KILLINEY GOLF CLUB

Chapter 7 - Of matters oval

If counsellors were being trained to help people cope with the ageing process, they could not have had a better mentor than Jack Arigho, one of the great “characters” of Killiney Golf Club. At 76, Jack claimed proudly: “I love growing old.” And he went on to insist: “I am as happy now as when I was 28 because I see things in a simpler, nicer way and recognise what is important to me.”

Jack was determined to enjoy life to the full and it was a recipe which worked brilliantly. In fact, when his many friends considered the physical abuse he had inflicted on himself over years of revelry, they couldn’t but marvel at his survival to the grand old age of 92. Up to his death November 29th 1999, he had been a wonderful focus for Killiney’s remarkable attachment to the game of rugby, an attachment which was reflected in a liberal sprinkling of gifted practitioners among the membership, down through the years.

Dr W S Collis, a founder-member of the club, was capped for Ireland against Wales in 1884 as a member of Wanderers, and his son, Dr Bob Collis  (KCH  and Harlequins), gained seven Irish international caps national caps from 1924 to 1926. This was the Dr Collis who was author of the documentary “Straight On”, which exposed the horrific conditions in the Belsen and Auschwitz concentration camps as he witnessed them at the end of World War II.

Dr Robin A Wright of Monkstown who was capped against Scotland in 1912, was also a member of Killiney, as were the illustrious Dr  Jammie Clinch, George J Henebrey of Garryowen, who got a total of six caps in 1906 and 1909, Jack Arigho, Dr Paul Murray, Phil Crowe (Blackrok College), W J McCormick (Wanderers), Dan Langan (Clontarf), Ted Ryan (Dolphin) and Pat Casey of UCD and Landsdowne, who gained 12 caps from 1963 to 1965.

For many years Arigho “Capped 16 times for Ireland” was the voice of rugby in the “Sunday Press.” And it was in an interview published by a sister paper, “The Irish Press” in August 1982, which, sadly, has also parted the scene, that he revealed the above-mentioned secret of his happiness. His enjoyment of people involved considerable closeness to his children Brian, Desmond and Marie, and to his grandchildren on whom he doted.

As the scribe reported: “His days seem full of mellowness, of chats with friends over a jars and moments to ponder what will win the 2.25 at Newmarket. But with a bit of coaxing, he admits to the wilder side of his nature. ‘I keep saying I won’t go to various discos at the golf club, but find myself in the middle of the floor slapping bot- toms at midnight,’ he said. ‘Once the band starts playing, I’m off. I’m mad about music. It rejuvenates me.’

George Crawford tells a fascinating story regarding the origin of Jack’s surname. Apparently John Arigho, Jack’s grandfather, arrived at Dun Laoghaire from Cannegio, Switzerland in the 19th century with two shillings and six pence in his pocket. After some time here, he set up a business at Christ Church where a signwriter inadvertently spelt his name with an “h”, which the owner decided to leave in for good luck.

As a member of Killiney GC, which he joined on leaving Elm Park, he became almost better known as an entertainer than as a former rugby international. Apart from the impersonations noted in “The Irish Press”, he could do splendid take-offs of Maurice Chevalier, Richard Tauber, Bud Flanagan and, fellow member, Roderick Tierney.

By way of celebrating his 80th birthday in 1987, a packed audience in the club was treated to the best of Killiney entertainment, most of the performers having appeared with Jack at club functions. In response, Jack made a very moving speech, followed by a tour de force from the Arigho clan.

John Lyons, honorary treasurer of the IRFU and a past captain of the club, has a fund of stories about the bould Jack, as does John’s contemporary, Tom McCarron.

The first tale, related by Lyons, involved his good friend and Bective Rangers colleague, Maurice Mortell, who, like Arigho, played on the wing for Ireland. “Maurice was also a pal of Jack’s, so he responded favourably when asked for a lift home one night,” recalled Lyons. “But there was a bit of a catch: Arigho informed him that he had to call into the Widow O’Rourke’s pub in Blackrock, where a fellow would have a cheque for him.

“Maurice agreed that Jack could go in but insisted that he himself would wait in the car. Deal done. So Jack went into O’Rourke’s and came out a short while later, explaining that the man he was looking for wasn’t there. So they then drove to Goggin’s in Monkstown. The same rules applied and while Jack was inside, Maurice turned the car around.

“Suddenly, Jack comes flying out of Goggin’s Pub and jumps into Maurice’s car. And next thing, as Maurice is driving away, he catches sight in his rear-view mirror of the pub owner and Bective Rangers colleague, Joe Keegan, out on the street and clearly not at peace with the world. Apparently when Arigho had gone into the pub, the fellow he was looking for wasn’t there either. But there happened to be a cooked chicken wrapped in a brown paper bag on the counter and in a flash of lunacy, he promptly drop- kicked it through the bar, splattering it everywhere. Which prompted an apoplectic Keegan to scream in his wake: ‘I’ll break the little f...er’s neck.’”

