News

By Emily J. Minor

    SOUTH PALM BEACH — Henry Sullivan “Harry” Cahill, a corporate accountant who retired young and moved to Florida so he could golf every day, died May 4 at home with his wife of 67 years. Mr. Cahill was 98.
“He was a good man,” said Eleanor Cahill, who married Mr. Cahill in 1946. Their first date was a New York Giants baseball game at the Polo Grounds. “I thought he was a big spender,” she said. “And it was a 15-inning game. I’ll never forget that.”
    Mrs. Cahill, who is 90, said they met while working at the Brooklyn Savings Bank in New York.
    Throughout his life, Mr. Cahill and his wife shared a love for armchair sports, but in his older years Mr. Cahill especially loved watching sports on television — golf, tennis, baseball, football.
“He didn’t like hockey,” she said.
    He was also an avid reader.
    Born in Yonkers, N.Y., on Nov. 14, 1914, Mr. Cahill made a career as an accountant for a home insurance company, serving briefly in the U.S. Army in financial services. The insurance company had a policy of mandatory retirement at age 62. That’s when the couple moved to Florida so that Mr. Cahill could golf year-round. In his retirement years, he continued his accounting, occasionally doing the books for some influential Floridians, said his wife.
    Mrs. Cahill said that while they loved their life in Florida, they always considered themselves New Yorkers.
    Still, her husband loved his frequent golf outings at The Links of Boynton Beach — a habit he kept up until about seven years ago, she said.
Recently, he developed pneumonia and then heart complications. Mr. Cahill went to Hospice, but came home for the last few weeks of his life, said his wife.
    “He had a very good life,” she said. “And that’s the most important thing.”
    Mr. Cahill is also survived by two children and their families: Thomas Cahill, of Commack, N.Y., and a daughter, Nancee Cahill-Barney, of Massapequa, N.Y. Five grandchildren and four great-grandchildren also survive him.
Services were in May at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Lantana, where the couple were longtime members.