This blog is a personal take on Listowel, Co. Kerry. I am writing for anyone anywhere with a Listowel connection but especially for sons and daughters of Listowel who find themselves far from home. Contact me at listowelconnection@gmail.com
This huge bell from the Presentation Convent sits in its alcove in the yard beside St. Mary’s. The Virgina Creeper that surrounds it is bare and creepy looking in Winter.
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A Conundrum
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A New Sign
Rasa’s popular nail studio has an elaborate new sign.
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An Old Craft
I bought the below d’oiley in Vincent’s charity shop. You have to be close to my age to remember these and to appreciate the hard work that went into making them.
The first time I saw one of these was in a convent parlour. The nuns had a period of recreation in the evenings when they sat around reading or doing craftwork. Pieces like these were often what they produced.
There was much skill involved in crocheting these centrepieces. Usually a cut glass bowl sat in the middle and the “swans” surrounded it.
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An Old Schoolbook
Recently a friend gifted me this old treasure. I looked it up online and while it wasn’t possible to put a year on it I’d say it dates from the 1940s or 50s.
It seems to belong to a series of readers, each named after a saint. I’ll give you a few sample pages next week, but the style of writing seems to be very preachy and aimed more at the teacher than the young reader. Thank God schoolbooks have come a long way since.
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A Fact
Rubik, who invented the puzzle cube that bears his name, once confessed that after he invented it it took a month before he could solve it a second time.
The beautiful Darren Enright Tidy Town seat, practical and beautiful. This welcome seat is a triumph of design, craftsmanship and location. It is just one of the many unique features that make Listowel stand out from other Irish towns.
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Big Job under way at Kerry Writers’ Museum
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The Postman
This picture is from the internet but the scene was replicated in November and December. in every town and village.
In Listowel back in the day we used to have two postal deliveries. In November and December extra postmen would have to be taken on to deal with the volume of cards and parcels arriving into town daily. There was no online shopping back then. These parcels contained presents.
Mick O’Callaghan writes here about the important role of letter writing in our lives in the old days.
PLEASE MR POSTMAN.
I remember that song by The Carpenters with its catchy first line ” Please Mr Postman look and see if there’s a letter, a letter for me.”
I love writing, composing , scribbling , doodling or whatever title you want to call it, but I note in latter years I write fewer letters . The only ones I write now are congratulating someone on retirement or on the occasion of a special birthday. Increasingly I am also writing sympathy letters because someone of my own vintage has died.
In my school days letter writing was very important. It was the main communication system for people .We were taught how to write the letter with the correct address and date on the top right-hand corner. Once that piece was correct you began the letter with the formal address of Dear —–.
You then proceeded to start the letter, so careful to spell each word correctly. Each paragraph had to be clearly indented. The proper thought process had to be correct so that each paragraph was a complete section. Then you proceeded to the next paragraph with the fresh news section to be developed .When the letter was finished there was the signing off and this process was always quite perplexing.
Do I address the person as Yours Sincerely, or Yours truly, or other such endearing term?
When this was complete there was the envelope to be addressed. You had to make sure you wrote the address in straight lines. `This was an imperative. Sometimes I used a light pencil mark to guide my straight-line writing .
Finally, the process was complete, and you had to submit it to teacher for critical arbitration and await the verdict. It amazed me that no matter how hard I tried teacher always found cause to use that red biro and pass some derogatory comment about my snail like scrawl.
In my own teaching career I used Composition and Grammar Parts 1and 2 by Mairéad Ní Ghráda . These were brilliant little books for proper writing lessons. I still have my copy of it and now and again I will have a peep inside the cover.
This simple letter writing exercise caused me great distress because in my head I saw no point in wasting time at this exercise when I could be doing my worthwhile Maths which I loved.
Anyway, we had good times in 5th class, except for the dreaded letter writing. I put it behind me as an experience not to be repeated again in life.
I was sadly disillusioned because in sixth year English during my Leaving Cert year our English teacher came in one morning and announced that we would be dealing with a very important topic this week, namely letter writing. He stressed how important it was in our lives. There was a collective gasp as we recalled our earlier days of letter writing in 5th class .
Now however our future lives depended on the famous letter of application. He told us that employers first impression of us would be the letter and no employer would employ someone who couldn’t write or spell properly or lay out a letter properly.
Now we had a new realisation of the importance of proper hand-writing. I went home and practised assiduously and at the end of the week I was pleased to get a commendation for my application letter thanks to my late father’s nightly inputs.
With my Leaving Cert completed I was accepted in St Patrick’s College for teacher training. Imagine my horror when I heard we had a professor of black board drawing and writing who emphasised the importance of proper legible writing on the blackboard and each word properly spelt and all written in straight lines . It was all so serious but funny now when you reflect back on it all 56 years later. I am sure that Professor Dignam has a nice scroll written for himself in heaven and proud as punch that he taught so many the craft of using a piece of chalk properly.His dusters were always so clean and he stressed the importance of giving the dusters a few bangs during the day to keep the. blackboard clean.
It is all a far cry from the modern era of whiteboards, laptops, mobile phone apps, text messages, whats app, face time and computers and Instagram.
I have embraced all this technology because it has enriched our lives. I could not imagine being without my mobile phone or laptop. .
In this techie world there is something that annoys me a little though. When I write a message to someone and they reply `TKs or cu soon. or some such code, which is an insult to the English language.
Another irritant occurs when you take some time, thought and trouble to send someone a letter. You have spent some time checking over the spellings and syntax of the message and then you get an insulting yellow thumbs up sign back in reply. I don’t respond usually to these people . Some weeks later I get a message of “We haven’t heard from you in a while. “Impishly, I reply with a yellow thumbs up sign .Yes I too have joined the modern era.
