John Wilson (Irish politician)

John Patrick Wilson, known as Big Johnny, was an Irish Fianna Fáil politician and Gaelic footballer, born on 8 July 1923 at Callanagh, Kilcogy, County Cavan, and died on 9 July 2007 in Beaumont, Dublin. As a footballer he played for the Cavan county team and won two All-Ireland medals, one of them in 1947 at the Polo Grounds in New York. He left Maynooth College after four years as a seminarian, took a Master of Arts in Classics, taught at St Eunan's College in Letterkenny, where he trained a team that reached the 1961 MacRory Cup final, and served as president of the Association of Secondary Teachers, Ireland. Elected to Dáil Éireann in 1973, he was Minister for Education from 1977 to 1981 and Tánaiste from 1990 to 1993, and later served as Commissioner of the Independent Commission for the Location of Victims' Remains.