CREDIT: Kevin Kelly

CAPTION: Particpants are seen in the 2007 street hockey tournmant.

Fifteen years ago, the Bryan J. McGonagle Street Hockey Tournament was launched in memory of a 9-year-old Charlestown boy tragically struck by a car and killed on Sept. 4, 1991. The event was intended to not only allow the community to grieve for the child but also as a gesture of thanks for the enormous support they showed the family following the tragic accident.
“My brother Pat and sister-in-law Barney lost a child, but it felt like the community lost a child,” recalled Joe McGonagle, Bryan’s uncle and one of the founders of the street hockey tournament held each year in his name. “They were going to need to grieve, and they were going to need to help. Because of all the wonderful things that the community did, we were looking to say thank you as a family.”
Since hockey was such an important part of Bryan’s life, the first event held in his memory was an ice hockey tournament at the Emmons-Horrigan-O’Neil Skating Rink, which continues to this day. The first tournament was organized by Joe’s late business partner Dan McGoff and included a particularly poignant moment when a portrait of Bryan in his Charlestown uniform was unveiled while “Forever Young” by Rod Stewart played over the rink’s PA system.
“You knew it was a magical moment,” Joe said. “It was something you were never going to experience again.”
In the third or fourth year of the ice hockey tournament, Charlestown resident Anne Considine provided a shirt signed by Bruins legend Bobby Orr as an auction item. (Ann’s husband, Pat, knew Orr from working at the Boston Garden during the Bruins 1970s heyday).
In 1993, the City of Boston dedicated the street hockey facility at Ryan Playground (“the Neck”) the Bryan J. McGonagle Street Hockey Rink at a ribbon-cutting ceremony that included Mayor Thomas M. Menino. It has served of the site of the annual street hockey tournament since its inception that same year.
From the first year, the street hockey tournament was a great success, drawing approximately 300 boys and girls who participated in the 6- to 9-year-old and 10- to 12-year-old age categories and 500 spectators.
Joe said that the tournament is now “a well-oiled machine” due in large part to the same volunteers who turn out for the tournament each year, as well as the Massachusetts Port Authority (Massport), which has served as its corporate sponsor for the past 13 years.
As a token of the family’s appreciation to volunteers, the McGonagles give the Dan McGoff Charlestown Community Appreciation Award at the tournament each year to someone who goes above and beyond to make it a success.
In the past six years, a 3- to-5-yer-old age division was added to the tournament, which Joe admitted was probably his favorite demographic of players.
“For little kids, it’s their first exposure to any athletics,” Joe said. “The emphasis for them is on playing, not winning.”
Joe also encourages newcomers to come to the tournament to see the true community spirit of Charlestown firsthand.
“I would like to encourage newer people in the community to bring down their kids and experience this,” Joe said. “If someone wants to know what Charlestown is all about, it’s at events like this.”
The 15th Annual Bryan J. McGonagle Street Hockey Tournament takes place from Friday, Sept. 5, through Sunday, Sept. 7, at the Bryan J. McGonagle Street Hockey Rink at Ryan Playground (“the Neck”). The tournament is free for boys and girls, ages 3 to 12, and features hamburgers, hot dogs and face painting. For more information, contact Joe McGonagle at 617-241-8725 or via-email at c21joe@aol.com.

CAPTION: Pictured, left to right, are Harry and Rich McCarthy, proprietors of McCarthy Brothers Liquors, and Tom MacDonald, director of social ministries for St. Mary-St. Catherine of Siena Parish, with the organ at St. Catherine of Siena Church in the background.

