REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE DOWN PLAYERS REUNION GALA DINNER CANAL COURT HOTEL
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE DOWN PLAYERS REUNION GALA DINNER CANAL COURT HOTEL, NEWRY, CO. DOWN
Is mór an onóir agus pléisiúr domsa agus do m’fhear céile, Martin, bheith anseo libh tráthnóna. Ba mhaith linn ár mbuíochas a chur in iúl díbh go léir as an cuireadh agus as fáilte a bhí fíor agus fáirsing.
It is a truly great pleasure to join you here for this wonderful celebration of the very best of Down football, with its rich store of memories and pride. Tonight honours Mussen’s heroes who brought Sam North of the Border for the first time and who besides carrying the huge weight of Northern hopes on their backs had to endure a Match programme which rather patronisingly pointed out that “there is a welcome and refreshing novelty in Down’s first appearance in an All-Ireland Senior Football Final….” Forty years later and the glory days behind us of 1960, 1961, 1968, 1991 and 1994, no match programme will have that to say again. It is a privilege, tonight to be in the company of those whose sporting excellence, whose courage and commitment gave us much more than a unique set of memories to keep us talking and recollecting for a lifetime. They gave us pride in self, pride in place, pride in identity and hope in the future.
In the normal course of events the very act of inviting someone who is, strictly speaking, an Antrim-born woman – even given she is President of Ireland - would be a gesture over and above the demands of ecumenism and reconciliation. But the men and women of Mourne who, like my mother and grandparents, made their living in Belfast, brought their Down loyalty with them and raised us, steeped in the red and black. I took my own missionary zeal a stage further when before agreeing to a “mixed marriage” with a former captain of the Antrim Minors, he solemnly promised that he would “turn” with me and raise our children in the Down colours. Mostly he has honoured that promise and mostly it has been easy to honour though there was some evidence of a reversion to Antrim for part of this year. But I put that down to the male mid-life crisis and let it pass, though it is a space I will be watching for the future for that Antrim team had a hungry look about it and more than a hint of sparkling talent. But there is no doubt that our proudest and most embarrassing days as a family have been the days when we followed the Down team through wind and rain, our daughters faces painted black and red, their nails painted black and red, their tongues whipping the opposition and the referee so enthusiastically that even from the VIP box in Clones I can hear them at the opposite end of the pitch and say fondly to their daddy- “That is our girls.”
These past few years the Down team may not have featured in Croke Park, as often as we might have liked, though they certainly helped seed-bed a new determination throughout the Northern counties and with it a remarkable chapter in the history of Gaelic football, but Down supporters have a reputation for subtlety and lateral thinking second to none. We might have temporarily ceded control of Sam Maguire but Dublin’s Mansion House is home to Lord Mayor Maurice Aherne whose wife Maura is a committed County Down woman and who still has the red and black flag she flew in 1961. So in this Millennium Year when we celebrate over forty great years, it is, I hope, some small comfort that probably for the first time there are Down supporters in both Áras an Uachtaráin and the Mansion House in Dublin at the same time.
Nobody here needs reminding of just how significantly the GAA has enriched and contributed to community life the length and breadth of Ireland. It has been a crucial part of our sense of who we are, a massive generator of pride at local and county level. In this part of Ireland, more than most, the reach and significance of Gaelic Football has extended far beyond the field of play. In the good times, the fate of the Down team provided cause for common celebration; in times of defeat, for common mourning; and at any time, cause for common criticism of the iniquities of referees and officials. The significance of those wins, and especially that of the 1960 team who brought the first ever Senior All-Ireland Football title north of the Border, goes way beyond football. To fully understand what it meant, you have to understand the mood of the time in Ireland, and especially in the North – the lack of belief in the possibility of change, in our own capacity to forge change. Loathe as I am to mention a Derryman in this company, nonetheless Seamus Heaney it is who captures the mood brilliantly in his poem From the Canton of Expectation:
“We lived deep in a land of optative moods,
Under high, banked clouds of resignation.
A rustle of loss in the phrase Not in our Lifetime’….
