The Death of Cyril J. O'Brien, U.S. Marine

I've led such a fortunate, privileged life. I attended a funeral of a friend yesterday. Yes, it was a sad occasion, funerals always are, but if you knew or had known the man who died you would have also known that the last thing this person ever would've wanted was a sad departure ceremony. There were lots of Marines there, old and young and in-between. There were lots of people who represented other interesting areas and regions of Cy's life. He was always the historical observer, the writer, the inveterate traveller. He was a pugnacious little man who possessed this spark that lit up any room he walked into. You know the type. He never really seemed to age. If he hadn't spoken with such accurate historical authority you would've classified him as a 'character' upon first meeting him. Cy may have been the last of his kind of character - the man who could actually handle and participate in the fine art of repartee. His mind was bright and quick right up to the end, even though over the past ten years the body had taken its toll. Cy was one of a kind. A true original.

I met Cy O'Brien sometime in the 90's. He would show up at any and all Marine Corps functions here in the Washington, D.C. area. You don't often actually get to meet a walking history book, or more sadly, we fail to fully appreciate the people we're meeting in our daily lives. I knew there was something special about Cy - his own personal history and the life he had encountered during World War II and the many luminaries he had met and written about in the many decades since that terrible period. He was never the critic but always the observer and recorder. Objectivity was his journalistic watch-word. Cy and I shared some great times at historical meetings, Marine Corps Divisional Reunions, and fancy events with lots of Marine Corps Dinner Dress uniforms on full parade. He was always in his own element with a ring of younger people surrounding him. The stories would begin at a dinner table. The tales would ensue. All of them true, witnessed by the correspondent. It was his job to record them for posterity. The Marine Corps lives and feeds on history - the Lore, the Legends, the Heroes, the good ones and the bad ones. The Army can't claim it and neither can any of the other branches of our military. Cy had fulfilled his Marine Corps duty right up to the end.