John Laddomada, retired Chaminade math teacher and avid golfer, dies at 75

Seaford’s John Laddomada was an electrical engineer and then a high school math teacher. But, say family and friends, he may have been less either of those things than he was one other: a golfer.

"He was a goal setter, and one of his goals was: ‘I want to golf in all 50 states,’ " said one of his children, Kristine Laddomada Santarpia, of Hicksville. "He made it to 44” before he died of a heart attack at his home on Oct. 20, at age 75. "He was supposed to go to Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas and Texas with my brothers in the fall. And then he was going to have his last hole at the first state in the United States, Delaware," his daughter said.

That historical whim was in keeping with a man who was "very bright and knew a lot about a lot of things," said Andy Habermann, of New Hyde Park, an old golfing buddy and a former work colleague at the Catholic high school Chaminade in Mineola. "One of his daughters told me that they would play word games with him and he would always win."

But Laddomada was more than a man of the mind, his daughter said. For years, summer meant a cross-country camping road trip with their mother, Jeanne, who died in 2018, and the five kids. "I got to see most of the United States, camping," Santarpia said.

Calling her father "a quiet guy but a strong personality ... like a walking contradiction," she described him as "a math guy who loved the arts. We went to concerts together all the time. He loved plays. He loved movies. ... And when it came to sports, he was at all of our games. With five kids, I really still don’t know how he did it. And he coached a lot of our teams."

John Rocco Laddomada was born Aug. 16, 1950, in Brooklyn, the eldest of three children of Italian-immigrant laborer Peter Armond Laddomada and Veronica Dolores Manzione Laddomada. He attended the now-defunct St. Catharine of Alexandria School and Xaverian High School, and after graduation attended the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, now the NYU Tandon School of Engineering. He received his bachelor of science in electrical and electronics engineering in 1972, and his master of science in engineering/industrial management in 1975.

He had met financial and legal secretary Jeanne Marie Knice at a Brooklyn disco in 1969, his family said, adding that she had announced to her parents that very night she had met the man she would marry. "Her parents were not thrilled," Santarpia said. But the relationship blossomed and the two wed on May 27, 1972.

By then Laddomada had begun a career at New York Telephone, first as a buildings engineer and later a revenues supervisor, according to the family. When the utility became part of NYNEX, itself later part of Verizon Communications, Laddomada became director of affiliated interests, interfacing with such entities as the New York Public Service Commission and the FCC.

In a career change, he earned a master’s degree in secondary education and teaching from Hofstra University in Hempstead in 1996. That fall he began teaching mathematics and computer courses at Holy Cross High School in Flushing, Queens, where he also coached the golf team. From 2003 until his retirement in 2012, he taught math and computers at Chaminade.

Throughout, the devoutly Catholic Laddomada was active at St. William the Abbot Church in Seaford, where his effort included eucharistic ministry, bringing the eucharistic host to congregants unable to travel to Sunday Mass. Her parents’ faith, Santarpia said, helped sustain them shortly after their marriage when they lost their first child, Jennifer, to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Although they would have five more children, "We memorialized her every year on April 3, her birthday," said Santarpia.

In addition to his daughter, Laddomada is survived by sons John, of North Bellmore, and Peter, of Shoreham; daughters Jeannine Dillon and Mary Bennett, both of Hicksville; his brother, Peter, of Howard Beach, Queens; and several grandchildren. A sister, Roseann Abitante, predeceased him.

Visitation was on Oct. 24 at the Charles G. Schmitt Funeral Home in Seaford, followed by a Mass at St. William the Abbot Church the next day. Laddomada was cremated and his ashes buried in a private ceremony at St. Charles / Resurrection Cemeteries in Farmingdale on Friday.

In a final nod to their father’s love of golf, Laddomada's children on his 75th birthday presented him with a green jacket in homage to that awarded the winner of each’s year’s Masters Tournament. "We were going to have him wear it in Delaware" and his 50th U.S. golf course, Santarpia said.