Bexley Mayor John Brennan didn’t get a lot of standing ovations during his four years and one month in office.

That made the salute he received Feb. 3 that much more special.

Friends, relatives, Bexley residents and leaders from several central Ohio communities rose in unison at St. Catharine’s Catholic Church in a sustained standing ovation during Brennan’s funeral service. In the words of the Rev. Michael J. Lumpe, it was their way of saying “well done.”

The one-hour service was not only a tribute to Brennan’s 31 years of public service. It was also recognition of the footprint he leaves behind in the community following an 11-month battle with pancreatic cancer that ended Jan. 30 at his home on South Stanwood Road.

Despite being weakened by the disease, Brennan, 64, ran for re-election and captured 67 percent of the vote in a three-way race on Nov. 8. He maintained office hours when he could in between chemotherapy treatments, and he missed only four city council meetings in 2011 before taking a leave of absence on Jan. 12.

He died less than a month into his second term in office.

Lumpe reminded the packed sanctuary that God wasn’t punishing Brennan with cancer, that it was “just one of those things that happens to our imperfect bodies.”

Brennan was remembered for his years as a coach, recreation worker and parks and recreation director for the cities of Bexley, Hilliard and Dublin, as well as for being the proprietor of the old Broad-Nel Restaurant.

His daughter Catherine remembered him as a caring father who was concerned only about her happiness when she quit playing basketball, the game he loved.

She also remembered him for his ability to strike up a conversation with anyone he met, including a man she overheard talking to him at a baseball game. She said she nearly choked on her hot dog when the man told Brennan he had just gotten out of jail and Brennan casually replied, “Oh, Franklin County?”

At the end of the service, as sunlight streamed through the church windows on an unusually warm February morning, a lone bagpiper led the procession from the church. A crowd of several hundred gathered outside as Brennan’s flag-draped coffin was loaded into the hearse.

“He was a good man,” one mourner said as the hearse pulled away. “I’ll really miss him.”