John F. Azzarello had a knack for simply making sure that things got done–and done right, family members said. It was a talent that took him from the mailroom of Aon Corp. into a vice-presidential office.
“He reacted to people immediately,” said his aunt Bernice. “He was a problem-solver. Anyone who had that job had to be.”
Mr. Azzarello, 59, of North Riverside, a vice president for administration at Aon, died of cancer Saturday, May 27, in Little Company of Mary Hospital.
He was born in the same Evergreen Park hospital and raised in Chicago’s Beverly neighborhood. He attended St. Barnabus grammar school and Brother Rice High School, his aunt said. After graduating, he got married and joined the Air Force.
His eight years working in personnel departments there taught him skills that blossomed later in life, his aunt said.
“He worked for a colonel most of the time,” she said. “So he learned to wheel and deal.”
He left the military in 1975. In the 1980s, while living in Texas, he and his wife divorced and he returned to Chicago. Mr. Azzarello was looking for work, and his aunt, who was manager of office services for Aon in Chicago, suggested he take a job in the mailroom.
He did, and quickly made an impression, she said. All sorts of tasks were thrown his way, from actual mailroom work to finding oddball items for corporate visitors.
“The fellows from Caterpillar loved Mrs. Field’s cookies,” his aunt said. “So he would get them. He learned to serve the clients.”
When his aunt retired in 1987, he was promoted to take over her job. Three years later, he was a vice president, a position he held until his death, she said.
Cancer was just a setback–one of many in his life–that he was sure he could overcome. He was born severely underweight, and later in his childhood survived polio. As an adult, a car crash in Houston nearly killed him.
Even though he had undergone 13 rounds of chemotherapy, he showed up at work, smiling and quick with a joke.
“He was so determined to live,” his aunt said. “He would have to take days off. But he would still go downtown.”
Other survivors include a daughter, Marissa; three sons, Robert, John Patrick and Daniel; a sister, Carla Pagani; a brother, Thomas; his companion of many years, Sally Rohr; and a grandson.
Services have been held.
———-
gxdoyle@tribune.com
