This website was created in memory of Dave Foley who passed away on December 8, 2013. He was a dear colleague who touched many people in his work and life. He will be sorely missed.
There was a memorial service for Dave on Friday Dec 20, 2013 at the Monterey NOAA lab where he has worked for the past 10 years. There are pictures from that event. It didn't seem quite right to post them here, so I have posted them on a flicker account:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69121141@N07/sets/72157639535636284/
Thank you to everyone who attended.
Tributes
Leave a tributeFoleys Sheffield U K
Sean
The Foley Family, Sheffield U.K.
cheers
Stephen
It was not until this morning, on the first anniversary of Dave's passing, that I realized December 8th is also the day John Lennon was killed.
Dave would have loved the irony.
Dave has been my friend since age seven, and so much of what I am today came through our adventures of growing up together.
We shared a love of music, the beach, Jimi Hendrix, hanging out, riding bicycles, computers, Dungeons and Dragons, Science-Fiction, Benny Hill, camping, girls, the Beatles, wit, humor, Monty Python, adventure, pranks, jokes, swimming, learning and pushing the limit.
After he graduated from Cornell and went out west, his visits back east to Shoreham became less and less frequent and we gradually lost touch.
I had hoped that with our upcoming 30th high school reunion I would have the opportunity to give my dear friend a big hug and melt away the years, but, alas, that is not to be.
Looking back at his life's work, I know that in a quiet moment, after the sun had set and as he stood on the deck of a ship or on some distant beach, he would gaze upon the vast ocean and, with fondness, recall those wonderful nights when our small coterie of friends would sit around a fire staring out into to Long Island Sound and enjoy each others company. I know I do.
I am sorry that neither Ken nor David will have the opportunity to relive the experience.
I will pray for them and for Babs and Stephen.
Valerie
Dave epitomized the two-pronged data service and research philosophy of the original Pacific Environmental Group and the innovative spirit of ERD today and, hopefully, in the future, regardless of its form and location. Dave was an adept technician and programmer. But he also was quite an insightful and productive scientist. He was sought out by researchers on grants and papers not for his pedigree but based on his proven knowledge and insight of oceanography. Dave’s keen ability to integrate across disciplines and data sources took CoastWatch and PFEL data services beyond archiving and map making, to developing truly useful and informative analyses and products critical to the stewardship of living resources and healthy ecosystems.
To the degree that Dave was an iconoclast, he fit in perfectly at PFEL. He freely shared his opinion about red tape, but understood when it was necessary to feed and care for the bureaucratic beast. Anyone who worked with Dave had the experience of deliberating about some task, and Dave ending the discussion by declaring “Oh, I’ll just go do it”. And he would “go do it”, well and on schedule.
As lab director, Dave made PFEL - and me - look good and deliver big countless times. We are less for his premature departure from our world, but greater for having Dave as a co-worker, a colleague, a friend.
Aloha Dave...
Our memories are mainly of David as a young child and teenager. My brother Ken brought the family over to South Wales and Sheffield and we visited them on Long Island
He was a good looking, clever, shy boy with a very good sense of humour. I tried to outsmart him using the British sense of irony but he soon got onto it.
He once said of me, “Uncle Tom was very funny but now he is just a Funky Phantom”
I saw similar characteristics in him to those of his father. Ken was a working class boy from South Wales who won a scholarship to Oxford, gaining a D Phil in Physics and a career in Particle Physics at Brookhaven Labs L.I. There was the same dedication to work.
David lived life to the full and as well as working very hard, perhaps too hard, at his job, he always found time to have fun with his many friends. He also inspired many young students by showing them that science can be great fun if you work hard enough.
He will be remembered by his family and his friends in many walks of life for the contribution that he made to their lives.
My thought for this post was to trawl through the many short emails Dave and I exchanged in the hopes of producing some sort of collage his hilariously quirky and witty character. But as I looked through these emails, what struck me was not his humor or his whimsical style (which I am always aware of!) but what a good friend he has been to me. Aside from our regular chats on gmail, I found dozens of emails from Dave checking in on me through various moves, trips, holidays, birthdays, and many cat-related fiascos. I wish I could remember the details of what I didn’t realize would be our last brief chat last weekend.
Dave found amusement and absurdity in so many small things. I think the list of things that most remind me of Dave demonstrates this well: carrot juice, armadillos, origami, “zen banana slugs”, EFH (I can explain, Elliott), ninja outfits, mola high fives, the colour purple, CLIOTOP wives, “Victoria Island”, bean bag chairs, butterfly cookies, rationed meat food, the wanderings of albatrosses…
Dave, you will be missed.
