Fond tributes paid to ‘gentleman' Denis

BY JACKIE KEOGH

FOR more than 34 years, Denis Crowley was a smiling, benevolent presence behind the counter at Crowley’s Newsagents in Townshend Street in Skibbereen.

Since his passing on Monday, January 15th, it is not just his family who have been left grieving, but also people right down through the generations who fondly remember dealing with him on a daily basis.

Denis’s eldest son, Donnchadh, said people of all ages naturally gravitated to his father because ‘they found it easy to talk to him.’

Denis was originally a fisherman but, at the age of 33, he had a heart attack and changed career; and, in opening the shop in 1977, ‘found his true calling.’

Donnchadh said Denis regularly ‘worked huge hours – 60 or 70 a week – but he was never bothered by it because he loved people and having fun with them.’ 

When people remember Denis, it will be as a person who was a bit of a blackguard – a man who seemed to have a permanent twinkle in his eye.

But the word most commonly used this week by those expressing their condolences was ‘gentleman’.