James Edward Patrick Butler

1902-1987

J. Edward P. (“Ned”) Butler (poet and history professor) was born 23 June 1902 in Newcastle, New Brunswick. Butler received his formal education from St. Michael’s in Chatham. He became the managing editor of the Union Advocate, a weekly Miramichi newspaper, then he went on to study at the University of Toronto before accepting a teaching position at St. Thomas College from 1954 until his retirement in 1968. When the college moved to Fredericton in 1964, he moved with it. In the year of his retirement, he received an honorary doctorate from St. Thomas University (STU). His early poems appeared in several magazines and anthologies, including The Sign, The Ave Maria, Integrity, Beginnings, and The Atlantic Advocate. One of his poems, “Carol,” was put to music and appears on Susan Butler’s Christmas CD.  Recollected in Tranquillity (1956, reprinted in 1966) is a series of poems that Butler reworked over the span of forty years. Ned Butler passed away on 20 September 1987 at the Mill Cove Nursing Home in Cambridge, New Brunswick.

Predominant New Brunswick Residences:

Chatham