The all too small speciality coffee world that many of us inhabit was rocked yesterday with the shock news that fellow enthusiast Danny McNulty had passed in the early hours of the morning.
It is always a surprise when someone dies suddenly, but even more so when they are apparently healthy, quite young – Danny was forty-nine – and a larger than life character. It seems that Danny had not been feeling too well and had been to hospital for tests. From accounts on alt.coffee, he went downhill quite quickly. That is all I know. It certainly made me think about how precious yet frail life is and how important it is to make the most of every sweet moment.
I came across Danny’s fabulously eclectic and informative website (www.danny.mcnulty.btinternet.co.uk/about.html) very early on in my
coffee journey, long before finding TMC and other places that I now frequent. His espresso area was full of useful information about pulling shots, grinding correctly and all sorts about equipment. I have been pointing newcomers to coffee towards Danny’s pages ever since as his style of sharing information made so many hirtherto befuddling things very clear to me when I was at that stage of my development.
Danny’s Aladdin’s cave of a site also yielded the extemely entertaining story of his exploits in starting up a ‘commercial’ mobile coffee trailer near his Portsmouth home, which at first appeared to be as much for fun as anything, but subsequently became a very successful venture. That was Danny, up to all sorts and always having an adventure. He certainly seemed to live life to the full.
Like many online coffee folk, I never met Danny personally, but I did email him to say thank you for the information on his site and a very pleasent conversation ensued. He was clearly a very nice and very patient man, whom many felt as if they knew like a friend through his online persona. Danny was a member of TMC and an infrequent poster, though when he did pop-in, everyone seemed to know him.
For a while, Danny was the UK distributor of Monsooned Malabar. A few of my TMC compartiots bought from him now and then, all spoke highly.
In a small way, Danny was the ‘Alistair Cooke’ of the UK coffee world, regularly penning extremely funny pieces regaling readers of alt.coffee with his adventures in the coffee trailer, entitled “Sitting in a Field”. A search on
alt.coffee will yield years worth of these classic little pieces that remind me very much of ‘Letter from America’. If you have not read them, they are well worth seeking out. Danny’s charm and wit shine through readily, as does his obvious consideration for his fellow beings. These are his lasting legacy to this, our little coffee world, which is today poorer for Danny’s loss.
God bless you Danny, rest peacefully. You will be missed by so many different people in lots of different ways. Thank you from those of us to whom you gave guidance either directly or through your website.
Our thoughts are with Danny’s loved ones.