23cm x 29 cm. Baldoyle Dublin
Atmospheric photo of Brian Mullins of Dublin following Paidi O Se of Kerry on a rain sodden Croke Park in 1978
Con’s description of Kerry player Mikey Sheehy’s free in the 1978 All Ireland Football Final between Dublin v Kerry is still the stuff of legend and is worth quoting again. Con wrote:
“Dublin were like climbers who had been driven down the mountain by a rock fall – they had to set out again from the plateau not far from the base.And now came the moment that will go into that department of sport’s museum where abide such strange happenings as the Long Count and the goal that gave Cardiff their only English FA Cup and the fall of Devon Loch.Its run-up began with a free from John O’Keefe, deep in his own territory. Jack O’Shea made a flying catch and drove a long ball towards the middle of the 21 -yard line.Mikey Sheehy’s fist put it behind the backs, breaking along the ground out toward Kerry’s right. This time Paddy Cullen was better positioned and comfortably played the ball with his feet away from Sheehy.He had an abundance of time and space in which to lift and clear but his pick-up was a dubious one and the referee Seamus Aldridge, decided against him. Or maybe he deemed his meeting with Ger Power illegal.Whatever the reason, Paddy put on a show of righteous indignation that would get him a card from Equity, throwing his hands to heaven as the referee kept pointing towards goal.And while all that was going on, Mikey Sheehy was running up to take the kick-and suddenly Paddy dashed back towards his goal like a woman who smells a cake burning.The ball won the race and it curled inside the near post as Paddy crashed into the outside of the net and lay against it like a fireman who returned to find his own station ablaze.Sometime, Noel Pearson might make a musical of this amazing final and as the green flag goes up for that crazy goal he will have a banshee crooning: “And that was the end of poor Molly Malone.”And so it was. A few minutes later came the tea-break. Kerry went into a frenzy of green and gold and a tumult of acclaim. The champions looked like men who worked hard and seen their savings plundered by bandits.”
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Great collectors item here - a picture of the 1977 Clare Hurling Team which won the National Hurling league Title.Note a young Ger Loughnane present in the front row and the later addition of a not exactly to scale man in the back row!
34cm x 40cm Kilmaley Co Clare
(From the Examiner Newspaper)
One of the 1970s’ great hurling forces was the Clare team of 1976 to 1978.
They made three NHL Finals in a row, winning in 1977 and 1978. Their brand of play lit up many matches, leaving indelible memories for supporters and spectators. They reached the 1977 and 1978 Munster Finals, losing on both occasions to Cork.
Next Monday evening, Councillor Tom McNamara, Chairman of Clare County Council, will host a Civic Reception to honour these players and their mentors. Fr Harry Bohan was manager, with Justin McCarthy acting as coach for the 1977 and 1978 seasons.
Among the players, Séamus Durack (Feakle/Éire Óg) and Jackie O’Gorman (Cratloe) were mainstays during this period. Born in June 1951, Durack won three All Stars as goalkeeper (1977, 1978, 1981). He was first choice for Munster in the Railway Cup between 1973 and 1979, when they won the competition twice (1976, 1978). Born in October 1943, O’Gorman offered a powerful presence at wing back and corner back, appearing for Munster in 1972 and 1973.
They spoke this week to PM O’Sullivan about their careers.
PMO’S: It is 40 years ago, just about, since the 1978 Munster Final in Thurles. What do ye remember about the build-up, the day itself?
SD: The build-up was unbelievable. There was no other topic of conversation in Clare. The level of expectation, especially after losing the Munster Final in 1977, jumped right off the charts. A massive crowd went to Thurles. 54,000 was the official attendance, and I think 5,000 people weren’t even let into the ground.
We couldn’t get in the gate when we arrived at Semple [Stadium]. There was a lad inside and he wouldn’t let us in. I remember saying to him at one stage, and it coming close to the game: “Look, after another minute, we’ll make a decision and we’ll be gone back down that road and there’ll be no game here today, and it’ll be you who has the problem then.”
JO’G: I remember you hit the door a few raps. You were off the bus first. There was this lad and his job was to let no one in that door, or he’d lose his job for the next day. He was shouting: “Ye can’t come in here! The official door is there for ye.” And I said to you: “Shem, sit back down here with us. Sure, there’s no rush. They can’t start without us.” Next thing, a fella opened a door further up, and we all walked in.
SD: To get from the Anner Hotel down to the pitch on the day was phenomenal in itself. We had a Garda escort, but even with it we could hardly get down with the crowds. It was frustrating. Here we were, in Thurles since early, and we still weren’t on time.
JO’G: I never got frustrated. What was the point?
SD: Jackie always had a more relaxed, practical view. He was years ahead of us, in every sense. He was ‘The Godfather’ and we all looked up to him.
But to give you an idea of how different things were back then… When you came in the gate, at the back of the Old Stand in Thurles, getting to the front door of the dressing room was still a nice few yards. As I walked across, I met four to six people I knew as well as I knew Jackie O’Gorman.
I saluted every one of them, and not one of them was capable of saluting me back. They were in a frenzy, a pure frenzy.
They thought Clare were going to win the Munster Championship for the first time since 1932. They were in a zone apart, going in to get their seat to see it all.
So there was a tension-filled trip on the bus, followed by more tension at the ground. There was nothing that could have been done about it. I think the officials were overwhelmed by the amount of people that simply turned up, hoping they might get in.
JO’G: I didn’t get caught up in the hype at all. Goalies are different. Ye have to think about the game more. Ye can’t make a mistake. We can make a mistake, because someone will cover up for you, behind the play, what have you. But no one hurled that day in ’78, both teams. Cork didn’t hurl either. It was an absolute disaster of a day. Never got going as a contest.
SD: I’d go back a year. I think you have to go back a year, to the 1977 Munster Final, in order to understand 1978. If we had won in ’77, I’ll always maintain strongly, we’d have won in ’78. But refereeing changed the whole structure of that first game. We were hurling well in ’77. We were beating Cork, and we had them in desperate trouble all over the place, halfway through the first half. Noel Casey at full-forward was destroying Martin O’Doherty in front of the goal. We were under no pressure at our end of the field.
Then it all changed. I was in the Town goal and Charlie McCarthy, at corner-forward, got involved with our full-back, Jim Power. I can’t say Charlie was a dirty player because he most certainly wasn’t. But that day there was a bit of skulduggery going on, and Charlie pulled three or four times against Jim Power’s leg, and nothing was done about it. Charlie should have had his name taken. Some referees might have sent him off. But it was let go by the referee on the day, Noel Dalton.
Ray Cummins was full forward for Cork, a bright intellectual guy, a wonderful thinker about the game, a brilliant hurler. Ray was one of the three best forwards we ever met in Munster, along with Éamonn Cregan and Francis Loughnane.
Cork’s Ray Cummins (right) flicking the ball past Clare fullback Jim Power. Cummins goal in the 1977 Munster final turned the match around.Now, Jackie was involved in a key incident, which I’ll come to. Ray went up for a ball and caught it. He was the only player I ever saw with the uncanny ability of going forward for the ball in the air, getting it in his hand, and being able to land turned for goal. Jim Power wasn’t the most agile in those situations. So Ray slipped Jim on the turn and came on for goal.
I was in the goals and there was no one between him and me. Being such a tall fella, Ray took his four or five long steps, coming in. And I said to myself: ‘Do I go too early or do I stay?’ So I waited and waited, until the last. And, just as he was on his last step, he dropped the hurley and palmed the ball.
At that stage, as far as I’m concerned, there should have been a whistle blown and a free out for dropping the hurley. We were beating Cork by five points at that stage, I think, and hurling them off the field. This is how close we came to winning a Munster Championship and an All-Ireland… Palmed the ball, and I instinctively put up my shoulder. The ball hit me there [indicates right shoulder], went up and hit the inside of the crossbar, and went into the net. That moment changed the whole course of the game.
JO’G: Was that rule there at the time? I can’t remember. Weren’t you allowed to palm the ball into the net? I remember it happening in All-Ireland Finals during the Seventies, goals got by palming it in.
SD: You could palm the ball into the net or over the bar, so long as you hadn’t dropped the hurley first. They didn’t stop scoring with the hand until sometime in the 1980s, I think. But Ray Cummins dropped his hurley before he palmed the ball that hit my shoulder.
PMO’S: Footage of the game bears out this point. Mick Dunne is doing the commentary for RTÉ and he expresses big surprise that the referee didn’t pull up Ray Cummins for dropping the hurl.
JO’G: Right. If the rule was there, it was there. But referees will always get stuff wrong…
SD: I’ll go back to the hurley being dropped and the other way it might have transpired. Instead of Cork getting a goal, Clare get a free on the 21-yard line, and I land it above in the far square on top of Noel Casey, who is having a right game and had already scored a goal. Maybe, off the free, Noel gets a point or a goal? Do you see what I mean? It was an awful big swing, on one incorrect decision.
Anyway, shortly after that goal, another high ball arrives. And here is where Jackie O’Gorman comes in. Ray Cummins goes up for that ball, in a no man’s land between full-forward and corner-forward. Jackie comes across, being the bit of a free spirit he always was. He’s conscious Cummins has just scored a goal off a high ball, and he pulls, to make sure Cummins doesn’t catch this time. Jackie was just doing his job, helping out his man at full-back.
