Michael J. Ryan

Obituary - - May 17, 1955 - Michael Ryan - Calvert

There were six priests in the sanctuary (one of them his son) - and five Sisters in the organ gallery (one of them his daughter) - and most of the population of Calvert, in the congregation (his sons and daughters, and relation and friends across the years)-the morning the Funeral Mass was said for the repose of "Mike" Ryan's soul. All who had known him, and who could come, were there to pay that kind of final tribute that civilized and Christian men pay to one of their number whom they have known to be a good Christian and a good citizen. In his time Mike Ryan was not concerned about making the kind of history that goes into the history books. He had more pressing matters to be concerned about. With him it was as it has always been with most Newfoundlanders - for the most part Newfoundlanders have had to be so concerned about making a living as to have no time left for making history.

Mike Ryan was born in Calvert when it was still called Caplin Bay - in the last years of the last century. He grew up - in time to go to war - the First World War. He served with distinction - and when he returned the whole community turned out to do him honour. War was the one episode in his life that took Mike away from his beloved Southern Shore. For the rest - he lived at Calvert all his life - and married there- and raised a large family - and this year he died there.

There is in every Newfoundland settlement, in every harbour and hamlet, of which I know, at least a small knot of persons who in their fineness of spirit and general strength of character, are the equals of anyone living. There a men of greater erudition in the world but not men of great gumption. There are men of greater wealth alive but not men of greater virtue. They work hard, they fear God, they do the right by their neighbours and by all men. They belong, in other words, to that noble company who give stability and substance to our civilization and our way of life. To that company did Mike Ryan belong. He was first a good provider and kind father. He was a kindly man to whom his neighbours came in trouble, a wise man to whom his neighbours came for advice - a just man who did the right by all men. For half a century he was part and parcel of everything worthwhile that went on in Calvert. He made to the growth and building up of that community the substantial contribution of good citizenship - and the great contribution of being a man of character doing the things that his place and times required of him.

One Sunday morning this April Mike was making ready to drive the family to Mass. In the midst of his preparation he died - suddenly, of a heart attack. Having lived a life given over first to the fear and love of God, it was perhaps fitting that he should die on the way to worship Him. It so happened that all his family were able to get home for the funeral - two sons from Greenland, and Sister Reginald from Placentia and Father Kevin and another son from Stephenville. (Two sons and a daughter live at home). And then - on the same altar where a few short months before his father had attended at his son's first Mass, Father Kevin said the funeral Mass for his father.

A guard of honour of the Canadian Legion escorted the funeral cortege to the cemetery on the hillside towards Ferryland - and when the final prayer had been said and the Legion ritual read, dropped red poppies in his grave. "And they buried him among the fir trees where the hill slopes towards the broad Atlantic - within the sight and the sound of which he had lived all his life".