Living the dream at 85

There’s a photo that has pride of place on a wall in a comfortable home in Cork city, a photo that has been a long, long time in the framing.

Front and centre in the picture is a magnificently conditioned animal, Connells Cú, and prime among the smiling faces gathered around is 85-year-old Tom O’Connell.

The reason for the photo, the reason for all the celebration? Late and all as it has come, Tom finally has a dog going to Clonmel, to the National Coursing Meeting, the All-Ireland championships of a pastime almost as old as time itself.

“I’m in seventh heaven, never thought I’d see this day. It’s so hard to get to Clonmel, any time. The family has always been involved in dogs and I’m in a photo from way back when Factotum won the Cork Cup, a long, long time ago now. He was the best greyhound we ever had but I had no part in the ownership of that dog. Three of my brothers, Donie, Noel and Paschal, they were the ones always directly involved, first class doggie men. Donie and Noel are dead now, Lord have mercy on them, and I’m involved with Paschal in this one.”

How he got involved, even how they came to own Connells Cú, is a story in itself. “Richie Maher owns La Torre, the dam, and he’s great buddies with my nephew Mike. He brought La Torre to Mike’s place in Emly — that’s where I’m from originally — to be ‘whelped’ (born), and they reared the litter there, in Emly. The pups were sold off and when everyone had come and made their choice, there was a dog and a bitch left – we got those.”

So they were left with the leftovers, so to speak? “I wouldn’t say that — it hasn’t worked out so badly, has it!” Tom’s son Paul takes up the story: “Michael (his cousin) texted me and asked if Tom and myself would like to get involved in a fawn dog for the year. I asked if Flor — my brother-in-law, married to my sister Geraldine — could also get involved and Michael said yes. So there’s Tom, Paschal, Michael and myself, and Flor Crowley, from Dunmanway.”

Right, so that’s two Tipperarymen and two Corkmen (“I’ve a Tipperary father, a Cavan mother, born in Dublin, but I’m an out-and-out Corkman,” proclaims Paul, proudly).

Where then does that leave Tom, and where does it leave the dog — Tipperary or Cork?

Tom: “I was born and raised in a pub, O’Connell’s in Emly, and never worked at anything else. I went to Dublin in 1945 and worked in a bar, got married to Anna May in 1955, bought a pub in Cork in 1969, in Douglas Street, and we’ve lived here since. But I’m a mad Tipperaryman, always was and always will be – you have to be if you have any kind of heart in you at all, you never give up your own.

“I got some slagging over the years in that pub — the day Cork and Tipp would be playing, murder! Other than that though I found Cork people to be the best in the world — after the match was over they were the finest, and I’ll tell you something now, after Tipperary I’d always shout for Cork. Limerick? Now that’s different!”

And the dog? “Put it this way,” says Paul, “In Emly they’re saying it’s mostly Tipperary but with a little bit of Cork! To be honest we don’t care where he’s from, it’s just great to be there.”

There are two others in this story, however, two ladies Tom would like especially mentioned. One is his wife of 57 years, Anna May, the other is his sister-in-law, Philomena O’Connell, nee Ryan.

“Anna May isn’t involved at all but she’s a great woman, coming up on 88 and no problem on her. The week we qualified for Clonmel we were in Galbally for two days then Templetuohy for another two, where we won the Trial Stake – we were coursing for four days out of the seven and she thoroughly enjoyed it.

“Then there’s Philomena, Paschal’s wife, and without her this wouldn’t be happening. Early in the season our fella ran in Limerick and he got a real grueller – I never saw anything like it. Grueller? He collapsed afterwards. Michael O’Donovan is the trainer — the same man who’s training Jimmy Barry Murphy’s dog Jackson’s Lane — and he was disgusted. He called over Philomena – her brother Michael Ryan won the Oaks with Lively Air – and said to her, ‘You bring him home to Emly.’ In three weeks she had the dog perfect, absolutely perfect.

The secret? Butter, that’s what she gave him, she told me she gave him three pounds of butter in total. She’d cut it into little squares, give him a few lumps of it every day, for his insides. You know the way good coursing dogs have great broad backs on them — after a gruelling they lose that and they never get it back, you can nearly see it falling off them. This fella never lost his back – I thought he’d never walk again but he came as good as ever, thanks to Philomena.

“That would have something to do with the way he was reared too of course, the feeding he got. After the three weeks Michael O’Donovan said he never saw the likes of it, the recovery, but after all the butter he had put on a bit of weight and Michael had a big problem trying to knock it off him. It wasn’t til he ran him in a Trial Stake in Ballyragget that he finally began to see the butter coming off!

‘Ballyragget made a man of him!’, that’s what Michael says. He was beaten there, a good dog belonging to Brendan Matthews – King Rooney, remember the name! But he finally made it through, in Templetuohy.”

Just goes to show, doesn’t it? It’s never too late to dream, never.

* The draw for the Derby, however, hasn't been kind to Connells Cú as he has been paired with Tilford Tom, one of the favourites to lift the classic, in the opening round and he will face an uphill battle from the word go this weekend.