JO’G: I was great for that! Coming across, helping out. A regular Samaritan…
SD: Whatever way Jackie pulled, Cummins goes down, and there was a free in. Cummins gets up off the ground and faces back towards goals. Jim Power is in his way, standing there, in case there’s a quick free. As Cummins heads towards the goals, he went to go at Power. He must have thought it was Jim who had got him, but it was Jackie. Cummins was mouthing into Power’s face, and he was right up close against him, breathing on him.
This is the white heat of battle, now. This is after Ray Cummins had scored a goal shortly beforehand, after Charlie McCarthy had failed to get booked for slapping at Jim Power. So he was rightly pissed off. Instinctively, with someone so flush in his face, Power did move [indicates a slight movement of head]. A flick, like that. Ray could have got an Oscar for going down.
Then the crowd started baying. The referee came in (and I’m the only one who heard the conversation with his umpires). He comes in to the umpire on my right and says: “What happened? Did you see anything?” He said back: “No, I didn’t see anything at all.” Then Noel Dalton asked the other umpire: “Did you see it?” That umpire said: “He butted him with his head.” Dalton said: ”What? Are you sure?” He repeated: “He butted him with his head.” The ref walked out, took Jim Power’s name, sent him straight to the line. Ray Cummins got up 30 seconds later, played on, not a bother on him. If Power had broke his nose, fair enough. Take out the red card. Ray was a gentleman off the field, and mostly on it too. But it was a disappointing thing on his part. Then again, I suppose he thought Jim had caught him under the high ball… I don’t blame Ray. The real truth was that the referee wasn’t up to the job. His head went on the day.
JO’G: But when I look back on it now I have no regrets about any of it. No regrets whatsoever. I thought those years were the best years of our lives.
SD: Absolutely. They were the same for all of us.
JO’G: Ray Cummins was a really tremendous forward. And there was no ill-will in the slightest between Clare and Cork. No way at all. They were just a bit craftier than us.
SD: They were crafty, and 1977 proved it. We had to see out the rest of the game with 14 men. The free Charlie McCarthy struck over after that sending off put Cork up two points. We had been ahead five points, going great, and now, two high balls later… One was a free out and the other shouldn’t have been a red card. Jim Power went to hell and back over 1977, inside Clare and outside Clare.
We’d have waltzed through Cork in ’78, only for ’77 hanging over us. That destroyed the whole scenario for us. Three-quarters of our team froze on the day in ’78. I mean, 13 points to 11 points as all the scoring done, in a top of the ground game that should have suited us down to the ground. Ray Cummins was one of the best Cork hurlers of all time but he hardly got a puck of the ball in ’78.
PMO’S: Am I right in concluding that ye played on in 1977 with five backs on six forwards? That aspect would amaze people today, playing on minus a defender…
JO’G: Yes, we stayed with just the five backs. That was the way it was at the time. I stayed inside marking Ray and Charlie, with John [McMahon] on Seánie [O’Leary] in the other corner. Those days, the coaching end of it on the sideline was pretty basic. There was no such thing as take off a forward and put on a back. In our time playing, the game wasn’t analysed the same way at all. It was absolutely man on man, do your job, and get out of the way if you can’t do your job. We were never coached, as such. Justin [McCarthy] came in and did fine work on the skills end of it. But the game wasn’t looked into the same way as you have now.
SD: Every team took that approach to a sending off at the time.
JO’G: We didn’t think as much about it. That time, when you went playing hurling, it was to get away from work. Now the current lads nearly go to work to get away from hurling! The present player’s life is consumed by it now. I don’t think a full-time farmer or a tradesman could be a hurler now. Where would he find the time to do the training? Instead you can go off to work for the day. It’s grand: no gym, no weights, no nutrition checks… It’s nearly a break.
You take the hamstring issue now. The present players get so much of this hamstring trouble because they’re straining so much one minute, going at it so hard in training, and then they go and work all day at a desk [mimics typing on a keyboard]. And then the whole thing, the whole body, goes slack. And then if they don’t warm up properly (and we are often laughing at the length of the current warm-ups), they’re fecked. It’s one extreme to another.
I always equate it to a greyhound and a sheepdog. You never saw a sheepdog break its toe. Yet every day greyhounds run out, one of them breaks his toe. Because the greyhound is cooped up all day.
Don’t get me wrong. I think the game now, as a spectator sport, is wonderful to watch. I love it. I don’t agree with this short game Clare were playing, and other counties. A lad runs out 50 yards from goal and he passes the ball sideways to someone… But Clare this year are gone away from that stuff and are playing a bit more direct hurling. They usually have three forwards inside now.
SD: The home advantage makes a big difference in this new round-robin system.
JO’G: It does. Clare should have beaten Cork, down in Cork, only the full-back line went ball-watching and allowed a ball that should have been let wide be struck back across, and a goal got off it. I think our forwards are doing pretty well but our backs, as a unit, are a bit vulnerable. They were cruising against Waterford, at home in Cusack Park, but conceded five or six points at the end of it for no reason I could see. As a unit, at the back, they don’t seem to know how to close it out.
SD: We’ve no enforcer in the current Clare team.
JO’G: John Conlon is the best we have at the minute, and he’s a great old warrior. But he’s not that kind of guy, the kind of lad who’s going to shout: ‘Come on! We’ll go through them now!’ We don’t seem to have any talkers. They’re playing a lovely game…
SD: They are, but it’s a schoolboy game. If you don’t have a couple of enforcers, particularly around the half-forward line, you’ll end up in bother. If you have overly fancy players under the dropping ball, you’re in trouble all day. Because if you have to go long, if the short game doesn’t work for you, you’re caught. If you don’t practise long, if you don’t practise hurling over your head, you’re sucked into an alien game, and you’ll be beaten when the game heats up. You can’t do what you didn’t practise. The big day, the hot day, you’ll be caught out.
JO’G: He doesn’t have to be scoring loads of goals or points, your enforcer. But he has to be going looking for work, knowing he has a lad beside him to give it to, a lad who’ll slot it over the bar. The only time Tipp are a force, in my view, is when [Patrick] ‘Bonner’ Maher is centre-forward, running at defences. [John] ‘Bubbles’ [O’Dwyer] won’t run through the middle. Neither will John McGrath or Noel McGrath.
Tipp lifted off when ‘Bonner’ came on last Sunday. He scored a goal, even though he won’t always score a goal, because he’s not a good striker. But neither was John Power of Kilkenny or Brendan Lynskey of Galway.
They bring something else, something vital, those sort of hurlers.
48cm x 59cm Bruff Co Limerick
1973 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final was the 86th All-Ireland Final and the culmination of the 1973 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship, an inter-county hurling tournament for the top teams in Ireland. The match was held at Croke Park, Dublin, on 2 September 1973, between Limerick and Kilkenny. The Leinster champions lost to their Munster opponents on a score line of 1-21 to 1-14.
Background
This was Kilkenny's third consecutive appearance in an All-Ireland final. After losing to Tipperary in 1971, 'the Cats' defeated Cork to take their eighteenth championship title in 1972. Limerick, having won the Munster title for the first time since 1955, were lining out in a first All-Ireland final since 1940 when they claimed their sixth championship crown.
The two teams last met in a major game in the semi-final of the 1971-1972 National Hurling League. Limerick were the winners on that occasion with a score line of 3-13 to 2-13. Both teams last met in the championship in the 1940 All-Ireland final when Limerick won. The 1973 All-Ireland final was the sixth championship clash between the two. Limerick had three victories - the All-Ireland finals of 1897, 1936 and 1940 - while Kilkenny defeated Limerick in the finals of 1933 and 1935.
All-Ireland final
Overview
Sunday 2 September was the date of the 1973 All-Ireland senior hurling final at Croke Park. Limerick were playing at the famous stadium for the first time in eighteen years, while for Kilkenny Croke Park was regarded as a home away from home due to the frequency of their visits.
Limerick undoubtedly started the game as rank outsiders against a Kilkenny team regarded as one of the greatest of all-time; however, ‘the Cats’ suffered an amazing streak of bad luck. Between the Leinster and All-Ireland deciders Kilkenny lost many of their key players for one reason or another. Éamonn Morrissey was forced to emigrate to Australia, Jim Treacy was ruled out due to injury, Kieran Purcell couldn’t play because of appendicitis and star forward Eddie Keher couldn’t play because of a broken collar bone. Limerick saw their chance and made a masterful selectorial decision. With Keher and Purcell sidelined Pat Delaney would take up the mantle as Kilkenny’s chief scorer. Delaney was an exceptional half-forward who was far too quick for most defenders. Instead of using a defender to mark him the Limerick selectors moved Éamonn Cregan from the forwards back to centre-back where he was charged with the task of nullifying the Kilkenny marksman. Limerick also had serious losses that day. Mickey Graham, who broke his leg in the National League Final that year, was thus a spectator. Jim O'Donnell, was also injured and was man of the match in the first round v Clare that year and Mick O'Loughlin who would have been their first choice corner back, but could not commit himself to the cause that year were also out. Leonard Enright, who would subsequently win 3 All Stars in his early thirties was engaged in other sports in '73 and thus also unavailable.
The weather on the day of the final was wet, with heavy showers falling before and during the match. Because of this the pitch was extremely slippery while the sliotar was also difficult to control.
