We are saddened to report the death of one of the great characters of Irish bridge, John Comyn, who died yesterday following an illness.
At his peak, John was a very good player – a multiple national champion and capped for Ireland at senior level in several European championships and at the Bridge Olympiad. But it was as a bridge correspondent and promoter that he made perhaps his greatest mark on the game. John was a journalist by trade, specialising in the world of sports, particularly horse racing. But he also contributed a bridge column to the papers of the Independent Group for more than fifty years, not quite a world record, but not far off it. John’s style could be acerbic, and some of his columns generated quite a bit of debate, but they were for many bridge players the first section of the paper to which the reader turned – the hallmark of a talented journalist. He could be scathing in some of his criticisms, and reserved particular scorn for the tendency in the modern game to play in humdrum 3NT games with a minor slam available. “The club suit has been completely abandoned,” he would thunder, “and the diamond suit is not far behind.”
John also had a keen sense of the potential to promote bridge, and was always full of ideas. Perhaps his most notable achievement in this regard was the development of the Rothmans Kings roadshow, in which a team of top players was sponsored by the tobacco firm to travel the length and breadth of Ireland taking on a variety of local challengers in teams games, which generated great interest from all the locals, who turned out to watch their own heroes take on the national stars. The Kings ran from 1978 to 1982, so John was well ahead of his time in his thinking. Stories and reminiscences from the Rothmans days make up a good part of the humorous book John penned a few years back – “Doubled Up: Laughing at the game of bridge“.
We send our condolences to John’s wife Anne, their children Geraldine, Robert, and Elaine, and to all his extended family and friends. May he rest in peace. Funeral arrangements