Geoff Foley
OP 1965
May 1947 - July 2024

With our thanks to the Foley family

Geoff Foley was born in Portsmouth in May 1947, the second child of Irish immigrant parents. He was a student at PGS from 1955 to 1965 where he was an enthusiastic participant in school sport, and was captain of tennis, hockey, and badminton. In his last year at school, he was also the major casualty of the 1965 Piano Race, severing his Achilles tendon following a collision among pianos shortly after the start of the race.  

Following PGS, Geoff went up to Oxford to read physics, where he also won a half blue in badminton. Perhaps of greater significance, in his first year at Oxford he met Lois, an American student, who quickly became the love of his life. And so, following his graduation in 1968, he left England for the United States to study solid state physics at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Happily, Geoff and Lois were married on Long Island in the summer of 1969. They enjoyed a 54 year-long marriage and were proud parents of two sons and a daughter. 

After completing his PhD and a postdoctoral fellowship, Geoff, Lois, and their children moved north to the cold and snows of Rochester, New York, where Geoff joined the Xerox Corporation at their large research, development, and manufacturing campus there. In his thirty-year career at Xerox, Geoff had a variety of assignments, both as an individual contributor and later in management. He was ultimately responsible for the worldwide development and manufacture of the imaging drums found in the company’s copiers and printers. Happily, this assignment brought him back to Europe on a regular basis, and allowed for frequent visits with family on side trips to the U.K. Of note, while at Xerox, Geoff took a leadership role in promoting creative problem solving and the importance of intellectual property and patents to Xerox’ consumables business. Indeed, during his career with the company, Geoff himself became the author or co-author of more than eighty United States patents. The Audrey and Malcolm Foley creativity award at PGS, named in honour of his parents, was an outcome of Geoff’s interest in supporting creativity and innovation. He always expressed his belief that the education he received at PGS was foundational to his future success. 

After a life as a healthy active individual, in 2002 Geoff was diagnosed with a rare lung disease and given a bleak outlook for survival. Close to death in early 2005, he was blessed to receive a double lung transplant at the renowned Cleveland Clinic. With a renewed lease on life, Geoff lived another 19 years.

As he often expressed to his children, Geoff firmly believed he won the Grand Prize in the Sweepstakes of Life: devoted parents, a great education, good friends, and a family on both sides of the Atlantic who loved him and whom he cherished dearly. He remained immensely proud of his British heritage. At the same time, he was most grateful to the United States, his adopted country, which was very good to him over more than fifty years. Geoff is survived by his wife Lois, three children, and four grandchildren, as well as two sisters in the UK. His love of family, good humour, and his zest for life will be greatly missed.