A president who left a rich legacy

Death of Séamus Ó Riain:The passing of in the early hours of Saturday morning breaks the link with the GAA's oldest surviving presidency. He served in that office from 1967 to 1970 and left one of the most significant legacies of any former president.

Born in 1916 in Busherstown near Moneygall he played junior football and hurling with Tipperary before going on to have a long and successful career in GAA administration with club, county, province and ultimately at national level.

He was educated at Moneygall NS, Coláiste Einde and Coláiste Chaoimhín Dublin and De La Salle College Waterford where he trained as a national teacher. He taught in Cloughjordan, Newcastle West, Inis Barr a Chuin (an island off the West Coast) and Borrisokane, where Séamus Gardiner (GAA President from 1943 to 1946) was his principal before finally taking up his post at Dunkerrin NS.

Marcus de Búrca, author of the definitive history of the association, remembered him at the weekend as a powerful presence in the GAA. "I once got in trouble for saying that he was the most charismatic president the GAA has had but certainly at the time he was extraordinarily popular."

In addition to that popularity, his presidency was notable for a vision of the future that can still be appreciated today.

De Búrca's history of the GAA details some of those initiatives including Féile na nGael, "the annual juvenile hurling festival devised in 1971 by Seamus Ryan, (which) continues to be an outstanding success" and the club development scheme, "begun largely under the influence of Seamus Ryan," which encouraged the development of GAA clubs as social centres within the community.

Other initiatives that emerged during the presidency were the inauguration of Scór, the first games with Australian Rules teams in Ireland and Australia, the setting up of the Commission on the Affairs of the GAA (the McNamee Commission) and the decision to build a modern handball court in Croke Park.

In an unusual sequence he became chair of the Tipperary county board after his presidency and in 1990 became president of the county board, in which office he served until his passing.

An athletics enthusiast, he was also an author, writing a history of his club Moneygall and a biography of another Tipperary GAA president, Maurice Davin, the first man to hold the office and who is commemorated in the Davin Stand at Croke Park's Canal End. His grandson is Shane Ryan, the Dublin footballer.

Séamus Ó Riain's removal took place yesterday in Moneygall and requiem Mass will be today at midday with interment in Dunkerrin Cemetery afterwards.