REFERENCE NO. AR/1/37 GAA Oral History Project Interview Report Form Name of Joe Jordan Interviewer Date of Interview 3rd Feb 2011 Location N/A Name of Seamus Mallon Interviewee (Maiden name / Nickname) Biographical Summary of Interviewee Gender Male Born Year Born: 1939 Home County: Armagh Education Primary: Middletown Boys School Secondary: St Patrick’s College Armagh Third Level: Queen University Belfast Family Siblings: 1 brother Current Family if Different: Wife and 5 children Club(s) Crossmaglen Rangers GAA [Armagh]; Thady Dwyers GAA [Armagh]; Middletown GAA [Armagh] Occupation Teacher Parents’ Farming Occupation Religion N/A Political Affiliation / N/A Membership Other Club/Society N/A Membership(s) 1 REFERENCE NO. AR/1/37 Date of Report 24 July 2012 Period Covered 1940s - 2011 Counties/Countries Armagh, Antrim, Cavan Covered Key Themes Travel, Supporting, Grounds, Facilities, Playing, Training, Covered Managing, Coaching, Officials, Administration, Fundraising, Education, Religion, Emigration, Role of Teachers, Role of the Club in the Community, Volunteers, Rivalries, Scόr, All- Ireland, Club History, County History, Earliest Memories, Family Involvement, Childhood, Impact on Life, Career, Violence, Northern Ireland, The Troubles, Ban on Foreign Games and Dances, Retirement, Relationships, Economy / Economics Interview Summary This recording takes the form, for the most part, of a recitation by Seamus Mallon of a written account of his life in the GAA. His earliest memories involve listening to match commentaries and results on the radio and being told stories by his father of Ulster championship games from the 1920s and 30s. He talks also about attending his first club and county games, including the 1946 Ulster final when Antrim defeated Cavan. Mallon’s own playing career was long and varied. It began with Middletown in the 1950s, but continued later with Keady Dwyers, Queen’s University and Crossmaglen Rangers. He would enjoy success with each, recalling such highlights as the winning of an Armagh minor title in 1957 (he also won an Ulster title with Armagh that year), a landmark Sigerson cup triumph in 1959 and 3 Armagh senior championships with Crossmaglen Rangers in the mid to late 1960s. He explains how he ended up playing with each of these clubs and discusses the training – or lack of, in some cases - done, the players he played with and against, the competitions they played in, the opposition they faced and how they fared. As he progress his own story, Mallon makes wider observations on games developments and the social, economic and political context. Mallon’s transition to management began before his playing days had ended. He began coaching teams in the school where he worked in Crossmaglen and this led to a deeper involvement with club underage and later teams. He outlines the transformation of Crossmaglen’s fortunes in the 1970s and his decision, after seven years involved in senior management, to leave. Having moved home to Middletown in 1975 and tiring of the travel – exacerbated by the disruption caused by the Troubles – he returned to help in Middletown 2 REFERENCE NO. AR/1/37 and talks about the fall and rise of Middletown’s fortunes in the 1980s. He would end up spending as much time helping with top Middletown team as had done with Crossmaglen. Stepping down from management, he remained hugely involved in GAA activity through participation in Scór and he details his involvement – with others – in an extraordinarily successful quiz team during the 1980s. 00:00:01 Introduction to Seamus Mallon, born in 1939 at Ashfort in Middletown, where he still lives. Remarks that all his life, except for 6 years in Belfast and 12 years in Cullaville,have been spent there. 00:00:30 Early memories of listening to Michael O’Hehir commentaries on the radio. Mentions also that it was compulsory to listen to Sean Óg Ó Ceallacháin on a Sunday night reading out all the club and county results. 00:01:00 Listening to the old schoolteacher, the late PJ O’Neill, a ‘dedicated GAA man. 00:01:15 Refers to other local GAA people like his father Frank Mallon, who had a ‘great memory’ of games from the 1920s and 30s. Recalls him telling of a ‘famous’ Ulster final in Castleblaney between Armagh and Cavan that was wasn’t finished because crowds rushed to pitch – it was ‘replayed in Croke Park’, the first time an Ulster final was played at the venue. 00:01:50 Refers to an Uncle from Middletown, Phelix Mallon, who went to a lot of the big county matches, bringing the young Seamus to his first Ulster final in Clones in 1946, when Antrim met Cavan. On the day, ‘Antrim defied all the odds’. 