Match report
At 3:15pm Mick Slattery of Clare threw in the sliotar and the game was on. The opening forty minutes saw Kilkenny set the standard. Pat Delaney, in spite of Éamonn Cregan doing an excellent man-marking job, scored the opening goal of the game to give Kilkenny the lead. Twice Limerick fell behind in the opening half and twice they fought back. At one stage they trailed by 1-5 to 0-3, however, they held Kilkenny scoreless for two nine-minute spells in the first-half. At the short whistle Limerick were very much on top and left the pitch leading by 0-12 to 1-7.
Five minutes after the restart Kilkenny levelled the scores courtesy of points by Claus Dunne and Liam ‘Chunky’ O’Brien. A minute later ‘the Cats’ went a point ahead when Limerick ‘keeper Séamus Horgan brought off a remarkable save from a palmed shot by Mick Crotty. Although the attempt on goal was blocked, the sliotar flew over the bar for a Kilkenny point. Shortly afterwards Richie Bennis had the sides level when he converted a free from forty yards out. A minute later Limerick secured the match-winning score. A puck-out from Kilkenny ‘keeper Noel Skehan was quickly sent back in his direction by Liam O'Donoghue. Skehan saved the shot but Mossie Dowling and Ned Rea were waiting for the rebound. Dowling became the Limerick hero as he turned the sliotar past Skehan and into the net. Although the match was far from over this was the vital score that gave Limerick the title. The entire second-half saw Limerick show their supremacy. Kilkenny were held scoreless for twenty-three minutes during the second-half while Limerick went on a point-scoring spree for the final quarter. Midfield marshal Richie Bennis finished the game with ten points to his name as Limerick claimed their seventh All-Ireland crown with a 1-21 to 1-14 victory.
"For his alertness and sense of judgement, for the crispness of his stroke which played such a sizeable part in regaining the National League title for his county."
"For the fervour he brings to all facets of hurling, and particularly for his dedicated half-back play which contributed so much to Limerick's 1973 successes."
"For his artistic stick-work which he has demonstrated with increasing regularity, and for establishing himself as one of the most elegant and energetic midfielders of recent times."
BRIAN CODY will have fond memories of All-Ireland hurling final day in 1972.
Brian Cody captained his county’s minor side to victory over Cork and later that afternoon those counties produced a classic encounter which ended in a spectacular victory for a Kilkenny team captained by goalkeeper Noel Skehan.
Cork were firm favourites after hammering Clare in the Munster final (6-18 to 2-8), while Kilkenny had been taken to a replay by Wexford in the Leinster decider. The game was a thrilling contest.
Cork dominated the early exchanges and went eight points clear after a long-range score from wing-back Con Roche in the 17th minute of the second half.
Remarkably the Rebels didn’t score again. Kilkenny took control with Pat Henderson a key figure at centre-back and Eddie Keher cutting loose up front.
They were level after Frank Cummins goal and went onto win by eight points.
Scorers for Kilkenny: E Keher (2-9, 1-7 frees); L O’Brien (0-5, three frees); P Delaney (0-3); F Cummins (1-0); K Purcell (0-2); M Crotty (0-2); P Henderson (0-1, free); M Murphy (0-1); J Kinsella (0-1).
Scorers for Cork: R Cummins (2-3); M Malone (2-1); C McCarthy (0-4, three frees); S O’Leary (1-1); C Roche (0-2, one free).
KILKENNY: N Skehan (c); F Larkin, P Dillon, J Treacy; P Lawlor, P Henderson, E Morrissey; F Cummins, L O’Brien; M Crotty, P Delaney, J Kinsella; E Byrne, K Purcell, E Keher.
Subs: M Murphy for Byrne (ht); M Coogan for Larkin (injured, 49); P Moran for Kinsella (75).
CORK: P Barry; A Maher, P McDonnell, B Murphy; F Norberg (c), S Looney, C Roche; D Coughlan, J McCarthy; G McCarthy, M Malone, P Hegarty; C McCarthy, R Cummins, S O’Leary
Subs: T O’Brien for Norberg (36); D Collins for Hegarty (68); J Rothwell for G McCarthy (76).
Referee: Mick Spain (Offaly).
Original JFK Tribute written by historian Brendan O'Shea on November 27th 1963,only 5 days after the assassination of the President in Dallas,Texas.It is a beautifully written and poignant tribute to the grandson of an emigrant who represented the hopes and dreams of the entire Irish Nation
Such was the love and affection for President John F Kennedy in the country of his ancestors, that numerous Irish homes, businesses and pubs displayed photographs, portraits and other memorabilia relating to the Kennedy and Fitzgerald families.
Origins :Co Limerick Dimensions :55 x 43cm. Glazed
President Kennedy greeting Irish crowds while on a state visit to the country in 1963.
55 years ago, President John F. Kennedy visited Ireland, his ancestral home, assuming that his family had mostly come from County Wexford, but new research shows us that JFK had links to many other Irish counties as well.
The President’s family tree, however, indicates that he has the most links to County Limerick, but also has connections to Limerick, Clare, Cork, and Fermanagh as research from Ancestry.com shed light onRussell James, a spokesperson for Ancestry Ireland, commented on how there is a great deal of discussion and research still ongoing about JFK’s roots to Ireland.
“President John F. Kennedy’s family history has been a much-discussed topic over the years with his Irish roots being something that was extremely important to him. Traditionally JFK’s heritage has been closely linked with Wexford but we’re delighted to find records on Ancestry which show he had strong links to other counties across Ireland,” James said.
“These findings will hopefully allow other counties across Ireland to further celebrate the life of the former American President, on the 55th anniversary of his visit to Ireland.”
Limerick, as opposed to Wexford, had the most number of Kennedy’s great-grandparents, with three in total from his mother’s side: Mary Ann Fitzgerald, Michael Hannon, and Thomas Fitzgerald. The Fitzgeralds had come from a small town called Bruff in the eastern part of Limerick, but Hannon had come from Lough Gur.
His great-grandfather, Thomas Fitzgerald, emigrated to the United States in the midst of the Irish famine of 1848 and eventually settled in Boston, Massachusetts.
His Wexford connection is not as strong, given that only two of his great-grandparents came from the county. They were Patrick Kennedy of Dunganstown and Bridget Murphy from Owenduff.
Patrick, when he arrived in the U.S in April 1849, was found to be a minor as shown on his American naturalization papers and had become a citizen three years later. He worked as a cooper in Boston until he died almost 10 years later in 1858.
JFK had visited Dunganstown because his relatives had shared the Kennedy name there, but ultimately his roots lie deeper in Limerick through his mother’s side.
The rest of his great-grandparents are from all over Ireland, with James Hickey from Newcastle-upon-Fergus, County Clare, Margaret M. Field from Rosscarbery, Cork, and Rosa Anna Cox from Tomregan in Fermanagh. Every one of them, though, had eventually emigrated and settled in Massachusetts.
On Wednesday, June 26, 1963, Kennedy had arrived in Ireland, but on the second day, he made the journey to his ancestral home in Wexford, where he spent time with his relatives there and gave speeches in the surrounding area.
While there, America’s first Irish Catholic President took a trip to Dunganstown, Wexford, where he met his extended family at the Kennedy homestead. It was there he made a toast to “all those Kennedys who went and all those Kennedys who stayed.”
The homestead, now a visitor center, is where his great-grandfather lived and is still maintained by the current-day Kennedy family. This land itself was included in a land survey of Wexford in 1853, which shows that John Kennedy, JFK’s two-times great uncle, occupied the property described as having a ‘house, offices, and land’.
Framed portrait of the three Kennedy Brothers from 1963 ,taken in the White House.
45cm x 35cm Bruree Co Limerick
Ulster is becoming Britain’s Vietnam,” Senator Edward M Kennedy, the youngest of three exceptionally accomplished brothers in the United States’ most famous Irish family, told the US Senate in the autumn of 1971.
This year marks an important anniversary for the Kennedys, the Irish and the world, for it was 50 years ago when Ted Kennedy set his sights on peace in Northern Ireland. And, from that moment to the miracle of Stormont, in 1998, that secured peace, Ted spearheaded the United States’ peace-making efforts. He pushed presidents, worked with key Senate and House members of Irish descent, testified before Congress, delivered speeches, wrote articles, visited the region and met leaders on both sides of the conflict.
Jack, Bobby and Ted Kennedy were all proudly Irish. They all spoke of the anti-Irish bigotry that had plagued their ancestors in the United States. Jack visited Ireland to trace his roots and, while there as president in 1963, called it “the land for which I hold the greatest affection”. Ted came in 1964 in grief after Jack’s murder, and he spent more time trying to end the Troubles in Northern Ireland than on any other global challenge.
Joe and Rose led discussions about the world with the boys over meals, and Joe invited prominent people, such as aviator Charles Lindbergh and media mogul Henry Luce, to dine with them and enrich the conversations
Ted’s peace-making in Northern Ireland, however, reflects far more than the proud Irishness that he shared with his brothers. It also reflects perhaps the most fascinating and consequential story about the Kennedy brothers that hardly anyone knows – a story with important lessons for the United States of today.
