ON THE day when the Dáil debated a formula to protect the security and stability of Irish finance houses, and US politicians writhed in efforts to rescue the remains of their free market ideology, the solid citizens of Ireland travelled in their hundreds to a tiny church in North Tipperary to pay a different kind of debt.
From the four provinces of Ireland they came to acknowledge their debts of honour and of gratitude to a most humble and self-effacing man known to all and sundry as "Perdue".
In the context of a world on the brink of disaster, the contrast could not have been more complete: greed, arrogance, competitiveness on the one hand; simplicity, sharing and self-giving on the other. Perdue had been a man among men, a man for all seasons, a man for others.
Baptised John Hugo George 81 years ago, the eldest child of a rectory family, Perdue, with his younger brother Ernon and sister Rosalyn, was reared by an indomitable mother on a meagre allowance and an income from paying guests in the impoverished Dublin of the 1930s. He knew what hard times were like. However, an education in the High School was afforded and academic excellence won him a sizarship in Trinity College, without which a university education would have been impossible.
He was commenced a Bachelor of Arts in 1949 and of Agriculture in 1950 and went immediately to a fruit-farming job in Kent. Within two years he was offered posts in management and in research. He refused both and instead wrote to enquire whether or not there might be a teaching post in the recently established Gurteen Agricultural College in North Tipperary. There was. He was offered it and accepted.
Some 40 years later, Perdue himself wrote: "When I came to Gurteen on the last day of February 1952 to start work on the first day in March, I had no intention of spending my working life there - possibly a year or so, and then move on to better things and a changing scene. Gradually I realised that I had actually arrived at the better things and had moved into an ongoing and continuously changing scene full of interesting work, ideas, action and people - all fired with a single purpose of making Gurteen Agricultural College into the premier college of its kind in the Republic. I would like to think that we have come pretty close to that ideal and by deciding not to move on I had a part in the process."
Within that account there lie concealed two core components of Perdue's understanding of life and living - challenge and patriotism. The challenge was to transform the practice of agriculture in the Ireland of the 1950s so that it should become robustly productive. The patriotism was a vision of a wholesome Ireland singularly focused on the common welfare of its people. To the extent that Gurteen College has been a success - and it has - Perdue played a central role. He was not just a lecture hall theoretician, he was a practical farmer. Students who listened to his lucid and colourful lectures could walk a couple of miles down the road and see all they were taught being put into practice on the glebe land at Loughkeen. On the day of his funeral the pasture, the fences, the stock were prime and perfect examples of outstanding animal and grassland management. People who do as they say earn respect; and that was why hundreds had come to honour Perdue.
In his 50 odd years of farming, Perdue demonstrated his breeding and rearing abilities with Jersey cows and their followers, pigs, draft horses, common and rare breeds of poultry, not to mention cats, white mice and runner ducks. He wasn't just an expert farmer and gifted teacher. He was a craftsman of no mean accomplishment in wood and stone. A note to himself written on the day of his death is a reminder to "build small pond for frogs". He was fascinated by art and sculpture from many cultures and by the music which partnered them. In everything that enthralled his interest he became an authority. When respect and authority are combined the young have a model citizen to emulate - and so it was with Perdue in Gurteen.
In many of his enterprises he was known the length and breadth of Ireland for sound advice, enthusiastic encouragement, wise counsel and incredible generosity. While his generosity took many forms, it is best exemplified by his hospitality. The door of Loughkeen was always open; and beyond was an interior that bespoke culture and exuded civility. Hugo and his beloved Myra had created together a home which embraced all and sundry - students, staff, past students, neighbours, friends and those who just dropped in. Around their table and by their hearth there was room for all. Their parties were mighty, with food in abundance and wine to tease the most sensitive palate, and scintillating craic encompassing everything under the sun (and moon and stars also, as we would take our leave in the wee small hours of the morning). When Myra died, Hazel, their daughter, thought it the most natural thing in the world to assume responsibility for their social endeavours with the same directness of manner and elegance of spirit as had characterised her mother. But even without either woman, Hugo was himself a master of hospitality and it was that that won him not just respect and authority, but also love and gratitude because even to the weakest student, the least self-confident member of staff, the doer of the most menial jobs, the clumsy and the awkward as well as the beautiful and elegant, Hugo gave himself wholeheartedly, without thought of cost and knowing well his place.
Of his place there is now the ground and the ground of being, with his epitaph as recorded in the Irish Times death notice:
"Here a man, honest and true,
Until the resurrection, lies Perdue."
His other place is in the hearts and minds of those for whom he was the pioneering companion on the road. There are hundreds if not thousands of them. They witness to the verities and values learned in his company and from his example. These are Ireland's hope and Hugo's legacy.
WSS