John Warren Gallivan

John Warren Gallivan was born on March 28, 1944 to Esther Rosenthal and Lester Paul Gallivan in Hartford, Connecticut. John’s parents met while working at Macys, and married despite some protest from their communities, since Paul was Catholic and Esther was Jewish.

John and his younger brother Peter spent their first few years growing up in Connecticut. When John was in Connecticut, he was seriously injured in a partial building collapse at his elementary school, where both of his legs were crushed under falling masonry. He said that his teacher used her body to block some of the debris, saving him from a far more severe injury. Doctors initially wanted to amputate, but Esther refused to give permission, declaring, “he came into this world with two legs, and he’ll go out of it with two legs.” Luckily, a talented surgeon from UMass lived in their town, and became John’s surgeon. He spent a year in the hospital and endured over a dozen surgeries, during which his legs were reconstructed; he then spent a year in a wheelchair, which he became adept at racing around the house. While still on crutches, he tried and succeeded at playing ball with the neighborhood kids. Ultimately, he was able to walk, play, and even race motorcycles for decades on those legs.

During his recovery, when John was six, his father died suddenly. Esther, widowed with two young children, then remarried to Warren Foley, Paul’s longtime friend and John’s godfather. They moved to New York City, changing locations every year for several years before settling in Washington Heights, followed by the Upper West Side near Columbia. Esther and Warren later had a daughter, Sara (Anderson) Foley. John used the last name “Foley” for some of his childhood, which caused legal issues when his high school diploma and birth certificate did not match. He ended up having to plead guilty to operating under an alias.

Initially thrown by the transition to urban life, John became an adept explorer of the city. He was independent and mischievous to a fault, often getting himself in trouble for resisting authority. Once, all bundled up on the steps of their apartment building, his mother asked him, “Why are you such a house devil and a street angel?” To which John replied with a smile, “Because I like to see you get mad!” before walking himself to school.

John was enrolled at Saint Thomas Choir School on West 58th Street, a boarding school for the treble boy singers in the church’s choir. John said the lighting in the church caused lasting damage to his vision and that of one other boy; while the church rectified it, the injury had already occurred. Choir school found John singing beautifully on Sundays but otherwise in constant rebellion, getting demerits left and right and spending most Friday nights sitting behind the school’s movie screen, listening to movies as punishment. He spent so many weekends in detention that the young teacher in charge of watching him decided enough was enough, and they would secretly spend those Saturdays walking around New York City and going to museums. John made pocket money walking, or maybe being walked, by the headmaster’s standard poodle.

When John was 13, his father Warren, a church organist, informed him that he wanted John to sing “O Holy Night” on Christmas Eve. John’s voice was getting ready to change, so he had to practice several hours a day to maintain his soprano range. When he performed in front of the church, the family remembers the entire church congregation tearing up. A week later, John was a baritone. He kept his choir-trained ability to project his voice for the rest of his life.

Warren worked for the Episcopal Church during John’s childhood, which resulted in John seeing himself as Episcopalian from then on. He liked to say that he was born Jewish, baptized Catholic, and raised Episcopal.

During his high school years, John lived at home and enjoyed running his school’s paper, drawing the paper’s cartoons, and even selling ads for local businesses. At 17, he enrolled at Columbia University, though he chafed at studying so close to his mother, who managed the University’s international student housing. During those years, he worked as a waiter at the university dining hall, at a local switchboard, and at Triangle Garage parking cars and making repairs, all while also making friends and making money through poker and pool. He had many friends at the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity, but was not admitted out of concerns that he would get them into trouble. During one commencement weekend while he was a student, John snuck out late at night or early in the morning and put his leftover glasses frames on every figure statue on campus. The next morning, all the students received diplomas under historical figures with thick framed black glasses. The Dean immediately knew who the culprit was.

John eventually dropped out of Columbia and opened a motorcycle shop with friends Pete Ferresten and David Dodge at the bottom of the hill. Called T.T. Motors for “Tourist Triumph”, they did repairs and sold Velocettes. They eventually had to close the shop because one of the partners refused to make the heavily required “donations” to the local police department. John also worked as a doorman at Cartiers, which he enjoyed, though he quit when they tried to promote him. During this time, John met and married Debbie Hawley, and they had two sons, Paul (named for his birth father), and Sean, the Irish language version of “John.”

In 1967, John and Debbie decided to move to San Francisco, California. John went first, getting a job in a car dealership, as a freelance motorcycle mechanic, and later delivering news reels and architectural drawings on his motorcycle. Debbie and the boys joined him in the Haight-Ashbury. In a couple of years, John and Debbie divorced, and the boys and Debbie moved back to New York for a time. John remained in California, and would have custody of the boys for the entire summer, when they would go on long road trips and have adventures.

In 1973 John and his friend Bruce Powelson purchased the motorcycle shop, Mother’s Motors, where John had been working. They renamed it T.T. Motors after the shop in New York, sold British and Italian motorcycles as well as gear, and survived their first year mostly on peanut butter sandwiches eaten behind the counter. Over the years, the shop became a fixture in the motorcycle community and the neighborhood. John and other members of the shop spent many weekends at the racetrack, and sponsored young racers, including John’s son Paul. John also served as a surrogate father figure for many boys in the neighborhood: fixing their bicycles, patching their cuts and bruises, and taking them on fishing trips and other adventures.

