Jack's Biography

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the

strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done

them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena,

whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly,

who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort

without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the

great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best,

knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst,

if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never

be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.

—Theodore Roosevelt

The Early Years

Jack Lord was born John Joseph Patrick Ryan in Brooklyn, New York, on December 30, 1920, to Ellen Josephine O'Brien Ryan (1892-1994) and William Lawrence Ryan (1887-1966). Mrs. Ryan was a housewife, who bore five children: William Lawrence Ryan, Jr. (1918-1982), John Joseph Patrick Ryan (1920-1998), Josephine Sheila Ryan (1923-2001), Thomas Herbert Ryan (1927-2006), and Robert Gerard Ryan (1935-2003).

Mrs. Ryan's family owned a fruit orchard in the Hudson River Valley of New York state, where Jack spent the summers of his youth. There, he learned to ride horses and developed a love for them. Mrs. Ryan still was running the farm when she was in her 80s. Jack described his mother as a strong woman, an Irish matriarch, who kept a beautiful home.[1]

Jack is seen with his horse.[2]

According to the 1930 census, Mr. Ryan was a ship surveyor.[3] In that capacity, he was an inspector and ensured that the company's ships and their cargo were safe. That source does not say whether he worked for a shipping company or for a government agency, such as the Federal Maritime Commission.

Most articles say Mr. Ryan was a steamship executive; in fact, Jack said his father owned a fleet of five ships with the word "angel" in their names; e.g., "Arch Angel".[4] Turner Classic Movies' (TCM's) biography of Jack goes a step further and says Jack worked as a freighter crewman on his father's ships during hiatus from school while he was a teenager.[5] TCM also stated that Mr. Ryan's business suffered badly during the Great Depression.[6] That ties in with a statement Jack made that his father had made and lost two fortunes in shipping.[7]

Jack spoke warmly about his father, who was at once both strong and gentle. Mr. Ryan instilled a love of reading in all of his children and paid them a penny for each line of poetry they memorized. Jack said this later helped him to memorize lines of script.[8]

The Homecoming

The winds blew fair and sent the schooner
clipping along over the ocean waves.
The sailors were homeward bound
following a journey of ten thousand miles.

At home, their families waited with anticipation,
hoping to receive trinkets from far-off lands.

Their wives patted their chignons into place
and pinched their cheeks for extra color.

Even the family dog knew something was up
and walked from one person to the next
as if to say, "Tell me! Tell me!"

Soon, the tall masts came into view.
Doors opened, and children dashed out,
scurrying happily toward the water's edge,
while the family dog ran, barking, along with them.

At home, the wife moved a vase an inch over on a table
and took her handkerchief to wipe away a smudge.
Everything needed to be perfect
for her husband's return home from the sea.[9]

The Ryans were Irish Catholics. According to Jack, his mother's family, the O'Briens, came from Tipperary, while the Ryans came from County Cork.[10]

At the time of Jack’s birth, the Ryans lived in what appears to be a late-19th century apartment house at 829 Halsey Street in the Bedford Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn.[11] Construction is stone, and there is an inviting tree-shaded park across the street. Jack grew up in South Richmond Hill, Queens, where the Ryans lived in a 1920s red-brick, semi-detached house at 95-28 125th Street.[12]

Jack attended grammar school at St. Benedict Joseph Labre School, a Catholic school, and secondary school at John Adams High School.[13] Former teachers and students at John Adams High School described Jack as a quiet, serious young man, who wore suits, won awards for his courtesy, was chosen to host visitors to the school, and dated, but not steadily.[14]

Jack said he was expected to earn his spending money while he was growing up. He did so by delivering the Long Island Daily Press newspaper.[15] From the time Jack was fourteen years old, his father sent him out to sea each school holiday to work on freighters.[16] It was time for the boy to learn the ways of being a man. The sea was a rough-and-tumble world, and Jack grew up quickly. Those long ocean voyages took him all around the world, most notably around Africa, the Mediterranean, and China.[17] In his free time, Jack sketched and painted scenes of places he saw along the way.