Mick O Callaghan
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A Poem in Praise of November
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Important Zoom Talk
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A Fact
The Rubik’s Cube was invented in 1974 by a Hungarian professor of architecture, Erno Rubik.
This list in St. Mary’s remembers all those who have passed away in the last year. We remember them and all our dead loved ones and during the month of November we can light a candle at a special shrine in their memory.
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Comings and Goings
New art studio, shop and classroom on Market Street
Frank Coffey Shoes in Main Street is closing shortly.
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What I’m Reading
My table on a November morning 2024; My neighbour’s newspaper waiting my attention; Candle lighting for the holy souls; Left over Halloween treats, a cuppa and my new book complete the tableau.
I am reading this book because I want this brave lady to get to Number 1 on the bestsellers list for Christmas.
I had never heard of Emma Heatherington until I heard her interviewed by Claire Byrne on her morning show on the morning of the launch of her latest book.
This photo from The Belfast Telegraph is how she used to look.
Emma was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a blood cancer, in March 2024 as she was nearing the end of her first draft of her Christmas novel.
I’ll give you the bones of her story as told to Claire Byrne. Many lesions in parts of her body, chemotherapy, recurrence of lesions, much pain and sickness, hospitalisations etc but she soldiered on and got the novel finished.
Fast forward to launch day and she is being interviewed in her hospital bed as she awaits the latest procedure to try to buy her a few more years. Her healthy stem cells have been harvested and now after more chemo to kill any remaining cancer they are being put back into her body. The procedure was happening on October 29 2024 as the book was being placed on the shelves.
Emma will never see it on those shelves for she will have to be in isolation for 6 weeks in order to let the stem cells take root without any risk of infection. She will not see her 4 children as she is only allowed one named visitor in case of emergency.
By the time she is better and back home, her book will have had its moment. So I did my small bit by buying it in the hope of getting it to number 1.
Maybe Next Christmas is a feel good love story, very readable.
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Very Last Hospice Coffee Morning Photos
The morning ended with a raffle for some marvellous prizes kindly donated by local businesses.
Next project; the Christmas cards. They look lovely again this year.
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A Fact
In 2005 , the singer, Adele’s song, Hello, became the first song ever to reach more than one million downloads in its first week.
Wearing a suit stained with blood, sweat and booze
Drinking the last of this months rent
He took the boat in 57
Leaving behind Mayo
Full of hope and fear
An address in his pocket
For a ganger and a start
Money for a week to tide him over
Sunday best on his back
New shoes squeezing his feet
No Irish need apply
Lodgings hard found
Working every hour god sent
Paid in the crown at the weekend
Missing home, laughs to hide the pain
Another from the top shelf
Saving for the summer holiday
Putting a little by
Back home for a week to the old sod
Buying pints for the lads
Bragging about the wages
Gold chains around the neck
Bought from a suitcase
When did you get home?
When are you going back?
Back to back breaking in blighty
Years passing on
Body getting tired
Drink taking hold
No money for the holidays
Or the funerals at home
Nights in the doss house
Sleeping on the rope
Days on the streets
Dreams of a long gone family
Passing away in the cold
(C) Kevin McManus
This sculpture, The Crying Stone by Colm Brennan
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A Few More Hospice Morning Photos
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Brehon Laws
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Tidy Town Work
The Tidy Town organisation is about so much more than litter picking and tidying up. The replacement of these important tourist information signs is just one of their many unsung contributions to making Listowel the lovely place it is to live in, to work in or to visit.
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Book Promoting in Kanturk
Kanturk looked very autumnal on my recent visit.
Noreen O’Sullivan has a keen interest in local history.
I met Alison Murphy in Presents of Mind. My book is now available in this lovely gift shop on O’Brien Street.
Eilish O’Connor in the beautiful welcoming Olde Worlde Alley Bar bought 3 books to give to family at Christmas.
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A Fact
After its catastrophic collision with the iceberg it was a full 2 hours and 40 minutes before The Titanic sank.
As promised, Sheilagh at the family resource centre has kept us informed about activities at this marvellous local meeting place.
If you have any questions about any of these activities, call 06823584
The centre is located on the John B. Keane Road
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A Cosmopolitan Corner of Tralee
I took the following photos without moving from my spot at the traffic lights by Guiney’s in Tralee. What strange neighbours, Peig Sayers, Neil Armstrong and an Italian Irish restaurant.
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A Hall in Kanturk
This very popular community hall in Kanturk is often referred to locally as The Temperance Hall. It is now looked after by the Community Council. I don’t know about its origins in the temperance movement but as a trade union hall it played an important role in social and political affairs in the town.
I had never heard of the All for Ireland League so I looked it up.
The All-for-Ireland League (AFIL) was an Irish, Munster-based political party (1909–1918). Founded by William O’BrienMP, it generated a new national movement to achieve agreement between the different parties concerned on the historically difficult aim of Home Rule for the whole of Ireland. The AFIL established itself as a separate non-sectarian party in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, binding a group of independent nationalists MPs to pursue a broader concept of Irish nationalism, a consensus of political brotherhood and reconciliation among all Irishmen, primarily to win Unionist consent to an All-Ireland parliamentary settlement.
This is just the introduction to a very interesting article in Wikipedia.
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Another Gold Medal
In Croke Park for the announcement of the winners of the National Tidy Towns Competition were Breda, Mary, Julie and Jimmy representing Listowel. Listowel achieved another gold medal and increased its overall mark by 11 points. well done everyone.
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Listowel Food Fair
Promoting the annual Food Fair at Garvey’s Super Valu on Saturday last.