Anthony Louis "Tooter" Palatucci, a former steel worker and brakeman for the Pennsylvania Railroad, died Tuesday at Union Memorial Hospital of respiratory failure caused by complications from a stroke. He was 75.
Mr. Palatucci was born in Norristown, Pa. His family moved to Highlandtown when he was 8 years old. He attended Patterson Park School, where he took an automobile repair course. He left school in the seventh grade to work in his family's bar.
As a child, Mr. Palatucci knocked out his two front teeth when jumping off a railroad car, earning the nickname "Tooter," as in "two teeth," from his friends and family.
He worked in several steel mills, including Bethlehem Steel in Sparrows Point from 1943 to 1945. Mr. Palatucci enlisted in the Army on May 1, 1945. He was honorably discharged as a private first class in 1947.
In 1950, he met Theresa Wroblewska at a Highlandtown bowling alley. They married and lived in the Belair-Edison neighborhood of Baltimore.
A few years after his marriage, Mr. Palatucci took a job as a freight-car brakeman for the Pennsylvania Railroad, where he worked for 18 years.
The marriage ended in divorce in 1969. Mr. Palatucci then moved to Rosedale, where he married Margaret Goetz. The two divorced in 1998.
While living in Rosedale, Mr. Palatucci worked as a maintenance man for the Kenwood Park Apartments until he retired in 1991.
His daughter, Lynn Morrow of Kingsville, said her father loved cars and enjoyed visiting garages and "talking to people about everything." He also enjoyed cooking Italian food and reading 20th-century history.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Friday at St. John's Episcopal Church, 11901 Belair Road in Kingsville.
In addition to his daughter, Mr. Palatucci is survived by a brother, Al Gambone of Trooper, Pa.; six sisters, Rose Mastrocola of New Market, Ann Bouctti of Ambler, Pa., Concetta "Connie" Carr of Parkville, Sue Tirabassi and Rita Miller, both of Dundalk, and Carmela "Millie" Uttenreither of Porterville, Calif.; and three grandchildren.
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