Ellen (Doyle) Tassinari

BEVERLY - Ellen Tassinari, age 89, of Beverly, MA, was born in Salem to Joseph and Mary Alice (Hayes) Doyle, the twelfth child and the grand finale of a family of nine boys and three girls. She played the whole of her life that way: most remembered, impossible to follow. Her mother was a woman of extraordinary conviction — an electoral voter for Franklin D. Roosevelt and active in the Democratic Party, a woman who loaded her oldest children into the car to deliver food to neighbors in need. Sorrow arrived before Ellen was old enough to name it; she lost her mother at five, and the years that followed were not easy ones. What those years gave her was a gift she would carry for the rest of her life — a rare, beautiful ability to leave hardship exactly where it happened and move toward the next better thing without ever looking back.

Her two sisters, Ann and Mary, were her first and most faithful companions. In a house full of brothers who competed on courts and fields both locally and nationally, the three sisters built something quieter and more durable: a friendship that lasted a lifetime. For more than fifty years, they met weekly for "tea" — a ritual that had nothing to do with porcelain and everything to do with the particular comfort of women who have witnessed each other's whole lives and chosen to keep showing up.

A "friend-first" mother, Ellen raised eight children with fierce loyalty and a unique, one-on-one bond with each of them. To the Ryal Side neighborhood and her children's friends, she was simply "Mrs. T." The Tassinari home on Ashton Street always had an open door — a place for easy conversation where anyone, from neighborhood kids to cousins from next door, could stop by for a haircut, a cold popsicle, or a hot coffee. When life felt heavy, time spent in Mrs. T's kitchen had a way of making things lighter without ever making a project of it.

She was a natural athlete long before golf entered the picture. For years, she was a formidable tennis player — her daughter Ann her trusted doubles partner — and when she took up golf in her fifties, she did so with characteristic seriousness. She eventually played to an 18-handicap and, more importantly, preferred to walk the course. She played multiple times a week until she was 86, refusing the cart the way some people refuse to admit defeat. Her husband of 45 years, Philip Tassinari Sr., shared her love of golf and the bridge table, where he was known simply as The Count — a title earned by a playing style so distinctly his own that when Ellen later logged on under his name, his online opponents knew immediately something was different. Sundays were for tackling the region's great courses together with their sons — from Western Massachusetts to the Cape. Every August meant the excitement of Saratoga Springs, a tradition shared first with Phil and close friends and later with her children Ellen, Peter, Joe, and Jim.

At Beverly Golf & Tennis, she was known simply as The Queen — and the title was not ironic. She earned it on the course, yes, but she truly held court on the porch, where a cold beer and good company were considered as essential as the back nine. She was the center of every good time: the one with the story nobody had heard yet, the laugh that made strangers want to pull up a chair, the energy that turned an ordinary Tuesday afternoon into something worth remembering. When a photo of Ellen appeared on the local golf range's website — in the ladies' lesson section, no less — and someone asked her about it, she smiled and said she gets unlimited range balls. That was Ellen: always finding the angle, always making it funny, never quite letting on how much she'd charmed her way into it. For nearly twenty years she brought that same sass and electricity to Racquetime of Danvers, where people were drawn to her athleticism and her gift for storytelling in equal measure.

As a grandmother, Ellen — aka Nana — was the steady, joyful anchor who turned everyday life into an adventure, from the infancy of her grandchildren to their adulthood. From Friday nights at Club Famco to twenty-five years sharing a home with Martha's family on Prince Street, she was not a guest but simply — and wonderfully — part of the family. For more than two decades her winters were spent in Melbourne, Australia alongside her daughter Mary, where she built a second community of friends so genuine that forty of them gathered to celebrate her 80th birthday. In what may have been her most hard-won title, she was voted Mother-in-Law of the Year. Every story was better the second time she told it. Nothing made her happier than a laugh that went on longer than expected and left everyone slightly breathless.

She leaves behind seven children, eleven grandchildren, three great-grandchildren, and a community of people — from Beverly to Melbourne — who will spend the rest of their lives trying to describe exactly what it was about her. The word that keeps coming back is unforgettable. So does one of a kind. So does the image of her on that porch, cold beer in hand, already halfway through a story that everyone in earshot had stopped what they were doing to hear.

Grit and wit come close. So does the particular forward momentum of someone who was always, quietly, already looking toward the next better thing.

Ellen is survived by her children Ann Tassinari (and Rick Mooney) of Beverly; Mary (and John) Kenny of Melbourne, Australia; Ellen Famigliette of Danvers; Peter (and Pam) Tassinari of Gloucester; Joe (and Karen) Tassinari of Beverly; Martha Tassinari (and Doug Chan) of Beverly; and Jim (and Laura) Tassinari of Bedford. She was predeceased by her husband of 45 years, Philip Sr., her eldest son Philip Jr. ("Fee") of Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and son-in-law Michael Famigliette of Danvers.

Her eleven grandchildren are Alison Kenny and Joseph Kenny (and Bridget Stafford) of Melbourne; Frank (and Nicole) Famigliette of Georgetown and Leigh (and Steve) Metayer of Medford; Colby Tassinari of Beverly and Laken Tassinari of Boston; Alexandra, Maxfield, and Genevieve Chan of Beverly; and Meghan and Elyse Tassinari of Bedford. Her three great-grandchildren are Frank and Siena Famigliette of Georgetown and Jasper Stafford Kenny of Melbourne.

She was predeceased by her brothers Joseph, Jackie, James, Richard (Sam), David, Peter, Philip, Louis, and Thomas Doyle, and her sisters Mary Doyle and Ann Kiley. She is survived by many beloved nieces and nephews.

ARRANGEMENTS: A Celebration of Ellen's life will be held when winter is behind us and the course is in good shape. Details to follow. Assisting the family with the arrangements is O’Donnell Cremations – Funerals – Celebration, 167 Maple St., (Rte. 62) DANVERS. To share a memory or offer a condolence, please visit www.odonnellfuneralservice.com.