[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 92 (Friday, May 15, 2020)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E458]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    HONORING THOMAS ANTHONY FLANNERY

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. BRENDAN F. BOYLE

                            of pennsylvania

                    in the house of representatives

                          Friday, May 15, 2020

  Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I rise today to 
ask the House of Representatives to join me in honoring Thomas Anthony 
Flannery.
  Tom Flannery was born and raised in the Germantown neighborhood of 
Philadelphia to immigrant parents from Ireland in 1923. Following the 
attack on Pearl Harbor during WWII, Tom enlisted in the Army where he 
became a part of the Third Infantry Division. At 20 years old, Tom was 
injured and captured at Anzio where he became a Prisoner of War for 
over a year under the German infantry.
  After returning home, Flannery married Joan Donnelly, who he met one 
summer in Ocean City, New Jersey. They were married for 62 years until 
she died eight years ago. They had seven children--Karen, Butch, Joan, 
Nancy, Eileen, Susie and Kate. For over 40 years Tom ran his father's 
``saloon'', Flannery's Tavern in the Nicetown neighborhood of 
Philadelphia. Always more of a social worker than businessman, Tom 
rented out apartments above the tavern and when anyone was struggling 
to pay their rent, he would let them work off the rent instead of 
evicting them.
  Tom is a humble, yet critical, member of our community. Even though 
he received a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for his service in WWII, 
Tom considers those who didn't return home from the war the real 
heroes. It is people like Tom who are the gears that make the entire 
engine run, and who make their communities better, stronger and more 
interconnected. It is people like Tom that remind us what life is worth 
living for. He never loses sight of what's most important to him--
family, friends and faith.
  May Tom ``live to be a hundred years.''

                          ____________________