James Sylvester Ryan was a member of a talented family who lived on the south coast of New South Wales. Two of the family were 'world-celebrated singers' according to E. J. Brady (1954). Ryan was an actor 'who varied his stage work with elocution and journalism.' George Lambert, Frank Mahony Fred Leist, Fred Brown and 'Pas' (qq.v.), who illustrated Ryan's 1909 volume of poetry, were his friends. Ryan wrote The Horse in Australia (1902) under his pseudonym, Narranghi Boori. He stood for Parliament and failed. By 1931 Ryan was living in New York on a barge in the Hudson River. In 1936 he fell overboard and drowned.
(Source: Adapted from E. J. Brady, 'Life's Highway (Extracts) - continued. Writers of the Nineties', Southerly 15.1 (1954): 53-58)
