One of Kilkenny city's best-known residents and most loyal GAA followers, Andy Heffernan was born in John Street where his father Michael ran a construction and cabinet-making business. His mother, a member of the Byrne family of Conlegar, Clara, had an antique furniture business in the shop. Andy and his brother Billy served their apprenticeship there and on the death of his father Andy began his own business.

He was a true craftsman who took immense pride in his work and was painstaking in his thoroughness. After he married Ann he moved to Michael Street. Behind their house was his workshop "which had a place for everything and everything in its place."
Phil Doyle related a story of how a leak occurred in the attic of his family home in Firhouse, near Sheestown, and nobody could trace the source. Andy was asked by Phil to come and have a look. He duly solved the problem. Asked by Phil to name his price, Andy replied "Oh, you often did a turn for me." That was the end of it. No charge.

During the Second World War Andy's father Mick, a native of Glenmore and a member of the Kilkenny County Board, made a submission to have a four-foot wall constructed in front of the old stand in Nowlan Park in order to replace the existing timber railing. Owing to the war, medals were unavailable, and when Glenmore won the county football final they agreed to divert 15 - the price of the medals - to help pay for the new wall. This gesture helped begin the redevelopment process at what is now one of the finest county GAA grounds in Ireland.

Andy was one of Kilkenny's finest Gaelic footballers ever. That was no insignificant achievement, for it the big-ball sport has for a century been the "other" game here then the county has still produced its share of very good footballlers. Andy was one of them, a corner-back with a great left foot. His old Clann na Gael team-mate Seamus Delaney in Patrick Street, for decades Kilkenny's Mr Football, describes him as "a stone wall - it was the Glenmore stuff in him". Andy and Seamus played with Muckalee before Clann na Gael, a forerunner of the modern-day O'Loughlin Gaels, were formed in 1960. Success came quickly; the new outfit were county junior champions in 1962, then senior champions in '63 and '64. Andy occasionally spoke of the occasion when he played football for Kilkenny in Croke Park following a Leinster hurling final. The football match was still going on at 6pm at which stage the referee stopped proceedings for the teams to say the Angelus!

It would be interesting to know how many matches Andy attended in his lifetime. It's a fact that he attended every All-Ireland hurling and football final for over 60 years, and how fitting it was that in the closing years of his life he was present to see Kilkenny beat Tipperary not once but twice on the first Sunday of September. Having attended his first All Ireland final in 1945 he saw all the greats of Kilkenny hurling from Jim Langton to Henry Shefflin, and if he admired every one of them he reserved a special place in his affections for DJ Carey and the excitement he brought to the game. He knew his hurling and football, his facts and figures, his matches and dates, without ever being a knowall.

Andy loved attending schools matches, identifying potential prospects and following their progress through the grades. If they made it through to senior ranks he'd take pride in having spotted them years beforehand. He was never one to criticise a player for a poor display; "ah, sure it wasn't his day" would be as far as he'd go. But Andy was no big-day-only merchant; he was one of those low-key hurling men who form the backbone of the GAA in the county. Any round of club championship matches would find him and Ann attending three or four fixtures over the course of a weekend and frequently two or even three games on a Sunday. His only gripe might be a clash of throw-in times. When asked why he went to so many matches he responded simply, "Because the day will come when I won't be able to go any more."

He harboured a special gra for his ancestral Glenmore, his own Dicksboro - he served as chairman of the club - and the various Kilkenny CBS teams. And last year he had another team to support; the Wexford minor hurlers, with whom his grandson Colm - Deirdre's son - lined out.

For years a regular in Shem Lawlor's and then Mick Dempsey's in John Street, he latterly switched custom to Langton's, where Friday and Sunday nights had him regularly replaying old matches in the company of Tommy O'Connell, Tony Deegan and Billy Sullivan. (A football match from the 1950s when Brownstown travelled by bus to Tullaroan to play Johnstown and the ball got stuck overhead in electric wires on Lory Meagher's field was a particular favourite). They'll miss him and his gentle wit and his catchphrases, among them "Be the hokey! - the closest Andy came to swearing - and "That's the way". A devout Catholic and a splendid Christian, he accepted his illness with patience and forbearance. That was Andy. No noise, no fuss, no histrionics.

It has become a cliche in circumstances like these to use the words "Ni breidh a leitheid aris ann". But in the case of Andy Heffernan the phrase could not be more accurate or more apt.

- Courtesy of Kilkenny People, January 13th 2012 Tweet

Most Read Stories