Patrick Corrigan, AM - A 'Blue Ribbon' 18ft skiff sponsorship partner

by Frank Quealey 20 May 10:07 BST

Mr. Patrick Corrigan, AM is an Australian businessman, focused mainly in the freight industry, an art collector, jazz enthusiast and philanthropist, who was awarded the Member of the Order of Australia medal in the 2000 Queen's Birthday Honours List.

Fortunately for the 18 footers class and the Australian 18 Footers League, Patrick's love of our sport also benefited Sydney 18ft Skiff Racing, spanning a period of thirty years. His brilliant business career between 1970 and 2000 resulting in a line of 18ft skiffs representing the companies he was working for along the way.

The partnership between Patrick Corrigan and the Australian 18 Footers League was unique and each party was a winner.

A rewarding result for his efforts was when Robert Brown's Southern Cross shared a controversial 1988 championship victory with Trevor Barnabas' Chesty Bond and in 1996 when Stephen Quigley's AEI-Pace Express finally gave Patrick the individual championship victory he wanted so much.

Patrick was born at Hangkow (now Hankou) in central China, and with his mother was granted a travel permit and left mainland China in December 1941 then spent four years in the Stanley Internment Camp during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong. He says, "the movie 'Empire of the Sun' almost duplicates my life in the camp."

In 1945, they were liberated by Australian Navy minesweeper personnel.

He left school in 1948 at the age of fifteen to work for a Unilever subsidiary where he was employed as a junior clerk in a freight subdivision, and reflected in a 2012 interview that he's "been stuck with it ever since".

In 1955 Corrigan became GM of a Sydney customs brokering firm and remained with the company until 1967 when he established his own freight forwarding and clearance company, Corrigan's Customs Agency Pty Ltd for a $2 registration fee and a $1,000 bank loan.

In the early years, Corrigan's freight forwarding and clearance companies specialised in shipping fashion, textiles and auxiliary machinery for clients such as Kolotex, Hilton and Mark Foys. (the same company formed by Mark Foy, the man who created the 18 footers class back in the 1890s)

In 1970 he successfully imported the largest ever painting to Australia (American Dream, an 80'x18' work by Brett Whiteley weighing 2.5 tons, for exhibition at Bonython Gallery. The same year he also co-founded the firm Express Livestock Pty Ltd, which specialised exclusively in animal cargo.

At the same time, he began his involvement with the 18 footers and his future working life until the year 2000 was virtually a carbon copy of his various sponsorship of 18ft skiffs for some of the sport's greatest competitors.

His initial involvement came in the 1969-70 season when he sponsored Vic Robinson, in Corrigans Express, at the 1970 JJ Giltinan world championship, which was a time when fleet numbers, and development to maintain the high standards in the 18s, was heavily dependent on the sponsorship dollars from corporations and individuals.

It was also just five years since Travelodge Hotels became the first big sponsorship in the class.

His support continued throughout the 1970s with another skiff for Vic Robinson, and his program became a two-boat sponsorship program when he added another boat, named Express Livestock, for a young up-and-coming team.

Corrigans Express was sold to the British conglomerate Mitchell Cotts & Co Ltd in 1972 and Patrick Corrigan remained as chairman until 1983.

Unsurprisingly, Patrick Corrigan reacted with sponsorship of a brand new skiff named Mitchell Cotts, which was skippered by 18 footer legend John 'Woody' Winning during the 1981-82, 1982-83 and 1983-84 seasons.

'Woody' recalls, "Pat was a great sponsor. He was also great for the League club and the 18 footer class for such a long period."

Patrick was recruited to establish the local arm of Swiss company Panalpina in 1983, which specialised in forwarding and logistics services and, in 1987 Panalpina became the number one IATA accredited agent in NSW.

As costs rose dramatically in the 18 footer class during the 1980s, Patrick was obviously pressed to continue his sponsorship at a high level but showed his business skill when he came up with a multi-sponsor combination of individual corporations in his quest to win a world championship.