Tom McCarron, another past captain of the club, told of an incident involving the bould Jack and his fellow Killiney member, Carroll Preston, a former president of Wanderers. “Carroll acquired a splendid little poodle by the name of Piccolo, which came to dominate his life,” recalled Tom. “Ever so delicately, he would call him ‘Come here, Pic-Pic-Piccolo.’

“It was a situation which got Arigho’s mischievous mind working overtime. So, in a phone call to Preston and speaking in a decidedly upper-crust accent, he identified himself as a Monkstown resident who had been informed of the existence of a wonderful specimen of poodle in the neighbourhood, i.e. Piccolo. Arigho further informed an eager Preston that he was staging a dog-show at his home the following Saturday afternoon, when he dearly hoped that Piccolo would be exhibited by himself and his wife, Pat. An address was then given which, naturally, was fictitious.

As Arigho suspected, the hapless Preston simply couldn’t resist the opportunity of showing off his pride and joy. So it was that when Saturday dawned bright and sunny, all thoughts of his regular golf game at Killiney were abandoned: nothing could interfere with the dog show. And as Preston drove up and down Monkstown Road, looking for an address which didn’t exist and with Piccolo ensconced in the passenger seat, Arigho was standing outside Goggin’s, chuckling wickedly. Indeed, he could hardly wait to get to the golf club to inform his fellow members of Preston’s gullibility. Needless to remark, it was a story which ran for weeks, much to the chagrin of Piccolo’s embarrassed owner.”

Lyons then told of the Belton Group’s annual ball in the Burlington Hotel. “Jack Owens (brother of one-time Irish international and GUI President, Gerry Owens) who was Dean of the Dental Hospital, would have been politically opposed to the Beltons, to put it mildly. So he wasn’t invited. But all the other leading lights in Killiney, including Arigho, were on the guest list.

“Anyway, the whole gang were gathered in the club on a particular Sunday morning, having a fierce political argument. And Arigho happened to notice a blank invitation to the ball, sticking out of Belton’s pocket. So he took the invitation, addressed it to Dr and Mrs Owens and handed it to Jack Owens when they were out of the room in the toilet. Seeing the invitation, Owens knew what Arigho had done and was delighted to play along with the ruse.

“Then, on returning to the bar, he was about to leave when he turned to Belton and said: ‘I’ll see you on Thursday.’ Whereupon Belton, with his inimitable, deliberate articulation replied: ‘No, no. You won’t see me on Thursday, because you’re not invited.’ ‘Ah well I’ll see you anyway; we’ll be going there anyway,’ insisted Owens. “Sure we have an invitation.’ ‘No, no, no you haven’t’ said the host. Suddenly, Belton realised what had happened and turning to his tormentor, exclaimed: ‘Arigho, you’re a b*****, but I love you.’

“Meanwhile, the Dean headed home hatching an idea which came to fruition at about 2.0 in the morning. That was when he decided to send a telegram which, at that time, would be delivered by a messenger on a motorbike, day or night. About an hour later, the motor- bike duly arrived in Belton’s driveway and the messenger proceeded to knock at the door. The telegram was then handed to an irate Belton. It read: “Thank you very much for the invitation. Unfortunately, Dr Owens and his wife are unable to attend because they have somewhere better to go.”

That was Jack Arigho. Killiney GC will never see his likes again.

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Local wisdom has it that leading rugby players were attracted to Killiney GC because of the renowned discretion of the members. Players, whose achievements would be cheered to the echo at Lansdowne Road on a Saturday afternoon, felt entirely comfortable in letting their hair down among a golfing fraternity who treated them simply as amiable drinking companions.

The often-breached dictum that “what happens on tour, stays on tour” was rigidly observed. So, if somebody happened to become tired and emotional, tongues were kept under a tight rein.

John Lyons, a resident of Sandycove, spoke of the gifted international Paul Murray and his Killiney connections. “All of the Murrays were members of Killiney, for the simple reason that they lived in Sandycove,” he said. “Indeed Paul would have been a member of Killiney before he joined Milltown GC.”

Tom McCarron, claims only a modest rugby connection through his one-time membership of Bective, but his father, Eamonn, was president of the Leinster Branch of the IRFU and was closely associated with UCD. Tom recalled: “One could describe him as very much a rugby man who happened to be quite an influential figure in Killiney from the 1930s up to his death in 1954.

“Paul Murray and Jack Arigho were friends of his. And when he was captain in 1948, I have no doubt he would have encouraged rugby-playing young men, who expressed an interest in golf, to join the club. I also have no doubt but that the renowned discretion of Killiney members was a very important factor in forging this link.”

