Cletus R Ryan

Cletus Roscoe Ryan was born in the St. Olive Community near De Witt, Arkansas on March 21, 1922.  His parents were Flora Annette Lee Ryan and John Alvin Ryan.  He was the fourth of nine children born to Flora and John Alvin, better known as Alvin.  Cletus Roscoe Ryan, the last surviving child of Flora and John Alvin, passed away on April 8, 2019, at the age of 97.  He confessed a hope in Christ at an early age.   

Flora and Alvin owned a farm where Cletus worked the fields as a child.  Flora and Alvin raised chickens, hogs, and cows. They also had an orchard of fruit trees and raised a vegetable garden every year along with cotton.  In season, Flora had Cletus and his siblings pick blackberries and plums so she could have canned fruits, not in the orchard, for the winter.  In addition, Cletus had farm chores like all of the other children in that time. He was born before the Great Depression and times were hard for the family. Cletus started school at St. Olive as a child.  He went on to school at Immanuel, then to Holman and Dunbar in Little Rock.  After he graduated from high school, he went to Chicago, Illinois.  He worked at Mid-State Paper Company which later went on to become the international company now known as 3M. He worked there until 1943.

In 1943, Cletus was drafted into the Army.  World War II was raging at that time.  He stayed in the Army until he was honorably discharged in 1946.  While in the Army, he was in the Army Engineers Corps and was promoted to the rank of Sergeant, serving under a white lieutenant, with 54 men under him.  He made runways so planes could fly in, refuel, and pick up munitions. Sergeant Cletus Roscoe Ryan led his 54 troopers in building roads on air strips and doing whatever was needed to support the infantry and air command.  He went to one island named Negro Island in the East Indies.  There was a woman there who had gone to Harvard College in the U.S.  She was dressed like the islanders, and she looked and sounded out of place there among the native islanders.  Negro Island was found to be an island where slaves were on a ship, overthrew the slave traders, landed on the island, and stayed there.  The men went to one end of the island to take baths and the women went to the opposite end.  “The women would take flowers and rub themselves with them so they smelled really good,” Cletus said.  He left Negro Island, went to Diak Island and stayed there until he went to Manila where he ran into OB Jemerson. Sergeant Cletus Roscoe Ryan returned home to the St. Olive Community near DeWitt, Arkansas at the end of the War. His stay at home was short lived. When the conflict broke out in Korea, he was conscripted back into the Army and sent to South Carolina to train soldiers for the conflict. There he met and married Esther Cauthen. 

Cletus and Esther had two boys Irvin Roscoe, Sr. and Roger Keen and a daughter Mary Ellen.  Their son Roger passed away on August 8, 2011.  Irvin Roscoe, Sr. has three sons: Irvin Roscoe Ryan, Jr., Keith Ryan, and Ashley Ryan.  Irvin Roscoe, Sr.  has been blessed also with 7 grandchildren:  Maya Ryan, Irvin Roscoe Ryan, III, Torin Cole Ryan, Shekeya Ryan, India Hamilton, Keith Ryan, Jr. and Kimora Ryan. Irvin, Sr also has a great grandchild, Amora Hamilton. Roger had one son: Troy Powell and 11 grandchildren.

Cletus’s wife, daughter, Irvin, Sr. and a contingent of his extended family are still living in Connecticut where the family lived before Cletus moved back to the St. Olive Community to care for his ailing mother and to help out on the farm. Cletus visited his wife and family, who remained in Connecticut, while his health was good.

Left to mourn his loss and cherish his memory are his sister-in-law Vivian Ryan of Forrest City, Arkansas, a host of nieces, nephews, cousins and friends across the nation and a legion of friends in the communities of St. Olive,  Casscoe, DeWitt, and Stuttgart who adopted him into their families and cared for him through his final breath and rest.

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