Sean Purcell: The passing of Sean Purcell removes another link with the golden age of Galway football in the 1950s and 1960s.
Within the last 18 months three iconic figures have died: Mattie McDonagh, the only Connacht man to have won four All-Ireland medals, Enda Colleran, who captained two of Galway's three-in-a-row teams in the 1960s, and now one of football's greatest and most revered players.
In as much as there can be empirical evidence of SeaPurcell's standing in the game, it was testified to by the fact that he became known as "the Master" and by the overwhelming consensus attending his inclusion on the GAA's two major historical selections, the Centenary Year Team of the Century in 1984 (when he received more votes than any other player) and the more recent Team of the Millennium.
Born to Johnny Purcell, a journalist with the Connacht Tribune, and Rita Kilkenny, he grew up in Tuam's Shop Street, which was made famous as the home of Purcell, Frank Stockwell, his partner in the "Terrible Twins" central attack and Jack Mangan, who captained the 1956 All-Ireland winning team. Sean Purcell was educated at the Presentation Convent and Tuam CBS national schools before attending St Jarlath's, the town's famed college and football nursery.
There he played on the team that won the 1947 Hogan Cup, the All-Ireland colleges' title. He went on to study for teaching in St Patrick's in Drumcondra, where a contemporary was RTÉ's Micheál Ó Muircheartaigh, who in June of this year read the citation when Sean Purcell was awarded an honorary doctorate at NUI Galway.
He also studied in UCG (as NUIG was then known), helping the college to a Fitzgibbon Cup success in 1950. By then he was an established senior player with Galway.
In 1954 he gave one of his great performances in the full-back position when Galway defeated then League champions Mayo in the Connacht semi-final and went on to win his first senior provincial medal. In that year's All-Ireland semi-final he gave another superb display, this time at centrefield, although Kerry ran out winners.
The central accolade of his playing career was his versatility. It enabled him to play in all of the central positions, but it was as a centre forward that he enjoyed greatest success and won his senior All-Ireland medal in 1956.
"He had the skills of the game honed down to a very fine art," remembers one of his best-known football adversaries. "He had great hands, he had great feet, left and right, and a great swerve - he could turn on a sixpence. He was a fierce strong man and never selfish with the ball." Although not particularly tall and very strongly built, Sean Purcell was exceptionally nimble and a very good dancer - "the only man in Tuam able to waltz properly", according to one local source.
Galway enjoyed other successes during the 1950s, winning the National Football League in 1957 and contributing many players to Connacht's three Railway Cup wins in 1951, 1957 and 1958, the last of which was captained by Sean Purcell. A year later he captained Galway to the 1959 All-Ireland final but they were defeated by a Kerry team, led by Mick O'Connell.
The 1956 All-Ireland victory is considered by many to have been SeaPurcell's finest game. Lining out at centre forward, his leadership of the attack was outstanding and the partnership with Frank Stockwell had its finest hour.
Supplied with ball by his long-standing friend and team-mate, Stockwell scored 2-5 (and had another goal disallowed) which remains a record for the 60-minute finals. Years later, Sean Purcell described the instinctive relationship between the "Terrible Twins".
"At centre forward, myself and Frank had a great knowledge of each other's game. Frank was a very experienced player at that time and I was too. We just managed to click together. There was nothing too organised about it. We just took it naturally."
A teacher for many years, firstly at Carras NS in Mayo but mostly as principal at Strawberry Hill national school near Dunmore in Galway, he also helped to run his mother's shop in Vicar Street, Tuam.
He married Rita Shannon, who predeceased him in August 1961, but the marriage faltered. They became estranged and lived apart while continuing to raise their six children together.
Although his primary interest was in football, Sean Purcell was also a keen follower of horse racing and more especially dog racing. He owned greyhounds and was a gifted amateur trainer as well as being an authority on breeding. He also briefly took up golf and was sufficiently adept to win a captain's prize.
"He was universally respected by sportsmen and footballers of all generations because he was a gentleman and very modest, and had achieved every honour in the game," was the reaction of one prominent former player with whom he was friendly.
"Yet he was a man who was prepared to listen modestly to most opinions. He was a lovely man, a great man for racing and the dogs and universally liked. He was an intelligent man - in fact there is very little you could say against his character." Sean Purcell is survived by his sons John and Robert, daughters Ruth, Mary, Francis and Louise, his sister Maura, brother Frank and a wide circle of relatives and friends.
Sean Purcell, born: December 17th, 1928; died: August 27th, 2005.