00:02:38 Mentions that Armagh people were delighted with Cavan’s defeat and recalls Kevin Armstrong sending in a high lob which ‘slipped in over the Cavan goalkeeper’s head. 00:03:10 Mentions supporting Antrim for a time and lists some of their players: Kevin Armstrong, Sean Gibson, Harry O’Neill, Paddy O’Hara, Sean Gallagher and Sean McEleavey (a ‘Keady man’). 00:03:40 Mentions also the ‘great’ Cavan players of the era: John Joe O’Reilly, PJ Duke, Victor Sherlock, Tony Tighe and Peter Donohue. 00:03:50 Attending his first Armagh county final in 1947, aged 8. The game was between Armagh Harps and Crossmaglen 3 REFERENCE NO. AR/1/37 Rangers. Recalls several of the players: Patsy McConville (father of Oisín), Kevin O’Callaghan, Gene Morgan, Tom Clarke, Bertie Regan and John Martin for Crossmaglen and Jack Bratton, Malachy McMahon, Des Slevin, Harry Irwin for the Harps. 00:04:40 Mentions being a ‘fanatical’ Harps supporter at that age, but Cross won that game. 00:04:50 Talks about the local scene and ‘hectic’ games in the 1940s between Middletown and Collegeland, Grange and Ballymacnab. Recalls players from that era: Jimmy ‘White boy’ McGuigan and his brother Barney, Mick McNally, Phelim McQuaid, Phelim McGuinness, ‘wee Jimmy McNally’. 00:05:35 Reference to the ‘Dobbyn Park split’ which led to a lot of bitterness in the late 1940s. Mentions that there was break in the football in Middletown in the mid 1950s until a team was ‘strung together again’. 00:05:53 Credit a Monaghan man, Paddy McArdle, with the re-emergence of football in Middletown. Describes him as a ‘rock’ in every sense. 00:06:05 Mentions that the team included players who had played in the 1950s joined by a younger group including Charlie and Josie McGuinness, Gabriel McGary, Fergal O’Neill, Peter Markey and himself. 00:06:23 Mentions that he had only a year with them at 16 or 17 years of age. The team, he says, went into ‘voluntary liquidation’ in 1956 owing to a ‘shortage of players’. 00:06:40 Comments that they had won a mid-division junior league in 1955, but couldn’t get a team out the following year. 00:06:50 Refers to the typical opposition they faced during these years: Tullysaran, Blackwatertown, Grange, Madden, Ballymacnab, Poyntspass and Mullabrack. 00:07:00 Discusses the economic depression through the 1950s and remarks on the difficulties clubs faced in surviving. 00:07:15 Mentions that a few of the team from Middletown who didn’t go to England joined neighbouring clubs: Charlie McGuinness went to Madden, Sean Barrett and Peter Markey joined another club and Mallon joined Keady Dwyers. 00:07:28 Talks about the absence of coaching and tactics – it was mainly ‘catch and kick’ and solo-running was frowned upon. 4 REFERENCE NO. AR/1/37 00:08:00 Recalls later joining Crossmaglen and telling John Martin that he learned to ‘go hard’ for a ball in Middletown field where it was the only way you’d get a kick of it. 00:08:14 Mentions that school matches were organised with neighbouring areas. Recalls one game when Jimmy Whan was playing. 00:08:40 Remarks that juvenile club football was ‘unknown’ in the 1950s. 00:08:50 Believes that clubs were no more than a ‘group of lads’ who came together for games. There was ‘little or no infrastructure’. 00:09:05 Mentions that meetings were held to give out details of matches, transport was by car or bicycle. 00:09:15 Togging out under a hedge and practice session going on until dark. Recalls characters from meeting such as PJ O’Neill, Owen Quinn, Packie McKenna. Mentions that Charlie McGuinness was match secretary and looked after correspondence. Recalls absentee referees, objections, the playing of illegal players. 00:09:58 The rise of Armagh county team in the late 1940s, reaching the All-Ireland junior final in 1948, winning the All- Ireland Minor in 1949 and running Cavan to a point in the 1949 Ulster final. 00:10:20 Reference to Armagh’s Ulster victories in 1950 and 1953 and the effect of giving young schoolboys their own ‘Armagh heroes and legends’: Refers to many of the prominent Armagh players of the era. 00:10:45 Mentions the ‘privilege’ of being seen with these men. Mentions also the honour of playing with them or against them. 00:10:55 Being ‘cup tied’ with Middletown at junior and only being allowed play for Keady Dwyers Minors in 1956. As a result, he says he missed out on a county senior medal that year when Keady beat the Harps. He confesses, however, that he was unlikely to have got his game on the senior team at 16 years old. 00:11:10 Playing minor and senior with Keady in 1957, winning minor title and losing senior final in the senior final. 00:12:05 Mentions the quality of the Armagh minor teams of 1956 and 1957.