Viatorian Brother Leo V. Ryan CSV, of Arlington Heights since 1999, has been chosen to participate in the Oct. 2 World War II Veterans Honor Flight. The last living member of the committee that built St. Viator High School and the school’s first president, Ryan, 86, is also the last living Viatorian World War II veteran in the American province of the Clerics of St. Viator.
Ryan was Dean of DePaul University’s Richard H. Driehaus College of Business from where he retired in 1999 as a professor of management. Earlier at Marquette University, where he earned full professorship, he was assistant dean of the College of Commerce and founding dean of the university’s continuing education program.
Ryan was an infantry NCO (non-commissioned officer) and Acting Sgt. Major at Camp Roberts (Calif.) before his appointment to the Command Staff of Admiral W.H.P. Blandy Operations CrossRoad, which in 1946 tested the fourth and fifth atom bombs in Bikini Atoll in the Marshall and Caroline Islands.
Find out what's happening in Arlington Heightsfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
His story appears in the book, ``Arlington Heights Greatest Generation,’’ a public service project of the Peoples Bank of Arlington Heights and St. Viator Students Class of 2009-2010 (Kevin Patrick Marty, ``Brother Leo V. Ryan, CSV’’. Page 101-104. Hendersonville, TN: Synergtic Publications, 2009).
###
