Albert Minn sat in the shade while people around him talked about why he’s so special. The 90-year-old wore his trademark pointed beard and a red T-shirt with a logo (depicting him with his trademark pointed beard) framed by the words “Al Minn Invitational.”

Graying men who were skinny kids when they swam for him knelt down next to Minn’s chair on the hot cement of the pool apron, took his hand and told him how much they appreciated him.

This weekend, for devoting more than half his life to teaching thousands of kids to swim and coaching generations of champions, Minn won special recognition: The Kailua District Park pool was renamed in his honor. The official announcement came in the opening ceremonies of the 44th annual Al Minn Invitational swim meet.

For his part, Minn was more excited to see so many of his former swimmers than anything else.

Albert Minn was one of seven sons to be born to Korean immigrant parents. He spent his early years in Wahiawa before the family moved to Kaimuki.

He attended ‘Iolani School, where he played football for the beloved Father Bray, but switched to McKinley when the war started. He attended Willamette University on a full football scholarship.

It was in Oregon where he met his wife, Shirley, and found his calling as a swim coach. While working at a summer camp, he was asked by some of the kids to coach them in swimming. They assumed someone from Hawaii must know all about the water.

As it turned out, Minn was good at it.

Though his resume includes coaching football, basketball, track and field and baseball as well as serving as principal at Jarrett Intermediate and Roosevelt and Kailua, swimming was the constant in his life.

He organized the Aulea Swim Club in the 1950s and started training young people for competitive swimming. By the 1970s, Aulea Swim Club became the dominant swim club in Hawaii.

U.S. Rep. Mark Takai swam for Minn both at Aulea and at the University of Hawaii when Minn was head coach there.

“He always used to talk about college,” said Takai, who was at the pool on Saturday for the presentation and because his son was competing in the meet. “He would say, ‘You’re not swimming for a medal, you’re swimming to give yourself an education.’ He would remind us that in order to go to college, you have to do well in all aspects. He taught me always to dig deeper and try harder.”

Brett Phillips was a high school all-American, Big 10 swimming champion at the University of Wisconsin and is a masters record holder. When Phillips first starting swimming, though, he didn’t show much promise.

“From the ages of 8 to 14, I was just terrible,” Phillips said. “But Mr. Minn didn’t care. He worked with me. Then I got old enough and strong enough and things started working.”

In the old days, they didn’t have a public pool, so they’d practice at the family-size pool at Minn’s house. He set up a weight room there for his swimmers and during summers ran the Al Minn Fun Camp, taking kids hiking, bowling, camping and surfing.

“He had this old bus with the roof cut off,” Phillips said. “The floor was open in the middle and that’s where the surfboards went. We sat on benches on either side. We’d meet at his house at 6 a.m., go to Waikiki and surf half the day and then come back and do other things.”

Peter Martin also swam for Aulea during that time. “For me, my dad passed away when I was 13, so Mr. Minn became a huge father figure for me after that … He was stern. He was always about commitment, diligence.”

“He knew how to be just as mean as he needed to be,” Phillips said.

Phillips nodded. “He was always there. He was the first to get to the pool and the last to leave.”

Minn’s list of awards and accomplishments can fill up a large plaque: He was assistant coach for the USA national swim team; he was athletic director at Hawaii Loa College, where he coached 12 all-Americans; he was assistant coach for the U.S. National and Olympic teams; his was one of the first names in the Hawaii Swimming Hall of Fame.

Aulea coach Joe Glenn glowed with admiration as he watched Minn receive accolades.

“Some of his swimmers still have records from the ’70s and ’80s. There’s a girls’ distance record that still stands from the ’80s and nobody has come within 30 seconds,” Glenn said.

Everyone who told stories about Minn struggled to pinpoint the one thing, the core value, that made him special.

“My understanding is that he was a master motivator and team builder,” Glenn said. “His swimmers had a real allegiance to him. Over and over again, his swimmers say, ‘I swam for Mr. Minn.’ They weren’t swimming for medals, they were swimming to make him proud.”

At the meet named in his honor held at the pool now named in his honor, Minn smiled and thanked everyone. His words of advice for success in the pool (or out, for that matter) were simple:

“Improve your time. Improve yourself,” Minn said. “Never mind about anybody else.”

Reach Lee Cataluna at 529-4315 or lcataluna@staradvertiser.com.