Even though approximately 20 years have passed since the organ at St. Catherine of Siena Church was last played, it still holds a special place in the hearts of Rich and Harry McCarthy, the proprietors of McCarthy Brothers Liquors.
“I remember it being played as a kid by [lifelong St, Catherine’s parishioner} Anna May Crowley,” Harry said. “You felt like you were in a cathedral, not a church.”
The organ has an even greater significance for the brothers, since their grandfathers’ uncles John and Jim McCarthy bought the organ for the church. After emigrating to the U.S. from County Cork, Ireland, in 1888, John and Jim established McCarthy Brothers Liquors on the Moulton Street at the site where it still stands today. The original McCarthy brothers later joined the congregation at St. Catherine’s and became friendly with the acting pastor. As a gesture of good will, John and Jim bought an organ for the church crafted by the famed German organ builder said to have crafted the instrument at the Holy Cross Cathedral in Boston, Moritz Baugmarten Jr.
According to Leonardo Ciampa, the director of music and liturgy for St. Mary-St. Catherine of Siena Parish, Baugmarten originally built the organ at St. Catherine’s for the Universalist Church in Roxbury in 1868. When St. Catherine of Siena Church was under construction in 1893, the organ was transported to Charlestown and Baugmarten personally re-voiced it to fit the acoustics of the new church. Today, the organ at St. Catherine’s is widely regarded as Baugmarten’s greatest achievement and the only intact instrument he made still known to be in existence.
“There is no question that the Baumgarten organ in St. Catherine's is one of the most historically significant pipe organs in the country,” Ciampa said.
Sadly, though, the celebrated organ will likely be leaving Charlestown soon, due in part to the high cost of restoring the instrument.
Tom MacDonald, director of social ministries for St. Mary-St. Catherine of Siena Parish, said with Rich and Harry McCarthy’s approval, the parish hopes to find a Catholic church where the organ will once again be played. “If not, we’re hoping we can find a buyer who can restore it and give it a new home,” MacDonald added.
To achieve this goal, McCarthy said Fr. James Ronan, pastor of St. Mary-St. Catherine of Siena Parish, recently contacted an organ-clearing house.
Harry McCarthy, meanwhile, said he and his brother’s greatest wish is that somewhere parishioners will again be able to enjoy the organ and its music.
“We’d love to hear the beautiful sound of the organ in a Catholic church in the Archdiocese in the future,” Harry said. “It would always remind us of St. Catherine’s and Anna Marie Crowley.”

Lifelong Charlestown resident Mary Killoran, who died Aug. 1 at age 75, will be best remembered as a good wife, a good mother and a good friend.
Last week, I met Mary’s family in the Tremont Street house that she called home since she was 6 and where she would go on to raise eight children with her husband, Wallace. In the mid ‘50s, Wallace, a native of New Brunswick, Canada, met Mary (Barry) at a mutual friend’s house on High Street, and the couple was married at St. Mary’s Church on Oct. 26, 1957, following a brief courtship.
Since Mary was a devout Catholic and lifelong St. Mary’s parishioner, it was only fitting that her wedding — and later her funeral — would take place at that church, her daughter Carmel said.
Eight years after Kathryn, the eldest Killoran child, was born in 1958 and one day after the couple’s first set of twins, Carmel and Daniel, were born in 1966, the family bought a cottage in Wareham, Mass. Each summer, the family would load up the family’s station wagon and head to Cape Cod for the summer.
“They’re very family-oriented people, and that’s what means the most,” said Kevin of his parents. “Everything centered around the family. They never went out to eat or on vacation without us.”
When Mary’s youngest children and second set of twins, Michael and Kevin, entered school in 1976, she began her career as a teacher’s aide at the Harvard-Kent School. She would later work at the Warren-Prescott School and Charlestown High. At the high school, she worked with special-needs students until the mid ‘90s — a cause that was very close to her.
“She had a big heart,” Kevin said. “She was always rooting for the underdog.”
From 1996 to 2006, Mary worked as the fitness center receptionist at the Constitution Inn in the Navy Yard (now called the Constitution Inn YMCA).
“She developed close relationships with everyone she worked with,” Michael said, “I constantly had people stopping me to ask when she was coming back to work.”
Following her retirement, Carmel said her parents joined the Castle Island Association, a South Boston seniors organization, and made trips to Florida with other group members nearly every winter. Mary and Wallace also traveled to Ireland, England, Bermuda and Las Vegas in recent years.
Michael said her mother also enjoyed a close relationship with her grandchildren. “She loved her grandkids and spending time with them,” he said.
At her funeral, Carmel said she was amazed by how many family friends told her that they would always walk away from a conversation with Mary smiling.
Kevin added, “When I thanked my mother’s close friend Ann Nagle for always being there for her, she replied that it was easy to be her friend.”
And a friend is what Mary was to both her family and all those in the community who had the pleasure of knowing her.

CAPTION: The Civil War statue at the Training Field.

