Between yesterday and today the occupations of the deceased have ranged from a global-minded chief of Merrill Lynch, 82; a baseball lifer who won the 1948 title with Cleveland, 100; A salsa musician, 81; an announcer on The Letterman Show, 78; a Carnegie Hall backstage comforter, 71; and an inventive microwave guru, 86. But not one saloonkeeper, although a legendary one has passed away.
Jimmy Neary, 91, owner of Neary's Pub on East 57th Street near First Avenue, has passed away. Jimmy was well known and hosted celebrities, and non-celebrities of all stripes at his bar and restaurant. He was the subject of newspaper stories and documentaries. He was basically the Irish Toots Shor, although I haven't read anyone compare him to Toots.
It was one such story a few years ago that I read about Jimmy that told us he was from Tubbercurry, Co. Sligo. Ireland. My wife's father, Patrick Brennan, was from Tubbercurry as well. Although it was unlikely that Patrick knew Jimmy, being born in 1904 and having passed away in 1980, my wife and I took in a meal at Neary's after a Carnegie Hall concert, hoping to at least share a story about a common background.
Unfortunately, Jimmy wasn't there at the time, having taken in a late afternoon nap back at the apartment. Even by the time we left, Jimmy still hadn't come back to the restaurant. Having never gone back, we never did get to meet him.
I will never forget when I was making the funeral arrangements at F.X. McKeon funeral home in the Bronx for Patrick the care I took to have a death notice printed in the Daily News that recounted that he was from Tubbercurry, Co. Sligo, Ireland. Tubbercurry is not easy to spell.
I must have gotten things right in the death notice, because one afternoon when it was just my wife and I at the funeral home, an elderly couple came by to pay their respects. Neither my wife or I knew them. They were complete strangers, but they were originally from Ireland and read about Patrick's passing and that he was from Sligo.
They said some nice things and asked about my wife's mother. We explained she was still back at the apartment and would be there in the evening. When they asked what part of Ireland Helen came from, they were visibly distressed to hear my wife tell them that she was from Liverpool, England. She was English.
The thought of an English/Irish marital union unnerved them. They politely withdrew and went down the hall to view another deceased they didn't know, but one I'm sure they were hoping had a more total Irish background.
I learned of Jimmy Neary's passing through a Tweet by the NYT reporter Corey Kilgannon (@coreykilgannon) who posted a link to the obit by the Irish Central (@irishcentral). It's a great obit and carries with it a video of Jimmy waltzing gracefully with his daughter Una to the Tennessee Walt at the restaurant. Una's day job is being a compliance officer and partner at Goldman Sachs and waitressing at the restaurant in the evenings.
My father-in-law always told us that Tubbercurry was full of Brennans, and that his bunch came from Station Road. My wife an I on a 1977 drive through Tubbercurry noticed several stores whose proprietors were named Brennan. We were a bit pressed for time, so we didn't try and stir up the lineage. Typical New Yorkers in a rush, I guess.
For the Irish, life on Earth is just a prelude to a good wake, and I'm sure one for Jimmy is on its way. And even though the tribute section of the Times has passed on writing an obit, Jimmy's children have filled us all in with three columns of an agate type death notice that doesn't come cheap.
Today and tomorrow there is a wake at Frank Campbell's, with a mass at 10 A.M. of Christian burial at St. Patrick's on Saturday.
With Jimmy's passing, there is one less saloonkeeper in New York City. There can't be many more left.
Note:
The NYT caught up to Jimmy's passing with a tribute obit published on October 12. Jimmy had passed away on October 1 at his home in Manhattan.
It's a great obit in that in the lede the writer Alex Vadukul avoids calling Neary's a "watering-hole" but rather a "canteen for the city's power brokers."
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