Listowel Connection

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

Presentation Convent, Sophie Hannah and Goats in Ballybunion

By

On February 6, 2017

In Uncategorized

Beautiful North Kerry


Pylons and a rainbow photographed by Mike Enright



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Presentation Convent Listowel in 2007




Photos by Mairéad O’Sullivan

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Glin; A Town Flowing with Milk and Money in 1897




The butter produced by the Glin Co-op creamery was of a renowned high quality partly due to its cooling which was aided by the importation of ice from Norway for the ice houses built for the thriving Glin fish market where salmon taken locally were bought and then sent directly from there to Billingsgate, London for sale. Ice was needed to pack the fish to keep them fresh. A dairy inspector report dated 13 August 1897 confirms this As the creamery is now receiving ice daily and I gave them information how to use this to the best advantage, I expect good results in the future both in quantity and quality.

Source; Glin, A Heritage Town website

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What I am Reading



My latest reading material is a whodunnit for my book club. Sophie Hannah is the writer chosen to write novels in the style of Agatha Christie. This one has Poirot solving a case in Clonakilty, Co. Cork. It’s like a trip down Memory lane for me. I used to love Agatha Christie but had not read one for years. This one is just like the style I remember. It is a real page turner.

AND

a little bird tells me that Sophie Hannah is coming to Listowel for Writers’ Week.

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New Parking sign








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Living on the Edge



My friend, Bridget O’Connor did the cliff walk in Ballybunion. She met a family of goats and took these great photographs.

Pres. Convent Chapel photos

By

On February 3, 2017

In Uncategorized

Beautiful North Kerry





Great photo of a rain shower by Mike Enright

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More of Mairéad O’Sullivan’s Convent Chapel Photos from 2007



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Adare is still like this today

This Ireland XO photo shows girls at a water pump in Adare, Co. Limerick

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Looking Ahead to St. Patrick’s Day 2017


John Relihan of Duagh and Holy Smoke, Cork has been to London to prepare for another big street party to mark the saint’s day.


This is Seán Spicer, the U.S. Trump administration Press Secretary (he of the alternative facts fame) who is, no doubt, preparing to celebrate as well. The CNN photo from 2016 shows Sean, whose emigrant ancestors came from Co. Clare, sporting his rather unusual St. Patrick’s Day attire.

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Then and Now….       a loss for design






This is how a post box used to look.




This is how they look today


Presentation Chapel in 2007 and a short history of Pres. sisters in town and a big win in badminton for a Moyvane family

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On February 2, 2017

In Uncategorized



St. Brigid’s Day






Celebrating St Brigid at her Well near the Cashen River between Ballyduff and Ballybunion in North Kerry

(Photo and caption: Diocese of Kerry on Facebook)



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Presentation Chapel, Listowel in August 2007


Mairéad O’Sullivan shared some of her really beautiful pictures of the convent chapel with us. Here are the first few.

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Hard Times come again no more


Frances Kennedy found this photo on a site called Ireland Long ago. It shows a young woman whose home has been destroyed in a Black and Tan reprisal attack. The atrocity took place in Meelin Co. Cork.

The Black and Tans (they got the name from the colours of their uniforms) were as feared in Ireland in the 1920s as The Taliban. They went around the countryside spreading fear and exerting their own brand of rough justice. This young woman appears broken but unbowed. Hopefully the menfolk of her household had found safety somewhere before this photo was taken.

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Presentation Sisters in Listowel



Photos of the convent in 2007 by Mairead O’Sullivan and text from Sr. Éilís Daly

Sr. Eilís with a tree with the names of the sisters who had gone before her up to 2002.


As we celebrate our tradition of Presentation Catholic education in

Listowel, we take inspiration from the lives of the Four Presentation

Sisters who began Catholic education in Listowel in 1844.  On the 7th

of May 1844, Sr. Mary Augustine Stack- a native of Listowel and three

sisters from Milltown, Sr. Mary Teresa Kelly, Sr. Mary Francis

McCarthy and Sr. Mary Francis Brennan founded a convent and school in

Listowel.



