On December 3, 2024 a consummate teacher and educator of disadvantaged students left this World for a better place. Myrna Bryan’s vivacious, outgoing and caring personality served her well as she, for the better part of thirty years, ministered to the educational needs of Toledo Central City students who were struggling with learning to read. As an administrator in Toledo Public Schools’ Right to Read program, Myrna often found herself in the homes of students delivering reading materials and later laptops to work not only with students, but also parents to find ways to improve student performance.
Born in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee to a father who was a teacher and a mother who provided a loving and supportive home, Myrna’s earliest memories were those of living in Oak Ridge, Tennessee where her father had taken employment as a security guard. Myrna could recall that the town was surrounded by a fence, though she was unaware that the World’s first atomic bomb was being built in her town. After suffering a single multiple sclerosis attack in her late twenties, she did wonder whether there might have been a connection between her early childhood and the attack.
The migration of Southern workers to take unfilled jobs in factories and refineries in the North swept Myrna’s family from Oak Ridge to Toledo when her father took a job with the Gulf Oil Refinery on the city’s East side. Myrna graduated from Waite High School and was proud to have been one of the first people to cross the Maumee River on the newly constructed Craig Bridge as a leading majorette of the Waite Marching Band during the celebration of the bridge’s opening.
Myrna received her Bachelor’s Degree in Elementary Education and a Master’s Degree in Education Administration from the University of Toledo. Myrna started her teaching career with the Toledo Public Schools in the early Sixties. She became one of the first individuals from the Toledo area to receive her State certification as a Reading Supervisor. Myrna often stated that she was most proud of the work she did developing and supervising the first approved extended day kindergarten in Ohio while she was President of the International Reading Association of Northwest Ohio. She also worked extensively in the Toledo Public Schools Diagnostic Reading Center.
In the early Seventies, Myrna was assigned the position of Remedial Reading Teacher for Riverside Elementary School in Toledo’s North end. On a teacher’s work day before the start of school in 1969, a new teacher walked into her room and introduced himself as a new hire with no teaching certificate, no training, no experience in teaching children how to read and an undergraduate degree in Political Science. A situation only made possible by an extreme teacher shortage at the time and the Vietnam War. She took the young man under her wing and got him through his first days as a clueless teacher. A year later she married that young man, David Bryan from Bowling Green, Ohio, in Prout Chapel on the BGSU campus. She and her husband, David, celebrated fifty-three years of marriage shortly before her death.
Myrna sharpened her reading expertise at BGSU’s Reading Center, studying and researching under Dr. Joseph Nemeth. During this time she assisted the University in forming a new Literacy Studio at the Reading Center. The Studio hosted annual “Literacy in the Park” events as part of the College of Education’s community outreach activities. She later served on the BGSU College of Education Advocates Board.
After she retired from teaching, she directed much of her time, talent and energy assisting the Toledo Symphony League. She became its President and after her term was over was asked to head up the League’s corporate fund raising efforts. She hesitated before taking the job. She explained that “she hated asking people for money” and had no experience in fund raising. Despite her misgivings, she took the position and was successful in significantly increasing corporate donations to the League. She loved attending Toledo Symphony Concerts in the Peristyle. She initiated the first date with her husband in 1970 by buying tickets to see Van Cliburn play Beethoven’s 5th Piano Concerto in the Peristyle. She also brought parts of the Toledo Symphony and classical musicians from BGSU’s college of Music into her home to host small concerts for University guests, friends and family in her living room.
When not working, Myrna enjoyed golfing with her lady friends at Belmont Country Club. She also greatly enjoyed scoring a hole-in-one while a guest of Trina McGivern at her Southshore Golf Course near Las Vegas, Nevada. She traveled frequently with her husband David, most notably on a Baltic Sea cruise, an African Safari and a visit to Machu Picchu in the mountains in Peru.
Myrna died after a fourteen year struggle with a dementia that took away her ability to speak. The challenge of caring for Myrna was made much easier by a set of private caregivers that one of Myrna’s hospice nurses identified as “one of the best group of caregivers she has ever seen”. Myrna’s family and friends want to express much love and thanks to: Kelly Brooks, Kaylee Wroblewski, Lesley Morris, Debbie Bolduc, Tasha Ruth, Heather Hall, Tiffani Cline, Jakeitha Robinson, Chasity Skutt, Becky Schardt and Martha Beckett.
Sadness over Myrna’s passing is mitigated by the knowledge that she is finally free of her disability and that she may once again have a voice with loved ones who preceded her in death, which were: her mother, Margaret Sue Hendrix; her father, Leo Hendrix; her brother Chuck Hendrix; and her sister and brother-in-law, Bettie and Dean Matheney.
Myrna is survived by her husband, David Bryan; her sister-in-law, Joanne (Dennis) Hendrix Cousino; her grand niece, Kayleigh Miller; her Nephews, Steve (Kendra) and Tim (Ken) Matheney; grand nieces and nephews, Lauren (Nick) Matheney Hagedorn; Erin (Connor) Matheney Hannon; and Evan (Kaitlyn) Matheney; great grand nieces and nephews: Aiden, Reagan, Ivy, Palmer and Evander; sister-in-law, Kathy (Frank) Hollingsworth; and nieces, Torey Hollingsworth (Michael McGovern) and Meredith (Kyle) Hollingsworth Marks; Sister-in-Law, Becky (Don) Bergert; and niece and nephew, Michelle (Mike) Bergert Crumley and Michael (Kristen) Bergert; and grand niece and nephew, Cameron and Katie.
A celebration of Myrna’s life will take place on January 4, 2025 at 2:00 p.m. in the sanctuary of the Lutheran Church of the Master on 28744 Simmons Road in Perrysburg, Ohio.
In lieu of flowers, please give a donation to the charity of your choice. Arrangements by Witzler-Shank-Walker, Perrysburg, OH.
