Philip J. McSweeney
Philip John McSweeney, a commercial fisherman who served as a spokesman for Long Island fishermen’s interests in Washington, D.C., and twice ran for East Hampton Town office, died on May 29 at his home in Corinth, Me. He was 75 and had been diagnosed with cancer a year ago.
Mr. McSweeney, who lived in Springs, kept a 40-foot dragger in Montauk for many years in the 1970s and ’80s. He served as an adviser to the Mid-Atlantic Fisheries Council and was on the board of the Long Island Fishing Association and the Eastern Long Island Trawlers Corporation. For the Trawlers Corporation, he negotiated a million-dollar contract to supply butterfish and squid to large offshore Japanese fish processors.
“Dealing with the Japanese was not nearly as difficult as fighting the Democrats in Town Hall and in Congress,” according to his campaign literature for an unsuccessful 1985 bid for East Hampton Town councilman.
His efforts to protect the interests of commercial fishermen — in particular a fight against the upzoning of commercial fishing docks in Montauk in the mid-’80s — spurred his involvement in local politics. He ran for councilman on the Republican and Conservative tickets in 1985 and for town supervisor on the Independence Party ticket in 1999.
Mr. McSweeney was born in Brooklyn on Jan. 13, 1941, to Bernard McSweeney and the former Mary Murphy. He graduated from Freeport High School, then attended night classes at Adelphi College while working as a warehouse boy in a Patchogue clothing factory. The owner of the plant “took a liking to me and asked if I wanted to go to F.I.T. in New York and he would pay my tuition, and I said sure,” Mr. McSweeney told The Star in 1985. He attended the Fashion Institute of Technology for three years, studying statistics, math, and other industry-related subjects, and then took a job at the Fairfield Nobel Corporation, where he became vice president of manufacturing.
He and his wife, Isabel, were married on June 22, 1969, and settled in Patchogue.
“The sea was his calling, though, and instead of continuing his start in the garment industry, he preferred the deck of a dragger,” his family wrote.
An outdoorsman, he “loved the sea and working with his hands,” they said, and also enjoyed hunting and fishing. After commuting from Patchogue to Montauk for a few years, the family moved to Springs.
When he left fishing in the late ’80s, Mr. McSweeney worked as a general contractor on the South Fork. He and his wife retired to their cabin in Maine about nine years ago.
He was “an independent, kind, generous spirit who deeply loved his family and friends,” his family wrote, and he “especially loved spending time with his grandchildren,” David and Sam Coren and Patrick and Delaney Keane, and with Nick and Kaylee Harvey and Katie Roberts of Corinth, who were said to be like grandchildren to him.
He is survived by his wife of 47 years, who lives in Corinth, and his daughters, Susan Coren of Ashburn, Va., and Bridget Keane of Narragansett, R.I.
A service will be held today at 1 p.m. at the Brookings-Smith funeral home in Bangor, Me., the Rev. Grace Bartlett of the First Congregational Church of Brewer officiating.
Contributions have been suggested to the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, P.O. Box 849168, Boston 02284, or online at dana-farber.org/gift.