Danny Gorman, 85, has lived in the Maybrook area of Derry for most of his life with his wife Gretta, who sadly passed away in 1994 after a long battle with cancer.
He worked as an engineer, starting out building steamed loco motives, then did merchant navy marine work, built tankers, worked with Burns and Laird and the Lough Swilly Bus and Railway Company before ending up in DuPont.
He said: “The marine work, that was oil tankers and stuff like that, it took me on northern trips to places like Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and the Arctic Circle up around Russia, and then a wee bit of Mediterranean work as well.
“It was in the 50’s when they were just coming out of the Second World War that I was based in the Scandinavian countries, oil was brought from the Persian Gulf to oil refineries in England and we distributed it around those countries then.
“It was interesting work and I enjoyed it, I always liked engineering, heavy diesel engines from steam loco motives and so on. In DuPont I ended up working with pumps, compressors, pipe work and that sort of thing, I worked there for 22 years and took early retirement from at the age of 59.”
Danny’s first experience with terminal illness came in 1982 when as he put it ‘cancer came knocking at our door very aggressively.’
Gretta wasn’t keeping well and went to Belfast to have heart x-rays. Danny got a phone call from the doctor one morning telling him to take his wife straight to Altnagelvin where that night she underwent the first of two mastectomies.
After a long battle with cancer, Gretta sadly passed away in 1994; and it was this, the most tragic of experiences in Danny’s life that would influence his decision to volunteer with the hospice.
His work at Foyle Hospice began around this time when members of the DuPont retiree club were asked to volunteer in order to clear an area of land which had been left in disarray following the construction of the first building on the site.
Till that point he knew nothing about the hospice, but having seen their facilities he vowed to do the best he could to help with their efforts.
He wholeheartedly believes in the care they provide and wanted anyone suffering from cancer or other terminal illnesses to avail of the highest standard of care, something his loving wife Gretta unfortunately wasn’t afforded as an option.
As part of DuPont’s inter-community work the aim was to create the first garden at the hospice.
The entire area was untouched other than an alcove with seating which was constructed nearby in memory of the first person who died at the hospice.
DuPont along with the help of planners cleared and levelled the site, with the plan being to ‘build stone walls, shrub it, and add a water feature’.
Danny explained: “A lorry landed with 20 tonne of stone from a quarry out beyond Altnagelvin, they came in massive chunks.
“I was asked did I want to build a stone wall, I wouldn’t have known what a stone wall was, so I went out in the car looking at stone walls, to see the layout of them etc.
“The next challenge was, how on earth would we break these stones up, so I decided to go back out to the quarry and the man showed us how to break the stones up with a pick.
“Every stone you see here, I’ve laid it, they were all broken, fitted and placed. With the engineering background, as long as you’re able to measure accurately and follow drawings it was fine.
“This was two years work, from nine in the morning to dinner time. Eight to ten people came down at first, and over the time with individual circumstances and a couple of people dying, it dwindled down to about four.
“We got the walls and everything sorted, then we added the waterfall and shrubs over time.”
The garden was entered into a competition by the hospice, and it won 1st prize for overall gardens in hospices in Northern Ireland.
It was then entered in a UK competition, where Danny and two others were taken to London and returned home having won the overall prize for a hospice garden in the UK.
Originally known as the Garden of Tranquillity, it has since been renamed the Foyle Garden.
Like every other area of the garden it has been finished to the highest standard and has been beautifully maintained by volunteers.
The trophy cabinet has continued to fill over time, most recently adding a trophy for best kept gardens at a Northern Ireland hospice.
Over the years numerous gardens have been created around the vast hospice site, many are dedicated to the memory of people who have been cared for and died there.
Pathways have been created, thanks to loads of cement donated by local building contractors, making the entire site accessible by wheelchair, allowing patients to enjoy the vast gardens, which is of course the main objective.
As we walk around the gardens Danny points out significant features such as the views over fields containing horses that stretch towards the Foyle Bridge and a gazebo built in memory of hospice visionary Dr. Tom McGinley’s late wife.
One of the latest projects was the renovation of the main building with the addition of wooden porches adjoined to patient’s rooms allowing for panoramic views of the Foyle.
Danny has been at the heart of a lot of the work which has seen hospice grounds transformed.
He has been a constant presence at the hospice since his first day volunteering turning up daily at 9am and staying till 1.30pm or thereabouts; nowadays he has restricted himself to light maintenance work as the gardening can be quite taxing.
Volunteering, he believes, has been beneficial to his health, it has kept him physically and mentally active; comradery between staff plays a significant part, and he couldn’t praise them highly enough.
Danny concluded by encouraging others to volunteer, he said: “it’s fulfilling, giving back by helping in whatever way you can, you go home feeling refreshed like you’ve given something back to the community.
“Whenever I see the advances that have been made in terms of cancer treatment and the work that’s being done down here, it feels good to be part of that.”
Photo shows Danny with fellow Foyle Hospice volunteers, from left Micky Gerard O'Kane, Fred Stuart, Eric Watson and Charlie McCallion. (Photo - Tom Heaney, nwpresspics)
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