Christopher J. Englert

Christopher J. Englert

Christopher John Englert, age 73, of Perry, New York, passed away peacefully on Wednesday May 29, 2024, at his home in Perry, NY, surrounded by his loving family.

Chris was born in the Town of Dansville, NY, on July 31, 1950, and grew up in Leicester, NY. He was the son of the late Neil and Violet (Young) Englert. He graduated from York Central School District in 1969 and from Alfred State in 1971 with a degree in Mechanical Engineering.

Chris married the love of his life, Alyson S. (Keeney) Englert, on June 12, 1971.

After working a short time at Combustion Engineering in Windsor, Connecticut, Chris began his lifelong career providing food services and sales which ideally suited his passion for directly dealing with people. He served first as Friendly’s Ice Cream location manager (now known as Friendly’s Family Restaurant) and then in a variety of other food sales-related positions, some of which included Hilltop, Stroehmann’s Bread, and Charles Chips. This eventually led to his creating A-Okay Bakery, a small wholesale bakery in Perry, and owning and operating Coco Bongos of New York. Over these years, he provided many young family members and friends with hours of early work experience in his food operations. More recent years have been spent developing the Keystone franchise for fireworks sales throughout New York State.

Chris enjoyed numerous hobbies and spent countless hours on projects that would benefit family and community. As a person of strong conviction and faith, he provided generous service support and leadership at Brick Presbyterian Church. Among many projects, Chris facilitated fundraising and construction activities for the church sign, provided oversight of details of the installation of a lift, handled coordination of church dinner sales and celebrations and establishment of the annual Corn Fest, and was involved in leadership on all of the church’s mission and growth efforts, to name just a few. He was always there to assist and summon support.

Notably though, he loved nothing more than time spent with family and friends, his Brick Church family, and sports where he had a special softness for high school sports (especially wrestling, football, soccer, and basketball in which his children and grandchildren were actively involved). He enjoyed the role he played in making HS sports better through the formation and improvements of the Perry Sports Boosters group. He was always interested in some type of creative problem solving, projects on his homestead, gardening, flying, politics, history, and so forth. In fact, his mind was busy until his last days as he brainstormed ways to improve one project or another.

He is survived by his wife Alyson S. (Keeney) Englert of 52 years, three children and their families--Jodi Gilbert of LeRoy (Chloe, Kai, Cruz), Todd (Melissa) Englert of Fowlerville (Jack, Sam, Max), Tammy (Nathan) Parker of Trumansburg (Tess, Anna, Eli); Siblings Fred (Cheryl) Englert of Wayland, Tim (Susan) Englert of Livonia, Melinda Englert of Lockport, Doug (Paulette) Englert of N. Chili, Marvin (Jackie) Englert of Leicester, and Andy (Michelle) Englert of Leicester.  Also surviving are sisters-in-law and brothers-in-law Sydney (Paul) Storment of Acton, MA; Leslie (MaryAnn) Keeney of Loveland, CO; Kurtis Keeney of Federal Way, WA; Michael (Bonnie) Keeney of Lexington, SC; Sally (Larry Newmann) Keeney of Pinellas Park, FL; along with many beloved nieces and nephews. In addition to his parents, he is predeceased by brothers-in-law Bruce Keeney and Eric Keeney, sister-in-law JoAnn Keeney, and niece Jennifer Pascale. 

Family and friends may call from 1:00 to 3:00 PM and 5:00 to 7:00 PM on Friday, June 7, at the Eaton-Watson Funeral Home, LLC. 98 North Main Street in Perry.  Funeral services will be held on Saturday, June 8, 2024, at 11:00 AM at the Brick Presbyterian Church on the corner of N. Main and Church St. in Perry.

He will be laid to rest in Glenwood Cemetery, Handley Street, in Perry. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Brick Presbyterian Church, 6 Church Street, Perry, NY.

Chris was diagnosed with stage 4 esophageal cancer, a silent killer, last summer.  He battled for 10 months.  Chris had no symptoms. His cancer was discovered by accident during an endoscopy exam in preparation for a minor procedure.  His wishes are that everyone visit their doctor and advocate for regular endoscopy and colonoscopy exams to catch any silent cancers before it is too late.