Carnival of Soul

-Submitted photo
Fort Dodge’s Tim O’Leary with his wife, Sara, at Blues Under The Trees in 2018.

Tim O’Leary shared his talent as a master craftsman painter and his love of blues music with the community of Fort Dodge for decades.

“When Tim got involved in the Blues Society or anything he had a passion for, he was gung-ho and really threw himself into it,” said Bob Wood, who founded the Lizard Creek Blues Society alongside O’Leary. “It shows up in his love of music and his love of painting — and also, he picked up the guitar and learned how to play just because of his love of the blues.”

At the same time, those close to O’Leary said he will perhaps be remembered most for his love of family and his friends, which included almost anyone he met.

O’Leary died Jan. 4 at his home. He was 65.

“Tim is Mr. Ultimate Family Man,” said Sue Bemrich, a longtime friend of the O’Leary family. “He was always attentive to anything his wife and daughters needed. On the other hand, he would help anybody no matter who they were.”

Tim O’Leary

Bemrich, who attended St. Edmond Catholic School with Tim’s wife, Sara, described O’Leary as “very unpretentious.”

“He was the kind of guy you could count on for anything,” Bemrich said. “He was a forever friend.”

O’Leary worked at Hawkeye Painting in the 1970s and eventually the Fort Dodge Community School District. He retired from the district in 2017.

Joe Cain, of Fort Dodge, said nothing was more important than family for O’Leary.

“Tim took pride in his work, his craftsmanship as a painter, but the main thing about Tim was his family,” Cain said. “When he got married and had their first daughter, Kari — everything changed. Tim was no longer one of the guys. He was Sara’s husband and Kari’s dad.

“And then Molly was born. He was as good a father as you could be and when he found out his first grandson was born, he got out of the van and did his happy dance. He was so happy to have his first grandchild.”

Cain grew up on the opposite side of Fort Dodge from O’Leary, but the two met through baseball and other school activities.

“I’ve known him since we were kids,” Cain said. “We double dated a lot because his girlfriend was friends with my girlfriend in high school.”

Cain said one of O’Leary’s best friends was Jim Andrews.

“Through high school and college, Tim and Jim were really close,” Cain said. “His best friend for life. When you were a friend of Tim’s, you were a friend for life.”

Nate Gibson, president of the Lizard Creek Blues Society, said it was O’Leary who accelerated his interest in the blues.

“He was the Blues Society wherever he went,” Gibson said. “I love the music, but it wasn’t until Tim invited me into the inner workings of booking the acts that I really fell in love with it. It’s because of him that I have such a fond love of the blues.”

Gibson said O’Leary is the “epitome of a good man.”

“He would be there for you if you needed anything,” Gibson said. “Always had a smile on his face. Heck of a volunteer. Worked tirelessly to provide for family and friends. He embodied what it was like to be a good husband to his wife, Sara. You never saw one without the other. That may be the thing that I look up to most.”

Wood’s friendship with O’Leary dates back to the ’80s when the two would play cards.

“It just kind of grew from there,” he said. “We took a lot of trips that normally centered around music.”

Wood said they visited places like Las Vegas and the Bayfront Blues Festival in Duluth, Minnesota.

“We had a lot of fun,” Wood said. “We were blessed to have Tim’s painting around our house. He was a painter by trade and a master crafstman.”

“He was very good at his work,” added Wood.

But it was the blues that helped to keep him going, according to Wood.

And Wood explained why he and O’Leary developed an interest for the genre of music which originated with African Americans in the south.

“I think the fact that blues really gave birth to rock and roll,” Wood said. “We discovered we had been listening to blues all our lives or a variation of the blues with a lot of artists we grew up with.

“When you start to discover that, you explore it a little more. And that’s when we started trading albums and CDs back and forth and listening to new artists.”

Wood said they each learned something from Buddy Guy, an American blues guitarist and singer.

“He (Buddy Guy) always talks about how the British invasion brought blues back to the United States and we didn’t realize we had given it away and brought it back. That was something Tim and I discovered.”

And through O’Leary’s efforts, the blues have been heard loud and clear in the Fort Dodge area.

“We always kept the mantra, ‘keep the blues alive,’” Wood said. “That’s part of the reason we started the Blues Society to have another venue for those people to perform the music and to keep it alive. That was the aim.”