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My Beautiful Obsession, Chasing the Kerry dream

Author:Fogarty, Weeshie
Format:Book
Reference code:978-1-84889-156-2
Published:The Collins Press, 2012
Covering Dates:NA
People Mentioned:Weeshie Fogarty
Extent:273pp
Reproduction:No Reproduction Allowed
Access:By Appointment
Subject Matter:Co. Kerry, Gaelic Football, Killarney
Available:Yes

My_Beautiful_Obsession.jpgMy Beautiful Obsession captures the importance of football in the life of a Kerry youngster in Killarney in the 1950s and his dreams of playing with Kerry in Croke Park. Through the eyes of young Weeshie the passion and all-consuming obsession, widespread in a football-mad county, are vividly described. He recalls attending his first All-Ireland in 1955, his first game with Kerry in 1959, and seeing the first live RTE broadcast from Croke Park in 1962. As his football career ended, Weeshie became an inter-county referee and experienced the trauma of assault. Some secrets of Kerry football are revealed and some controversial moments candidly recalled, bringing the reader back to an era when packed trains carried thousands to matches.
Today, he is an award-winning sports broadcaster with Radio Kerry. Into this memoir he weaves an account of life as a psychiatric nurse in a Victorian-style mental hospital. Weeshie also includes his greatest Kerry football team, the greatest game he attended, and lists his 20 greatest living Kerry sportsmen/women. This is a compelling account of the life and career of Weeshie Fogarty and his beloved Kerry.

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