Mr. John J. O'Neill
Of Blue Bell, PA passed on April 11, 2016 at age 89. Born in Philadelphia, he was raised in Easton, PA. He is survived by his wife Claire, daughter Cynthia (Mark Blume), son John M (Stephanie), three nieces and one nephew. He served in the US Navy during WWII on the USS Tranquility and was recalled during the Korean War. He graduated from Temple University and did graduate work at Penn. After military service, he worked on programming for commercial companies before joining Burroughs as a computer engineer. While at Burroughs/Unisys, he worked on a program to evaluate Atlas'' Launch Guidance capabilities for manned flight, on the Mercury program. He was lead programmer for the Gemini space flight and also for communication for the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, US Air Force, NASA, US Army, NY Clearing House, Canadian Department of Defense and SWIFT (Society of the World-wide Inter-Bank Financial Telecommunication. John worked on NORAD, ADRC and AMPS secure messaging programs. His work resulted in a patent.
John was devoted to his family and will be remembered for his gentle nature, quick wit, great sense of humor, smiles, intellectual and analytical skills and kind hearted nature. Claire and John met at Temple, enjoyed 65 wonderful years of marriage, vacations at Cape Cod, travel and gatherings with family and friends.
John''s memorial service will be held Friday April 15th at 11 am at St Thomas Church Whitemarsh, Bethlehem Pike and Camp Hill Road, Whitemarsh, PA 19034. Interment will be private.
Contributions in his memory may be made to the American Cancer Society or the charity of your choice.