….And next thing, suddenly, this change of mood.”
That Down team of 1960 were part of that sudden change of mood, that breath of fresh air that blew away the stale attitudes of resignation and hopelessness in every sphere of life. They proved that they could take on the best and win, with a pioneering playing style that made each of them a household name the length and breadth of the country. At a time when there was precious little glamour about, these were young, handsome, dynamic – the pin-up boys of their day! And they were ours. The spirit of determined excellence which brought them victory over Kerry, inspired us, filled us with pride, showed us that nothing was impossible if we had faith in ourselves and in what we wanted to achieve both on and off the sports field. Together with the subsequent victories over Offaly in ‘61 and Kerry, once again, in ’68, those teams captured the essence of a generation, the newly discovered sense that there need be no limit to our expectations for we had our own genius and it was ready to flow. All of you, but especially that team of 1960 whom we honour this evening, deserve our heartfelt thanks. You provoked us to look at ourselves differently, to stretch our horizons, to push ourselves to new limits.
One of the secrets of the GAA’s enduring success is the way that each generation has drawn from the achievements of previous generations, and taken pride in the accomplishments of the next. I am delighted that among us here this evening are some members of the 1946 All-Ireland Junior Football team – the first Down team at any level to win an All-Ireland honour. They paved the way for success at senior level, and though it took another 14 years, few in the county would disagree that it was worth waiting for.
It is easy to generate enthusiasm among supporters, volunteers, young players, when success comes easy and often. But the true test of a county’s dedication, comes when times are lean. The famine lasted 23 years in Down’s case, but the 1990’s brought success on two wonderful occasions, so heart-stopping and dramatic that even remembering them today sends the blood pressure off the Richter scale. There are plenty of years in this new Millennium and I’m sure you’ll agree, the name of Down will be written on them.
Gaelic games grow from the parish up. Loyalty to the local team may be fierce but through loyalty to county we transcend parish rivalry and acknowledge the talent outside our own immediate doorstep. And when our county team is occasionally bettered by another Ulster team, we still trek to Clones and to Croke Park to cheer on Ulster’s heroes, whether Armagh, Tyrone, Derry or Donegal and none of us would begrudge a day out to Monaghan, Cavan or Antrim. For all the things we roar at matches, for all the rivalry and banter, we have a common bond in pride in the game itself; and because we know what it is to win, because we know how profound the reach of a win, we know what it is that drives others to reach that goal and we respect it. The more people who have that drive and that passion, the healthier are Gaelic Games wherever they are played.
One of the most heartening characteristics of Gaelic Games is that it is a high-achieving amateur sport, driven by voluntary endeavour. This county, and Gaelic Games in general, owes an enormous debt of gratitude to the many volunteers who work week in and week out, far away from the glamour days and glamour venues, with dedication and passion, to ensure that this important part of our heritage goes from strength to strength. There are thousands of such men and women, scattered throughout this island. They have inculcated in generations of young people, not only a love of Gaelic Games, but a respect for the ethos which underpins it – a spirit of true egalitarianism. Gaelic Games bring together as players, people from all walks of life. It recognizes the unique talent which each possesses and celebrates the synergy of the team which at its consummate best fuels history-making days like those great Down victories we remember tonight. It brings together as supporters, rich and poor, grandparents and grandchildren, men and women, melting away differences that in many other spheres of life amount to barricades.
Scratch the surface here and you will find the firmest of friendships and it is the bonds of friendship which must surely be the most enduring and the most heartening. How many friendships the length and breadth of Ireland have started, as complete strangers got to know each other through discussing Gaelic football, in a pub, on a beach, in a hotel, at a match. And when you declare yourself a Down supporter, how many times has the conversation turned to the inspirational historic days of the 1960’s and the glory days of the 1990’s. And the names have tumbled out, names indelibly inscribed on heart and memory. Names gathered here tonight. We owe you guys so much. I hope you know how proud and grateful we are, how proud and grateful you made us.
Martin and I are privileged to be here tonight. May your stories continue to inspire in the years to come and may you enjoy this special evening in each others company.