Thomas Derry Walker

My dad, Thomas Derry Walker, was born 11 November 1933 in Belfast in a terraced house in Saunders Street off the Newtownards Road, in the shadow of the gantries of Harland & Woolfe, otherwise known as the Belfast Shipyard.

He was the fourth eldest in a family of 8 children, 8 boys and 1 girl. Their names are:
Hugh,(deceased) my dad, John, Bobby, Wesley,(deceased) Agnes, Matthew and William (deceased) and young William. His parents’ names were Mary and William (also deceased) and they too were Belfast ‘born and bred’.

My dad met my mum Kathleen (nee Henderson) and they were married on 19 March 1956.

He was a foreman welder in Harland & Wolffe shipyard and retired in 1993. He died on 5 July 1999 in Musgrave Park Hospital of a myocardial infarction following a knee replacement.

He was a hard worker, dependable, practical and creative with strength and steadiness of character. He was a level handed man, had a good sense of humour and kept calm in times of anxiety and stress. He was liked by so many people and this was evidenced at his funeral when hundreds of men and women whom he had known as neighbours, friends, and work colleagues visited his wake and funeral to pay their respects.

As well as being a good dad, he was a good husband and friend. If help was needed, he wouldn’t just hand out advice but was there to assist personally. When you called at the house, he was the first up to put on the kettle for a cuppa.

He loved the sun. He loved comedies on television. He used to video record programmes for his 3 grandchildren, Scott, Graeme and Jonathan. He was a Glentoran Football Club supporter. He loved his work in Belfast Shipyard. He loved making things for the house and used his welding skills to create and decorate the garden with bespoke wrought iron pots and sculptures. He had a sweet tooth and always loved Mars bars. He was a handyman in the homes of his children too and had a warm and generous heart. He didn’t procrastinate – if something needed doing, it was sorted. He liked driving and took mum and me to places around Northern Ireland for days out when he retired. He was independent and enjoyed talking about books, education, politics, and liked to ‘philosophise’ and debate about life. He always made provision for the future. He embraced technology and progress and encouraged his children to study and aim high.

He got impatient when he was out shopping and was quite a private person when it came to socialising. He didn’t like ‘foreign’ foods and kept to a blander diet.

In later years, he developed arthritis in his neck and knees. He had a quadruple coronary by-pass operation in 1993 and a replacement knee operation in 1995 and during the course of his convalescence following his second knee operation in 1999, he suffered a heart attack and died.

I’ve many warm and happy memories of my dad. If you have them too, please feel free to add them at any time to this site. For those of you who read this and didn't know my dad, I hope you can gain just a little snapshot of the man and what a lovely man and great human being he was.