Most people know that Joe and Rose Kennedy groomed their sons for success. They started with Joe jnr, who died at war in 1944 at the age of 29, and continued through Jack, Bobby and Ted. What most people don’t know (and what I explore in my new book, The Kennedys in the World: How Jack, Bobby, and Ted Remade America’s Empire) is that, from the time the brothers were little boys, Joe and Rose pushed them not just to succeed but to look beyond the United States’ borders – to learn about the world, care about the world and, once they attained power, shape the United States’ role in the world.
Superbly framed portrait of JFK
Such was the love and affection for President John F Kennedy in the country of his ancestors, that numerous Irish homes, businesses and pubs displayed photographs, portraits and other memorabilia relating to the Kennedy and Fitzgerald families, who hailed largely from Wexford and Limerick
57cm x 47 cm Dromkeen Co Limerick
President Kennedy greeting Irish crowds while on a state visit to the country in 1963.
55 years ago, President John F. Kennedy visited Ireland, his ancestral home, assuming that his family had mostly come from County Wexford, but new research shows us that JFK had links to many other Irish counties as well.
The President’s family tree, however, indicates that he has the most links to County Limerick, but also has connections to Limerick, Clare, Cork, and Fermanagh as research from Ancestry.com shed light onRussell James, a spokesperson for Ancestry Ireland, commented on how there is a great deal of discussion and research still ongoing about JFK’s roots to Ireland.
“President John F. Kennedy’s family history has been a much-discussed topic over the years with his Irish roots being something that was extremely important to him. Traditionally JFK’s heritage has been closely linked with Wexford but we’re delighted to find records on Ancestry which show he had strong links to other counties across Ireland,” James said.
“These findings will hopefully allow other counties across Ireland to further celebrate the life of the former American President, on the 55th anniversary of his visit to Ireland.”
Limerick, as opposed to Wexford, had the most number of Kennedy’s great-grandparents, with three in total from his mother’s side: Mary Ann Fitzgerald, Michael Hannon, and Thomas Fitzgerald. The Fitzgeralds had come from a small town called Bruff in the eastern part of Limerick, but Hannon had come from Lough Gur.
His great-grandfather, Thomas Fitzgerald, emigrated to the United States in the midst of the Irish famine of 1848 and eventually settled in Boston, Massachusetts.
His Wexford connection is not as strong, given that only two of his great-grandparents came from the county. They were Patrick Kennedy of Dunganstown and Bridget Murphy from Owenduff.
Patrick, when he arrived in the U.S in April 1849, was found to be a minor as shown on his American naturalization papers and had become a citizen three years later. He worked as a cooper in Boston until he died almost 10 years later in 1858.
JFK had visited Dunganstown because his relatives had shared the Kennedy name there, but ultimately his roots lie deeper in Limerick through his mother’s side.
The rest of his great-grandparents are from all over Ireland, with James Hickey from Newcastle-upon-Fergus, County Clare, Margaret M. Field from Rosscarbery, Cork, and Rosa Anna Cox from Tomregan in Fermanagh. Every one of them, though, had eventually emigrated and settled in Massachusetts.
On Wednesday, June 26, 1963, Kennedy had arrived in Ireland, but on the second day, he made the journey to his ancestral home in Wexford, where he spent time with his relatives there and gave speeches in the surrounding area.
While there, America’s first Irish Catholic President took a trip to Dunganstown, Wexford, where he met his extended family at the Kennedy homestead. It was there he made a toast to “all those Kennedys who went and all those Kennedys who stayed.”
The homestead, now a visitor center, is where his great-grandfather lived and is still maintained by the current-day Kennedy family. This land itself was included in a land survey of Wexford in 1853, which shows that John Kennedy, JFK’s two-times great uncle, occupied the property described as having a ‘house, offices, and land’.
Tom Moloughney: 'It was a great aul' Tipperary team, we should have won five-in-a-row'
It was the first All-Ireland final to be shown live on Telifis Eireann and the cameras had barely started rolling when Tipperary's Tom Moloughney found the Wexford net. Brendan O'Brien rewinds the tape back to 1962 for our 'Moment In Time' series
It was the first All-Ireland final to be shown live on Telifis Eireann and the cameras had barely started rolling when Tipperary's Tom Moloughney found the Wexford net. Brendan O'Brien rewinds the tape back to 1962 for our 'Moment In Time' series
Tom Moloughney, Jimmy Doyle, and Kieran Carey relax in the dressing room after Tipperary’s victory over Dublin in the 1961 All-Ireland final, a success that was to be repeated the following year. Picture from ‘The GAA — A People’s History’It seemed as if most of Croke Park had been caught on the hop. A cameraman was still scrambling for the sideline as the Archbishop of Cashel and Emly, Dr Morris, threw the ball in and the game was only clearing its throat when Wexford were hit with a pair of blows that would have felled a team buttressed by lesser men.
“Two goals in eighty seconds set champions for victory,” was the sub-heading in the Cork Examiner the next day. The paper's correspondent detailed how reporters were still straightening their papers and spectators in the crowd of 75,039 were finding their seats, or a perch on the terracing, when the drama spilled over like a boiled kettle.
Close to 58 years have passed since the two counties lit up what was a dull and sometimes wet September afternoon in the capital but the fog of time clears in an instant as Tom Moloughney recalls those opening credits. Both goals are broken down play by play. The only aspect that ever escapes him was his opening score's wider significance.
“I never heard any talk of it really,” Moloughney explained yesterday. “One fella reminded me of the TV thing lately. I had forgotten.”
Everything else? Crystal clear.
His slice of history began with a sideline cut from Theo English that found its way to him after Liam Devaney tangled with an opponent. The finish was, by all accounts, a blistering one from a man whose superb second-half goal for Kilruane MacDonaghs against Thurles Sarsfields in the 1959 Tipperary North final had been one of the prompts for the county to turn to him in the first place.
Wexford had more coming.
Nick O'Donnell was a colossus. Texaco Player of the Year in 1960, when they shocked Tipp in the All-Ireland decider, he would later be named on the GAA's centenary and millennium teams at full-back, but his puck-out at that crucial moment was mishit. It fell to Moloughney who in turn presented the gift to Sean McLoughlin.
What followed was a game for the ages. If not quite in quality then in thrills and spills. Wexford recovered, found themselves just a goal adrift at half-time and then took a two-point lead with 13 minutes to go before the fury of their chase emptied the tanks. A Tipp side that had lost Jimmy Doyle to a broken shoulder midway through the half took full advantage.
There are no clips of the game in the usual corners of the internet today but newspaper coverage captures the world in which all this unfolded. The biggest international story of the week was the escalating tension between the US and Cuba after an incident between the respective navies while an Ireland piloted by Sean Lemass was slowly emerging from its insular existence.
Telifis Eireann only began its broadcasting for the day minutes before throw-in and the schedule wrapped up long before midnight. Among the other offerings on the box that weekend were 'Kit Carson', 'The Flintstones' and a TV western series called 'The Restless Gun'. The US, after centuries of taking our people, was now beginning to give back in all sorts of ways.
Roughly 500 people had arrived at Shannon Airport from the States and Canada on the morning of the match. A Swissair jet carrying 67 members of Toronto GAA Club was another visitor to Irish shores and these international waves were replicated on the ground. CIE laid on 25 special trains and road works on O'Connell Street made traffic jams inevitable.
The 1962 All-Ireland hurling final wasn't the first time that the nation had been treated to live coverage of a game from Croke Park. That honour had been claimed by the Railway Cup hurling and football finals six months before when Clonmel's Mick Kennedy, playing for Leinster, had the honour of claiming the first ever score shown on live television.
Dublin's Des Foley made his own entry into the annals by winning medals in both codes.
Tipperary had seven players on the Munster hurling selection that particular St Patrick's Day. All of them would play again 24 hours later when the county side faced a Rest of Ireland selection in an exhibition in Thurles. Others to double up that same weekend were Christy Ring and Lar Foley. This was an era blessed with players whose talents would transcend time but Moloughney has no doubt that Jimmy Doyle's was the star that shone brightest. And still does.
“He was the best of the lot,” he declared without any hesitation. “You would go up to see Jimmy Doyle training. They used to get big crowds to watch training in Thurles at the time and I'd say they were all there for Jimmy. The things he could do! He wasn't fast but he had great anticipation. He had a brilliant hurling brain.”
Moloughney's own days with Tipp lasted no more than four years, although his stint with Kilruane would stretch through to the early '70s. He regrets the brevity of his inter-county career now, and thinks maybe he could have trained as hard as the Donie Nealons or the John Doyles through winter, but there was farming to be done at the time and life goes on.
Tipp kept rolling and, for the most part, they kept winning too. All-Ireland champions in 1961, their win a year later brought them level on the roll of honour with Cork on 19 and, after losing a Munster final to Waterford in 1963, they would add another pair back-to-back thanks to many of the men with whom Moloughney had soldiered.
“It was a great aul Tipperary team,” he said. “We should have won five-in-a-row.”
45cm x 35cm
Tipperary and Kilkenny met for the fourth successive year in the Minor final, with Kilkenny completing their third victory in a row. For the Senior match, Tipperary (captained by legend Jimmy Doyle) were looking to avenge their shock defeat when they last met Wexford (led in 1962 by Billy Rackard) in the 1960 All-Ireland. Dignitaries present to witness the final included: President of Ireland, Éamon de Valera, Former President Seán T O Kelly, An Taoiseach Seán Lemass, Minister of Industry and Commerce, former Cork hurling star Jack Lynch, and renowned actor Noel Purcell.
