Tuesday, August 05, 2008

Paddling through memories

Paddy Maloney became interested in canoes because he had a family of six and 'didn't want to see them running around the roads every night'.

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"The only other things we had were a boxing club and a tennis club, and they weren't interested," he recalls. "Then I thought that we have a fine river here, and maybe I could use that?"

Swimming and fishing were all that the river had been used for, but Paddy figured there was an opportunity for using boats of some kind. So he began construction of a canoe, in a store behind Jim Byrne's pub, The Hideout.

"I remember Jim Byrne Senior came up to have a look one day and he said it would never work. And in a way he was right, because when I finally launched it in the river it would capsize all the time."

The problem actually was simple. Paddy had put the seat high up and the craft with an occupant was top heavy. "Eventually I realised this and put the seat low in the boat and it worked fine."

He didn't realise it at the time, but this effort to keep his lads off the streets was the genesis of a Canoe Club which was to prove to be very competitive as the sport grew in Ireland, even to providing a several times Olympics paddler, Brendan O'Connell. Paddy was guest of honour at last weekend's dedication of the state of the art new clubhouse built by the developers of Market Square.

Now 88, he recalls how he built several more versions of the finally-successful boat, and organised the first of regular regattas along a stretch of the Liffey close to the town. "We had great times, with crowds lining the bank. We got 6d a head from them going in the gate."

Paddy was a carpenter by trade and his early constructions were made by stretching cloth over a light wood frame. "The cloth was ticking, used for covering mattresses, with a couple of good coats of oil splashed on it."

The 'clubhouse' for the embryo club was a lean-to of galvanised sheeting. Later they bought a piece of land from the late Joe McTernan and began a construction programme which eventually resulted in a safe storage area for boats and a slipway.

"One early club member was Jock Kelly, who worked on the Curragh and was a very good canoeist. He'd come along in the evenings with a couple of lads and they had their own boat which was called 'Katy Daly' after a popular song from the time."

Paddy was still into constructing boats, and had moved from ticking to canvas. But even with the stronger material, the craft were vulnerable to damage in the shallows.

"I decided to try and make one in fibreglass. I knew what I wanted, I knew I had the ability, but the material was the problem. So I went to Thompsons in Carlow, who were making pleasure boats for the American market from fibreglass, and they agreed to supply me."

The fibreglass-hulled boats which Paddy eventually put in the water in the early 60s were the first of their kind in Ireland. He considered making it a full-time business, but there really wasn't enough work to support him.

"It was very successful in its own way, but unfortunately I had to go back to work or leave my family hungry," he smiles.

Paddy was always curious and inventive, and after the canoes he took an interest in a completely different kind of vehicle which gave him a profile right across the country.

"I built a hovercraft. I used a lawnmower engine for power and a balloon underpinning. I remember one day I took it across to the Curragh and while I was driving it on the grass around Ballymany, a military jeep came up alongside me and pulled me over. These MPs with guns pointed surrounded me, very curious about this strange vehicle on their territory!"

The hovercraft could also ride on water, and in one of the early versions Paddy gathered a crowd as he drove it down Kilcullen's main street. "To get away from them I drove it into the water at the square and travelled on up the river," he remembers.

Paddy never lost his love for the river. For years after he'd taken a back seat in the club he would still be found paddling up and down the Liffey, often in the company of a pair of swans which he would feed on a regular basis.

He's very pleased with the new premises, about which the late Pat Dunlea consulted with him in the planning. "It is amazing, and with the floating dock it is state of art," he says, adding that with Kilcullen's recent development there is scope for a whole new era in the club's history.

Brian Byrne.