Nicholas D’Arcy Roche

Gathering friends, family, and neighbors around their dinner table allowed D’Arcy to exercise his salesman’s gift for Irish toasts, long-winded storytelling, and the airing of ideas that sometimes blurred the line between provocative and controversial. He had a knack for connecting with people and forged friendships with everyone from neighbors and ski instructors to healthcare providers and fellow travelers with a twinkle in his eye and a ready laugh.

Central to D’Arcy in his later life was his role as “PopPop,” the name his oldest grandchildren gave him, slyly refusing his preferred choice, “Grandfather.” Despite this minor setback, he relished the role, eagerly taking the grandkids every winter to Telluride, where he loved nothing more than skiing the black diamonds alongside them. PopPop’s Summer Camp was another regular event featuring tents in the San Mateo backyard, barbecues, ghost stories, and Stephanie’s favorite, See’s candy pops.

D’Arcy started his adult journey in New York City where he graduated from Columbia University in 1960 and rowed varsity heavyweight all four years - an unusual feat. While he received a degree in English that inspired a lifelong love of high-brow literature, he was just as likely to be caught with a low-brow airplane thriller.

In NYC, D’Arcy met his first wife, Marilyn Miller Roche, who predeceased him in 2003. They first connected at an Irish pub in Manhattan during the go-go days of the early 1960s, at a time when they both worked at Big Blue - aka IBM - the tech behemoth of its day. Their peripatetic IBM life took D’Arcy and Marilyn from NYC to Philadelphia to Washington, DC, with five boys - Sean, Jamie, Matt, Stephan, and Scott - arriving along the way. The seven of them eventually settled in Wilton, CT, where he and Marilyn raised their boys and he spent countless hours pacing pool decks all over New England watching his boys’ swim meets.

Throughout this time, D’Arcy climbed the corporate ladder at IBM, transitioning to marketing and achieving the 25th anniversary mark and a gold-plated IBM watch. Not long afterward D’Arcy took a star turn working as a Silicon Valley startup CEO before finally retiring in San Mateo, CA, in a home his sons Jamie and Matt designed and built. The San Mateo house has been the site of major family events ever since.

In addition to Marilyn, D’Arcy was predeceased by his son Scott in 1998 and his sister Helen McCarty earlier this year. Along with his wife Stephanie and stepdaughter Dana Twomey, he is survived by a constellation of other loved ones including his sister Katharine Porter, his four remaining sons (Sean, Jamie, Matthew, and Stephan), their spouses (Cindy Klein Roche, Talbott Hoskins Roche, Kara Putney Roche, and Catherine Cawood Roche), and nine grandchildren (Alex Roche, Courtenay Roche, Cecile Jackonis (Logan Jackonis), Caroline Roche, Scott Roche, Griffin Roche, Sam Klein Roche, Kate Roche, and Alison Roche).

A viewing will be held on Friday, August 8, from 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m., with a 7:00 p.m. Rosary service at Sneider & Sullivan Funeral Home in San Mateo, CA. The memorial service to celebrate his life will be on Saturday, August 9, at 1:00 p.m. at St. Catherine of Siena Catholic Church in 1310 Bayswater, Burlingame. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Stone Research Foundation or the Glaucoma Research Foundation.