Tributes have been paid to Galway teacher, photographer and open water swimmer Jane Hogan who died recently at the age of 77.

As The Sunday Independent reports, Hogan, who was one of the Kenny Bookshop family, was a competitive swimmer from an early age.

Her late father Des was first chairman of what was then the Irish Water Safety, after it was set up by the late minister and Galway West TD Bobby Molloy.

As her brother Tom Kenny said at her funeral, “Jane was an avid sea swimmer her whole life, always encouraging others to spend time in the sea which she considered the best medicine for all ills”.

“She was one of the regulars down in Blackrock where she swam daily most of the year round. She referred to her friends there as “The Blackrock Clinic”.

She was a keen photographer and an inspiring teacher at Salerno Secondary School.

Paddy McNamara, a fellow swimmer at Blackrock, Salthill, remembered how she would pull out the camera, and it was ‘stand there, pull in together’ as she got her snap, he said.

He said Hogan was very accomplished, competing in many open water events in Galway and beyond.

Her daily swims took a realistic tack as she would take a break once sea temperatures dropped below 10C, he said.

“Jane would say to me that she would return when we had ‘a week of tens’, as in 10C,” McNamara said.

In a tribute, Galway Swimming Club said that her “dedication to swimming was not merely a personal pursuit but a tradition passed down through the generations”.

“Jane’s influence extended beyond her own accomplishments, as her children and grandchildren continued the family’s tradition, carrying forward the torch of her passion for swimming,”it said.

Read The Sunday Independent here