Ralph J. Flood, 79, longtime English teacher

Ralph J. Flood, 79, of West Philadelphia, an English teacher for many years, died Saturday, Oct. 25, of cancer at his home.

At the end, Mr. Flood refused all drugs except pain medication. "Despite Dylan Thomas," he told his family, "I will go gentle into that good night."

(Thomas' famous poem exhorts the elderly to "not go gentle into that good night" but to "burn and rave" in old age.)

Mr. Flood grew up in the Oxford Circle section of Northeast Philadelphia and graduated from North Catholic High School in 1953. He went to the University of Pennsylvania on a mayor's scholarship - awarded for the highest SAT scores in the city - then to Princeton University for a master's degree, and back to Penn for a doctorate in English literature.

He taught English literature at Penn, Temple University, Gettysburg College, and Chestnut Hill Academy before retiring from the academy.

"He immediately went back to work at Temple," said his daughter Persephone Braham. His courses covered Caribbean literature and work in America. "He loved it; he taught last spring," she said.

From 1974 to 1977, he was the one-man news department for the public radio station WHYY; he broadcast a weekly program called What's Left - After the News Is Reported.

In the 1960s, though well past induction age, he turned in his draft card to military officials at a demonstration in Washington to protest the Vietnam War. He also marched in civil rights demonstrations and against wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Mr. Flood owned a solar-heated home in the woods of Weld, Maine, which he built with help from friends. The family summered there. Though tolerant of most creatures, Mr. Flood made war on the local porcupines - they ate the foundation posts on which the house sat. "They liked the glue," his daughter said.

Mr. Flood remained wary but optimistic about the future of the United States and the world, and never missed a chance to march against injustice and oppression.

"He believed in peace, the possibility of regulated capitalism, and the benefits of reading, culture, and quiet but firm argument," his daughter said.

Surviving, besides his daughter, are his wife of 54 years, Carol; another daughter, Eloise; and two grandchildren.

The family chose 5:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 15, for services in the Lower Egyptian Gallery of the University of Pennsylvania Museum, 3260 South St., Philadelphia. Burial is private.

Donations may be made to the Southern Poverty Law Center via www.splcenter.org, or the Nature Conservancy via www.nature.org.