Tom Desmond, who owned and ran the Embassy Market, a Latin grocery and deli in Montauk, for over a decade, died on Aug. 9 of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. He was 66 and had been living with his sister Kathleen Carney in Ormond Beach, Fla., since his diagnosis in 2023.
Well known and well liked in Montauk, he was “one of the funniest, warmest, most charming characters in this town full of characters,” according to a July 2000 Montauk Life article about him and his business that he’d had framed.
Thomas Gerard Desmond was born on July 29, 1960, in Flushing, Queens, to Jeremiah Edward Desmond and the former Eugenia Barbara Quinn. He graduated from the Montauk School and Xavier High School, an independent Jesuit school in Manhattan, before earning his B.A. in English from Fordham University. He worked briefly in sales in the city after graduation, then moved back to Montauk in the late ‘80s.
As the community welcomed a growing number of Latin American immigrants, Mr. Desmond saw a need and an opportunity to provide the newcomers with some of the foods and products they missed from home and couldn’t easily find on the South Fork. When he first conceived of the market, according to an article in The Star, he put out a flier asking people about favorite foods and traditional recipes. Their responses helped him figure out how best to stock the store he opened in 1993.
“He makes every customer feel like the most important person in the store that day,” said the 2000 Montauk Life story. “In a town where many of his customers are newly arrived, Tom takes the time to know their names, and needs.”
Mr. Desmond and Julia Caguana were married in August 2003 and had two children, Thomas and Delilah. Though they divorced in 2012, they remained close friends and raised their children together in Montauk. Mr. Desmond left the Embassy Market in 2005 to work in real estate with the Hamptons Realty Group in Amagansett, and also managed Wines by Morrell in East Hampton, where he remained until his diagnosis. “He had a deep love and knowledge of wine,” his family wrote.
He lived in Quogue from 2021 to 2023 before relocating to Florida.
Mr. Desmond collected books, loved to read about history, and enjoyed the classics. “He loved a good spy novel,” his family said, as well as “college basketball, driving down to the beach, and singing along to the radio with his children playing catch in the yard.” He made his family laugh “with made-up songs, catchphrases, and the occasional dance.” They described him as warm, spirited, sociable, and good-humored.
A proud Irish Catholic, he attended services at St. Therese of Lisieux Catholic Church in Montauk, where a funeral will be held on Saturday at 10:30 a.m., followed by burial at Fort Hill Cemetery, also in Montauk. A wake will be held tomorrow from 2 to 5 p.m. at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton.
He is survived by his children, Thomas D. Desmond of Washington, D.C., and Delilah C. Desmond of Albany, and by his five siblings, Ms. Carney, of Florida, Eugenia O’Connor of Nyack, N.Y., Mary Howard of Springs, Richard Desmond of Flushing, and Jeremiah Desmond of Sag Harbor.