Tipperary started explosively with two goals from Tom Moloughney and Theo English. Padge Keogh scored Wexford’s first point and they eventually clawed back into contention with Ned Wheeler drawing them level with a goal and a point. However, Tipperary went in at half time three points ahead with scores from Jimmy Doyle and Seán McLoughlin and it could have been more only due to the great goalkeeping display by Wexford’s Pat Nolan. The second half was tense and tough with Wexford drawing level again with Jimmy O Brien scoring a goal and Billy Rackard drawing them level. The sides were level three more times in a keenly fought encounter. Jimmy Doyle was a big loss to Tipperary having to go off injured, however a goal from the substitute Liam Connolly and points from Donie Nealon and Seán McLoughlin meant that Tipperary just pulled ahead and took the title by a two-point margin. Tony Wall deputised for the injured Tipperary captain and accepted the Liam McCarthy Cup.
33cm x 28cm Tournafulla Co Limerick
Truly wonderful photo from the 1950s capturing the essence of the traditional congeniality and warmth of the Irish Pub as two old friends & neighbours discuss the issues and/or gossip of the day over a pint but right outside the Ladies !
Beautiful B&W image of legendary Tipperary captain Tony Wall lifting the Liam McCarthy after winning the 1958 All Ireland Hurling Final.
Thurles Co Tipperary 45cm x 35cm
Tony Wall was in charge of the last Tipperary championship team that took on Clare in Ennis. Thirty-three years later, he looks back on a famous career, considering all that could have gone wrong as well as all that went so well. A holder of five All-Ireland medals, Wall was one of the game’s finest ever centre-backs and the author of a still fresh book, Hurling (1965). If he wrote a sequel today, he’d advise a couple of small tweaks to the modern game.
“We have no electricity,” Tony Wall says, greeting me at the door.
This announcement makes sense of an estate filled with machines and vans and cables, men speaking urgent Polish, diggers operating as if in an underwater world. An upgrade is taking place in Raheny. The Walls are making do until six o’clock, when power is due back. Mrs Wall is in the sitting room, a gentle smiling presence. Conversation turns naturally to her experience of attending the many big occasions in which her husband hurled for Tipperary.
“We didn’t meet until after the 1958 All-Ireland final,” Wall relates. “So Betty didn’t start going to any of the matches until 1959.” He expands: “She was from a totally non GAA background in Dublin. I was this savage from down the country, bringing her away from civilisation. I was even bringing her to hurling matches…”
Mrs Wall beams. She found quite a first championship day out. Tipperary, the reigning All-Ireland champions, had Waterford in a Munster semi-final on July 12, 1959. A gale entered the Cork Athletic Grounds and stayed there. Strong wind means a tough decision. Tipperary won the toss and here was that decision.
“I was captain, same as the year before,” Wall begins. “I decided on going against the wind. I felt I had no choice because of previous experience.”
Tough decisions mean strong opinions. “I was there with Tony’s mother,” Mrs Wall remembers. “She didn’t agree with the decision to go against the wind. I said to her not to be putting the mí ádh on the team. But maybe…”
Behind this decision in 1959 lay another match in 1956. “We met Wexford in that league final,” Wall explains."We were up 15 points at half-time, having played with a strong wind. Then Wexford came back out in a frenzy and scored three or four goals in less than 10 minutes. We ended up losing by four points, on a famous day."
Wall’s call was dictated by this reversal. “Waterford just blitzed us. It was the greatest display of free-flowing hurling I ever saw. They ran through us lightening. Terry Moloney was the goalie and he couldn’t be faulted for any of the balls that passed him.”
Behind 8-2 to 0-0 at half-time, Tipperary played only for pride in the second half. They were out. The contrast was stark with the previous season when Tony Wall captained Tipperary to All-Ireland glory, won Man of the Match in the final, and was made Caltex Hurler of the Year.
“It was only because Tipperary were beaten that we could get married,” Wall reflects. “I had just been posted down to Limerick. We headed off nearly the next day, everything packed in the back of the Volkswagen, and eventually got a house there.
“Everyone really welcomed Betty into the hurling, both with the county and with the club. I think they knew our situation, that we were a bit cut off. I was the first of the younger lads to get married.”
Mrs Wall adds: “Everyone was so friendly, the whole circle. We will be 60 years married in August. If we get there…”
Tony Wall is not a dry man. His face often flashes with merriment. Jim Stapleton often acted as West Division’s selector and became worried the night before an All-Ireland final.
“I was there as an experienced player,” Wall begins. “Paddy Leahy as supremo in chief. Jim said to us: ‘So and so has a woman in his room. What are we going to do?’ Paddy was great in these situations, cool out. He just said: ‘Look, we’ll all say a decade of the Rosary, and hope for the best.’ That was that.”
The other side of romance became a factor in 1962. As Wall recounts: “Our goalkeeper, Dónal O’Brien, got married the Saturday before the All-Ireland final.”
“Eight days before it?” I say, slow on uptake.
“No, one day,” he replies. “Dónal got married on the day before the final.” He smiles at my amazement: “There weren’t that many of the players there. Myself and Betty did go. None of us were drinking, of course. But still… But we thought nothing of it at the time.”
He smiles again: “Dónal was a terrific goalkeeper. He has a remarkable record of never being beaten in a championship match while he hurled with Tipperary, during 1961 and ’62. Got married on the Saturday, won the All-Ireland on the Sunday, went to America for good on the Monday… That was it.”
A knock at the door breaks the laughter. The man of the house goes to see. The Walls’ next door neighbour has come to check: Would they like some tea?
“Our neighbours have gas for cooking,” Mrs Wall says. “So they’re not too badly fixed today.”
She starts to recall the shape of her childhood, central Dublin in the 1930s and ’40s: “There wasn’t that much electricity, back then, even in Dublin. It was mostly gaslight, which was a lovely soft light. Fade Street was gorgeous in the evening, and really quiet at the weekends, when all the traffic had gone. My father, who’d fought in the First World War, came back and eventually managed to establish a jewellery case-making business there.
“I kept one of those old lamps, and our daughter Sharon saw it and said: ‘That’s lovely. Could I have it?’ And of course we said yes, even though we could have done with it a few times afterwards. But of course we said nothing…”
Tony Wall comes back, arrangements made. There is no complacency in this man at all. Right to this day, the elderly man is fulfilment of a talented determined youth. He could sit back, cushioned by five Celtic Crosses, six NHL titles, five Railway Cups, a Minor All-Ireland in 1952 (which he captained), 11 Tipperary senior titles between 1952 and 1965. Those gongs would deafen anyone else’s modesty.
Tony Wall proved not just one of Tipperary’s greatest but one of hurling’s greatest. At centre-back, he was that good. But this man looks back on how it could all have been different. He takes me to the Cadet Mess in The Curragh during early summer of 1953. He was reading the Sunday Independent, when he noticed John D Hickey reporting that a rule change meant Tony Wall would now be eligible for Thurles Sarsfields.
Mr and Mrs Tony and Betty Wall, married on August 29, 1959 Photo courtesy of the Wall family
“Previously you had to be living in the parish to hurl with that club. I could have ended up hurling with Newbridge or somewhere else in Kildare. But the rule change meant you could declare for the club with which you’d hurled the previous season.”
Wall jumped up, got his gear, and thumbed home to play a club match. “Then I was there with Sarsfields for 50 years!”
There was a more serious consideration: “I hurled Harty Cup with Lauri McDonnell. He is a very talented hurler, but kind of got lost in Dublin. He was a year older, and fell the other side of that rule change.
“Right to the end, Lauri always wondered if he could have been a contender. I needed to be hurling club in Tipp. It wasn’t all plain sailing with Tipp in the early days, and I needed to keep my name there. I was shunted into the forwards. Without club hurling at home, I could have got lost too.”
Tony Wall has thought as deeply about hurling as anyone. The present so often patronises the past. Wall is a courteous rebuke. These switches in position, however difficult at the time, did become a resource. 1965 saw the publication of Hurling, a book still brimming with commonsense, insight and wisdom. Should this book not have found a new edition, rewritten in light of later developments?
He has retained an immersion in the game. Again, Tony Wall’s mordant side emerges: “Your name goes. You get forgotten about. And rightly so, really.”
Tony Wall is Thurles, one of hurling’s sources from the start. He states: “I was really honoured to launch Liam O Donnchú’s book. He is a brilliant historian.”
But Walls’ take on history is partly mordant: “There were old fellas, like myself now, walking around the town.”
Jim Stapleton of Thurles captained Tipperary to victory over Galway in 1887’s senior final, the inaugural contest - 71 seasons later, Tony Wall of Thurles Sarsfields repeated the feat. Mostly made of the same wood, the Tipperary wheel turned and turned."I remember, as a young fella, seeing [Jim] Stapleton around the town. He would be mentioned. A big tall stately man. But as a child you’re not tuned into these things."
The past comes later. Yet he did grow up with a keen sense of old glories. “There were plenty of older players around,” he continues. “Paddy Brolan was there. Died in the mid-1950s. I knew Tom Semple’s children. And Tommy Butler, who kept goal in 1937, was the key influence in changing me from a left hand on top grip to right hand on top.”
