Emmett Michael Joyce

Emmett Michael Joyce, passed away on Friday, September 20, 2024 at the age of 80. Beloved Husband for a loving 57 years to Demetra, nee Lattos, Joyce. Devoted Father of Jayme Joyce and Michael (Emily) Joyce. Loving Son of the late Emmett and the late Alice Joyce. Dear Brother of Hannah (James) Piotrowski and the late Colleen (the late George) Henriksen. Dear Uncle of many nieces and nephews.

Emmett was a man of many lives: fighter, bartender, proprietor, journalist, author, community involvement coordinator, union-man, and a lifelong progressive.

Emmett spent the first years of his life growing up in Chapel Hill, NC with many fond memories of summer visits to a slower, small-town life, that his birthplace gave him. He later fell in love with city life after living in various locations on the west side of Chicago's Lawndale neighborhood, where he completed his primary school years as a paper boy and getting into general mischief at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School on 15th & Keeler. The factories and taverns of Grant Works, Cicero stamped themselves onto his soul as he spent the next decades of his life there. Emmett loved all the characters from the area that he rubbed shoulders with into the sunrises and diner-breakfasts of the morning. The town became an anchor of his identity and in later years he would refer to the “Cicero part of me” as a way of life.

He co-owned a live entertainment, rock saloon named Sir Drinkalot’s Pub in Chicago and helped to start and run many lounges before becoming one of the staff bartenders that opened the Hyatt Regency Chicago.  He worked his way through Junior college and then went on to earn his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Northwestern University. He drank with Chicago giants like Mike Royko, Jay Robert Nash, and Roger Ebert at taverns across the city—with O’Rourke’s and Miller’s Pub holding special places in his heart.

He got to live his dream by writing articles put in the Chicago Tribune and then working for many years as a radio broadcaster at the Chicago Bureau of the Voice of America (VOA), where he was able to combine his love of history, global and domestic politics, and journalism. He co-authored two books, Shoot to Miss and a translation of The Good Soldier Švejk by Jaroslav Hašek.

Emmett started the 90s moving to Crystal Lake, IL with his wife and two young kids. Many of his favorite memories were simple times after coming home from work, spending the summer sunset days by the beach, reading books while listening to the sounds of his family laughing away in the water. He was a voracious reader and scholar, leaving piles of books annotated and dog-eared behind him.

He went on to work at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency after layoffs across VOA, where he found a new passion and discovered a natural ability; all his years as bartender and an everyman allowed him to connect with people across the Midwest as he and his colleagues worked to fix toxic messes that big and bankrupt corporations left behind.

Emmett spent his retired years staying close with his football buddies from St. Mel’s for weekly football season meetups, using his email as his own political news bureau, and posting regularly across old Chicago and Cicero groups online. He loved family and he was loved by his family, his spirit lives on in the hands, pens, and shot glasses of all those who knew him. 

Family and friends are to gather for the Visitation on Saturday, September 28, 2024 from 10:00 A.M. to 11:00 A.M. At Russo’s Hillside Chapels, 4500 Roosevelt Road, Hillside, IL 60162 (Located between Mannheim and Wolf Road). A Chapel Service of Christian Burial will be celebrated promptly at 11:00 A.M. Interment Queen of Heaven Catholic Cemetery, Hillside, IL. For additional info. Call (708) 449-5300. Please sign Emmett’s guestbook.

To send flowers to the family or plant a tree in memory of Emmett Michael Joyce, please visit our floral store.