GERALD DAVID DORAN

Gerald Doran was the first born (eldest of 6 boys), of the 15 children of David Daniel Doran and Sarah Jane Pickard Doran. He was born on March 3, 1897 in Houtzdale, PA, perhaps in his Grandmother Mary Massey Doran Allen's house (around Sue, Brisbin, & Elk Alley). He was baptized March 7 at St. Lawrence Roman Catholic Church in Houtzdale. According to the church's records (now held by Christ the King Church), Gerald's godparents were Jacob Wood & Catherine Schmeader. In the 1915? Doran family picture, Gerald is third from the left; in the 1917? Doran family photograph he is the one wearing a (World War I) U.S. military uniform, center back.

As a baby, Gerald had golden hair and was the apple of his parents eyes. He may have started school in Pittsburgh but most likely had his primary education in DuBois. He took the Academic Course at St. Catherine's High School, DuBois, was the school's band leader, and also played both 2nd base and pitcher for the school's baseball team. Gerald, known by the nicknames, Gus & Jerry, was the Associate Editor, 1914-1915, of the school's literary magazine, The Mentor.

Here are a few tidbits from that publication:

The Mentor, Autumn 1914: "The thinker of the Seniors is Gus, with solemn brow, A boy with brains like Shakespeare. Before him we shall bow... PERSONALS. There is a young fellow named GUS, who drives a swell omnibus. He made such a hit, with the dames at the PIT, That the other poor chauffeur did cuss. Irene Rodgers "15." The Mentor Commencement Number v.1, no.3 [1915]: Gerald David Doran [senior picture] "Here is Gus, the golden haired; He would use slang if he dared. But his lady friends might slight him then, you know; when it comes to keen debate He's the best man on the slate. His motto is, "To act, be always slow."

In 1913, while a high school student, Jerry obtained a Clearfield County hunting license. The certificate notes his height then as 5'4" and that he had light hair. Who knows what, if anything, he shot that season. Gerald later grew to be the tallest of the Doran family, perhaps 5'10".

While at St. Catherine's, both Gerald & his cousin, Edmund Paul Allen, performed in "A Dip into the Future - an original sketch" for the Senior Class Night exercises in the school auditorium, June 7, 1915. Gerald played a magician, while Ed was a milliner. Gerald & his cousin were two of the fourteen graduates of the Class of 1915 whose commencement took place in the church the next day.

Following his graduation from St. Catherine's, Gerald enrolled in Saint Vincent's Archabbey & College. He was probably considering the priesthood. In Saint Vincent's school catalog for the year 1915-1916, Gus is listed in the Third Year Academic Program (equivalent to a High School junior). That year, the only one he attended, he was awarded 2nd premium for Rhetoric and distinquished citations for Composition & Elocution. A copy of Evangeline (Maynard's English Classics Series, 1893) inscribed Gus Doran, May 9, 1916 may have been his prize. In the autumn of 1916, Gerald was living with his aunt & uncle, Lucille & Stewart Muchler in the Knoxville section of Pittsburgh. While there, he wrote home congratulating his parents on the birth of his newest brother, Bill Doran, born Oct.27, 1916. Gerald had hoped to come home for Christmas but now was even more eager to come home & "size the future president up".

Earlier, in DuBois, Gerald had been one of the original members of the Holy Name Band, organized by his step uncle, Con Allen. He also played the trombone in the army. Gerald may have enlisted June 1917 when the 1st wave of men from Pennsylvania (aged 21-31 yrs.) were called up for service in in World War I. He played first for the Infantry's 320 Band at Camp Lee, then asked for a transfer to the 305th Engineers (Co. F) Band.

Here are a few excerpts from Jerry's many letters home to his mom:

Feb.2, 1918. "Today I have the honor of being a K.P., yep my shoes weren't shined well enough to suit the top cutter so I'm shining pots, pans, knifes, floors, knees, etc. this K.P. is all right, but let George do it... I don't know how it is in town today, but down here the weather is just of the variety that makes a fellow feel like playing hookey and going fishing, you know the kind of day, your underwear feels to heavy, and then there are the first songs of the birds, just an ideal spring day." April 18., 1918 "Tell father that if they keep sending men to camps at the rate we've been receiving them he will have no one to wear [his] shoes. But here's wishing him luck."

