Basketball and the Busby Babes were Weeshie’s second love
FONDLY remembered by many as a broadcasting legend, Gaelic footballer and referee, the late great Weeshie Fogarty was a wonderful supporter and ambassador for Killarney basketball and had a deep love for the game that he excelled at in his playing days.
Weeshie had no hesitation admitting that after Gaelic football, basketball had always been his second favourite sport. Growing up on Lower New Street, Killarney, Weeshie was only ten years old when the first Killarney Basketball Club was founded by Ben Campion in October 1951.
Weeshie was present when the very first game of basketball took place in November of that year in the old Killarney Town Hall and he also had the thrill of watching the high flying Harlem Globetrotters playing an exhibition match on an outdoor court at Killarney Race Course in the mid 1950s.
Basketball continued to grow during the 1950s with the Killarney Town Hall hosting the All-Ireland Basketball Championship finals in October 1955. Several Killarney teams began to emerge throughout the 1950s and 60s to participate in a local town league.
The United, New Street, High Street, Arbutus Eagles, Ross Rovers, Woodlawn Rangers, St. Marys, The Panthers, The Warriors, The Red Devils, The Jokers, The Battleships, The Shadows and The Rockets were just some of those teams.
With Basketball booming in Killarney and throughout Kerry, Weeshie and his sports mad friends Louis Nolan, Mick O’Sullivan, Donal Courtney, Jimmy O’Leary, Jerry Looney and Noel O’Connor decided to form their own basketball team and decided to call themselves The Busby Babes.
Weeshie himself often told the story about sitting down and drafting a letter to Matt Busby, then Manchester United manager. A few weeks later a brown box arrived at the home of Mick O’Sullivan in Daltons Avenue and it contained eleven red jerseys with white collars and all sporting huge numbers on the back.
A short letter signed by the great man himself wished the lads every success and added that the enclosed jerseys had been worn by “The Babes” in some of their great triumphs.
Ironically the Killarney Busby Babes team wore the famous jerseys for the very first time on February 6, 1958, the same date as the Munich air disaster when British European Airways Flight 609 carrying the Manchester United team, officials and journalists crashed on a the snow covered Munich runway resulting in 23 fatalities with 21 survivors.
Weeshie and The Killarney Busby Babes basketball team went on to win numerous Killarney town leagues and championships. By the mid to late 1960s the Busby Babes were the main basketball team in Killarney and in the 1966-67 season the Babes won senior and minor county championship titles while the junior team lost a final in overtime to The Red Devils.
Weeshie played on that Busby Babes senior team alongside his brother Geni Fogarty, Tadghie Fleming, Jackie Looney, Pat Somers, Johnny Culloty and Tommy ‘Bracker’ O’Regan.
The Babes also went on to represent Kerry in the Munster championship and in a dramatic two-legged affair they beat Cork champions Neptune by one point. The Busby Babes were also strengthened with the emergence of some great young players in this period, particularly the late Paudie O’Connor, a neighbour and friend of Weeshie, who he described as the greatest Kerry born basketball player he had ever seen and the greatest innovator of the sport of basketball in his era.
Weeshie, who was living in O’Sullivan’s Place at this stage, also recalled a fascinating and proud story about his neighbours who won three different All Ireland titles in 1969.
Paudie O’Connor had the All-Ireland senior and minor basketball Cups in O’Sullivan’s Place, his near neighbour Vince Johnson was the All Ireland fly fishing champion and another neighbour Johnny Culloty had captained Kerry to win their 21st senior All-Ireland title to bring the Sam Maguire Cup to the small housing estate.
Weeshie’s basketball playing days came to an end during the 1970s but he never lost interest in the game and he was a passionate supporter of the great St. Vincent’s Gleneagle Killarney team in the late 70s and early 1980s.
He enjoyed the big nights at a packed St Brendan’s Gym during these glory days when Gleneagle won national titles as well as suffering an agonising overtime loss to Doncaster in the Federation Cup Final in 1982.
His interest in Killarney basketball never waned and he followed the fortunes of St Pauls Basketball Club during the 1990s right up to the present day. He was always obliging and very supportive in promoting Killarney basketball giving it prominent coverage on his radio show on several occasions.
In an article he wrote for a St Pauls programme a number of years ago, Weeshie wished the club every success stating that St Pauls are the heirs to a precious tradition of basketball in Killarney, a tradition handed down from that first ever match played in the town in 1951.
Sincere condolences are extended to Weeshie’s wife Joan, daughters Denise and Carolann and son Kieran, son-in-law Glenn, granddaughters Lucy and Eva, sister Sheila, and extended family.