A longstanding nightworker for The Royal Gazette who oversaw the composing of the daily enjoyed a lifelong newspaper career from the era of hot-metal press to online news.

Warren Dyer, who brought calm, precision and easygoing humour to the often stressful role of production manager, had a love of reading, writing, current affairs and Bermuda’s history.

Reminiscences excerpted in The Bermudian magazine, written in Mr Dyer’s typical droll style, opened: “When I was born, Admiral Sir Ralph Leatham was Governor of Bermuda, Harry S Truman was President of the United States, Clement Attlee was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, bread was 14 cents a loaf, gas was 26 cents a gallon and I’m Looking Over a Four Leaf Clover by Art Mooney was the top song.”

Mary, his wife, said Mr Dyer’s memoirs of old-time Bermuda were being considered for publication by the University of the West Indies.

The two met when she happened to come through the Gazette to meet a friend: “Our eyes met across the room,” she said.

They married the following year, in 1989, and had three sons — Mark, Christopher and Zachary.

His newspaper career spanned close to 60 years, beginning with a summer job as a 16-year-old summer student.

“He loved it,” Mrs Dyer said. “There were a lot of laughs. He was a very good mimic who could imitate anyone at the Gazette. He was very, very intelligent and had a fantastic memory.”

A keen photographer with an aptitude for layout, Mr Dyer started when the newspaper was headquartered on Reid Street.

He eventually had a department working for him, when staff known as “paste-up artists” composed pages by hand.

Many staff were trained by Mr Dyer in layout and composition, even as the trade gradually gave way to computerisation and editing software.

In the 1990s Mr Dyer tried his hand at the publication Bermuda Now! but it was unsuccessful.

Although he retired from the Gazette in 2015, Mr Dyer continued to fill in on production.

Mr Dyer had two older siblings, Vincent and Carol, and grew up on Ingham Vale in Pembroke, near Spanish Point, where much of the neighbourhood was extended family.

He traced his ancestry back to an Irishman, Patrick O’Dwyer, who worked as a convict guard on a ship headed for Australia that stopped in Bermuda, where he decided to stay, in the 1830s. He married a former enslaved woman, Eleanor, and adopted the Dyer surname.

Mrs Dyer said her husband was “very concerned about racial prejudice” and disliked the idea of having to specify a race on census forms.

He attended West Pembroke Primary School, followed by Howard Academy.

Mr Dyer was often a reluctant student despite skipping two grades because of his intelligence. He once fed his report card to his brother’s cow to hide his frequent absences from school.

He attended Pickering College, a boys’ school in Canada, followed by Albert College in Bellevue, Ontario.

Mr Dyer’s studies included computing and his father was keen for him to qualify as a company secretary. But after a stint working for the Bank of Bermuda, Mr Dyer returned to the newspaper, enjoying the night shifts working on production.

He proved so useful that on the occasions when he left for other jobs, the company wooed him back.

His sister said his humour and love of practical jokes easily won people over.

“He was full of mischief, but quiet about it,” she said. “It was the glint in his eye.”

Early in life, Mr Dyer developed an incurable autoimmune disease, ankylosing spondylitis, which fused vertebrae in his spine and caused a string of painful ailments.

His wife said he was “very determined not to be disabled”, and preferred to make light of his discomfort.

Mr Dyer was devoted to his family. He was a keen collector of music, films and books, particularly of Bermuda history.

His immediate family held a private service for him before leaving the island.

They asked for condolences to Mr Dyer to be shared on his Facebook page.

• Warren Llewellyn Dyer, a former production manager at The Royal Gazette, was born on February 17, 1948. He died on May 14, 2023, aged 75