Alexander Robert DeVito died June 8, 2022 at Duncaster Medical Center in Bloomfield, Conn. He was 85.

He was born in Cambridge, the youngest of eight brothers and sisters. He played stickball and helped his father with his air raid warden duties during World War II.

He worked a career in the computer software business and said that he experienced joy by working in an area that changed the way people live. After graduating with a masters degree from Columbia University, he went to work for IBM. In 1970 he started his first company, Synergetics Corp.

His family affectionately called him Big Al. He and his beloved wife Catherine raised their family in time split between Wellesley during the school year and, starting in the early 1980s, magical summers spent at their second home in the upper Makonikey section of West Tisbury.

Upon retiring to the Vineyard in 2002, Alexander served the town of West Tisbury by sitting on the finance committee and the search committee for the West Tisbury police chief and serving on the board of the West Tisbury Public Library. He chaired the Vineyard chapter of Habitat for Humanity and served as the finance director of Island Elder Housing. In 2010, he “retired” for the second time.

Alexander was predeceased by his wife Catherine Anne DeVito, who died in 2010. He is survived by his four children Steven DeVito of Delray Beach, Fla., Dr. Victoria DeVito Gould of Simsbury, Conn., David Devito of Brooklyn Heights, N.Y., Gregory DeVito of Portland, Me., and his five grandchildren Eli, Sadie and Ezra Gould. Beatrice and Luiza DeVito.