I first met Dave and got to know him our freshman year at Cornell, we were on the same dorm room floor in Baker Hall. I must admit it took me a little time to gain an appreciation for Dave’s unique wry humor and way of seeing things. We became good friends even though we didn’t always quite agree.
I knew Dave was wicked smart, and liked that he was (almost always) modest and unassuming about his talents - he could hit a great baseline tennis shot, wing a Frisbee, and who knew what a good cook he would become?
Though our paths would not cross as often as we would have liked after college, I had great fun and memorable times with Dave over the years in LA, Hawaii, and CA. I never knew what to expect, and that always had the best results – stopping by LA to catch up would turn into a ride on that sail boat up the coast would then become a house party with new interesting people to meet. Dave never hesitated to hop an island or drive hundreds of miles to give a ride for his friends. I guess one of Dave’s greatest gifts was his generosity of spirit, his love of the journey. I wish he could have taken better care of his health.
I did not see Dave very much in the last handful of years, and this is my loss. I am very happy that Dave had the chance to meet my wife Hifumi and our sons – all became fast friends. They were good times seeing Dave get down on his hands and knees and play with little children.
Wave, my friend, I will miss you.
On to that distant shore.
I first met you more than 20 years ago when you where one of the ringers on our softball team, the Young Guns. I think you played center field because you where so fast. Remember we won first place in our division in the LA league. At that time you lived in the Marina Del Rey and worked/taught at USC, I think. You took me on a research vessel with your students who where studying habit quality just off coast from the Hyperion Treatment Plant. The theory was that the sewage-overflows were creating abundant nutrients for fish species. It made me so mad that something as bad as sewage could be good. That was typical of you, Dave, always dispelling my prejudices.
Now in hind site I believe it was these discussions with you that lead me, an architect by training - a builder of structures, to becoming a proponent of watershed health and reduced urban runoff.
You had a way of often redirecting my anger aimed at humans. I was always spouting on about “healing” the earth and educating people about the negative impact of their behavior on the environment. You made fun of me, in a nice way, saying the planet will be just fine.
Later I visited you in Hawaii with my sister. And again we visited you in Monterey with our 3 rambunctious children. The kids drove us crazy but you where cool as a clam.
The last time I saw you was unexpectedly at a World Ocean Conference in Long Beach. You seemed frenzied, off to another conference. We didn’t have time to talk.
You emailed me about 2 weeks ago that you have moved to Santa Cruz. How I wish I had picked up the phone to chat.
Dave, you had a way of putting everything/everyone's needs in front of your own. You are my only friend at NOAA. I felt good knowing you where working for an organization that studies and protects the ocean's health. But you didn’t look after yourself. Thank you for your service as a friend and a fellow ocean lover.
Love and will miss you
Isabelle
I honestly don't know what to say other than you were one of my favorite collaborators, a great traveling partner, and consummate friend. Dining in Charleston with you during the satellite course was such a treat. Your appreciation of food, including the amazing food you cooked for us when we had Phoebe was unforgettable. Thank you so much.
You will be missed.
Dave had downloaded some software from our French web site at the end of November and had said " hi ". My colleague and I answered; I was happy at the idea of reconnecting …. but the communication has stopped before I got to learn how he was doing. This is a big loss.
I want to express my heartfelt condolences to all his relatives and close friends. Bon courage à tous,
Anne Petrenko
Peace
In 1984, Dave was a curious creature. He was my freshman college roommate (one of three). I remember waking up in the middle of the night or coming home late from a party and finding Dave sitting on the couch in the common area of our dorm suite, with the lights out and the television off. This seemed odd. I quickly got used to it. He was shy back then—I don’t really remember him coming out of his shell until later in college—so if I asked him what he was thinking about, he’d usually look away, and then with a grin say something about a mathematical or scientific problem that I didn't understand. At first, I thought he was ribbing me (early in our relationship he liked to tease me with such subtlety that I was never really sure when he was or was not being fecetious). In time, I began to realize that Dave really did like to be alone in those moments. It was his time to be with that extraordinary mind of his. Thinking back now, he appears to me almost sage-like.
Through college, Dave became more of a friend, though truth be told, he was closer to my then girlfriend than he was to me—they shared a disdain for the college social activities in which I indulged. When my girlfriend went through some tough times, Dave took care of her. When she and I graduated and moved to New York, Dave went West, though he would come back and visit. When she and I went through the roughest of our rough patches, Dave, who prided himself at that time on being both a matchmaker and a caretaker, tried to counsel us. He wanted us to be happy and together so badly that he talked me into waking her up one New Year’s eve at 3 a.m. and proposing to her, which I did while he waited outside the room. Even at the time I knew it was a bad idea, but I followed his advice. I figured Dave knew better than I did and that with commitment the situation would improve. The relationship ended before we made it to the altar.