In 1975, John met Jennifer Pierce, who brought her Honda motorcycle into his shop to get a luggage rack installed. While immediately smitten, John decided to set himself apart and become her friends first. He endured the teasing of his employees for working on a Japanese bike, and they spent several months going to flea markets and getting to know each other, and he decided to ask her on a date while sporting a bloody nose, after getting bunched by an angry neighbor. She said yes anyway, and they were together for 50 years, to his deathbed.

John’s sons Sean and Paul moved to the Bay Area for high school, living with John and Jennifer in Oakland. John and Jennifer married in 1984, and had their daughter, Emily, in 1986. After having to move to an apartment because their rental house was sold, the rental caught fire in the middle of the night. Jennifer luckily woke up and the people and the cats all got out of the house, but most of their belongings were lost in the fire.

In 1988, John and Jennifer decided to start anew on the East Coast, and moved to Bethesda, Maryland, right outside Washington, D.C. where Jennifer had grown up. John was a stay-at-home dad with Emily for a time, before getting his early childhood education license and teaching at the same preschool his daughter attended. John thoroughly enjoyed teaching two-year-olds, and by the end of the year, his entire class was potty trained, knew all the days of the week, and could read each other’s names. When Emily started kindergarten, John got a job at a small motorcycle shop in Kensington, Myers Cycle, where he worked for many years; he created great window displays which won the shop awards, and helped cultivate a wide range of customers. John later spent a year driving a 1960s Mercedes Dump Truck for his friend Robert Patch’s roofing company, then worked as a service writer at Bob’s BMW motorcycle shop. He had to write his first resume at age 65, for his final job as a contractor at the Department of Transportation. He happily retired at the end of 2016.

John became involved in the local motorcycle scene, helping to run the Classic Motorcycle Day annual shows and swap-meet, going to meets and shows in Pennsylvania every year, and convincing the local Norton Owners Club to allow him to join even though he didn’t have a Norton. For eight years, he built a 1967/1968 Triumph 500 race bike by hand, and was then sponsored by his good friend Robert Patch, to race in American Historic Racing Motorcycle Association events all over the eastern United States.

While his daughter was young, John would go to her school on Mondays and volunteer in the classroom, identifying kids who had struggles at home and providing extra support and encouragement. After Emily joined the church choir at St. Johns Norwood in Bethesda, John began volunteering, eventually getting elected to the vestry, planning church fundraisers, and then running the property committee for the church for many years with his friend John Mertens. The Johns together oversaw many upgrades and repairs to the church that preserved and improved the building now and for the future.

In 2007, John and Jennifer visited Emily while she was studying abroad in Ireland, and they made a trip to Sneem, the supposed Gallivan family ancestral hometown. In 2015, they look a road trip back to California and got to reunite with members of the T.T. Motors community, see many old friends, and buy a Matchless racing motorcycle.

After retirement, John’s favorite hobby was “lunch!” He loved finding hole-in-the-wall family restaurants to support, and taking his wife Jennifer on lunch dates (though he sometimes forgot his wallet). The fun road trips continued, including to Pennsylvania, Maine, the Carolinas to visit Sean, Indiana to visit Paul, and California to visit Emily. During the pandemic, John took on the role of Snow White for the neighborhood wildlife, and every time he left the house, cardinals, blue jays, robins, squirrels, and bunnies would scramble out of the bushes while he threw them peanuts. He developed a fondness for the cardinals in particular, who came back year after year, and a somewhat helpless squirrel named Ringo.

In 2002, John survived a brush with kidney cancer, but dealt with advancing kidney issues for the rest of his life. For the last two years, he did at-home dialysis, which improved his quality of life and bought him more time with his wife and his kids. In January 2025, John developed a rare kidney disease complication called calciphylaxis, which he could not recover from. After discussion with his family, John made the decision to stop dialysis treatment, and spent the last two weeks of his life visiting with close friends and loved ones, and eating all of his favorite foods. He was able to see both of his siblings, all his children, their spouses, his grandson, and some of his motorcycle friends to reminisce and say goodbye. He was cared for by the incredible teams at Suburban Hospital and later at Casey House Montgomery Hospice, where he passed with his wife and daughter by his side.

John is survived by his wife, Jennifer Gallivan; his son Paul Gallivan, with wife Bennett Gallivan and grandson (Lester) Max Gallivan; his son Sean Gallivan and wife Mary Barr Gallivan; his daughter Emily Gallivan and her husband Colm Mc Nally; his siblings Sara Anderson and Peter Gallivan; his extended family, and his many friends from coast to coast.

A Memorial Service will be held on Saturday September 27, 2025 at 2:00 PM at Saint John's Episcopal Church, 6701 Wisconsin Ave., Chevy Chase MD, 20815. Parking in lot next to church, or Wisc. Ave, or on West Ave. (off Bradley Blvd.) Public lot end of West End and Walsh Street. Church entrance on Wisc Ave., off parking lot, or on West end.