Daniel Franey Malone

Daniel Franey Malone The sport of water polo has three types of fouls. Dan Malone, who died at the age of 84 with family at his side in Stuart, FL, played the game as though this ancient sport was founded on a desire to commit all three fouls at the same time. His favorite ploy was to mug and dunk the nearest opposing player. It mattered little whether the ball was anywhere in the vicinity. Water polo at the Malone’s residence during the 1970s, 80s and 90s on Palm Island, Miami Beach was just one of Dan’s aquatic loves. In 1961, on a blind date in Miami Beach, he met a beautiful Irish-Catholic girl from Springfield, MA, Barbara Kelly. They married the next year. Not a year had passed before they purchased the first of their many ocean worthy boats, the Irish Mist. During the 1960s and 1970s, summers were spent traversing the waters of the Gulf Stream, docking at the original Ocean Reef Club, and exploring coral reefs. Dan took their son Duffer, at the age of 10 on his first scuba lesson in Bimini. Their daughter, Brigid, not quite 5 years old, was initially skittish about snorkeling with sharks and barracudas lurching in the deep blue Caribbean waters. Dan swam by her side to calm her fears. As the children grew older, their friends accompanied the family on frequent seafaring outings to the Bahamas and beyond. Dan taught them how to care for a boat, respect the seas, shoot skeet off a moving deck, drop an anchor, spear a fish, and enjoy each other’s company. His generosity of spirit, honesty with partial judgment and thoughtfulness that never failed were at the root of all his friendships. Before meeting his wife of 53 years, Dan served two years in the Army. He completed basic training and cryptography school at Camp Gordon, Georgia. On assignment in Ft. Meade, Maryland he and fellow soldier Rod Kendrick forged a lasting friendship. Rod fondly remembers visits to Dan’s working family farm in Ashland, PA, and catching spiny lobsters on “bachelor” cruises to the Bahamas. He studied public relations and swam varsity at Boston University, graduating in 1952. Dan was no mere ordinary paddler on the water. In the 1920s, prior to his birth, his father, Martin Joseph Malone, and uncles acquired the Roman Pools and Everglades Cabana Club and Pool located on 23rd and Collins Avenue, Miami Beach. The purchase occurred after they sold the family’s brewery in Pennsylvania, which was the nation’s second oldest beer distillery, before Prohibition. At the time it contained the only swimming pool south of Jacksonville. Growing up, Dan lived on the second floor of the real estate compound renamed Malone Properties. He swam regularly in the pool that served as a training center for swimming legends Buster Crabbe and Johnny Weissmuller. As an adult, Dan was a pioneer figure in the growth of Masters swimming at a time when nearly everyone believed swimmers’ careers ended after high school or college. Nineteen years after graduating college, he captured a second and third place in the sprint freestyle events at the second Masters National Swimming Championships in Amarillo, Texas. In the early 1990s he won his age group’s national 100-yard freestyle championships in Ft. Meyers, Florida. Dan’s commitment to pool training was an inspiration to family and friends. His son Duffer, also later called Daniel in his adult years, became the top prep school water player in America along with winning All-America accolades in swimming. Dan’s daughter Brigid demonstrated her fierce competitive determination in contesting challenging distance-swimming events. As recently as the spring of 2015, Dan was observed still instructing friends on swimming techniques at the high school pool in Jupiter. Unexpected family deaths in the early 1960s propelled Dan to the presidency of Malone Properties. He continued to serve as a principal in the family’s real estate business on Miami Beach until his death. As much as Dan enjoyed playing water polo, boating and swimming, his life-long friend, and the target of many of his grab and dunk water polo tactics, Judge Michael Jones recalls the one thing that meant the most to him. A few years back they visited Duffer in St. Vincent Island. Dan’s son was working on the marine set for the Pirates of the Caribbean movie. After a long day of traveling and securing a hotel room, Dan unpacked, and softly said, “I miss Barbara.” Now Barbara, Duffer and his wife Georgia and their children Mary Jane and William, along with Brigid and her husband Philippe and their daughter Alice, join a host of extended family and web footed friends to say together, we miss you Dan.