I visited Dave in Los Angeles a number of times. One time I told that I didn't want to put him out so I was going to stay in a hotel. Wanting to play host, he talked me to stay with him instead. When I arrived, he picked me up in his art-car (covered in seashells) and surprised me with, “We aren’t going to stay at my place…I don’t have a place right now, but it is no big deal, I’ve got us set up,” and courtesy of a mutual friend who has also written on this site (Ashley), we stayed in a large Hollywood home where she was house-sitting. The situation was perfect until the third night when the owner phoned to say that he was coming back early and Ashley needed to be out immediately. That night I ended up sleeping on the floor in Dave’s campus office (he kept a sleeping bag there) while he pulled an all-nighter working at his computer on a report that was due in the morning.
I never made it to Hawaii. David regularly traveled back to the mainland, and seemed to periodically ‘pop up’ in my life, often arriving on short notice. Visiting my now-wife Shelly and I in Seattle, I remember Dave almost bragging about the life he had made for himself out in the middle of the Pacific. I remember him talking about the incredible flora and fauna, of sea turtles, of living in near isolation “on the other side of the island.” He talked about his love of being on the water. About spending time on FLIP ships. And about having this second-life as a producer/promoter of local bands.
Then things seemed to change. As happens to all of us, he had what he saw as a professional setback. I don't remember the exact details but I remember that his aspirations to complete his PhD had been thwarted by some bureaucratic snafu. Understandably, he was very upset about it. He said that he would never be able to get the kind of job he wanted; that he would have to start his career over. I don't remember if he was still living in Hawaii when he told me this, though I think he was.
The next and last time I saw Dave was on December 28, 2008. I didn’t recognize him. He’d already been in Monterey by that point for probably five years. He emailed me on December 27th to say that he would be in New York the following day and that he wanted to visit. I told him to come up to the art gallery Shelly and I were running in Harlem.
Before lunch, a man and a woman walked into the gallery. The man smiled at me. I asked if I could help them. After a long, awkward silence, I realized it was Dave. Dave. Wow. He looked so much older. He had gained so much weight. His hair was cut short. Even knowing it was him, it took me a long time to see through the surface of this person who was standing in front of me to the person I had always known.
The four of us went and had lunch at our favorite Mexican restaurant, then headed back to our apartment, where we spent the next six-plus hours talking, laughing, and drinking rum. Dave didn’t look like he was in great physical shape—he was too, too big, there was no question about that—but he didn’t look anything like he does in the most recent pictures. (I am still in disbelief that this boyish creature could age so quickly.) He was in excellent spirits; he still had that puckish charm. We talked about everything—it seemed there wasn’t a conversation Dave couldn't carry--and he seemed to happy in his new life in Monterey, with new friends and colleagues, new work adventures, the softball team, and more. Well after dark, Dave’s friend Miranda motioned that it was time for them to go. I remember hugging his now large frame and him giving me a long, very sweet hug back. And I remember that when he left, I felt that he was leaving too soon.
Dave, I am going to miss you so much. It is hard for me accept the fact that several years from now, you won't surprise us with a visit. If there is a heaven, I imagine you are sitting quietly on a cloud in the dark, with a bemused look on your face, while radical light plays like music in your skull.
From A.R. Ammons, who taught at Cornell when we were there. Perhaps you already know it:
"He held radical light
as music in his skull: music
turned, as
over ridges immanences of evening light
rise, turned
back over the furrows of his brain
into the dark, shuddered,
shot out again
in long swaying swirls of sound:
reality had little weight in his transcendence
so he
had trouble keeping
his feet on the ground, was
terrified by that
and liked himself, and others, mostly
under roofs:
nevertheless, when the
light churned and changed
his head to music, nothing could keep him
off the mountains, his
head back, mouth working,
wrestling to say, to cut loose
from the high unimaginable hook:
released, hidden from stars, he ate,
burped, said he was like any one
of us: demanded he
was like any one of us."
Leave a Tribute
The Ballad of Dave Foley (E minor)
(found in one of his data notebooks)
He was promised the fog when he rolled into town
But the sun was shining bright and his boots kicked up the dust
He pitched his tent tight and settled in for the night
Praying for the moon to bring the chill on down
So curse the bright sun and the clear blue skies
I long for the fog and there I'd like to fly
Dave's Days at USC
The Red Dress Party
A number of years ago I decided we should have a "Red Dress Party", where everyone, regardless of their gender, wears a red dress. This is one of my favorite pictures of Dave, he's so happy and relaxed, and he looks strangely right at home in a red dress. The picture was taken on the back porch of the home that Dave has lived in for the past 8 years or so. Dave didn't live there when the party was held, but he moved in shortly therafter, when the previous tenant moved out of town.