They used to say Pat Heffernan was capable of selling ice-cubes in a snowstorm – such was the considerable reputation he forged in the Motor Vehicle industry…..
He was also well-known as a multi-faceted sportsman…..particularly in the Racing game, where, at various stages, he was an Owner, Trainer, Breeder and Administrator.
That’s all in the past, Pat says……..His sole focus in recent times has centred around acclimatising to his new ‘digs’……He admits it hasn’t been all beer and skittles settling into St.Catherine’s Hostel ………
Pat Heffernan settles into St. Cath’s
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The couple of tumbles he’s had this year – one of which resulted in a smashed femur – haven’t helped…….. “It was strongly suggested I have a spell in here to see how I coped…..”
He admits that he ‘escaped’ a couple of times………
“I said to myself: ‘Stuff this, I’m going home………Off I went, and stayed the night……I was firmly convinced this wasn’t the place I wanted to spend the rest of my life….”
“They coaxed me back, sat me down, and asked: ‘What’s wrong ?……Where can we improve ? ‘…”
“ I said: ‘Well you people are pretty good, but if I’m going to stay you’ve gotta improve the tucker, for a start……Since I’ve been in here I haven’t seen a sausage..…and I haven’t had a chop, either…..”
“There were a few other whinges I had…..Then, the more I thought about it the more I realised what a fantastic job they do looking after you in this joint…..”
“I thought I’d better stick around…..”
***
It was a familiar hard-luck story of the Depression Era…….His parents, Bill and Cath, hit upon hard times and lost their farm at Barooga…..They moved to Wangaratta with their six kids when Pat was four.
“Dad found a job at Bruck soon after we got here….. I used to go out helping him cut wood with an old cross-cut saw, to enable the family to pick up a few extra bob ……..He was a really community-minded person and, along with a couple of other fellahs helped kick off the Junior Footy League in the late-thirties……”
Imperials (1950 WJFL Runners-Up). Pat is far left, front row.
His dad Bill, the WJFL President, is seated next to him.
That’s where Pat started his footy career, with Imperials…..When he moved to Melbourne to start work as an apprentice wool-classer with VPC he spent a season with Diamond Creek, aged 17, under the coaching of ex-Collingwood legend Gordon Coventry.
But his dad fell ill and he returned home to help the family.
Jack, his brother, was a Rovers player, but when Pat alighted from the train at the local Station, prominent Wangaratta official Norm McGuffie was there waiting for him.
He was persuaded to pull on a Black and White guernsey……
“It was the tail-end of the famous Holten Era……Old Mac acknowledged I had ability, but thought I was a bit lazy….He was probably right……”
In his three years with the ‘Pies, Pat played as a defender in the Reserves , interspersed with an occasional senior game…..
“Peter Hughes, who was Wang’s fullback at the time, got the coaching job at Whorouly…… I said: ‘I’ll head out with you, Pete…..”
“Holten wasn’t too impressed, and assured me: ‘If any of these senior blokes get injured, you’re straight in’……I said: ‘Look, Mac, I’ve already been in the queue for a couple of seasons’…….
So, off I went to Whorouly for three enjoyable years under ‘Hughesy’, and then the classy left-footer Billy Dalziel, before a knee injury put paid to my footy career …..”
***
Pat landed a job as a Salesman, firstly at the Co-Store, then in the Hardware division of New Zealand Loan, for three years or so.
“John Brush, who’d recently helped open up a Holden Dealership on the corner of Ely and Murphy Streets, came in looking for a Ladder…..A few days later he approached me, and offered me a job….”
“He said: ‘I was pretty impressed with how you went about convincing me to buy that ladder, young fellah…..I thought you might be able to sell for us’…..”
Pat didn’t need too much prompting…….One of the perks of the job was a company car, and he got off to a flier, selling 12 vehicles in the first month.
Pat Heffernan (left), and Ian Rees (right) in the fledgling days of their selling careers.
Even though he wasn’t too mechanically-minded, he possessed a couple of other attributes – the ‘gift of the gab’ and an engaging manner…….The art of salesmanship just came naturally to him.
He’d been at Donovan-Brush Motors for five years when a rival, Alan Capp, persuaded him join his burgeoning Used Car business……….’
When ‘Cappy’ was handed the Holden franchise shortly after, Pat became the Sales Manager of Alan Capp Motors…….
***
Tennis and cricket were his summer pursuits…..
As an up-and-comer, he’d played WDCA cricket with St. Patrick’s, before transferring to the Sunday competition……He was a mainstay with Housing Commission, alongside such luminaries as the hard-hitting ‘Lofty’ Bracken, Rob McCullough and ‘keeper Frankie Hearnes.
Joining ‘Commission’ enabled him to combine cricket with playing Saturday tennis for St.Pat’s, in the local Hardcourt Association.
The St.Pat’s captain, Jack Clohesy, somewhat fortuitously, paired him in mixed doubles with another youngster, Beryl Therese O’Brien, the daughter of a Laceby dairy-farmer.
“She grew up milking cows, and had been boarding at the local Convent since she was about five…….The first thing she told me was that she wasn’t fond of the name Beryl…….She preferred Terry…….We became a handy combination, and she was later to become my wife……”
Pat was recruited back to WDCA ranks in the early-sixties by an old mate, Wangaratta captain Max Bussell, who was keen for him to stabilise the middle-order of a proud old club that had won just one flag in 10 years.
