“Combining with the high catching Joe Mulvenna, Martin Breen set off bearded Vinty Kearney down the right wing. The wing-forward’s pass found the stocky Jimmy Kelly who placed big Pat O’Hara in position on the edge of the square.
“The burly Pearse’s captain didn’t reckon on heroic Johnnies keeper Henry Gallagher who forced him to return the ball to unmarked Kelly who sent a rocket into the roof of the net.”
- Newspaper report of the 1968 Antrim Senior football final between Pearse’s and St John’s
NORTH Belfast GAA club Pearse’s are mourning the loss of one of their 1968 championship-winning heroes – big Vinty Kearney – who passed away earlier this month.
Well-known in GAA circles in both north and west Belfast as well as among the local Celtic fraternity, the once “fearsome” wing-forward suffered a fall just before Christmas and sadly passed away in hospital on January 2, aged 81.
Funny, charismatic and a “wonderful storyteller”, big Vinty would often regale friends and family of the day the proud north Belfast club won the Antrim senior football championship – their only senior success to date – having finished a runner-up three times before their unforgettable ‘68 triumph.
After attending St Teresa’s Primary School on the Glen Road, Vinty became friends with some players from the Pearse’s club during his education at St Mary’s CBS in Barrack Street.
“The Pearse’s were short of players one time and my dad was asked did he fancy playing and to bring his boots,” says his son, Vincent Kearney.
“And that was it, he just got the bug. He absolutely loved that club.
“They reached five championship finals in the 1960s and I think my dad played in three of them. In ‘68, they reached the Promised Land.
“I jokingly say there were only two kinds of people he would talk to about that 1968 championship winning team: those who asked and those who didn’t!”
A bright student, Vinty left school early and worked as a fitter in the Falls Road bus depot.
He married Pat Sullivan from the Short Strand in Belfast, and they had three children together and now have nine grandchildren.
Vincent remembers reading letters his father wrote to his mother when she was in America for six months and was struck by his “beautiful” handwriting.
Growing up in an earlier era, when university wasn’t as accessible as it is today, Vincent sensed his father regretted never going on to further education.
“But he wanted to make sure his kids [Vincent, Anne-Marie and Eileen] didn’t have the same regret. Once we graduated, he felt right: ‘That’s part of the job done’.
Vincent, who is northern editor for RTE News, added: “My dad was a big believer in education and because of where we were from [west Belfast] – he was quite blunt about it - the odds were stacked against you.
“He felt the best way to improve those odds was to get an education. My mum and dad both drove us. They saw education as a foundation to a better future.
“My dad’s advice throughout life was, be whatever you want to be and don’t let anybody stop you.
“He was a big, robust man, a hard-as-nails character. He had a fearsome reputation on the football field. He was just a guy who took no nonsense.
“A very proud man – proud of who he was, where he came from, and a very proud Pearse’s man.
“If there were conversations about who won the European Cup for Celtic, my dad could recite the Pearse’s team of ‘68 – Martin Green, the O’Hara brothers, Geordie Eagleson, the great Jimmy Kelly, who called to the wake. My dad would have talked about all these guys like they were Premier League stars.”
Due to the onset of ‘The Troubles’, it became difficult to travel across town to play for his beloved Pearse’s.
A Celtic season ticketholder for many years, his first match he attended was watching the Hoops hammer Rangers 7-1 in the 1957 League Cup final, at Hampden Park.
Living in the St James’s area of west Belfast with his wife Pat up until his passing, he enjoyed close links with O’Donovan Rossa GAC and O’Donnell’s GAC before becoming part of the fabric at Falls Road club St Gall’s where his grandsons - Eoin and Luke Burke - ended up playing.
“Pearse’s were his original band of brothers - and St Gall’s were his present-day band of brothers.
“There have been lots of tears but lots of laughs too. People have been sending us photographs and sharing stories about my dad.
“So, there’s been a lot of banter which is exactly the kind of person he was. My dad always had a smile on his face. He would normally have been the one telling the funny stories – now we get to hear stories about him.”
A funeral mass will take place today, Thursday, (12noon) at St John’s on the Falls Road followed by a service at Roselawn. The St Gall’s club will provide a buffet and carparking afterwards.