The sensibility that authored so incisive a monograph on the most beautiful game has not disappeared. The analytical mind is undimmed. Wall urges action in two main areas of the contemporary game: the steps rule and the nature of frees.
“I think the current hurlers are incredibly skilful,” he stresses. “The ball is travelling so far and so fast that it’s amazing the skill they have in controlling, sending it 70 yards with just a flick. There are lads scoring points from 100 yards for fun. But one of the things I really don’t like in the current game is this running with the ball in the hand. What a fella is doing that, what can an opponent do to stop him? There’s feck all he can do.”
He continues: “In our time, it was three steps with the ball. You got pulled for this rule. Sometime in the 1970s, for whatever reason, it was increased to four steps which is actually five, six, seven, eight steps… When it was three steps, you’d no need to foul, because you’d get in a tackle as the man in possession went to play the ball.”
Would he return to a three-step rule? “Yes, definitely. I’d love to see it go back to three steps, so that you have to play the ball quicker. That would go a long way towards eliminating frees and those scrummages.
“Everyone wants to pick up the ball. As soon as they pick it, they charge. Put down the head and charge. I know ‘charging’ is still in the rulebook. But referees seem to have forgotten it.”
Wall offers an intriguing contrast between codes: “When the ball is in hand, it’s more like football. What can you do when an opponent has the ball in his hand? With other lads running off his shoulder? That’s a new concept, and hurling is still figuring it out.
“If the ball is always loose… That’s the beauty of soccer. The ball is never hidden from view. It’s always in play, in soccer. There is no great skill in running with the ball. It should be anathema to a hurler. Or should be, to a stickman.”
This observer discerns the glimmer of a different future in compromise shinty games: “On these occasions, the Irish lads cannot take the ball in their hand. Look at the skill they then find… They’re back to being hurlers. Not taking the ball to hand eliminates the pulling down.”
The other bugbear is inappropriately weighted penalties: “Is a pointed free enough at times? I think, for a yellow card issue, that kind of foul, there should be a free for two points. If you have a ‘pulling down’ foul, a bit like the black card in football, you could go this way. And it would eliminate putting off lads, except for vicious fouls.
Wall elaborates: “If this kind of foul is committed by a forward in his own full-forward line, the ball should be brought out to a scoreable distance.
“What does this ‘letting it flow’ mean? All this approach means is that you don’t pull clear frees. A two-point penalty would solve a lot of it. If a referee at present actually refereed a game of hurling properly, that referee wouldn’t get any more games.”
For better or worse, this season’s hurling will continue under the current rules. Tipperary travel to Ennis tomorrow, taking on Clare. Cusack Park hosts a championship match between the two counties for the first time since 1986. The man in charge of Tipperary 33 years ago, coach and trainer? One Tony Wall.
The county experienced many lacerating championship days between 1972 and 1986. No one felt ‘The Famine’ overdid the matter as description. 1986’s impact felt like the nadir. Injury difficulties did not help. A collapsed lung suffered while kicking football meant Nicky English’s absence.
Even so, Tipperary led by seven points at half-time. Although the gap widened to nine points after the break, calamity was about to hatch. Clare outscored the visitors by 2-4 to 0-1 over the closing stages. Full-time: 1-11 to 2-10. Tipperary were gone, again. That puckish side:"Do we have to talk about 1986?"
Time has not entirely cancelled exasperation: “I was parachuted in out the blue. It was the worst decision I ever made. I should never have taken the job. Mrs Wall says: “I remember that time. All the stress and difficulties…”
Her husband elaborates: “I was too far away from it. I’d been years not involved with teams, nearly 20 years out of it. I didn’t know the Tipp scene at all. Anyway, I should have known better. A delegation landed in here to me. I suppose you could say they appealed to my Tipperary patriotism. You could also say they were desperate…
“I went down [to Thurles] the Saturday night before the Clare game, to finalise the team. There seemed to be about 25 people on the selection committee… I don’t know what they were all doing in the room. AnywayI should have had more sense.”
Natural merriment survives even these memories: “If we’d beaten Clare, after getting that big lead, and won the Munster final against Cork, God knows what would have happened… I could have been there for all time!”
Another throaty laugh: “No, we were beaten, and I was out, and I was happy as Larry to be out.
“But maybe it wasn’t all for nothing. I wrote a report afterwards, urging that a sole manager be appointed. I don’t know whether the county board actually read it, but they did appoint [Michael] ‘Babs’ Keating as sole manager, and Tipp got back to winning Munsters and All-Irelands.”
Thoughts of Tipperary and Clare tomorrow delivers a natural break. I turn off my recorder. Wall feels this day will be a different test for the Tipperary backs: “If they go well against the Clare forwards, 2019 could be a long campaign.”
He admires Éamon O’Shea’s renewed input: “I don’t know the inside story but he seems to be a tremendous coach and tactician. He came on as a sub in 1986, but I don’t ever remember us ever having a proper conversation.”
Then this man, not for the first time, surprises me. “Could I finish off with a poem?” he asks. “Of course,” I reply. “Let me just shove this yoke back on.”
He glosses his choice of an ending: “In the 1980s there was this lad writing on the Tipperary Star called ‘Tales of the Gael’. Around 1983, he went up to Dublin and met a former hurler named Tommy Treacy, who was a man of the 1920s and ’30s.
“Tommy was in a flat in Phibsboro, and this man, when he came back down to Tipp, published a poem in the Star. I cut it out, and I’m probably the only eejit left in the world who remembers it.”
Then Tony Wall throws back his head and half sings five verses, finishing with this one:
I bade goodbye and left him sitting there,The old Tipperary hurler in his upright chair.Although old and grey and full of years at lastHis thoughts are those of youthful days now past.
23cm x 29 cm. Baldoyle Dublin Atmospheric photo of Brian Mullins of Dublin following Paidi O Se of Kerry on a rain sodden Croke Park in 1978 Con’s description of Kerry player Mikey Sheehy’s free in the 1978 All Ireland Football Final between Dublin v Kerry is still the stuff of legend and is worth quoting again. Con wrote: “Dublin were like climbers who had been driven down the mountain by a rock fall – they had to set out again from the plateau not far from the base. And now came the moment that will go into that department of sport’s museum where abide such strange happenings as the Long Count and the goal that gave Cardiff their only English FA Cup and the fall of Devon Loch. Its run-up began with a free from John O’Keefe, deep in his own territory. Jack O’Shea made a flying catch and drove a long ball towards the middle of the 21 -yard line. Mikey Sheehy’s fist put it behind the backs, breaking along the ground out toward Kerry’s right. This time Paddy Cullen was better positioned and comfortably played the ball with his feet away from Sheehy. He had an abundance of time and space in which to lift and clear but his pick-up was a dubious one and the referee Seamus Aldridge, decided against him. Or maybe he deemed his meeting with Ger Power illegal. Whatever the reason, Paddy put on a show of righteous indignation that would get him a card from Equity, throwing his hands to heaven as the referee kept pointing towards goal. And while all that was going on, Mikey Sheehy was running up to take the kick-and suddenly Paddy dashed back towards his goal like a woman who smells a cake burning. The ball won the race and it curled inside the near post as Paddy crashed into the outside of the net and lay against it like a fireman who returned to find his own station ablaze. Sometime, Noel Pearson might make a musical of this amazing final and as the green flag goes up for that crazy goal he will have a banshee crooning: “And that was the end of poor Molly Malone.” And so it was. A few minutes later came the tea-break. Kerry went into a frenzy of green and gold and a tumult of acclaim. The champions looked like men who worked hard and seen their savings plundered by bandits.” .
Great collectors item here - a picture of the 1977 Clare Hurling Team which won the National Hurling league Title.Note a young Ger Loughnane present in the front row and the later addition of a not exactly to scale man in the back row! 34cm x 40cm Kilmaley Co Clare (From the Examiner Newspaper) One of the 1970s’ great hurling forces was the Clare team of 1976 to 1978. They made three NHL Finals in a row, winning in 1977 and 1978. Their brand of play lit up many matches, leaving indelible memories for supporters and spectators. They reached the 1977 and 1978 Munster Finals, losing on both occasions to Cork. Next Monday evening, Councillor Tom McNamara, Chairman of Clare County Council, will host a Civic Reception to honour these players and their mentors. Fr Harry Bohan was manager, with Justin McCarthy acting as coach for the 1977 and 1978 seasons. Among the players, Séamus Durack (Feakle/Éire Óg) and Jackie O’Gorman (Cratloe) were mainstays during this period. Born in June 1951, Durack won three All Stars as goalkeeper (1977, 1978, 1981). He was first choice for Munster in the Railway Cup between 1973 and 1979, when they won the competition twice (1976, 1978). Born in October 1943, O’Gorman offered a powerful presence at wing back and corner back, appearing for Munster in 1972 and 1973. They spoke this week to about their careers. It is 40 years ago, just about, since the 1978 Munster Final in Thurles. What do ye remember about the build-up, the day itself? The build-up was unbelievable. There was no other topic of conversation in Clare. The level of expectation, especially after losing the Munster Final in 1977, jumped right off the charts. A massive crowd went to Thurles. 54,000 was the official attendance, and I think 5,000 people weren’t even let into the ground. We couldn’t get in the gate when we arrived at Semple [Stadium]. There was a lad inside and he wouldn’t let us in. I remember saying to him at one stage, and it coming close to the game: “Look, after another minute, we’ll make a decision and we’ll be gone back down that road and there’ll be no game here today, and it’ll be you who has the problem then.”To get from the Anner Hotel down to the pitch on the day was phenomenal in itself. We had a Garda escort, but even with it we could hardly get down with the crowds. It was frustrating. Here we were, in Thurles since early, and we still weren’t on time. I never got frustrated. What was the point? Jackie always had a more relaxed, practical view. He was years ahead of us, in every sense. He was ‘The Godfather’ and we all looked up to him. But to give you an idea of how different things were back then… When you came in the gate, at the back of the Old Stand in Thurles, getting to the front door of the dressing room was still a nice few yards. As I walked across, I met four to six people I knew as well as I knew Jackie O’Gorman.