He played the innings of his life in the 1963/64 Grand Final:
“ When Heffernan was LBW to Rovers captain Jeff Wallace, for an invaluable 64, his partnership with Stan Trebilcock had been worth 136 runs…..The Hawks had flung all the pressure on the comparatively out-of-form Heffernan when he first came to the crease, but everything they tried failed……”
Wangaratta took the flag with ease, providing Pat with one of his proudest sporting moments.
He recalls one piece of banter which he exchanged with Frank Hogan, the Rovers champion and fellow car-salesman at Alan Capp Motors:
“Frankie was the Rovers’ best bat, and their chances pretty much hinged on his innings……..I also knew that he’d spent a fair bit of time trying to clinch a deal on a new car with a customer at Bungeet…..”
“When he strolled to the crease I sidled over and said to him: ‘You know that bloke out at Bungeet, Frank……I signed him up yesterday….”
“Of course I hadn’t, but you could see Frank’s complexion change…..He said: ‘You prick of a thing’…..He had a swing next over, and was bowled by our quickie Peter Morrison…..”
Wangaratta’s Daryl Schleibs, Clem Fisher, Max Bussell, Alan ‘Drag’ Harris (top).
Graeme Sheppard, Vern Smith, Pat Heffernan and Mick O’Brien (seated)
watch the action in the closing stages of the 1963/64 WDCA Grand Final.
***
After Pat had been at Alan Capp’s for just on ten years he decided to take the plunge and buy Carmody Motors in Parfitt Road. He’d forged a brilliant reputation as a Salesman, but it was another thing to learn about the complexities of operating a business…
Ian Rees later joined forces with him and, in another huge step for the flourishing operation, they set about purchasing the freehold of the premises.
Pat Heffernan (right), with long-term employees, Leo Seymour, Adrian Kiker and Clyde (Slack) McGibbon.
With Heffernan-Rees Motors now on a firm footing, he was able to indulge in what had been a lifelong interest – Horses……
He’d been involved with the Wangaratta Race Club, as a long-term committee-man, and as President, but his horizons now extended to becoming a racehorse Owner/Trainer and Breeder.
He established Wangandary Lodge Stud on 80-acres, out on the Yarrawonga Road……A large White House, jokingly referred to as ‘The Vatican’ by his mates, was its feature….
Pat travelled to Stud Sales throughout Australasia, and at one stage had 17 mares and foals on the property…..…He picked up one of them when he saw it advertised in the mid-week Sporting Globe for $10,000 ……..
“It was in foal to the renowned stallion, Century……..I let the foal grow out ‘til sales time, then decided to sell it……We accepted an offer of $50,000 for the colt, Sabre Tayeb, which went on to win six races in Sydney…….
The Heffernan’s later moved the Stud further along the road to a 94-acre property near Killawarra…..Its handsome red-brick double-storey residence was dubbed ‘The Kremlin’….
“To be quite honest, where I got my biggest kick out of racing was mucking around with horses which didn’t cost a lot of money……..I had a little truck and would float ‘em out to the Wang track, where we’d train six days a week……or take them to race meetings in the area……”
“I was able to learn from people who knew a lot more than me, and I proved a point that I could train a horse…..”
The story of one of his all-time favourites probably best illustrates the vagaries of racing:
Stain In The Rain, which he had bred from his successful mare, Tashette, broke down after running second in a Wodonga Cup in 1984…… Surgery, to remove two chips of bone in its knee followed……
Stain In The Rain greets the judge in one of his 11 race wins.
Despite the operation being successful, he was given only a 50/50 chance of racing again…… And after he’d struggled to recapture his best form, Pat accepted an offer of $1,200 from a person who wanted to try him as a Dressage horse.
Things didn’t work out……The purchaser found him unsuitable to ride, and Pat agreed to buy him back for $200.
Two years later, Stain In The Rain completed a dramatic comeback when he set a course record in winning the Towong Cup….
Alas, after celebrating profusely Pat returned home to find his promising filly Sovereign Solar, which was being treated for pleurisy, dead in the paddock…….She had only raced once…..
When Stain In The Rain retired he had 11 wins to his name.
Parisian Lover, Vapour, Masses of Stars, Going Alone, Boat Boy, Flat Chat, and River Ride were a few of the others who brought success to the Heffernan stable.
A painting of two of the Heffernan favourites, Stain In The Rain and Touching The Stars,
decorates his Dad’s old Cross-Cut Saw……….
***
Pat returned full-time to the Motor Vehicle business following Ian Rees’s decision to retire……His wife Terri had also succumbed to illness at this stage……..So he became the Principal of Heffernan Ford for several years, until he sold out in 2004….
The years have moved quickly in retirement, but the 87 year-old hasn’t lost his enthusiasm for Racing.
He’s a part-owner of a good horse, Scheelite, which won a 2 year-old Handicap at Sandown earlier this year……
“He missed the jump, slipped, then 50 metres from home the jockey gave him a crack with the whip and off he went…..”
“Then he took out the Super Vobis Plate at Flemington a fortnight later….a good race, worth $150,000……We thought he had a chance in the Caulfield Guineas recently, but he ran 11th……Looked to me like he was angling for a spell….which he’s now having…….”
“Seems like a silly question, Pat, but will you continue to be involved with Racing ?…..” I ask,
“My word……I can sit and watch ‘em all day…..When I’m going into the grave I’ll be calling out the name of a horse……”
His present favourite, Scheelite.
Pat Heffernan with Brian Johns, who rode many
To read more on the Almanac site by KB Hill click here.
This story appeared first on KB Hill’s website On Reflection and is used here with permission.
All photos sourced from KB Hill’s resources unless otherwise acknowledged.
To read more of KB Hill’s great stories on the Almanac, click HERE.
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