During his high school years, Jack was very active in school activities. According to his high school yearbook,[18] he was an athlete. He was a senior life saver, played on the varsity football team, and participated in intramural sports. He won a number of awards, including the bronze and silver A's and the honor, meritorious, and distinguished service certificates. He was also secretary of the Newman Club, which was a group for Catholic youth. Jack studied art, and his paintings often hung in the main hallway of the school.[19] He wrote an art column for the school newspaper, worked on the school yearbook, and spent much of his time in the art room. Most notably, he won the Saint-Gauden's Medal for Fine Art.[20]

Upon graduating from high school in June 1938, Jack spent another summer at sea. In the fall, he began studying fine arts education at New York University on the Chancellor Chase football scholarship.[21] He played as a sub-tackle, was business manager of the school publication, Trek, and was associate editor of Education Violet, the School of Education's yearbook.[22] One summer, while in college, he worked as a lifeguard at Manhattan Beach.[23] Even as he studied, Jack went in with his older brother, Bill, to open the Village Academy of Art in Greenwich Village.[24] His plan was to join Bill, who was making a name for himself as an artist. It was during this time that the Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired two of his works, “Vermont” and “Fishing Shacks”.[25]

The War Years

In 1942, Jack married Ann Cicely Willard, who was born December 15, 1921, in the City of Paris, Ile-de-France, France.[26] It was a youthful romance, a whirlwind courtship. The marriage was not a good one, for the couple were young (18 and 19 years of age), and Jack was away from home, serving in the Merchant Marine during World War II.

It was not Jack's choice to be away from home. Five years before America entered World War II, Congress passed the Merchant Marine Act of 1936.[27] The purposes of the Act were to facilitate water-borne commerce; provide the best-equipped, safest, and most suitable types of ships; provide well-trained civilian crews to operate them; and serve as a naval auxiliary in time of war or national emergency. To oversee the program, the Act established the US Maritime Commission, now known as the US Maritime Service.[28] Six months before Jack finished college, the United States was drawn into World War II with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt declared war against both Japan and Germany. With that and backed by the Merchant Marine Act of 1936, Congress and President Roosevelt took control of all shipping activities and drafted the civilian mariners into branches of the military as they were needed.

Jack was drafted along with his fellow mariners. Like other merchant mariners, he served in other branches of the military, as well as in the Merchant Marine. Beginning in 1942, Jack served in Persia (now, Iran), helping to build roads and bridges for the US Army Corps of Engineers. Then, he went to sea with the US Maritime Service. A ship on which he served was torpedoed by a German U-Boat off the coast of Italy while en route to pick up a load of manganese ore in East Africa. The ship sank in seven minutes. Jack was afloat in one of only three lifeboats deployed for sixteen hours before he was rescued.[29]

After returning to the United States, Jack attended Officer Training School at the Coast Guard training center at Fort Trumbull, Connecticut. In June 1945, he received a commission into the US Maritime Service as an ensign with a third mate's license. From there, Jack was sent by the Maritime Service to Washington, DC, where he served for the next three years as an artist for a service magazine and helped to make training films. It was there that he discovered a love for acting. He completed his obligation to the Department of Defense (formerly, the War Department) in 1948. He held the rank of lieutenant and received a presidential citation from President Harry Truman.

Jack had found duty ashore, but it proved to be too little too late to save his marriage. His wife had divorced him in 1946. Jack had seen his son, John Joseph Ryan, Jr., born December 1, 1942, only once, as an infant. He would not see him again, for on August 24, 1955, his son would die at the age of 12 following a brief battle with hepatitis.[30],[31] He is buried in Fairfield County, Connecticut. Jack learned of his son's death when his former wife sent him a copy of the death certificate.[32]

Ann Willard Ryan went on to marry Sven Magnus Jons Olsson in Greenwich, Connecticut, on March 22, 1958. She passed away on December 30, 2004. The location of her cremation ashes is unknown.[33]

Jack Rebuilds His Life

Jack Meets Marie

In 1946, while still in service to the US Maritime Service, Jack met the woman who would become the love of his life. It all came about when he was visiting his brother, Bill, near Woodstock, New York. He came across a stone house that caught his interest. Wanting to learn more about it, he sought to locate its owner. He learned that the house belonged to Marie L. DeNarde, a fashion designer in New York's garment district.[34]

Jack obtained Marie's telephone number and began calling her. For nearly three weeks, she did not return his calls; however, at last, she took the call in an effort to dissuade the tireless Jack from bothering her. She firmly insisted that she was not interested in selling her house and asked him not to call again. Jack insisted that he was not the real-estate agent, John Ryan, who had been pressuring her to sell. He was Jack Ryan, who was in the Merchant Marine. He liked the house and was curious to learn something about it. Oh! Well, that was another matter. She invited him to come to her home that same evening.[35] She had a dinner date, but if he would come early, she would see him before she left to meet her date. She never quite made it to her dinner date.[36]

