Lawrence Creaghan’s Eulogy for His Father

Lawrence Creaghan

My father grew up in Newcastle. As a child he was often taken to visit the Doyles, relatives in Douglastown, just a few miles downriver. One Doyle visit that he mentioned more than once started with a horse and buggy ride to Douglastown and ended with a supper of ribs, something Bill had never had before. When his parents asked him on his return what he had for supper, he thought for a moment and replied, “bones!”

Bill put his pithy power with words to work again in a poem he wrote in Grade 8 about New Brunswick’s premier at the time.* “Mr. Dysart is our premier and he comes from near Cocagne. Has digested clams and oysters, brainy food makes brainy man.”

That little poem summed up two of my father’s great loves: seafood and politics. And I must say that no one could open a lobster like Bill Creaghan. He also became quite skilled in politics, even if he didn’t always get it right. In fact, I got an email from him just a few hours before he died on October 1, in which he confidently predicted a Conservative majority.**

William Lawrence Marven Creaghan enjoyed a long and charmed life. Among his many blessings was his 58-year marriage to Thérèse, our mother. Their love was wonderful to see, the kind that is developed over a lifetime of devotion to each other.

My father was a just, fair, kind, and patient man. Someone who could weigh things over very carefully in his mind before making a decision. The older I get, the more I appreciate these and all the other qualities that made Bill Creaghan that modern wonder to behold: a good man.

We all miss him dearly.