Ryan Lybrand (R.L.) Kannaday, Jr. is the new chairman of the Dillon County Chamber of Commerce.
He took over his official duties at the Dillon County Chamber of Commerce Banquet held recently.
As a member of the Dillon County Chamber of Commerce, Kannaday has served four years board of directors, served as vice chairman,  and recently became chairman.
Kannaday is the owner of Kannaday Funeral Home in Dillon and Latta and the owner of Greenlawn Cemetery.
He worked in his father’s business, Carolina-Doric, Inc., a major supplier of burial vaults to funeral homes in South Carolina, becoming co-owner and later owner.  He sold the business to an employee in 1997 and came to Latta and  Dillon to help his aunt and uncle at Kannaday’s Funeral Home purchasing the business in 2009.
Kannaday served a six-year term on the board of directors of the National Concrete Burial Vault Association, Inc. and  also served as vice-president and president.
He is past-president of the S.C. Funeral Supply Salesman Club. He is a member of the South Carolina Funeral Directors Association, the National Funeral Directors Association, and the Pee Dee Funeral Directors Association.
Kannaday is a member of the Captain Andrew T. Harllee Camp SCV in Dillon (serving as Lt. Commander), a member of the Dillon Rotary Club (vice president, incoming president), a member of Main Street United Methodist Church and choir, and a member of  the Dillon County Rifle and Gun Club.
Kannaday served as Chairman of the Friends of the NRA Banquet Committee for six years in Florence and three years in Dillon. He for many years has been a competitive pistol shooter (three years on the championship State Pistol Team) and for several years a competitive sporting clays sportsman. He is a life member of the NRA and a life member of the National Sporting Clays Association.
Kannaday served sixteen years on the Florence County Planning Commission.
Kannaday is a State Constable amd served on the Board of Directors  the Palmetto State Constables Association. Kannaday was born in Columbia and  moved to Florence when he was five years old with his parents, Ryan and Anna Kannaday, and brother, Wayne.
Kannaday was educated in the Florence Public Schools and graduated from McClenaghan High School in the class of 1967.  He attended the University of South Carolina at Florence and Columbia and graduated with a B.S. in Business Administration from Francis Marion College in 1973, the second graduating class of FMC.
He married Susan M. Kannaday in 2002 and has a step-son, Kemper Peel, a step-daughter, Aynsley Eastman, and two grandchildren, Jack and A.J. Eastman.