NYAC Honors 9/11 Casualty And Reigning Club Champion Derek Sword By Rob Dinerman
Dateline September 20th, 2011 --- This past Saturday, September 17th, the friends, family and club-mates gathered at the New York Athletic Club to celebrate the life of Derek W. Sword, who was killed at age 29 in the September 11th terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, where he worked on the 89th floor on the south tower at Keefe Bruyette & Woods. The Scottish-born Sword, who was made an Athletic Member of the club due to his prowess at rugby, had won the NYAC club squash championship the previous spring and was planning to both marry and run the New York City marathon in the weeks leading up to his 30th birthday on November 30th. He and Maureen had just returned from a vacation in Inverness, Scotland, where they had celebrated their recent engagement at one of the castles there, an event that was subsequently described by one of Sword’s many friends, as “magical.”
In early January 2002, Sword’s memory was honored as part of the first World Squash Day, a team from New York traveled to London to play a British team at the famous Lambs Club, which also hosted an eight-man pro tournament featuring John White, Alister Walker, Paul Price, Peter Marshall and Sword’s compatriot (and good friend) Peter Nicol, and in subsequent years the Derek Sword Trophy has been competed for between teams from New York and the UK. NYAC longtime head pro Pat Canavan has always played a major organizational role in this annual event, which was held in Edinborough (just a short drive from Sword’s home town of Bundee) in 2004 and 2009 and has been hosted by the NYAC all of the other years. Sword’s parents, Dave and Irene, and his then-fiancee Maureen Sullivan (who married three years ago), have strongly supported the event every year, and at their request the event now takes place on the first Saturday after 9/11.
This past weekend the New York team won eight of the 13 singles matches and all three doubles matches to go 11-5 overall.
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