Dr. Dennis A. Dore

Dr. Dennis A. Dore, age 77, longtime local dentist and resident of Bower Road in Trumansburg, died peacefully at home on Monday afternoon, March 31, 2025. He was surrounded by a puppy-pile of his beloved wife Darrelle, family, friends, and all of his kitty cats, just as he would have wanted.

Dennis was born in Brooklyn on September 26, 1947, a son of the late James W. Dore and Lucille (Benoliel) Braun. He was the oldest of three sons and a star athlete. Although baseball was his true love, he was a state champ in wrestling and fullback on both the HS varsity football team. Every summer he would head to Camp Keeyumah where he was a camp counselor for years and spoke lovingly about his time there through his final days, keeping in touch with his campers until the end. The photos of him in the accompanying slideshow, playing the part of Snoopy in the Charlie Brown musical, was one of his fondest memories from those summer days and was just the beginning of a lifelong love with community theater.

He spent four years at Cornell University (1965-1969) studying biology. Though he was a profoundly sharp intellectual and lover of history, he shared less about stories of his studies during his college days, than how he paid for his expenses successfully by navigating card games like poker or his adventures with his brothers from Phi Sigma Delta fraternity, who he loved dearly.

Dennis graduated in 1969 and would always recount about the serendipitous occasion that a friend who was in the admissions office saw his name on the Tuft’s Dental school waiting list when a spot opened up the day before classes, redirecting his life to dentistry instead of Vietnam.

After completing dental school in 1973 and running his own dental practice in Halifax, MA for a few years, he returned to Ithaca in 1979 for a joint venture with friends Steven Damiani, Richard Goldman and Sydney Piburn. The Renaissance Bookstore on the Ithaca Commons opened a few years after the Commons was built and just two years before Center Ithaca opened its doors on the other side of the well loved big stone playgrounds - where we kids spent many of our afternoons. He began his private dental practice in Trumansburg a few years later and continued until his retirement in 2007.

Dr. Dore embodied the notion of “hometown dentist” and endeared himself to his patients, both young and old alike. If patients didn’t have funds or insurance to pay he would trade crafts for care or a handshake deal for folks to pay when they could. He was irreverent when it came to formalities, occasionally even wearing sweatpants to work saying what people came to him for was not how he looked, but how meticulous he was with their teeth, and maybe occasionally his sharp wit and sense of humor; or maybe the endless stream of music, because of course he made any and every playlist for the office, only sometimes to the chagrin of staff, because you can only hear a sappy Irish love ballad just so many times. On that note, he will be forever remembered fondly for his dance mixes as the DJ and dancing fool at every party with friends.

Saying Dennis had a sharp mind and intellect is not quite grasping it. He was the guy that would pick up concepts dizzyingly fast, remember facts like a vault (it was such a missed opportunity that he didn’t go on Jeopardy because he knew EVERY answer, to the point of being insufferable!), and question the meaning of life through deep philosophical pondering all before lunch. Of course sometimes it made him impatient, and could lead to long monologues of pontification, but it stemmed, in truth, from a zeal and passion for thought itself.

Dennis was active in theater throughout his lifetime, inspired by his mom who would take him to Broadway plays when he was a kid including influential performances by Tom Bodley in “Fiorello” and Robert Preston in “The Music Man”. A 1992 Firehouse Community Theater performance of Glenn Gary Glenn Ross was his launch back into theater leading to many more Firehouse performances including the comedy-drama “The Cocktail Hour” performed with his wife Darrelle. In 2004 he directed 12 Angry Men with all local community leaders including the then NY Assemblymember Marty Luster. He was particularly proud of his role as Daddy Warbucks in the 2010 Trumansburg Middle School production of “Annie” directed by local beloved teacher Alice Ploss. His crown jewel was directing and taking on several roles in the production of Spoon River Anthology produced by Encore Players, a community theater company he helped found in 2014. Whether through theater, his local radio show, or his poetry, Dennis loved to entertain, provoke, and inspire.

He will always be remembered by his three daughters for his endless passion for gaming, hosting the Friday night gaming crew who brought the best snacks and stayed sometimes through the night playing strategic civilization building games with hundreds of pages of rules or silly fun games that we could actually understand. He also loved history, particularly history of the civil war going so far as to believe our ideal family vacations were trips to old history sites like visiting the reenactment of the battle of Antietam in Maryland; and his passion for music from Atlantic R&B, Latin dance, folk, opera, 60’s rock & roll to Irish ballads and yes Dad, we forgive you for imposing your music on us no matter where or when, from family dinners to outings on the lake. He was a man of noble ideals. Even if he didn’t always manage to live them himself, he shared the insights often and freely ensuring they were fixed deeply into our psyches becoming a part of who we are to ourselves and in the world.

For his wife Darrelle, through the decades of caring for his many illnesses, it is the small things that will be remembered the most. His love of her voice that he thought was one of the most beautiful things he had ever heard and would sing with her on car rides, to their shared love of animals and nature, and the quiet conversations when things were calm. His companionship is missed.

In his final days, Dennis was surrounded by his whole family, sometimes singing him a lullaby to sleep or playing cello to ease his pain. He even rallied a few times to play a final few rounds of hearts before he drifted off to fly with the angels.

Dennis is survived by his wife of nearly 30 years, Darrelle; his daughters, Jenny (Matt) Miller of Ithaca, Anna (Joey Steinhagen) Kelles of Freeville and Rebecca (Joe) Tien of Colombus, OH; Paula Jacobs, mother to Jenny, Anna, and Rebecca; his grandchildren, Taran and Calliope Tien, Nathan and Noah Halverson and Summer Steinhagen; his stepsons, Tait Halverson of Lansing and Jeffry Halverson of Myrtle Beach, SC; and brother Kenny Dore, of NC. He was preceded in death by his brother, Michael Dore.

A Celebration of Life will be announced by his family for the Summer of 2025.

In memory of Dr. Dennis A. Dore you can order memorial trees or donate in his name to STAY WILD Rescue or to the Encore Players Community Theater Company.