On May 26, 1918 Company F was shipped off to the war in Europe. Gerald was made a musician first class by the end of the war. He was wounded in the leg, September 1918, during the Somme offensive near Verdun (Bois Dourrus). According to a 305th Engineers Detachment Order (May 2, 1919), Gerald was "authorized to wear the Service Ribbon (Representative of the Victory Medal) and three bronze stars thereon, having participated in the Somme Offensive 23 July -18th August 1918, St. Mihiel Offensive (Corps Reserve) 12th-16th September 1918 and the Meuse-Argonne Offensive 26th September to November 1918". Gus brought back a French airplane chronometer as a war souvenir - it hung on Bill Doran's apartment wall for years-- it now hangs in my house. Gerald was probably the Doran who said that United States prisons wouldn't be large enough to hold all the men if we ever went to war again. It must have been a horrific experience.

Jerry was the only member of the Doran family to go to college. Among the Doran possessions kept by my grandmother, Sarah Doran, was the fund raising issue of the Dusquesne Monthly, December 1920. Duquesne University of the Holy Ghost's had just embarked on a major publicity campaign to attract Pittsburgh's Catholic young men. Perhaps this publication, sent to all Pittsburgh Catholic families, persuaded Gerald to maticulate the next September. Gus often contributed poetry to its literary magazine, the Duquesne Monthly, and became an associate editor his senior year. Gerald graduated from Duquesne with a BA degree in June 1925. The commencement ceremonies were held in Soldier's Memorial Hall, the evening of June 17th, 1925.

Three months after his college graduation, Gerald was living in Baltimore, MD. He began studying for the priesthood at the downtown Paca Street campus of St. Mary's Seminary, September 21, 1925. That December, Gerald was the crozier bearer during Archbishop M. J. Curley's Christmas mass. Gerald was deeply religious and hoped he had a vocation. In 1926 he was a third degree member of the Knights of Columbus.

Often when the Baltimore Sun newspaper ran one of H. L. Mencken's columns about Pittsburgh (that dark & dirty city of iron & steel), Gerald would clip the vitriolic descriptions and send them back to his family at 5518 Howe St., Shadyside.

During his seminary days, Gus and a fellow seminarian enjoyed walks about St. Mary's 1 1/2 acre campus or in Druid Hill Park, a couple of miles away. On one snapshot taken of Gerald in the park with fellow seminarian, Marty Gallagher of Cleveland, Gerald pencilled "Orphan" (meaning he was not yet chosen by a bishop for a diocese). He never was ordained. He left the seminary on January 26, 1927. Either Gus realized that the priesthood was not his vocation or perhaps the Doran family needed him at home. His father, David Daniel Doran, had been having circulatory problems, possibly a stroke.

Gerald then returned to Pittsburgh to help his father sell shoes. In the 1930 census, Gerald is listed as a shoe salesman living at 5518 Howe Street. One year later, David Doran, Gerald Doran and Fred J. Brown registered a patent for an improvement in shoe support with the US. Patent Office which they received in 1932. In Pittsburgh, Jerry also began or continued his passion of boat building. Al McRae, a Howe St. neighbor, chuckled when he remembered one boat which Gerald built in the Doran basement. Somehow the initial dimensions grew. Upon completion, Gerald and friends had to dismantle the basement steps to get the now 16' boat out of the house.

The Mullin Boat Company of Oil City, PA (Venango Co.) hired Gerry as a woodworking foreman in the mid 1930's and put Gerald to work building and testing speed boats. According to his niece, Betty Jane Grainey Herko (who was living at Howe Street in the mid 1930's with her mom & sister), Uncle Gerald "was a very quiet person" and "was away most of the week with his friend, Bob Shaw, building a speed boat and came home on Saturdays." Betty Jane remembers "all night card games on Saturday nights with grandpa and Bert Flister and Gerald, along with a girl who lived up the street who was nuts about Gerald. Her name was Kitty Medairy. They always played five hundred." Gerald was proud of the speed boat he built for his friend, Robert Shaw. It was named Escapade, & was probably produced in Oakmont. Betty Jane said that all the Dorans got a ride on it when it was finished. A photograph of the Escapade was prominently displayed on one of 5518 Howe Street's walls.

In the fall of 1936, Gerald and 23 year old Jack Gordon, who also worked for the Mullin Boat Company, were giving a speed boat its test runs on Crawford County's Conneaut Lake - Pennsylvania's largest natural lake. During one of their early afternoon run, Saturday, October 3, 1936, in this resort area -- according to the Meadville, PA's Tribune-Republican--Gerry "attempted to make a sharp turn in the motorboat throwing the rudder "clear over."' The boat, suddenly capsized, tossing both men into the cold water. Life preservers & boat floated about 40 to 50 feet away from the struggling men. Jack tried to hold Gerald up, but Gerald couldn't swim . Both were wearing heavy clothes. (A cousin of mine suspected Gerry was also carrying a pocketful of heavy tools) Jack Gordon was rescued by a nearby boater but Gerry drowned. (His silver pocket watch stopped around 1.23 pm.)