Cork’s Ray Cummins (right) flicking the ball past Clare fullback Jim Power. Cummins goal in the 1977 Munster final turned the match around.You could palm the ball into the net or over the bar, so long as you hadn’t dropped the hurley first. They didn’t stop scoring with the hand until sometime in the 1980s, I think. But Ray Cummins dropped his hurley before he palmed the ball that hit my shoulder. Footage of the game bears out this point. Mick Dunne is doing the commentary for RTÉ and he expresses big surprise that the referee didn’t pull up Ray Cummins for dropping the hurl. Right. If the rule was there, it was there. But referees will always get stuff wrong… I’ll go back to the hurley being dropped and the other way it might have transpired. Instead of Cork getting a goal, Clare get a free on the 21-yard line, and I land it above in the far square on top of Noel Casey, who is having a right game and had already scored a goal. Maybe, off the free, Noel gets a point or a goal? Do you see what I mean? It was an awful big swing, on one incorrect decision. Anyway, shortly after that goal, another high ball arrives. And here is where Jackie O’Gorman comes in. Ray Cummins goes up for that ball, in a no man’s land between full-forward and corner-forward. Jackie comes across, being the bit of a free spirit he always was. He’s conscious Cummins has just scored a goal off a high ball, and he pulls, to make sure Cummins doesn’t catch this time. Jackie was just doing his job, helping out his man at full-back. I was great for that! Coming across, helping out. A regular Samaritan… Whatever way Jackie pulled, Cummins goes down, and there was a free in. Cummins gets up off the ground and faces back towards goals. Jim Power is in his way, standing there, in case there’s a quick free. As Cummins heads towards the goals, he went to go at Power. He must have thought it was Jim who had got him, but it was Jackie. Cummins was mouthing into Power’s face, and he was right up close against him, breathing on him. This is the white heat of battle, now. This is after Ray Cummins had scored a goal shortly beforehand, after Charlie McCarthy had failed to get booked for slapping at Jim Power. So he was rightly pissed off. Instinctively, with someone so flush in his face, Power did move [indicates a slight movement of head]. A flick, like that. Ray could have got an Oscar for going down.Then the crowd started baying. The referee came in (and I’m the only one who heard the conversation with his umpires). He comes in to the umpire on my right and says: “What happened? Did you see anything?” He said back: “No, I didn’t see anything at all.” Then Noel Dalton asked the other umpire: “Did you see it?” That umpire said: “He butted him with his head.” Dalton said: ”What? Are you sure?” He repeated: “He butted him with his head.” The ref walked out, took Jim Power’s name, sent him straight to the line. Ray Cummins got up 30 seconds later, played on, not a bother on him. If Power had broke his nose, fair enough. Take out the red card. Ray was a gentleman off the field, and mostly on it too. But it was a disappointing thing on his part. Then again, I suppose he thought Jim had caught him under the high ball… I don’t blame Ray. The real truth was that the referee wasn’t up to the job. His head went on the day. But when I look back on it now I have no regrets about any of it. No regrets whatsoever. I thought those years were the best years of our lives. Absolutely. They were the same for all of us. Ray Cummins was a really tremendous forward. And there was no ill-will in the slightest between Clare and Cork. No way at all. They were just a bit craftier than us. They were crafty, and 1977 proved it. We had to see out the rest of the game with 14 men. The free Charlie McCarthy struck over after that sending off put Cork up two points. We had been ahead five points, going great, and now, two high balls later… One was a free out and the other shouldn’t have been a red card. Jim Power went to hell and back over 1977, inside Clare and outside Clare. We’d have waltzed through Cork in ’78, only for ’77 hanging over us. That destroyed the whole scenario for us. Three-quarters of our team froze on the day in ’78. I mean, 13 points to 11 points as all the scoring done, in a top of the ground game that should have suited us down to the ground. Ray Cummins was one of the best Cork hurlers of all time but he hardly got a puck of the ball in ’78. Am I right in concluding that ye played on in 1977 with five backs on six forwards? That aspect would amaze people today, playing on minus a defender… Yes, we stayed with just the five backs. That was the way it was at the time. I stayed inside marking Ray and Charlie, with John [McMahon] on Seánie [O’Leary] in the other corner. Those days, the coaching end of it on the sideline was pretty basic. There was no such thing as take off a forward and put on a back. In our time playing, the game wasn’t analysed the same way at all. It was absolutely man on man, do your job, and get out of the way if you can’t do your job. We were never coached, as such. Justin [McCarthy] came in and did fine work on the skills end of it. But the game wasn’t looked into the same way as you have now.Every team took that approach to a sending off at the time. We didn’t think as much about it. That time, when you went playing hurling, it was to get away from work. Now the current lads nearly go to work to get away from hurling! The present player’s life is consumed by it now. I don’t think a full-time farmer or a tradesman could be a hurler now. Where would he find the time to do the training? Instead you can go off to work for the day. It’s grand: no gym, no weights, no nutrition checks… It’s nearly a break. You take the hamstring issue now. The present players get so much of this hamstring trouble because they’re straining so much one minute, going at it so hard in training, and then they go and work all day at a desk [mimics typing on a keyboard]. And then the whole thing, the whole body, goes slack. And then if they don’t warm up properly (and we are often laughing at the length of the current warm-ups), they’re fecked. It’s one extreme to another. I always equate it to a greyhound and a sheepdog. You never saw a sheepdog break its toe. Yet every day greyhounds run out, one of them breaks his toe. Because the greyhound is cooped up all day. Don’t get me wrong. I think the game now, as a spectator sport, is wonderful to watch. I love it. I don’t agree with this short game Clare were playing, and other counties. A lad runs out 50 yards from goal and he passes the ball sideways to someone… But Clare this year are gone away from that stuff and are playing a bit more direct hurling. They usually have three forwards inside now. The home advantage makes a big difference in this new round-robin system. It does. Clare should have beaten Cork, down in Cork, only the full-back line went ball-watching and allowed a ball that should have been let wide be struck back across, and a goal got off it. I think our forwards are doing pretty well but our backs, as a unit, are a bit vulnerable. They were cruising against Waterford, at home in Cusack Park, but conceded five or six points at the end of it for no reason I could see. As a unit, at the back, they don’t seem to know how to close it out. We’ve no enforcer in the current Clare team. John Conlon is the best we have at the minute, and he’s a great old warrior. But he’s not that kind of guy, the kind of lad who’s going to shout: ‘Come on! We’ll go through them now!’ We don’t seem to have any talkers. They’re playing a lovely game… They are, but it’s a schoolboy game. If you don’t have a couple of enforcers, particularly around the half-forward line, you’ll end up in bother. If you have overly fancy players under the dropping ball, you’re in trouble all day. Because if you have to go long, if the short game doesn’t work for you, you’re caught. If you don’t practise long, if you don’t practise hurling over your head, you’re sucked into an alien game, and you’ll be beaten when the game heats up. You can’t do what you didn’t practise. The big day, the hot day, you’ll be caught out. He doesn’t have to be scoring loads of goals or points, your enforcer. But he has to be going looking for work, knowing he has a lad beside him to give it to, a lad who’ll slot it over the bar. The only time Tipp are a force, in my view, is when [Patrick] ‘Bonner’ Maher is centre-forward, running at defences. [John] ‘Bubbles’ [O’Dwyer] won’t run through the middle. Neither will John McGrath or Noel McGrath. Tipp lifted off when ‘Bonner’ came on last Sunday. He scored a goal, even though he won’t always score a goal, because he’s not a good striker. But neither was John Power of Kilkenny or Brendan Lynskey of Galway. They bring something else, something vital, those sort of hurlers.
48cm x 59cm Bruff Co Limerick 1973 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final was the 86th All-Ireland Final and the culmination of the 1973 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship, an inter-county hurling tournament for the top teams in Ireland. The match was held at Croke Park, Dublin, on 2 September 1973, between Limerick and Kilkenny. The Leinster champions lost to their Munster opponents on a score line of 1-21 to 1-14.
Rare GAA Allstars Poster.In 1973 Cork were victorious in Football and Limerick won the Hurling . 90cm x 60cm Limerick City
Noel Skehan
Pat Hartigan
Colm Doran
Francis Loughnane
Billy Morgan
Mick Ryan
Liam O'Neill
John O'Keeffe
48cm x 59cm Pre Match Team photo of the 1972 All Ireland hurling champions -Kilkenny
Original JFK Tribute written by historian Brendan O'Shea on November 27th 1963,only 5 days after the assassination of the President in Dallas,Texas.It is a beautifully written and poignant tribute to the grandson of an emigrant who represented the hopes and dreams of the entire Irish Nation Such was the love and affection for President John F Kennedy in the country of his ancestors, that numerous Irish homes, businesses and pubs displayed photographs, portraits and other memorabilia relating to the Kennedy and Fitzgerald families. Origins :Co Limerick Dimensions :55 x 43cm. GlazedPresident Kennedy greeting Irish crowds while on a state visit to the country in 1963.
