Mikey Danaher Memorial Lifetime Membership

“As Ballingarry AFC prepares to celebrate its 25th anniversary in 2009, it is fitting that our club should operate a lifetime membership scheme. This scheme will offer an opportunity to everyone associated with the club to formalise their ties with Ballingarry AFC. We hope it will encourage more people to become club members – bringing about greater numbers at our General Meetings and, hopefully, the generation of new ideas and innovative plans”.

– Paschal Moynihan, Chairman Ballingarry AFC 2008

Over the years, many former players and club members may have lost contact with the club – this scheme offers those people an opportunity to rekindle their ties with the club that they helped to create and develop. In addition to the pride of being associated with this great club and voting rights at our General Meetings, lifetime members will be rewarded with special commemorative trophies and placing of their names on an honours board in the clubhouse.

The Late Mikey Danaher (1924 – 2000)

In an effort to ensure that the memory of Mikey Danaher lives on, the lifetime membership bears the name of a man who was a loyal and passionate supporter of Ballingarry soccer.
Mikey was a native of Ballingarry. He was born in Ballynoe in 1924 and lived there all his life. He loved Ballingarry soccer club but was keenly interested in all sports. He loved horse racing, gaelic football, hurling, rugby and cricket. He especially loved greyhound racing and, indeed, kept a number of dogs himself.

He was a founder member and attended the first meeting in the “Supper Room” during which the club was formed in February, 1984. He attended our first ever game and went to every match, home and away, whenever possible, including friendly fixtures. He was voted the club’s first ever Supporter of the Year in 1984/85, an honour that moved him to tears and, when accepting the award, he said it was the only thing he ever won and that he would treasure it. He won the award again in 92/93, the only person to win it twice, and again he was thrilled.

Mikey was one of life’s true gentlemen who was much respected within the community of Ballingarry. Ballingarry AFC sincerely thank the Danaher family for granting the club permission to honour him in this manner.

Mikey Danaher Memorial Lifetime Membership Launch, June 25th 2010, The Paddocks Ballingarry.

On Friday 25th June 2010, Ballingarry AFC hosted the inauguration of its first Lifetime Members at a special ceremony in the Clubhouse at The Paddocks, home of Ballingarry AFC. The function consisted of a cheese and wine reception for all the Lifetime Members while each member was presented with a commemorative trophy, a specially commissioned copy of the club rule book and a photographic DVD of the first 25 years of the club, “Ballingarry AFC, 25 Years in Pictures”.

Chairman Pascal Moynihan addresses the Lifetime Members

All members were formally presented with the trophies by the club President Mr. Moss Doody. Opening the ceremony club Chairman Mr. Paschal Moynihan welcomed all Lifetime Members and said that he believed that Ballingarry AFC was a football club in which all its members could have a great deal of pride. He thanked those in attendance for their commitment to the club and said that Lifetime Membership provided an opportunity for those who held the interest of the club at heart and who felt a genuine affection for the club to formalise their ties with Ballingarry AFC.

He finished by saying that Lifetime Membership carried with it a responsibility to ensure that the club was run in a proper manner by capable people and continued to be a club that all those associated with it can be proud.

At the ceremony a dedicated teak Lifetime Membership board was unveiled which displayed the Lifetime Members.