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The real McCabes

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

Last Sunday, a bright, crisp October day, saw them in action on home turf — Forest Hills, Queens.
At first glance it looked like a family picnic, which it was, but the McCabes and friends had more on their minds than just coffee, bagels and the thought of a cold beer later in the day.
The annual Francis M. McCabe Sr. 5-kilometer run has been raising money for good causes for 21 years. It’s organized by the Irish American Association of Queens, which is another way of saying “the McCabes.”
This year, the clan has selected Project Children to benefit from the charity run, which attracted all ages of participants to Victory Field, a running track in Forest Park.
There are 10 McCabes of an original 14 children who commemorate their father, Francis, for whom the race is named. All of them have in one way or another fulfilled the deep sense of civic pride and duty that he and his wife, Audrey, who is still alive, instilled in them — and they have passed it on to the next generation.
“Us bunch of scallywags?” replied Brian McCabe when asked about the family’s tradition of service. He is a detective sergeant in the New York Police Department.
“We do what we can,” he said. “We have a profound sense of pride in our heritage from our father. He instilled civic responsibility, civil service. It all comes together in an Irish matrix of service.
“The causes have changed through the years,” he continued, “but they’ve always been good causes, as diverse as the American Diabetic Association, or the Broad Channel volunteer firefighters department — one of their ambulances was lost in the collapse of the buildings on 9/11. So we helped defray the cost of a new one.”
What also moves the McCabes is their Irish pride.
“We started out on the Lower East Side, like a lot of Irish,” said Brian McCabe’s son Danny.
Brian’s brother Peter paused in passing: “Absolutely,” he declared. “We grew up with the church, the civic organizations, the parish and the Democratic Club.”
“We’re engrained with a sense of putting effort into civic duty,” continued Danny, who’s 24. “That’s somewhat lost in our generation.
“The Depression was massive in shaping our grandparents’ memories. My grandfather Francis, he was constantly hustling. He was a longshoreman, a bartender, a cab driver, a track star and he sang with the Tickle-toe Orchestra in Coney Island.”
The McCabe family believes their main family branch immigrated in the dark year of 1847.
The Famine, therefore, also shapes their family memories.
“This charity does great work trying to mend fences in Ireland,” Brian said of Project Children as he helped “our matriarch,” his mother, Audrey McCabe, hand out the prizes after family friend Father Brian Jordan of the FDNY had said an interdenominational prayer. Also present was City Council member Joseph Adabbo, who said he was “proud to be a big fan of the McCabe family.”
This year the medals commemorated men and women of the services who have passed away outside of the line of duty, including Michael and Eileen Corrigan, a brother and sister who died within a year of each other, of cancer in their early 30s.
“They knew they were dying,” Brian said of these two and others. “And they displayed exemplary courage.”
After the medals had been handed out, friends, family and participants started to make their way to Dan Foley’s bar on Myrtle Avenue for food and refreshments and music. It was a cause well served.
Well, not quite yet.
Brian McCabe bellowed into the microphone, indicating the stars and stripes flapping in the breeze, the Irish flag on the table and the banner that read “Irish American Association of Queens.”
“All the McCabe nephews report here for a work detail,” he said.
Project Children was founded by Cork native Dennis Mulcahy, retired NYPD bomb squad police officer. Donations can still be made to Project Children through the Irish American Association of Queens, 91-08 71st Ave., Forest Hills, NY 11375.

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