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Arthur O. Mahoney was a coach at Saranac Lake High School from the late 1930s and '40s, and headed a Boy Scout troop in October, 1938. He was a World War II veteran having joined the army in 1942.
Howard Riley wrote this reminiscence about him in his column in the Adirondack Daily Enterprise, January 28, 2017:
Art Mahoney then served in WWII as an Army Ranger and came back to the high school and coached our championship cross-country team. He also had to coach the football team [1946], both training in the fall, of course. He would alter his time between the teams and he came over one afternoon to take us on a little jog, and to make sure we were training properly when he could not be with us; he looked old to us but he didn't look old later as we ran out to the state bridge and back, and then, as we headed for the high school he cut over to Edgewood Road and out the Forest Home Road for a long ways and back, somewhere between 10 and 12 miles; he at the front of the pack all the way, fresh as a daisy; and us young classy, sassy runners not so fresh. We were used to training at about six miles; our official races were 2 1/2 miles.
Plattsburgh Daily Press, December 23, 1938
JANET MILNE TO HEAD DELEGATION
Former Plattsburgh Skater to Compete at Newburg on January 1
SARANAC LAKE — Saranac Lake's skating team, headed by Miss Janet Milne, North American women's senior champion, will swing into action for the 1939 season on the ice at Newburg, Jan. 1 in the Middle Atlantic championships, according to a decision of the village board of trustees. The action followed an announcement of the skating committee that the team was ready for action.
The Newburg meet will be the first of several in which the Red and White team will see action as warm ups for the North American championships to be held here the third week in February. The skaters have been practicing daily under the watchful eye of Coach Art Mahoney.
Adirondack Daily Enterprise, February 19, 1962
Many remember Art Mahoney, coach at the Saranac Lake High School before and after World War II. Lt. Mahony was with the U.S. Army Amphibious Forces in the South Pacific. He had received a communication which read: “Lt. Arthur Mahoney is commended for the excellent manner in which he successfully evacuated natives from behind enemy lines on the West Coast of New Britain on the 28th of December, .1943, in an LCM and LCV.”
Mahony was in many battles and island landings in the Pacific and returned to teach physical education and coach at the high school in 1947. During a gym class one morning he told the group to do an exercise. One guy didn't move. Coach asked him if something was wrong. The boy said he was a veteran, he didn't have to do this kid stuff. The coach was interested, and asked the boy where he had been. He had left school, enlisted in the Navy, served 3 months; and was discharged. He did the exercise.
