrison and Evelyn; and nephew Andrew Pillsworth.

Visitation will be held on Monday, November 14, from 4 to 8 p.m. at the O’Connell-Rothwell Funeral Home. A funeral Mass will be held on Tuesday, November 15, at 11 a.m. at the Our Lady of Poland Church in Southampton.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in his memory to Our Lady of Poland Church, East End Hospice Kanas Center, St. Jude’s Research Hospital, or to a cause of one’s choosing.