JOHN SMALL was born in the Wirral, Cheshire. His mother was a member of an old Wexford family, Stafford of Baldwinstown Castle. His father was English but had maternal Irish descent. During the second World War John was evacuated to his many relations in Co Wexford after the bombing of his home.
After college he studied classics at Liverpool University, captained the rugby club and was elected auditor of the literary society. He was conscripted to national service, which he spent as an officer lecturing on current affairs to officer cadets in the RAF. This must have been one of the most imagination expanding duties of his military career.
In 1956 he joined Tube Investments as a graduate management trainee and began diverse work experiences in the UK. He was appointed works manager in Staffordshire and again in Chesterfield. In 1962, having majored in executive management selection, he joined a firm of management consultants in Manchester.
The ancient patrimony claimed him finally when he met Ann, daughter of the legendary Wexford hotelier Eugene McCarthy. They married in 1956 and, on the death of Ann's father, both of them returned to jointly manage the 200 year old business of White's Hotel. With that return, a contribution to Wexford, to the arts and tourism began which finds few equals in influence and accomplishment.
John Small was almost immediately elected to the council of the burgeoning Wexford Opera Festival, a position he held until his death, and one in which he exercised a profound and never discouraged influence.
From his new base in Wexford, John's enthusiasms expanded in several directions, but one factor was outstanding. Wherever he diagnosed talent in the beginner or the frustrated he became an adviser, stimulator, and programme proposer. He was the founding chairman of the Arts Centre in Wexford, where he set up all the grant opportunities and financial assistance to develop the centre toward its present crucial role in intimate theatre and lectures, plays (as in the case of Billy Roche), and art exhibitions. He became chairman of South East Tourism, founding director of one of the first hotel marketing schemes which eventually became Best Western International. He was also a founder director of the Irish National Heritage Park at Ferrycarrig, which attracts thousands of visitors annually.
John was unobtrusively proud of his old English Catholic background, exuding occasionally a whiff of the recusant. His kindness to people in distress was another motivating impulse. He declared an enthusiasm for the English socialism of the Frank Pakenham hue but was not found favouring the Keir Hardie fashions of his time.
John suffered a health setback in 1975 when a heart bypass became necessary. It was never sufficiently realised bow severe and permanent that setback was because to observers outside of his home he continued to present the cheerful, witty, consoling, characteristics which made him so appetising a companion as a host or at family or business gatherings. This he accomplished with remarkable bravery while his illness continued to oppress him as time went on. That few realised he was in any state of peril is a tribute to his kind stoicism.
He was throughout these difficult years increasingly devoted to his happy family, his wife Ann and their six children. As I write it shocks me to consider that over many shared occasions I had no appreciation of his disability. His concealment was thorough. In 1997 he was compelled to undergo major surgery in the phase of failing health which lead to his death.
I hope he was in spirit present at the party of friends and family which gathered after his funeral. There he would have relished the regurgitations of his finest witticisms issued with fine panache in all quarters over 30 years. Tears were shed that were tears of mirth. On contemplation of a thousand quotes I hope I can just this once quote from Myles na Gopaleen. I protest the death of John Small.