This view is shared by Lyons, who said: “There were also men who came out to live in this area, men like Dan O’Connor, president of Bective and a senior partner in Arthur Cox (solicitors), who settled in Dalkey. He was a past-president of the Leinster Branch and a referee par excellence and became captain and president of Killiney.”

Lyons went on: “His brother-in-law, Frank O’Rourke Snr, who was president of Bective, also joined. In my own case, I grew up here with Tom and John McCarron and though I didn’t become a member until about 1964, about a year after I got married, I used to go up there long before that, with Tom’s brother on a Friday night.

“That was when I was an accountancy student and we would share the company of Willie Gaffney, the club professional. Later, when I became a member in my mid-twenties, I would become involved in sing-songs on Saturday nights, involving the winner of the members’ prize. Every Saturday, two or maybe three people would club together to put up a prize. In the case of Harry Robinson’s father, Tommy Robinson, who was Captain in 1942 and President from 1954 to 1956, it was a watch. And Harry, who was captain in 1970 when the club first won the Bloom Cup, and who has long established rugby connections with Monkstown continues to put up what has become known as the Robinson Watch.

“The tradition was that donors would come to the club with their prize at 6.0pm on a Saturday, when the presentation would take place. And from the proceeds of a sweep on the competition, the winner would buy drinks. Then, instead of a rendition of ‘For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow’, it became the custom for a group of us to break into some song appropriate to the winner, generally a hackneyed tune but with special words for the occasion.

“Though there was often a considerable age gap between ourselves and the older members, there were no ‘Misters’ between the youngsters and their elders. Just as would happen in a rugby club, we all treated each other as equals.

“It was an attitude which ensured that whatever we might have got up to, within reason, there was never a word of censure. Indeed, the senior members of the club would encourage sing-songs in the bar and become actively involved themselves.

“So we had that generation and the previous one, singing songs and telling stories on a Saturday night and generally enjoying each other’s company. Fellows doing crazy things. And if you stepped out of line, it made no difference. As I’ve said, it essentially became an extension of the sort of atmosphere we would have expected in our own rugby club. There was a bit of style about the place, so it was small wonder that people such as Dan Langan, an international who was a member of Clontarf, and Carroll Preston of Wanderers, were attracted to the club.

“There is no question but that the Killiney member had a profile very different from the other clubs in the area.”

Links with Blackrock College are especially strong. Fergus Slattery, capped 61 times for Ireland and four times for the Lions from 1970 to 1984, is a member. So is Ray McLoughlin, another Lion who has 40 international caps. Their late, lamented Blackrock colleague, Locky Butler, who was capped for Ireland in 1960, was also a member of Killiney. Then there was Mick “Bomber” Brown, who had the distinction of being capped for Canada. Another member Richard Airey, played for Kenya and Tanganyika in 1957.

And the net stretched to embrace such internationals as McCormick and his Wanderers club-mate Murray, there was the Rev. Austin Carrie who played for an Irish XV against the British Army in 1943 and 1945 as part of the war effort. And he also played for Ireland against Scotland and Wales in so-called victory internationals in 1946 when, sadly from his stand- point, no caps were awarded.

In the list of Killiney members who played representative rugby for Leinster, members of Bective Rangers have been to the fore. And Kevin Kelly of Wanderers and Willow Murray of St. Mary’s were also among them, as were Blackrock players Dermot Hassett, Eric Pembrey and Ivan Austin, while Murray and Brian McLoughlin filled the role of coach to the Leinster team.

The club can also take pride in the membership of John P Lyons (Bective Rangers), the honorary treasurer of the IRFU and of Frank Sowman (Wanderers) who was an Irish international selector from 1992 to 1996 and was manager of the Irish tour to Australia in 1994.

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Had Dr Jammie Clinch actually consumed all the pre-match pints of Guinness attributed to him, he would never have been able to leave the dressing-room, much less perform heroically for Ireland as a backrow forward in 21 international matches. After making his debut against Wales in 1923, his representative career, as a member of Dublin University and Wanderers, culminated in five international appearances during the 1931 season.

The high points of his career were being selected to tour South Africa with the Lions in 1924, and an outstanding performance against England at Twickenham five years later, when he was acknowledged as the best forward on the field, in a memorable Irish triumph. At 69, he returned to Ireland, 12 years before his death on May 1st 1981, claiming that he had been “granted parole.” Whatever the reason, it came as a great joy to his many friends and admirers in Killiney. On being asked what he thought of modern rugby training methods compared with those of his day, he replied in his famous drawl: “In my day, if we practiced like that, I would not only be out of the game the next day, that kind of training would make certain I would be for the rest of the season.” Jammie was never short of an opinion on whatever subject one cared to raise.