Making the acquaintance of Coleman O hIarnain, or "Colie Hernon", as he was known to thousands of visitors to the Aran Islands, made it easy to see how the myth arose that the Irish are all descended from High Kings. A man of truly kingly mien and noble bearing, his photograph has appeared in practically every album, magazine article, compiled about Inis Mor over the last half century.
Winning his friendship and learning the range and depth of his character and intelligence, brought home to one the effects of the haemorrhage of emigration on Ireland generally and on the western seaboard in particular.
Had Colie chosen the larger canvas he could easily have become a Governor, Senator or Tycoon. As it was, on the smaller scale, he deployed his skills for the benefit of his island community in a manner that won him renown in Gaeltachts from Dingle to Donegal. Using a diplomatic talent rare amongst the Irish, he wielded a benign and constructive hand through a myriad of organisations Comhdhail na nOilean, Comharchumann Arainn, Coiste Forbatha Arainn, and many other community bodies, some of them long since forgotten. But, in the dusty files of the many government offices which Colie hoped might help his beloved island, testimony to his unsung, and unpaid efforts remains in the thousands of letters he wrote, and in the minutes of the meetings he attended.
Aer Arainn would scarcely exist without him, nor would an air sea rescue service be stationed at Shannon. Many other essential services, be they pier improvements, electricity supplies, the life boat, or the water system, all owe something to Colie's tireless lobbying.
An expert seaman, who learned his craft in currachs, he was a heroic coxswain of the Aran lifeboat, and subsequently its secretary. In an era, in which literally thousands of people land daily on the island, during the high season, few now remember the days when Colie and John Mullen were pioneering the link with the Connemara mainland, at Rosseveal in the tiny Queen of Aran.
Indeed, as in the universal way of such failures to recognise a prophet too few remembered his many good works, to elect him to Udara's na Gaeltachta when he ran as a Fianna Fail candidate. But he never showed the slightest bitterness, preferring instead to concentrate on the fact that that year he won a People of the Year Award.
In Coleman O hIarnain his wife Delia and their children, Michael, Catherine, Bartley, Maire and Martina had a husband and father to be proud of. Ar dheis De go raibh a anam.