None Maria Nocito

Maria (Thieme) Nocito, 84, a resident of Philadelphia for over 45 years, died January 27 of complications from a stroke in Dedham, Massachusetts. She had moved to Dedham five years ago to be closer to her daughter, Dasha Layne. Maria spent her early years in the Russian enclave in Shanghai, China. Her family had fled to China during the Russian revolution. She remembered her family friends telling her that her grandfather served in the military under Czar Nicholas, so they were forced to leave. Her mother died when Maria was nine months old and her father died when she was eight. After their father’s death, she was adopted by a family friend, Anna Thieme, who earned a living as a dressmaker and seamstress. At the end of WWII, Maria and Anna spent a year in Japan before emigrating to the United States. They settled in Long Island where Anna continued to work as a seamstress fashioning fine clothing. Maria excelled at school and earned a scholarship to the State University of New York, Stonybrook. While attending college she worked as a nanny. After graduation she worked for advertising agencies in New York City. In New York she met and married George Nocito, a talented sculptor. The couple moved to George’s hometown of Philadelphia so he could earn a master’s degree in fine arts from Temple University and then to West Virginia where George was teaching at the University of West Virginia. The Nocitos returned to Philadelphia in 1969 when George became the chairman of the art department at the University of Delaware. Maria is predeceased by her husband George who died in 1980. For several years she was coordinator of international programs and in charge of membership at the Victorian Society in America in Philadelphia.  Maria is survived by her daughter Dasha, her son-in-law Matthew, two grandchildren Amelia and Noah, and her brother Andrei who lives in Germany.