According to some sources, Marie said Jack looked like an ad for Wonder Bread as he stood in her doorway.[37] According to other sources, he looked like the Greek god, Thor, as he loomed over her petite figure.[38] Even so, she invited him in and told him about the house, which she had designed. After all, as a fashion designer, she knew something about art. He knew about art, too, having studied fine art education. The story says they spoke long into the night, falling head over heels with each other with each sentence they spoke.[39]

Jack proposed to Marie following dinner at El Faro, a Spanish restaurant located at 823 Greenwich Street in The Village.[40] According to Jack and Marie's personal friend, Paul Denis, they were married on January 17, 1949.[41] Following both the lessons of her upbringing and the traditions of her day, Marie would give up her career for marriage – but not until Jack was well established in his career as an actor.[42]

Now, for a New Career!

When Jack completed his obligations to the Maritime Service, he was nearly twenty-eight years old. He had yet to establish a career for himself. Like many young men, Jack did not know what he was meant to do in life. He had followed his father to sea only to learn that the lifestyle could cost him his marriage and even his life! He had attempted to follow his older brother into art only to learn that one could starve, working piecemeal.

It had been a blessing when he was sent to make training films. He had enjoyed acting and knew he wanted to experience more of it. Now, he had a new goal – to become an actor. We will delve into this in the chapter entitled “Jack’s Third Love – Acting.”

_______________

[1] Miller, Roland. Jack Lord Talks About His Mother and Father: They Were Two Brutes… Photoplay. May 1971.

[2] Hughes, Judith. Donated to author, 2024.

[3] William Lawrence Ryan. 1930 United States Federal Census.

[4] Miller, Ibid.

[5] Jack Lord Biography. Turner Classic Movies. https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/person/116266%7C75826/Jack-Lord#biography.

[6] Turner Classic Movies, Ibid.

[7] Raddatz, Leslie. How an Ex-Rodeo Rider Went West to Enjoy the Good Life as a Hawaiian Cop. TV Guide. January 4, 1969.

[8] Raddatz, Ibid.

[9] Tolles, Virginia. The Homecoming, 2011.

[10] Black, Cobey. Lord and Lady in Honolulu Advertiser. December 22, 1977.

[11] William Lawrence Ryan, 1920 United States Federal Census.

[12] Holton, Brett. You Never Read a Story about Jack Lord That Told You This. TV Radio Mirror. December 1970.

[13] Holton, Ibid.

[14] Holton, Ibid.

[15] Witherwax, Rita. Jack Lord: The Man Behind McGarrett. Aloha: The Magazine of Hawaii. October 1980, pp. 20-26.

[16] Miller, Ibid.

[17] Adamski, Mary. Five-O Star Jack Lord Dies. Honolulu Star-Bulletin. January 22, 1998.

[18] John Adams High School Clipper. Ozone Park, New York, May 1, 1938.

[19] Holton, Ibid.

[20] Holton, Ibid.

[21] Gill, Alan. Big! Big! Big! TV Guide, November 17, 1962.

[22] 1941 New York University Football Press Informational.

[23] Ibid.

[24] Ibid.

[25] Gill, Ibid.

[26] Olsson, Ann Cicely Willard. Find a Grave. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/184360142/ann-cecily-olsson.

[27] The Merchant Marine Act of 1936. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/merchantmarinea00fishgoog.

[28] Merchant Marine Act of 1936, Ibid.

[29] Rainbird, Walter. Your Only Son is Drowned. Publication data unknown.

[30] Rainbird, Ibid.

[31] John Joseph Ryan, Jr. Find a Grave. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/145665839/john-joseph-ryan.

[32] Rainbird, Ibid.

[33] Olsson, Ann Cecily Willard, Ibid.

[34] Denis, Paul. Was It Wrong to Marry Her? Jack Lord’s Bitter-Sweet Love Story. TV Radio-Mirror, June 1963.

[35] Denis, Ibid.

[36] Jack Lord’s Amazing Confession. Photoplay, May 1971.

[37] Ryan, Tim. Marie Lord: An Old-Fashioned Wife. Honolulu Star-Bulletin, October 1996.

[38] Jack Lord’s Amazing Confession, Ibid.

[39] Denis, Ibid.

[40] The Night Jack Lord Proposed, Movie Life (Publication data unknown).

[41] Denis, Ibid.

[42] The Secret and Bizarre Life of Hawaii Five-O Star Jack Lord. Chicago TV Listings, November 4, 1978.