Seamus and Nicholas on the day Nicholas graduated from Queens University
Dr Nicholas McNaughton and his dad Seamus, from Loughgiel County Antrim appear tomorrow evening on the popular BBC programme The Repair Shop. Like most of the stories on the show theirs’ is a tale of triumph and disaster.
The show, which has been running on the BBC since March 2017, features a team of highly skilled craftsmen and women who do their best to restore a range of items, mostly family heirlooms, which have fallen into disrepair after being in the family for many years.
Nicholas and Seamus present expert craftsman Will Kirk with a hurling stick which Seamus’s mum bought him in 1980 when he was 18. The McNaughton family have been involved in hurling and camogie from a very early age – and Seamus’s mother Mary won an All-Ireland medal with Antrim back in 1947.
Seamus, better known locally as ‘Crow’ enjoyed playing with his brand new hurl for a few years and used it during Loughgiel Shamrocks’ famous run to the 1983 All-Ireland Club Hurling Final where they beat Leinster champions St Rynagh’s of Offaly in a replay at Casement Park, Belfast, after the two sides ended level at Croke Park, Dublin the previous week.
Straight after the triumph ‘Crow’ put the hurl away in a safe place, or so he thought, until one day he and Nicholas got into a deep discussion over whether he was more skilled having used the old stick compared to the newer ones Nicholas and his brother James were playing with in the present day.
Nicholas had to put things to the test, but as soon as he swung at the ball with his dad’s old hurl, the stick smashed into bits.
Full of guilt, Nicholas was desperate for wood expert Will to piece the shattered stick back together, especially when this hurl had been signed by all the players on the Shamrocks All Ireland winning team, with every signature now with a crack on them somewhere.
It was a difficult fix for Will, but one that leaves it fit to commemorate a proud time in the McNaughton family and in the Loughgiel community.
The programme airs tomorrow evening on BBC 1 at 8pm