Gerald's niece, Betty Jane Grainey Herko remembers that day vividly. It was a Saturday and "Grandma was waiting for him, in fact, she said she saw the car go past the house and they must have driven around the corner for pipe tobacco and she put the teapot on to fix his tea. That is when the news came ... Cy Henkel [took] grandpa to the lake while they were trying to recover him". Gerald's body was recovered the next day at 9:15 am. His brother, Paul Doran, provided the death certificate information (but incorrectly made Gus a year older). Gerald's funeral service was held in St. Paul's Cathedral, Pittsburgh, October 7th, followed by burial in the family plot in Pittsburgh's Mt. Carmel cemetery (Lot 29 Section 6) on Lincoln Road.

Throughout his adult life, Gerald paid special devotion to St. Therese of Lisieux (also known as the Little Flower, who was canonized in 1925), but she certainly tried his patience. One year on her feast day, Oct. 3, he lost a job; this year he lost his life. A Saint Therese medal was on his silver pocket watch when he drowned. He was 39 years old.

(Text miscellaneous notes: Gerald's brother, Paul, told coroner Gerald's was born in 1896 (on death certificate), but it was 1897; Since Sarah Doran probably had not reconciled with her dad, William Thomas Pickard, by the time Gerald was born, the birth probably took place in the Allen home; According to a slip of paper in Sarah Doran's hand, Gerald's godparents were and James Woods & Katherine Smeder; Bill Doran thought Gerald might have been as tall as 5'10"; Betty Jane Herko remembers her uncle being very devout and often praying beside her bed when she was very ill; October is still St. Theresa's feast month, but perhaps the date has moved around. In a 1947 book her feast day was Oct. 3, but in 2004 it looks like it was celebrated, Oct. 1st.) Ger. Doran Drowns at Conneaut (newspaper clipping)

Former DuBois Resident Victim of Speed Boat Test
Tragedy, Body Recovered Sunday

Gerald Doran, son of David D. Doran, and a former resident of this city, was the victim of a tragic accident over the week-end, when he drowned in Conneaut Lake, according to information received Sunday by local relatives.

Mr. Doran, who was about 37 years old, had been specializing on speed-boat building in recent years and was recognized as an outstanding boat-builder. He was employed by a concern in Oil City that specialized on speed-boats and had just completed the construction of a new boat of which considerable was expected.

Mr. Doran and a party of experts took the boat to Conneaut Lake on Saturday to test it in trial spins and it was during one of those tests that the boat floundered and sank. Rescuers hurried to the scene too late to save Doran and his body was not immediately located. However, searchers worked throughout the day and on Sunday afternoon recovered the body.

Mr. Doran was born in Houtzdale, Pa, and was brought by his parents to this city at the age of eight when his father, who is a step-brother of Con Allen, came here to take a position in the Con Allen shoe store. For a dozen years the family lived in DuBois, during which the younger Doran received his scholastic education He also was a member of the original Holy Name Band. Later the family moved to Pittsburgh and the younger man pursued advanced studies at St. Vincent's, Buffalo, Baltimore and the University of Pittsburgh, where he graduated. (no, Duquesne University)
However he had turned to the profession of boat-building and had advanced far as an authority on speed boats. He was unmarried.

The remains were taken to the family home in Pittsburgh and funeral services will be held in St. Paul's cathedral, Pittsburgh, on Wednesday morning at 9 o'clock, and burial will be made there.

[Gerald D. Doran died Oct. 3, 1936]

The Tribune Republican

Meadville, PA Monday October 5, 1936 p. 1, paragraph 9. article's headline: Accidents Take at Least 107 in Week-End Toll. ...Jerry Doran, 40, of Oil City , drowned in Conneaut Lake, near Meadville, after a motorboat he was testing upset.

The Tribune Republican Meadville, PA Monday October 5, 1936 p. 3 article headline:

Jerry Doran, 40, Formerly of Pittsburgh, Drowns at Conneaut Lake After Motorboat Overturns and Jack Gordon, Also of Oil City, is Rescued.

The Body of a man who drowned early Saturday afternoon in Conneaut Lake after he fell from a motorboat was recovered yesterday morning. Jerry Doran, 40, was the victim of the tragedy. In company with Jack Gordon, 23, of Oil City, he was thrown into the water when the motorboat he was operating overturned. Both men were connected with Mullin's Boat Corporation at Oil city.

