By Ronan McSherry

JOHN Joe O’Hagan, one of the great trailblazers and legendary figures in Tyrone GAA, passed away on Tuesday night.

Mr O’Hagan died peacefully in the company of his family.

He won All Ireland minor medals in 1947 and 1948 on the first Tyrone teams to bring All Ireland glory to the Red Hand county. The win in 1947 remains part of Gaelic football folklore when supporters ran onto Croke Park to hail the All Ireland conquering team after they made a magnificent comeback to beat Mayo. A year later they took the Thomas Markham Cup to Tyrone again with a win against Dublin. On that Dublin team was the great Dessie Ferguson who also sadly passed away on Tuesday night.

Mr O’Hagan went on to have a tremendous senior career with the county and his club Clonoe O’Rahillys. In 1956 he lined out on the half back line on the first Tyrone senior team to win an Ulster championship beating Cavan in the final. In the All Ireland semi-final they were narowly beaten by the great Galway team, that included Frank Stockwell and Sean Purcell, who went on to win the final. A year later (1957) he won his second Ulster senior medal when Tyrone defeated Cavan in the final.

A tough defender, he won five O’Neill Cup medals with Clonoe that included the famous three-in-a-row in 1958, ’59 and ’60 as well as in 1964 and 1965.

As a manager too, he made his mark, most notably in 1970 when he guided Eglish to their first, and to date their only senior county championship victory.

Sean McCabe of the Clonoe GAA club said, “John Joe was one of the greats of Tyrone football. He was a great servant with this club and one of five men to win five O’Neill Cup medals with Clonoe. That record speaks for itself and he gave it all for Tyrone at all levels.

“Everyone here is deeply saddened at John Joe’s passing and we extend our sincere condolences to his family”.

A very popular figure in the Coalisland, Clonoe and wider area, Mr O’Hagan for years ran a bread delivery service before his retirement.

He was the father of former Tyrone and Coalisland Fianna star Damian O’Hagan. On Sunday his grandson Cormac scored the winning point for Coalisland in the semi-final of the O’Neill Cup against Errigal Ciaran. O’Hagan, who has has had a fantastic championship campaign to date, hitting 15 points in three games, told Gaelic Life that he was thinking of his grandfather as he went up to take the free and asking him to help guide the ball over the crossbar.

Cormac said: “I was thinking of getting a good connection, a good strike on it. I’d been hitting them well all day and throughout the campaign, and i was thinking about my granda and i was just really hoping he would guide it over the bar.”

On going to press Funeral arrangements have not been announced.

Mr O’Hagan is surived by his wife Maureen, sons Damian, Sean, Martin, Cathal, Kevin, Patricia and Siobhan, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and a wide family circle.