Biographies of Our Forefathers

John Yeakel was the third child and second son of Rose Ann Tinneny and Joseph Yeakel.  He was born November 4, 1917 in a house in which his parents were temporarily living in  on Pencoyd Avenue in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania.  John was baptized at Saint Mary of the Assumption Catholic Church in the Manayunk section of Philadelphia, which was just across the Schuylkill River from their eventual home in Bala Cynwyd.  His godparents were his father's brother Andrew Yeakel and his wife Elizabeth. 

John grew up in the family home at 183 School Street in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania and he attended Saint Mary's Grade School in the Manayunk section of Philadelphia.  After graduating from Saint Mary's, he attended Lower Merion High School in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania.  After graduating from the 10^th grade at St Mary’s he took the test to enter Lower Merion High School and tested into the 10^th grade - enabling him to skip the 9^th grade.

After he completed high school John found work as a sheet metal worker at the Philadelphia Navy Yard.  He left that job to enlist in the United States Army during World War II.  He was initially sent to Fort Bragg, North Carolina for training.  There he became a good shot with a rifle as well as becoming efficient in other military skills.  He was assigned to the European Theater of Operations and while in Europe he visited Greenock, Scotland, the birthplace of his mother Rose.  He went to Saint Mary's Church in Greenock and got the address of his Malloy relatives still living in the area.  The Malloys were relatives of his grandmother Tinneny (Margaret Malloy Tinneny).   The priest told him that his first cousin Joseph Tinneny, my (Rich Tinneny) father's brother who was also stationed in Europe during the war, had also inquired about the Malloys and gotten their addresses.  During that stay John did get to visit with his Malloy cousins.  After the visit to Scotland John went on to fight as a part of the American Forces in Germany.  He came home from the war in 1945 a very different man than when he went.  According to his sister Jean he was never the same for the remainder of his life.

John died on February 21, 1982.  He was buried at Calvary Cemetery in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania after a Mass at Saint Mary of the Assumption Church in Philadelphia.