According to Coroner Luther J. King, of Meadville, the men were engaged in testing boats for the Oil City firm. Gordon told authorities he sought to keep Doran afloat after the two were thrown into the water. The elder man was unable to swim, it was said. Forced to relieve his hold on Doran because of the latter's struggles, Gordon was rescued by persons in the immediate vicinity of the accident, near the northeast part of the lake.

The younger man was treated for exposure and shock by a Conneaut Lake physician. He was removed to his home a short time after the accident. Reports last night were to the effect that both Gordon and Doran whad been engaged in making motorboat test at Conneaut Lake for several days. It was said that the motorboat was being operated at a fast speed. At Oil City it was learned that Gordon said Doran attempted to make a sharp turn in the motorboat throwing the rudder "clear over." The boat upset, Gordon said, and both he and Doran struck the water with considerable impact. It was stated that the boat was of an unsinkable variety and had several life preservers in it. The two men were unable to reach it as it floated 40 to 50 feet away from them. Both were wearing heavy clothes.

A buoy was placed at the spot where Doran sank and little difficulty was experienced in locating his body.

The victim had been employed for a short time as woodworking foreman of the Oil City boating firm. He formerly was a resident of Pittsburgh and is survived by his mother and a sister, who make their residence on Howe Street, Pittsburgh.

The victim had been employed for a short time as woodworking foreman of the Oil City boating firm. He formerly was a resident of Pittsburgh and is survived by his mother and a sister, who make their residence on Howe Street, Pittsburgh.

Coroner King said last night his investigation of the accident is being continued.

Gerald David Doran Research Notes 3/2005

Documentation

• Baptismal record: St. Lawrence Church, Houtzdale (now held by Christ the King Church)
• Lock of his baby hair.
• PA Census 1900 roll 1373 ED 14 Sheet 9 above line 30 Ford City, Armstrong Co.
• PA Census 1910 roll 1331 ED 73 family 144 DuBois, Clearfield Co.
• A Census 1920 roll 1520 ED 425 Sheet 7 line 55 Pittsburgh, Allegheny Co.
• PA Census 1930 roll 1972 ED 2-106 Sheet 8B line 51 Pittsburgh, Allegheny Co.
Clearfield Co., PA. Residents Hunters Certificate, 1913 License no. 75 DuBois PA City Directories:
• 1915/16 Doran, Gerald D student bds rr 112 Evergreen
• Pittsburgh, PA City Directories: (I haven't checked all Pgh directory years)
• 1922 Doran, Gerald D student 5518 Howe
• 1930 Doran, Gerald student 5520 [!] Howe
• 1932 Doran, Gerald 5520 [!] Howe
• St. Catherine's High School, DuBois, PA Mentor Autumn [1914]; Commencement [1915]
• Class Night Exercises [program] Monday June 7th, 1915
• Diploma June 8th, 1915
• St. Vincent's, Latrobe, PA. My correspondence with Rev. Omer U. Kline.
• 2/3/2004 - he checked their Catalog Roster for 1915 & 1916. Duquesne University of the Holy Ghost (they have not answered my inquiries yet)
• Duquesne Monthly 1920 Dec.; 1924 Oct., Dec.; 1925 Jan., April, May
• 47th Annual Commencement [program] June 17, 1925
• Diploma June 1925
• St. Mary's Seminary, Baltimore, MD. My correspondence with Simran K. Dhami. 12/2/2003
• World War I Army dog tags, #1831866
• Some World War I letters (to and from- in my possession).
• Patent licence agreement - July 11, 1934 regarding letters patent of 8 March
• 1932 #1848518 for improvements in shoe arch supports (w/ David D. Doran & Fred J. Brown);
  patent can be seen on the US Patent Office web site - www.uspto.gov/patft/index.html
• Death notice Pittsburgh Press (Oct. 5th, 1936)
• Unknown DuBois newspaper [Oct. 5th or 6th, 1936]
• Tribune-Republican (Meadville, PA) Oct. 5, 1936 p. 1 & 3. (have not looked in the Oil City Derrick (mainly advertisements) 1880-1954;
• or Oil City Blizzard 1882-1943; or Conneaut Lake Breeze 1922-)
• Death certificate (22858? or 22838)-
• Crawford Co., Salisbury Township for
• Oct. 3rd, 1936. Coroner Luther J. King.
• Various books belonging to Gus, some annotated - in my possession.