Menswear store owner, hurler, and services founder

OBITUARY: Pat McElhinney, Athboy

The funeral took place in Athboy on Sunday 25th February last of Pat McElhinney of Otterstown, businessman, hurler, community figure, founding member of Meath Sheltered Workshop, and a genuine friend to many. There was great sadness across the county when news of his death became known on Thursday morning, as he had battled various illnesses through the years, but had always recovered. He passed away in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda, aged 83.

The McElhinney name is synonymous with Athboy, ever since his mother, Molly, opened an iconic fashion store there in 1937. She was a member of the O'Callaghan family who ran a public house in the town. After 'serving his time', a young Pat McElhinney returned to the town and entered the family business. He had worked in Cavan in 1955, Ferns in Wexford from 1959-1960, and in Arnotts, Dublin, to 1962. At the time, McElhinney's was a general drapery business, with ladies fashions, menswear and children’s wear.

The business was then located where McElhinney’s for Men is now situated, and as it grew, Molly decided to expand the ladies’ fashion business, moving up the street in 1962, with Pat remaining at the original premises. In the early years, Pat and his wife, Catherine McLaughlin from Ballivor, whom he met at the tennis club dance in Athboy and married in October 1968, lived over the business, before building their own family home at Otterstown.

On the hurling fields, Pat was captain of the Athboy team the last time they brought the Jubilee Cup to the town as the county's 1972 senior hurling champions – after an epic battle with Kilmessan in early 1973.

This week, the Clann na nGael GAA club described Pat as “a pillar of the community and a man who was held in the highest regard by anyone fortunate enough to meet him either on the hurling pitch or in his shop on main street, over a lifetime of service to both club and parish”.

Beginning his GAA career playing both juvenile hurling and football with the O'Growney Club, he was part of the senior hurling team that won five senior championships (1966, ‘67, and ‘68, ‘70 and ‘72), four Feis Cups and numerous tournaments. In 1979, along with former senior hurling team mates, he won a junior hurling championship medal, beating Killyon.

Pat took over as secretary of the club in 1963, a position he held for over 20 years. During difficult times in the 1960s and 1970s, Pat and the McElhinney family were a constant support to the club, whether it was socks, sliotars, hurls or jerseys needed, and this support continues to the present day through his son, Padraic.

In 1987 and 1988, when Sean Boylan's Meath senior football team were competing in and winning All Ireland senior football championships, Pat McElhinney sponsored their suits. He also sponsored the County Hurler of the Year Award.

In the early 1980s, Pat McElhinney chaired the Meath Rehab Committee, and in 1982 became chairman of a new committee to raise funds to develop a facility for training young adults with intellectual disabilities, the Meath Sheltered Workshop. The facility opened in January 1986, with Pat on the board of management as chairman. An official opening was performed by the then Minister for Finance, John Bruton, in May 1986.

As the facility and service evolved over the years, in the late 1990s it became known as MIDWAY - the Meath Intellectual Disability Work Advocacy You. In 2015, MIDWAY amalgamated with Prosper Fingal, a similar service operating in Dublin, and Prosper Meath came into being, now catering for over 200 users, with some 75 staff numbers.

In 'Prosper Meath – a 40 Year Celebration' published last year, historian Aidan Gilsenan writes that: “Its founders were parents/guardians who demanded a meaningful service for their adult children and firm friends such as health board official, Jim Roche, and Pat McElhinney, who became a campaigner for services in Meath for people with intellectual disabilities as a 'hobby after work', but took great pride in the 'joy and happiness that it brought'.”

While Pat was known for his work with this group, he quietly and discreetly helped out people and organisations without any fanfare, in Athboy and further afield. He was very proud of the town and its history and in his mens shop, had a display of old photographs of Athboy.

Speaking at his funeral Mass on Sunday, Fr Padraig McMahon, PP, said that Pat had a great pride in the town, embraced all newcomers, and held on to all that was good about its past. “Perhaps in that, he has left a lesson, and a legacy, for us all to learn from.”

Symbols of Pat's life on the altar were his hurl and sliothar, and an Athboy hurling jersey, his measuring tape and cloth from the drapery, his prayer book and rosary beads, and a family photograph.

Fr McMahon recalled that Pat had a great passion for hurling, but that his hoard of medals were not the extent of his interest - his interest was in the people, the club, the players and their families that and that was why being a selector and a trainer and a generous sponsor was a constant thread in his life.

The chat with customers and flow of life through the shop meant that customers always returned for his kindness, honesty, and decency over the years.

Pat was a man of faith and man of prayer, attending Mass on Sundays and during the week, and Eucharistic Adoration. He and Catherine travelled to Lourdes on pilgrimage in May 2019.

Son of the late George and Molly McElhinney, Pat was predeceased by his brother, Mossie, and sister Mary Sweeney, and is survived by his wife, Catherine; sons, George, Joe, Padraic and Rory; grandchildren, Luke, Molly, Patrick, Jamie, Sam, Andrew, Lauren, Harry, Kate and Ross; sisters, Doreen Twohy, Seattle, USA, and Louise O'Sullivan, Athboy; brother, Jack, London, daughters-in-law, Tracy, Lorna, Regina and Mairéad; brother-in-law, sisters-in-law, extended family and many friends.

Hundreds from across the county and country attended his wake on Saturday, and funeral from St James’ Church to St James’ Cemetery on Sunday, with queues of over an hour at the funeral home, and the church thronged, in a huge tribute to the deceased.