OBITUARY: Carrick-on-Suir writer, poet and playwright Jack Ryan lived an adventurous, fruitful life

The death of Brewery Lane Theatre’s dear friend, Jack Ryan, removes from our midst a talented and proud Carrickman.

Jack died in England recently surrounded by his family.

His passing marks the end of a fruitful life. Jack was a writer, poet, author, and playwright. His life was a 90 year adventure.

Like many Carrick people, Jack had a challenging childhood in the 1930s and 1940s with bad housing and poverty. He left home at 14 years of age to sail on the cattle-boat from Waterford to England.

He secured a job as a bell-boy in a hotel in London. At the age of 16 he went and traveled the world as a ship’s steward. His next adventure was as a cowboy in Montana. In the cold Montana winters, the cowboys were confined to the bunkhouse for months. Jack would read to them as he was the only literate one among them.

They sat listening to him in awe and confided to him that none of them had ever seen the sea. Following his life as a cowboy, he made his way to Canada where he sold cigarettes in a railway station.

A chance meeting with a friend brought him to England once again, and employment as an airline steward with BEA.

Recognising his ability and intelligence, the BEA Stewards Union sent him to college from where he graduated with a degree in English.

Jack lectured in colleges and prisons until he retired aged 65.

Before he returned to Carrick, he drove a bus in London for a period of six months. In retirement, Jack wrote about his childhood in his first book, The Broken Place.

His book of poems, The Mermaids Singing, was published in 2008. Having settled in to small-town life once more, Jack joined Brewery Lane Drama Group , and was a cast member in three plays, Brush with a Body, Our Day Out and A Midsummer Night’s Dream which was staged in Jack and his wife Hanna’'s back garden in Ballinacroney.

He wrote a one-act play, The Snug, which we staged in Brewery Lane for the Clancy Brothers Festival on two occasions. The play reflected the attitudes and humour of Carrick people during the Great War 1914-18.

Jack certainly played his part in the drama of human life. He had a well-stocked mind and transplanted those qualities to the page.

Life is a continual farewell. Between the laughter and the tears falls the shadow. His memory will be cherished by all who were fortunate to have known him.

The members of Brewery Lane Drama Group extend their heartfelt sympathy to Jack’s daughters Elaine and Niamh, son John, siblings, grandchildren, and great-grandchild. Solus na bhFlaitheas Dá Anam Dílis.

WD