Rev. John E. Taylor
departed this life on January 23, 2009, in Durham, North Carolina.
He was born in Nassau, Bahamas on February 14, 1924 to Edward and Frances
Clark Taylor. He was predeceased by his parents and sister, Gwendolyn.
Fr. Taylor was educated in Nassau
public schools, at Columbia University, and the General Theological Seminary
of the Episcopal Church, graduating in 1956. He was ordained to the
Episcopal priesthood the following year at St. Philip’s Church in Brooklyn.
Before retiring in 1990, John and his wife, Coral, served churches in Nassau,
Dallas, TX, Evanston, IL, Annapolis, MD, Brooklyn and Hempstead, NY.
After retirement, they returned to the Bahamas, where he served as an associate
priest at St. George’s and later St. Mary’s Anglican churches and taught
at St. John’s College in Nassau. John also had a lifelong interest
in theater and literature, writing and directing plays with local theater
groups, penning “Simple Things,” a collection of inspirational essays in
his retirement years, and publishing The North Star, a novel based on the
life of Frederick Douglass.
Fr. Taylor is survived by Coral,
his lifelong friend, love, and wife of 58 years, five children and their
families, Rev. Stephanie Yancy and her husband, Spike, of Hagerstown, MD,
son John and wife, Kelly, of Boulder, CO, daughter, Dr. Sharon Taylor and
her husband, Willie Covington, of Durham, son, Philip and his wife, Joanne,
of Menlo Park, CA, son James and his wife, Dee, of Alexandria, VA, and
his grandchildren, Janelle, Jesse, Ben, and Emily Taylor, Wendy Covington,
Joseph Yancy, III and Joy Yancy Jones.
Fr. Taylor was buried in Nassau
from St. Mary’s Anglican Church where he was baptized, grew up, and married.
The Funeral of Rev. John E. Taylor
Photographs by Peter Ramsay