His boat raced as Southern Cross, with Robert Brown as skipper, and had the logos of the individual sponsors featured on the working sails and spinnakers.

A complicated rule had been introduced by the League for the 1987-88 Season, which related to what was declared a new or previously used sail. The intent was to try and restrict escalating costs in the sport as fleets were dwindling. Unfortunately, the rules created confusion and a controversial protest was lodged which led to a decision declaring Southern Cross and Chesty Bond joint champions.

Despite Patrick's disappointment with the 'shared' victory, he continued his sponsorship support of young skippers like David Witt and Anthony Young during the early 1990s, in an attempt to win the championship outright.

In 1988, he founded a new company, Pace Express, and became its executive chairman. In its first year the company achieved the top ranking for export freight forwarding by the IATA and in 1989 won the Governor of Victoria Export Award for significant achievement by a new exporter. It was also named the Exporter of the Year for Transport and Associated Services in the Export Council of Australia's Premier's NSW Export Awards. It was the first time any company had won both major awards in one year and the first time a freight forwarder had won either.

Again, Patrick chose to race his skiffs, between 1990-91 and 1994-95 seasons, as Pace Express.

In 1993 Pace Express was acknowledged by the IATA as being the first Australian agent to receive a settlement of more than $2 million for freight forwarding billing in a single month then in 1994 Pace Express was acquired by the American company Air Express International and Patrick was appointed as director.

The Australian 18 Footers League had just made the greatest change in the 100-year-old class, by introducing a single hull design, and Patrick was not going to miss out on the opportunity to become a part of the massive change. He named his new skiff AEI-Pace Express and Stephen Quigley took on the position as skipper for the 1995-96 season.

Quigley and his team 'delivered the goods' when they took out the first JJ Giltinan World 18ft skiff championship victory for one of the new-style 18s, and gave Patrick Corrigan the outright world championship he deserved.

Patrick remembers his excitement at finally achieving his 'outright' victory and becoming the first world championship-winning sponsor of the new-style 18 footer.

Stephen Quigley recalls. "We had a fabulous relationship with Pat that extended beyond the 18 footers. He was a true gentleman, a really interesting guy and an accomplished international businessman. A visit to his office or home was an incredible insight into the world of modern art."

"We'd had a great season winning all the major regattas in the lead up to the JJs and being only our second year in the 18s, we were happy to be competitive at the top end of the fleet."

"It was a really tight regatta with Trevor Barnabas in the Omega Smeg-2UE and Jack Young sailing a new Nokia, which was launched a few weeks prior to the regatta, but when the win was confirmed Craig Ferris, Riss Cleary and I were thrilled to get there in the end.

It was Pat's first outright JJs win after many years of sponsoring and I recall him being so anxious before the last race, he couldn't come down and watch and he was over the moon when we called him with the result."

Patrick Corigan's final 18ft skiff was Emery Worldwide, which was skippered by USA's world champion Howie Hamlin at the JJ Giltinan World championship in 1999, and by twice gold medal Olympian Malcolm Page at the 2000 regatta.

The Australian 18 Footers League acknowledged Patrick Corrigan's 30 years sponsorship and gave him a Life Membership in 2007 and, in 2017 asked him to present the Giltinan World championship winner's blue ribbon to the Thurlow Fisher Lawyers team, led by Michael Coxon.

So why did Patrick continue to sponsor 18ft Skiffs for more than 30 years? His simple answer, "It's a three letter word - FUN. I sponsored a number of different things in sport as well as the arts. The reason I did it is simple, I liked to have fun."

"I always had fun sponsoring the 18s and enjoyed watching the skiffs. It was also a good way to give the company's staff an interest outside the day-to-day workplace."

It was incredible for the 18 footer class to have such a successful individual as Mr. Corrigan show his approval for the iconic Australian sport.