Gregarious Aidan celebrates 60th in typical fashion

ON Tuesday, January 31, the 60th birthday occurred of Aidan Walsh of Knightstown. The gregarious, loquacious and ubiquitous Aidan, never one to shirk a party, celebrated the occasion in fine style with family and his legion of friends in the comfortable surrounds of Boston’s Bar of Knightstown on Saturday, February 4.

A past pupil of Knightstown National School and the Cahirsiveen CBS secondary School, he commenced his working life with the Irish Lights in 1975, in keeping with the tradition of Valentia Islanders employed as lights workers down through the years. He was made redundant from the Irish Lights in 1993, but returned in 1998 to work in Inis Tearaght and the Skellig Rock.

A seafaring man by nature, he is the son of Carmel and the deceased Valentia Lifeboat Cox Dermot (Dermie) Walsh. He fished in the Pato’s Wish trawler with Joe O’Shea of Cahirsiveen and also fished in the Spailpin Fanach trawler with Paddy Maguire as well as the Marber Therese with Mickey Devane of Portmagee.

Aidan also fished the Ocean Wanderer boat owned by his first cousin Donal and also fished with his late uncle Tony Walsh. He fished in the boats Island Lass and the Agnes Olibhéar owned by his brother Owen, the Loch An Eisc and The Skua owned by Peadar Houlihan and the Christian Island boat owned by Christy Curran. Fishing experience was also gained with Eddie and John ‘Hopper’ Murphy of Knightstown. He operated his own angling boat, Iolar Na Mara, and is also a qualified diving instructor.

Aidan was the goalkeeper – at the age of 15 – in the victorious Valentia South Kerry championship minor team of 1972, versus St Marys, the last Valentia team to win such a competition. Big in stature as an underage player, he played at that level up to the minor grade with Valentia, alternating between full-forward and goal. Due to the commencement of work with the Irish Lights in 1975, he missed out on Valentia’s South Kerry Minor league win over a star studded St Marys, Cahirsiveen, in the mid- seventies.

A man of many parts, he operated as a FÁS Supervisor and Co-Supervisor for 10 years. He was a crew member of the Valentia Lifeboat, a drummer with the Valentia Pipe band, a writer of local notes for The Kerryman, and is a current pub quiz master, never short of an opinion or a reply of witty retort when challenged from the floor. His quips and utterances on such occasions are legendary.

Tá an tri scór bainte amach aige agus go mairfidh sé an céad.

Aidan Walsh(centre) with friends Con O’Shea(left) and Sean Curran(right) at the occasion of his sixtieth birthday celebrations in Boston’s Bar of Knightstown