Pat Collins: an incredible contributor to the Mullingar Shamrocks community ...
A few years ago Pat Collins retired from An Post after 44 years of unblemished service. Pat seems determined to repeat this feat in his second ‘job’ as Mullingar Shamrocks’ Underage Secretary, a role he has filled for the past twenty years and thankfully his energy shows no sign of abating. The genial Collinstown man is part of the Lynn Heights crew of volunteers who continue to give fantastic service to Shamrocks. They include Pat’s wife Olive, Marian Glennon, Patricia Carter, Tina McCarthy, Charlotte Connolly, Mary Curley and Martina Heffernan, not to mention our PRO Tom Hunt. Pat first made the trek to Springfield approximately 27 years ago as he brought his son Peter to underage training. Fast forward a generation and Pat is now organising our Saturday morning training sessions with his grandsons Seaghan Óg and Micheál part of the SeamrÓgi training. The title of Underage Secretary doesn’t do justice to the variety of tasks undertaken by Pat, organising visits early in the year to the local national schools, registering players and maintaining records, contacting team mentors, fundraising via the annual All-Ireland Tickets Draw, ensuring that referees are contacted, washing various sets of jerseys, pumping footballs, ring-mastering the prestigious Shamrocks’ under 10, 11 and 12 annual tournaments, keeping every underage coach on his or her toes, the list goes on and that’s before we get to the weekly Bingo that Pat has steered over the past 14 years.
The Shamrocks’ weekly Bingo on Thursday nights has been superbly coordinated by Pat with able assistance from the wonderful Detty Cornally and the Lynn Heights ladies mentioned above. It has been an extraordinary commitment from the day it all started on 14 September 2006. Many club members would not be aware of this contribution but it is part of the unrecognised work that takes place behind the scenes that enables GAA clubs around the country to function and at the same time contribute handsomely to community wellbeing. Pat knows every bingo player by name, recruits callers to assist such as Mary Curley, Ray Twomey and Paul Doolin and countless other tasks to ensure a successful evening from the club’s and patrons’ viewpoint. There has been a lot of talk during the current pandemic about the importance of volunteers in the community across a range of activities and services and An Post’s postmen and women have deservedly been praised for their crucial role in keeping contact with the isolated and the vulnerable. And we pride ourselves on our family orientation as a club; indeed Pat was the one who summed up this aspect of the club when he coined the phrase 'Family Friendly Club'. Pat's care for his great friend Tommy Lennon in his final years of ill health showed the soundbite was much more than empty rhetoric.
Pat Collins may have retired from the day job but he still plays a huge role in the community across a variety of sectors and Mullingar Shamrocks and thousands of young boys and girls can count themselves lucky to have benefited from his organisational skills, energy and enthusiasm.
It could be said that Pat does the work of many men but as the picture accompanying this feature shows, there really is four persons in the one Pat Collins.
