The former Fianna Fβil Minister for the Gaeltacht, Denis Gallagher who died on November 3rd aged 78, was renowned for his tireless work to develop thriving communities in his native Currane and the neighbouring Achill Island in the 12 years since he retired from national politics. He was widely admired for his efforts to promote the Irish language during his ministerial career and was closely involved in the establishment of ┌darβs na Gaeltachta.
He was also keenly interested in the development of sea fishing and was a founder member of the Achill Fishermen's Cooperative and of the Federation of Sea Fishing Cooperatives.
Denis Gallagher decided to quit national politics in 1989 after a career, which had brought rapid promotion under the Taoiseach, Jack Lynch, to the Cabinet table followed by disappointment when he backed George Colley in the leadership contest in December 1979 and found himself dropped from Charles Haughey's first Cabinet.
Denis Gallagher was born on November 23rd, 1922, in Currane, Co Mayo, a village on the northern coast of Clew Bay facing Achill Island across a narrow estuary. His life would be closely bound up with both communities. His father, John Gallagher, owned a shop in Currane and his mother, Catherine Gallagher, was also from the area.
The young Denis played Gaelic football for the local Achill club and retained a love for Gaelic games reflected in his life-long support for the GAA in Co Mayo.
Following his early education at the local national school, he attended St Enda's College in Galway and went on to qualify as a national teacher in St Patrick's College, Drumcondra. He taught for several years in Drimnagh, Dublin, before returning to Mayo. He married Hannah McHugh on March 31st, 1948.
It may have been his discontent with Fianna Fail's handling of the national teachers' strike in the 1940s, which led him to stand for Clann na Poblachta unsuccessfully in the Mayo North constituency in 1954. He revealed in a magazine interview at the end of his political career that for a time he was involved with Sinn FΘin in the 1950s when the IRA was engaged in a Border campaign. He told the Comhar interviewer that he had been convicted for collecting for Sinn FΘin without a licence. He also acknowledged that IRA members were given shelter in his home on one occasion.
In 1967 he was in the Fianna Fβil ranks and was elected to Mayo County Council where he served until 1977. He was an unsuccessful Fianna Fβil candidate for the new constituency of West Mayo in 1969 but won a seat there in the 1973 election and was easily re-elected until his retirement in 1989.
In Opposition from 1974 to 1977, he was Fianna Fβil spokesman for fisheries, a post to which he brought some practical experience because of his 28-foot fishing boat. He was a member of Bord Iascaigh Mhara and the Western Regional Tourism Organisation during this time. He also served as chairman of the Galway-Mayo Marine Resources Advisory Board.
Following the Fianna Fβil landslide in 1977, he was appointed Minister for the Gaeltacht and became familiar with the personalities and problems of the western seaboard from Donegal to Kerry. On the day he was demoted from Charles Haughey's Cabinet, he had to ask the new Taoiseach to be allowed to use his ministerial car to travel to Currane to vote in the first elections to ┌darβs na Gaeltachta that he had helped to set up.
Denis Gallagher's demotion and the promotion of his constituency rival, Padraig Flynn, at his expense did not go down well in West Mayo. Haughey responded to local pressure by appointing Denis Gallagher a Minister for State at the Department of Industry, Commerce and Tourism several months later. He supported Haughey in the various "heaves" against him in 1982 and 1983. He was restored for several weeks to his job as Minister for the Gaeltacht in a Cabinet re-shuffle in October 1982 caused by the resignations of Desmond O'Malley and Martin O'Donoghue but was back in Opposition following Fianna Fβil's defeat in the November election. He had served as Minister of State at the Department of Social Welfare from March to October 1982.
When the party returned to Government in March 1987, there was still no place for Denis Gallagher at the Cabinet table where Padraig Flynn had become a powerful figure. The Currane man had to be content with a junior ministry in the Department of the Gaeltacht. When Haughey called a sudden election two years later, Denis Gallagher decided to stand down.
But retirement from the national scene did not mean a leisurely life sailing his traditional Mayo yawl and attending football matches.
Instead he plunged into local community work and told friends that he believed he was able to do more for the region than as a minister. Within two years he had founded the Achill Development Committee which has now grown to comprise three sub-committees: Information Technology, Coiste na Gaeilge and Energy Survey. Denis Gallagher was able to draw on his large network of political contacts and friends to lobby for funding for these activities.
His most recent success, just weeks before his death, was to help secure £60,000 in Government funding for the purchase of the Heinrich B÷ll cottage on Achill Island to ensure its continuation as a centre for literature and the arts. He was also concerned about the welfare of the many elderly returned emigrants now living in the Achill and Currane area and campaigned to provide community facilities for them.
He is survived by his wife Hannah; sons Brendan, Denis, Michael, Padraig and Terry; daughters Mary, Catherine, Anne, Nora, Sheila, Margaret and Br∅d; brothers Owen, Brendan, Father Michael and Terry, and sisters Mary and Sister Kathleen. He was pre-deceased by his brother Patrick.
Denis Gallagher: born 1922; died, November 2001