Rockaway Borough –  Mrs. Grace M Joe, 84, died on March 19, 2024 at St. Clare’s Hospital in Denville.  She was born in China and married her husband Roger in Hong Kong in 1959.  They initially moved to Minneapolis to be with family and in 1962 moved to Dover, and remained locally in Rockaway since 1978.   Grace was the Owner of Chan’s Tea House in Rockaway from 1963 to 1987 and later the Woodport Deli in Lake Hopatcong from 1987 to 2007. Grace’s culinary skills were renown and even years later, customers remembered her legendary egg rolls for which they would travel across Morris County to sample.  Even after she left the restaurant business and moved to the deli, she learned how to make a great German potato salad

Grace loved to travel throughout the US and the world with her husband as well as with her children and grandchildren.  Grace visited places as far flung as Estonia, Dubai, and China and near flung places like Roadside America, Gettysburg, and High Point, NJ.

Grace loved spending time with her grandchildren as they would often come from the Big Apple and spend weekends with her and grandpa in the suburbs.  Grace made them little helpers in the garden, showed them how to rake leaves, hand wash the car in the driveway and taught them mahjong.  In the summer, everyone looked forward to getting ice cream from Dover Dairy Maid.  No stranger to the Big Apple herself, especially because of her many friends in Chinatown, Grace enjoyed city life with the grandchildren as they got older.

Well known for having the greenest thumb, her neighbors loved her yearly parade of flowers with daffodils in the spring and a blooming magnolia tree followed by an orange azalea.  Not to mention her garden with summer bumper crops of tomatoes and peppers as well as exotic Chinese gourds, bitter and winter melons, and long cucumbers stretching three feet long.

Later in life, saddled with dementia, she still managed to do her own thing by going out to coffee each morning, giving back to businesses like hers, and having her son post photographs of her lovely smile on Facebook.

She was predeceased by her husband in 2009. She is survived by her son Henry of NJ and of the Czech Republic, and daughter Joyce and her husband Jason of NY, 2 grandchildren, Jules and Myles, and 2 sisters, Laura of CA and Matilda of NJ.

Family and friends may visit at Davis & Hepplewhite Funeral Home, 973-584-7264 (davishepplewhitefh.com), Saturday, April 6 from 9 – 10:30AM.  The Funeral Service will begin at 10:30AM, immediately followed by the internment which will be held across the street at the Succasunna Presbyterian Cemetery.  Street parking is available on both sides of the street, all along Main Street.  There is also some cemetery parking and parking at the library next door.