John Matthew VETERAN TYHURST

PO1
US Navy
February 12, 1981
September 13, 2013

*Obituary
Bennett-Wormington Funeral Home
Monett, Missouri

John Matthew Tyhurst, son, father, brother, and friend, was born on February 12, 1981, in Joplin, Missouri, and passed from this life on September 13, 2013, at the age of 32. Mourning the loss are his parents, John and Mary Tyhurst of Kingwood, Texas, and Anne Steele of Tecumseh, Oklahoma, along with a host of family and friends. Siblings include Amiee Tyhurst, Matthew Thomas and wife Amanda, James Tyhurst, Travis Tyhurst, Thomas Tyhurst, Mark Tyhurst, Rachel Tyhurst, and Daniel Tyhurst.

Matt graduated from the Northeast Christian Academy of Kingwood, Texas, in 1999, and immediately enlisted in the United States Navy where he served for thirteen years as an information technical specialist. Chief Petty Officer ITS 1 Matthew Tyhurst served his country and the crew of the U.S.S. Albuquerque submarine by operating complex on board computer systems, and he was later instrumental in the installation and implementation of computer operations for the U.S.S. Missouri. At the time of his passing he was a resident of Pearl City, Hawaii, where he was stationed.

In 2002 Matt fell in love and married Catherine Flynn of Danbury, Connecticut. To this union were born daughters Alyssa and Madison. In 2010 Matt married again adding Amity Bennett and son Addison to his family. While Matt’s interest in computers started early, he also loved animals, soccer, cars, the outdoors, but most of all his children. Whether a trip to a trip to a park, beach, or zoo, Matt delighted in sharing and seeing the world through their eyes. As a sailor looks to the stars as constants, Matt held his children as his guiding lights.

Aside from prizing his role as “daddy,” Matt was an avid reader, devouring books which captured his attention. He was known in the family as the one responsible for the chance meeting of parents John and Mary. As their then young children played together at a public park, Matt fell while pretending to “add gas” to the ride John was pushing. When he fell and required eight stitches to the head, it was Mary who applied first aid and led John to the local hospital. The rest became family history.

Matt was known to those who loved him as the giber of seriously painful “cow bites.” For those of you who weren’t privileged to experience one of these, it involved an uncanny ability to use his big toe and first toe to deliver a seriously wicked pinch! It’s often the silly little things in life that become big memories that enable us to smile as we remember a loved one.

As we gather today to celebrate Matt’s life, we are reminded of our own mortality. Poet Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote “Crossing the Bar,” a poem about a man of the sea who reaches his mortal end. He wrote—

Sunset and evening star
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For though from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.

The poem speaks to the crossing each of us will one day be called to make, the crossing Matt has made before us. As we experience our own “ashes to ashes, dust to dust” transformations, may we have no sadness of farewell as we embrace our final forms.

John was laid to rest on September 21, 2013.

Contributed on 4/5/17 by wfields55
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Record #: 803980

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