The Charlestown Preservation Society has announced that conservation of the Civil War statue in the Charlestown Training Field was completed last week. The statue will be rededicated in a special ceremony at the Training Field on Saturday, Sept. 20, at 11 a.m. Refreshments will follow at the American Legion Hall, with more details to be announced soon
The Training Field statue, which honors veterans of the Civil War, was created in 1872 by Martin Millmore, a leading Victorian-era sculptor. As scaffolding was removed, details of the sculpture, once grimy and hidden in weeds, were revealed.
“The level of detail Millmore was able to achieve in granite was remarkable,” said Ivan Myjer of Building and Monument Conservation who was the project’s conservator, pointing to the visible veins in the hands of the soldier and the border of stars lining Victory’s robes.
“The statue that so many visitors stop to photograph is no longer marred by years of neglect,” said Marilyn Darling, Charlestown Preservation Society board member and campaign chair. The conservation effort was made possible through grants from the George B. Henderson Foundation, the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority Community Partnership Fund, the City of Boston’s Small Changes program and the Charlestown Preservation Society, along with the generous donations of many members of the Charlestown Community.
Conservation efforts by Myjer, in partnership with the Joseph Gnazzo Company, revealed that the mortar that had originally held the three main figures in this remarkable statue was completely disintegrated. “The only thing holding them in place was slate shims underneath,” said Myjer.
A thorough cleaning revealed that years of incorrect maintenance had permanently marred the surfaces of the granite base through inappropriately strong acid washes and power sprays.
As a condition of the Henderson Foundation grant, CPS hired a professional arborist, Tree Specialists of Holliston, Mass., to trim the trees surrounding the statue. Removal of nearby limbs will increase the amount of light reaching the statue and discourage future biological growth.
As part of the monies raised for the conservation work, CPS will establish an endowment for the Training Field Statue through the City’s Adopt-a-Statue fund. The fund will ensure that maintenance occurs as needed and that it is of a quality that will minimize the kind of damage the statue has been subjected to in the past.
For more information on the Training Field statue rededication-ceremony, contact Marilyn Darling at 617-242-7214.
The CPS looks forward to showcasing the newly conserved statue to Charlestown residents and many other visitors as one of the stops on the Charlestown Historic House Tour on Saturday, Sept. 27. Please visit www.charlestownpreservation.org for details and to purchase tickets.

PHOTO 1 CAPTION: Back (left to right): Estfania Giraldo, Tanya Queen, Cynthia Lopez, Veronica Robles and Janise Queen. Front: Alondra Tirado.

PHOTO 2 CAPTION: Participants in the DANCE CAMERA ACTION! program at the Boys & Girls Club.

In September, local youth can learn the mariachi, salsa and other Latin dance styles when DANCE CAMERA ACTION! returns to the Charlestown Boys & Girls Club.
The program, which is about to enter its fourth year, is taught by Mexican television personality and recording artist Veronica Robles and funded by a grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council YouthReach initiative. It will be divided into eight workshops, and participating 10- to 19-year-old girls will learn dance techniques from a particular Latin American country while dressed in costumes from the region. The children will also learn about the history and customs of each region as part of each workshop. Robles added that three workshops would feature guest dance instructors who will also serve as mentors to the participating teens and one workshop would be a two-week “salsa special.”
In June, the program will culminate in a dance recital at the Boys & Girls Club, where participants will perform two songs from each workshop.
Robles said some teens who were initially intimidated by dance learned to love it as the program progresses.
“Some teens were al little shy in the beginning, but once they get into it, they really start to come out of their shells,” Robles said.
Alondra Tirado, age 12, joined the program during its first year and said she favors Peruvian dance. She hopes one day to visit the Latin American countries that the program has introduced to her.
“I always wanted to see other places and learn about their cultures,” Tirado said.
Janice Queen, 14, got involved with the program two years ago when she began assisting Robles in designing costumes. Although Queen had never danced before, Robles soon recruited her for the program.
And Queen also hopes to follow in Robles footsteps one day.
“I would like to teach other kids dance,” Queen said.
Participants from the DANCE CAMERA ACTION! Program will perform on Labor Day, Monday, Sept. 1, at the 24th Annual Bread and Roses Festival on the Lawrence Common in Lawrence, Mass. For more information, contact Jim Beauchesne at Lawrence Heritage Park at 978-794-1655 or via e-mail: at jim.beauchesne@state.ma.us or breadandroses99@hotmail.com.
To learn more about DANCE CAMERA ACTION!, contact Veronica Robles at the Charlestown Boys & Girls Club at 617-242-1775 ext. 251.