Keohane Funeral Home

Joan Yanarella Bohmbach of South Weymouth, MA passed away peacefully on July 7, 2020. She was 85 years old. A longtime resident of Hough’s Neck in Quincy, MA and most recently Naples FL. Joan returned home in 2019 to live with her daughter Patrice in South Weymouth. 

Joan’s career encompassed working as a word processor at Stone and Webster Engineering and later at Gaston and Snow Law Firm in Boston.  Joan hit her stride when she moved to Naples, Florida in her early sixties and began her second career as a hostess at Campiellos and The French restaurants in Naples. She loved being a hostess and meeting and talking to new people and was fiercely independent. She prided herself on being self-sufficient. She worked into her early eighties. 

 Joan grew up in an Italian household where her father would make weekly trips to the Italian North End for supplies. Her mother Louisa was a great cook and this skill was passed down to Joan who loved to cook.  

Joan also loved to gamble and enjoyed the excitement of the casino. She hit it big in 1981 when at the Hilton in Las Vegas where she won a jackpot of $250, 000. Even into her mid-eighties she hounded her kids to get her lottery tickets, saying she felt lucky. 

Joan loved the ocean and the warm Florida weather. She loved when her kids and grandkids came to visit, where she would bring them to the beach and then to her restaurant of employ to show the grandkids off. She loved her grandchildren dearly and was always so proud of each of them and their accomplishments.   She told them to get a good education and develop courage to act!  Joan also had a passion for drawing and sketching. She had a creative mind. 

Joan is survived by her daughter, Patrice Bavis and her husband Patrick of South Weymouth, MA and her son, Brian Bohmbach  and his wife Michelle of East Lyme, CT, and her three grandchildren, Caroline Bavis and Emily and Benjamin Bohmbach. 

Relatives and friends are respectfully invited to attend the visiting hours on Tuesday from 10:30-12:30 in the McDonald Keohane Funeral Home SOUTH WEYMOUTH at 809 Main Street (Rte 18 opp. So. Shore Hospital), followed by her Funeral Service at 12:30 PM. Burial will follow in Blue Hill Cemetery, Braintree. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations in memory of Joan may be made to MSPCA, Mass Society for the Prevention of Creulty to Animals, 350 S. Huntington Avenue, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130.