Framed portrait of the three Kennedy Brothers from 1963 ,taken in the White House. 45cm x 35cm Bruree Co Limerick
Superbly framed portrait of JFK Such was the love and affection for President John F Kennedy in the country of his ancestors, that numerous Irish homes, businesses and pubs displayed photographs, portraits and other memorabilia relating to the Kennedy and Fitzgerald families, who hailed largely from Wexford and Limerick 57cm x 47 cm Dromkeen Co LimerickPresident Kennedy greeting Irish crowds while on a state visit to the country in 1963.
48cm x 59cm. Borrisokane Co Tipperary
Tom Moloughney, Jimmy Doyle, and Kieran Carey relax in the dressing room after Tipperary’s victory over Dublin in the 1961 All-Ireland final, a success that was to be repeated the following year. Picture from ‘The GAA — A People’s History’What followed was a game for the ages. If not quite in quality then in thrills and spills. Wexford recovered, found themselves just a goal adrift at half-time and then took a two-point lead with 13 minutes to go before the fury of their chase emptied the tanks. A Tipp side that had lost Jimmy Doyle to a broken shoulder midway through the half took full advantage. There are no clips of the game in the usual corners of the internet today but newspaper coverage captures the world in which all this unfolded. The biggest international story of the week was the escalating tension between the US and Cuba after an incident between the respective navies while an Ireland piloted by Sean Lemass was slowly emerging from its insular existence. Telifis Eireann only began its broadcasting for the day minutes before throw-in and the schedule wrapped up long before midnight. Among the other offerings on the box that weekend were 'Kit Carson', 'The Flintstones' and a TV western series called 'The Restless Gun'. The US, after centuries of taking our people, was now beginning to give back in all sorts of ways.
45cm x 35cm Tipperary and Kilkenny met for the fourth successive year in the Minor final, with Kilkenny completing their third victory in a row. For the Senior match, Tipperary (captained by legend Jimmy Doyle) were looking to avenge their shock defeat when they last met Wexford (led in 1962 by Billy Rackard) in the 1960 All-Ireland. Dignitaries present to witness the final included: President of Ireland, Éamon de Valera, Former President Seán T O Kelly, An Taoiseach Seán Lemass, Minister of Industry and Commerce, former Cork hurling star Jack Lynch, and renowned actor Noel Purcell. Tipperary started explosively with two goals from Tom Moloughney and Theo English. Padge Keogh scored Wexford’s first point and they eventually clawed back into contention with Ned Wheeler drawing them level with a goal and a point. However, Tipperary went in at half time three points ahead with scores from Jimmy Doyle and Seán McLoughlin and it could have been more only due to the great goalkeeping display by Wexford’s Pat Nolan. The second half was tense and tough with Wexford drawing level again with Jimmy O Brien scoring a goal and Billy Rackard drawing them level. The sides were level three more times in a keenly fought encounter. Jimmy Doyle was a big loss to Tipperary having to go off injured, however a goal from the substitute Liam Connolly and points from Donie Nealon and Seán McLoughlin meant that Tipperary just pulled ahead and took the title by a two-point margin. Tony Wall deputised for the injured Tipperary captain and accepted the Liam McCarthy Cup.
33cm x 28cm Tournafulla Co Limerick Truly wonderful photo from the 1950s capturing the essence of the traditional congeniality and warmth of the Irish Pub as two old friends & neighbours discuss the issues and/or gossip of the day over a pint but right outside the Ladies !
Beautiful B&W image of legendary Tipperary captain Tony Wall lifting the Liam McCarthy after winning the 1958 All Ireland Hurling Final. Thurles Co Tipperary 45cm x 35cm Tony Wall was in charge of the last Tipperary championship team that took on Clare in Ennis. Thirty-three years later, he looks back on a famous career, considering all that could have gone wrong as well as all that went so well. A holder of five All-Ireland medals, Wall was one of the game’s finest ever centre-backs and the author of a still fresh book, Hurling (1965). If he wrote a sequel today, he’d advise a couple of small tweaks to the modern game. “We have no electricity,” Tony Wall says, greeting me at the door.This announcement makes sense of an estate filled with machines and vans and cables, men speaking urgent Polish, diggers operating as if in an underwater world. An upgrade is taking place in Raheny. The Walls are making do until six o’clock, when power is due back. Mrs Wall is in the sitting room, a gentle smiling presence. Conversation turns naturally to her experience of attending the many big occasions in which her husband hurled for Tipperary.“We didn’t meet until after the 1958 All-Ireland final,” Wall relates. “So Betty didn’t start going to any of the matches until 1959.” He expands: “She was from a totally non GAA background in Dublin. I was this savage from down the country, bringing her away from civilisation. I was even bringing her to hurling matches…” Mrs Wall beams. She found quite a first championship day out. Tipperary, the reigning All-Ireland champions, had Waterford in a Munster semi-final on July 12, 1959. A gale entered the Cork Athletic Grounds and stayed there. Strong wind means a tough decision. Tipperary won the toss and here was that decision. “I was captain, same as the year before,” Wall begins. “I decided on going against the wind. I felt I had no choice because of previous experience.” Tough decisions mean strong opinions. “I was there with Tony’s mother,” Mrs Wall remembers. “She didn’t agree with the decision to go against the wind. I said to her not to be putting the mí ádh on the team. But maybe…”Behind this decision in 1959 lay another match in 1956. “We met Wexford in that league final,” Wall explains."We were up 15 points at half-time, having played with a strong wind. Then Wexford came back out in a frenzy and scored three or four goals in less than 10 minutes. We ended up losing by four points, on a famous day." Wall’s call was dictated by this reversal. “Waterford just blitzed us. It was the greatest display of free-flowing hurling I ever saw. They ran through us lightening. Terry Moloney was the goalie and he couldn’t be faulted for any of the balls that passed him.” Behind 8-2 to 0-0 at half-time, Tipperary played only for pride in the second half. They were out. The contrast was stark with the previous season when Tony Wall captained Tipperary to All-Ireland glory, won Man of the Match in the final, and was made Caltex Hurler of the Year. “It was only because Tipperary were beaten that we could get married,” Wall reflects. “I had just been posted down to Limerick. We headed off nearly the next day, everything packed in the back of the Volkswagen, and eventually got a house there. “Everyone really welcomed Betty into the hurling, both with the county and with the club. I think they knew our situation, that we were a bit cut off. I was the first of the younger lads to get married.” Mrs Wall adds: “Everyone was so friendly, the whole circle. We will be 60 years married in August. If we get there…”“I was there as an experienced player,” Wall begins. “Paddy Leahy as supremo in chief. Jim said to us: ‘So and so has a woman in his room. What are we going to do?’ Paddy was great in these situations, cool out. He just said: ‘Look, we’ll all say a decade of the Rosary, and hope for the best.’ That was that.” The other side of romance became a factor in 1962. As Wall recounts: “Our goalkeeper, Dónal O’Brien, got married the Saturday before the All-Ireland final.” “Eight days before it?” I say, slow on uptake.Tony Wall is not a dry man. His face often flashes with merriment. Jim Stapleton often acted as West Division’s selector and became worried the night before an All-Ireland final.He smiles again: “Dónal was a terrific goalkeeper. He has a remarkable record of never being beaten in a championship match while he hurled with Tipperary, during 1961 and ’62. Got married on the Saturday, won the All-Ireland on the Sunday, went to America for good on the Monday… That was it.” A knock at the door breaks the laughter. The man of the house goes to see. The Walls’ next door neighbour has come to check: Would they like some tea? “Our neighbours have gas for cooking,” Mrs Wall says. “So they’re not too badly fixed today.” She starts to recall the shape of her childhood, central Dublin in the 1930s and ’40s: “There wasn’t that much electricity, back then, even in Dublin. It was mostly gaslight, which was a lovely soft light. Fade Street was gorgeous in the evening, and really quiet at the weekends, when all the traffic had gone. My father, who’d fought in the First World War, came back and eventually managed to establish a jewellery case-making business there. “I kept one of those old lamps, and our daughter Sharon saw it and said: ‘That’s lovely. Could I have it?’ And of course we said yes, even though we could have done with it a few times afterwards. But of course we said nothing…” Tony Wall comes back, arrangements made. There is no complacency in this man at all. Right to this day, the elderly man is fulfilment of a talented determined youth. He could sit back, cushioned by five Celtic Crosses, six NHL titles, five Railway Cups, a Minor All-Ireland in 1952 (which he captained), 11 Tipperary senior titles between 1952 and 1965. Those gongs would deafen anyone else’s modesty. Tony Wall proved not just one of Tipperary’s greatest but one of hurling’s greatest. At centre-back, he was that good. But this man looks back on how it could all have been different. He takes me to the Cadet Mess in The Curragh during early summer of 1953. He was reading the Sunday Independent, when he noticed John D Hickey reporting that a rule change meant Tony Wall would now be eligible for Thurles Sarsfields.
