John Joseph Dunn died peacefully in Halifax on October 23, 2022, at the age of 94. He leaves behind six children with former wife Elizabeth (Campbell) MacLean: Elizabeth (Skode), Helen (MacLean), Kathryn, Philip (Anne Catzeflis), Michael (Holly McCurdy), and Patrick (Margaret Johnson).  He also leaves behind his grandchildren: Rhetta (Chappell), Brook, Elyssa Skode, Laura Slabbert, Livia, Beatrice; his great-grandson Angus (who travelled from Australia to meet his great-grandfather); and his special friend, Jane Trimble. He and his recently departed sister, Edith “Didi” (Torrie), join their predeceased sisters Theresa, Patricia, Marie (Peachey) and Doris (O’Neill).

John was born in Bathurst, NB on August 12, 1928 to Perley Joseph Dunn, a butcher and shop owner, and Laura Aurelia Boudreau, a homemaker and amateur pianist from Campbellton whose playing accompanied silent movies in local movie houses. He developed severe asthma as a child which put him in his room away from friends for days on end. It is in this quiet space that he focused on breathing, reading Popular Mechanics, and building balsa wood plane models.

He attended Bathurst High and St. Thomas College in Chatham and went on to St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish via the Canadian Officers' Training Corps program. A board member of the Music Appreciation Society, he graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in geology and a lieutenant’s commission in the Royal Canadian Artillery. It was the mining and field gun blasts that started the hearing loss that dogged him in old age.

At a dance in Antigonish John met Betty, a nursing student from Halifax who became his wife after she finished her Registered Nurse studies at St. Martha’s Hospital. At St. F.X. he formed many friendships that endured over the years as he and his pals moved their families to Calgary in the late 1950s.

Music was a huge part of John’s life starting with childhood singalongs around the piano, led by his mother, or sister Didi. He tried, and hated, playing the violin as a young child, then moved to the banjo, ukulele and bongos in the ’60s with beatnik sideburns to match. But it was his lovely bass vocals and compulsion to harmonize that people most remember. He sang barbershop classics, Irish ballads, hymns and old Maritime songs like Jack Was Every Inch a Sailor and Tabusintac, Neguac, Take Me Back. The Chivalrous Man-eating Shark remains a family favourite.

In the 1950s, John switched from geology — working for mining companies in the northern bush wasn’t fun — to industrial sales with bearing heavyweight the Timken Company, starting in Calgary, then transferring with his young family of four kids to Toronto in the mid 60s. In the early 1970s, with two more children in tow, he and Betty dared to start their own business, Seaboard Bearings and Supplies, in Moncton, NB, taking the Dunn brood east to grow some Maritime roots. John joined the Rotary Club, was a dedicated church lector, started sailing out of the Shediac Bay Yacht Club and built a cottage in Cap-Pelé. While he could be a somewhat difficult father, he did establish rapport with some of his kids in their adulthoods.

In the early 80s he sold SBS, moved to Halifax, retired and rekindled his love of a cappella singing as a long-time member of the Atlantic Swells Barbershop Chorus. As a 90-year-old with a bad knee living in a nursing home, his beloved chorus brothers would drive him to weekly practice and later Zoomed virtual practices into his room during the COVID-19 lockdowns.

A proud Irish Canadian, he often declared that “green is the only colour that doesn’t run!” John/Perley/J.J./Jake/Dad/Uncle John/Babunk/Grandpa/Teppa will be remembered for his constant singing, humming and absent-minded whistling, his love of and playfulness with language, his inventive and agonizing puns, his interest in all things mechanical, the importance of regular maintenance and sound record keeping, and his master classes in long, intricate joke telling with accents and perfect timing. One favourite JJD punchline had God rebuking a cheapskate painter who used watered-down paint on the local church, which then ran in the rain: “Repaint, and thin no more!”

John’s family and Jane wish to recognize and thank the Melville Gardens staff for the care and kindness they showed John daily, especially in the last weeks and days that unraveled more quickly than expected. Special thanks to Father Irek Bem who helped John go to his Maker with dignity and grace.

John donated his body to the Dalhousie University Medical School to support the advancement of medical research and training. As a result, a funeral Mass notice will be published for St. Agnes Catholic Church in Halifax at a later date. [note: funeral on August 27, 2024]

To remember John, please sing a song or tell a joke to someone you love, or make a donation to MusiCounts, the Coalition for Music Education in Canada, or the Dalhousie Medical Research Foundation.

Keep the heavenly chorus laughing and on key up there, Dad.