Friends and fellow historians paid tribute this week to John Ward, former editor of The Donegal Vindicator, who died in Canada on Wednesday, October 28.
The Ballyshannon man’s legacy was recalled by Anthony Begley. “I did not know John personally but grew up hearing about the high regard in which the family were held in Ballyshannon and over a wide area.
“There was great affection for the Vindicat
or dating back to the days of John McAdam in the 1890s and subsequently the Ward family who married into the McAdam family. They were newspaper pioneers who left their mark in our community.
“There were no fortunes to be made in printing newspapers and it was a challenge to produce a paper each week. Ballyshannon was amazing as two local papers, The Donegal Democrat and The Donegal Vindicator, were printed each week up to the 1950s. Local people still recall the Ward family and indeed John is held in very high regard by a new generation of Ballyshannon people at home and abroad.
“His website on the internet is regularly consulted by those who wish to take a nostalgic look back at old Ballyshannon. I did communicate by e-mail with him and he certainly was one of the foremost historians on his native town. I hope his great reminiscences about Ballyshannon will still be available on the internet because I have met countless people who refer to it as a valuable source of local history and especially of his beloved East Port.”
John Murphy, a long-time friend, said the deceased was “known as a very bright man, who kept a lot to himself but was still very nice and approachable.”
He had “a great passion for politics and sport, especially GAA. He attended all the Aodh Ruadh and the county matches, and by God, if you didn’t play well, you would read about it in The Vindicator that week.”
Jim Gallagher recalls: “John went to school here in St Joseph’s and was always a very, very nice fellow. We were great friends, even after he emigrated to Canada after The Vindicator closed around 1948. He was very quiet and reserved, but a real gentleman and always very polite.”
In addition to his work at The Vindicator John Ward was also an official reporter in Dáil Éireann. He rose to a position of significance in Canada where he recorded the affairs of Parliament in Hansard
He is survived by his wife Marion Elizabeth (Betty), daughters Geraldine (Nigel) and Catherine, grandson Brandon, and nieces, Helen and Annette in Ireland.
