1881: The Ninth Generation in Canada

Dan was born in Chatham, Ont. on August 20, 1909. He attended Chatham Collegiate then graduated from St. Michael's College, Toronto, with a major in Philosophy and did two years work towards a doctorate but did not complete his thesis. He taught English at St. Dunstan's in Charlottetown, PEI, then took a position as instructor in Philosophy at Fordham University in New York City. He enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1942. He was stationed with Intelligence for a time then was transferred to Regiment Headquarters. He went overseas in 1944 and served with the American 1st Army in Belgium, Holland and Germany.

As a member of the 104th Division of the 1st Army the youthful staff sergeant was wounded at the Roer River battle in December last year when his division aided in closing the gap. The division suffered heavy casualties.

One of the most stirring incidents that the genial soldier remembered was when his reinforced division overran a P.O.W. camp at Nordhausen, Germany, and released Canadian and British prisoners.

He served with his regiment at Cologne and with Canadian Amored forces in Holland and took part in the closing of the gap at Lippstadt.¹³

He was awarded the Purple Heart for wounds received as a result of enemy action in Germany on December 15th, 1944 and the Silver Star, awarded for conspicuous gallantry in action. The citation accompanying the Silver Star read as follows:

"Staff Sergt. Daniel J. Sullivan infantry, Company C, 414th Infantry United States Army, for gallantry in action in Germany on 17 and 18 November 1944. As his company was forced to withdraw Sergeant Sullivan voluntarily remained behind in an open field 300 yards from his company's position to care for a wounded comrade. As darkness fell he improvised a stretcher and with the help of another man, evacuated the wounded man to safety and medical aid. He then volunteered to cross open, fire-swept terrain to evacuate a second man and successfully completed his self-assigned mission. The fearlessness and devotion to his comrades displayed by Sergeant Sullivan, above and beyond the call of duty, reflect the highest credit on himself and the military service."

Dan refused a commission in the army. "He saw in military authority something less than human."¹⁴

After the war he suffered a brief period of depression from the indescribable horrors he had experienced particularly during hand-to-hand combat.¹⁵

He returned to Fordham and became very active in the Catholic Worker movement; "he was a cofounder of the Catholic Interracial Council in New York; he (was a member of) the liturgical choir at St. Paul the Apostle parish; worked with Robert Rambusch to elevate the place of liturgical art; and because he saw the importance of a strong lay voice in the Church, was an early and ardent supporter of Commonweal."¹⁶

Dan was an author and a translator. He wrote An Introduction to Philosophy (Bruce Pub. Co.) and Fundamentals of Logic (McGraw-Hill). He also translated philisophical articles by Jacques Maritain from French to English, translated The Doctrine of the Trinity by Abbe Felix Klein, edited Rabelais, and revised the original translation by the Dominican Fathers of the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas for the Great Books series.

He was a professor of Philosophy at Fordham for forty years and during his last years there he took on the direction of the Excel program - a program for mature students.

When Fordham honored him for twenty years of service his citation read "He was possessed of a vision graced by a profoundly Catholic spirit, seeking to know in all things that which is true, and to love in all things that which is good." When he was honored for forty years of teaching at Fordham, he was described as "a man of deep religious philosophical and moral convictions, all lived without a trace of fanaticism, puritanism or professional reformism."¹⁷

He took several sabbaticals to write his books: he spent one year in Greece but found the winters too damp, thereafter he spent his time in Los Boliches on the coast of Spain with trips to Morocco.

When his mother moved to Montreal around 1952 to live with Margaret and her family, Dan rented a cottage at Lake L'Achigan and Emma spent the summers with him. He bought a Verchères boat with a small motor and fished every day, wrote, and read. Because his nieces and nephew called him Uncle Dan, all the kids in the neighborhood soon did too. He was always willing to take any local kid fishing if they wanted to go.

In 1962 Jack and Dan bought a piece of lakefront property at Lake Chaud and built a two-bedroom cottage with a screened-in porch on it. Dan always slept on the porch in his sleeping bag, he only moved inside when it got too cold.

He retired from Fordham in 1979 and spent the summers and autumn at Lac Chaud, the winters and spring in Spain and the month of June in New York City. It was in New York City that he died unexpectedly of a massive heart attack. He was stricken while shopping and was taken to St.-Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital where he died on the 29th of June 1984 at the age of 74. A funeral Mass was celebrated in St. Paul the Apostle Church in Manhattan on July 5. Interment followed at Calverton National Cemetery in Calverton, Long Island. Two memorial services were held for him later in New York City: one in Greenwich Village, one at Fordham.

Fordham University instituted a lecture series in Dan's memory.

Margaret Mary Sullivan was born in Chatham on January 11, l911.

She attended Ursuline Convent, Chatham Collegiate Institute, then business college. For twelve years she worked in the law office of Kerr, McNevin, and Kerr for Mr. McNevin, a friend of her father's. She played tournament level badminton and golf and was an excellent pianist.

In 1938 she met John Arthur (Jack) Cullen on a blind date arranged by her friend, Ruth McLachlan, and they were married quietly on January 29, l939, in Windsor, Ont.

An interesting event taking place at ten o'clock this morning in Sacred Heart Church, Windsor, was the marriage of Miss Margaret Mary Sullivan, only daughter of Mrs. H.J. Sullivan and the late Dr. Sullivan, to Mr. John Arthur Cullen, son of Mr. and Mrs. Michael J. Cullen of Ottawa. Rev. Father Dillon officiated.

They lived in Chatham for one year then Jack was transferred by his employer, Commercial Credit, to Saskatoon, Sask. After two years, he resigned from the company and accepted a job with the Wartime Prices and Trade Board in Ottawa where their three children were born. In Ottawa they lived at 283 Nelson in a third floor flat across the street from Jack's parents.

After the war Robin Hood Flour Mills offered him a job as credit manager in Montreal. They moved to 2305 Madison Avenue, Montreal, in 1945.

Around 1952 they bought a house at 4900 Doherty Avenue, in a new development in N.D.G. Margaret's mother, Emma Sullivan, moved in with them.

When Robin Hood wanted to transfer him to Minneapolis, Jack left the company and took the position of Raw Sugar Buyer with Lantic Sugar. In October 1971 Lantic transferred him to Bermuda for two and a half years where he held the position of President of Berlantic Enterprises Ltd., Lantic's offshore trading company. They returned to Montreal in early l974 and he retired in 1977 and moved to Ottawa.

Jack died on February 10, 1982, in Ottawa. He was buried from the Church of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and interred in the Cullen family plot in Notre Dame Cemetery.

Margaret did volunteer work from the late 60s to 1995: first with the Montreal Childrens Hospital, then with the hospital in Bermuda on the geriatric ward, then with the Pharmaceutical Department of the Ottawa General Hospital. She played bridge with an Ottawa women's bridge club and used to play the piano until it gave out.

Margaret and Jack had three children. Mary Lynn was born on May 5, 1942 and baptized Mary Evelyn after the two grandmothers, Janet Anne was born on August 25, 1943, her father's birthday, and Michael James, named after his paternal grandfathers, was born on February 3, l945.

The three attended St. Ignatius Elementary School, then the girls went to St. Augustine's High School, a public girls school run by the sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame, and Michael attended Loyola High School, a private boys school run by the Jesuits.