During the Famine of 1845-48, the sisters had to close their school.

They opened soup kitchens to feed the starving people. The Famine resulted in

the deaths of many families and of some of the young sisters. Sharing

their meagre resources with the poor, over the course of twelve

months, the sisters supplied 31,000 breakfasts to the starving

children. The Convent Annuals read of the Sisters baking bread to feed

so many, eventually being reduced to rye and black bread. The Sisters

also initiated groups to make garments for the women and shirts for

the men in the workhouse closeby – so that people could earn wages.



A significant event in the life of the early Listowel Presentation

community was the ‘Battle of the Cross’ in 1857.  The Sisters were

ordered to take down the Cross from the gable end of their school by

the Education Board. In spite of dire threats, the sisters refused to

do so, and defied the Board. Eventually the Board yielded.



In 2007 the sisters closed their convent, after 163 years of service

in Listowel. The tradition of Presentation Catholic education is still

alive in Listowel.  Our school is now under the trusteeship of CEIST

which is committed to continuing the great tradition of Presentation

Catholic education in Listowel into the future.

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Badminton in the Genes ?




Junior Griffin has a long list of Kerry badminton families. This family must be the most high profile at the moment.

“A pair of very proud parents, Breda and William O’Flaherty of Moyvane with their daughter Niamh and son James who created their own bit of Kerry Badminton history at Killarney on Sunday last, January 29 2017 by both winning Kerry senior singles championships; Niamh at 16 years of age is the youngest ever winner of the ladies senior title and they are the first brother and sister div 1 title holders to do that double since 1996.

For both it was their first senior title. In the mens decider James overcame 10 times title holder Tom Bourke in a three set final that was a pure joy to behold. Indeed, it has been acclaimed as one of the greatest Kerry finals ever.” Junior

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Grandparents’ Day



Yesterday, February 1 2017, feast of St. Brigid  was Grandparents Day. My photo shows St. Michael’s boys on their way to mass in the parish church. Pupils and staff from Scoil Realta na Maidine also attended. On behalf of all grandparents, “Thank you, boys.”

A tale of St. John’s clock, a few Listowel photos and John Relihan at Fifteen in London

By

On February 1, 2017

In Uncategorized


Great Hunting Weather



Duhallow Hunt       Photo; Willie Nunan



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A Tale of Protestants and Catholics United by a Clock


 My story started with this old postcard. I posted it here a few weeks ago. On the same day as it appeared I was on Radio Kerry giving my Just a Thought. Just a Thought is a minute’s reflection broadcast on Radio Kerry on weekday mornings. It is broadcast first at 7.30 a.m. during Kerry’s Full Breakfast. One of the presenters of this programme is Elaine Kinsella. Elaine heard my “Thought” and realised that it was her old teacher whose blog she now follows. So Elaine opened the blog and the first thing she saw was this old picture of Listowel Town Square. “I wonder,” says she, “when this photograph was taken.”

Later on the same day, I met my friend Junior Griffin. Junior didn’t know when exactly the photo was taken but he was sure that it was before the 1940s because he had observed that the numerals in the St. John’s clock were illegible and he knew all about their being repainted.


Junior is a great man for a story and he didn’t let me down on this occasion either.

The man second from left in this photo (kindly given to me by Patsy O’Sullivan) is Archdeacon Wallace and he was the last Protestant rector of Listowel parish. Junior remembers him as a great community man and on the very best of terms with his Catholic neighbours.

One of these Catholic friends was Junior’s dad, John Griffin. Now John was the local expert at mending clocks and watches. So it was to Bridge Rd to the Griffin house that the archdeacon came to get his clock seen to.

Junior remembers the whole undertaking well.

In the 1940s it was forbidden for a Catholic to enter a Protestant church. Mending the clock would not involve entering the church as there was no access to the clock from the church. To solve this problem John Griffin constructed a kind of primitive cherry picker. This contraption was a kind of cage that he would enter on the ground and using pulleys and ropes he would hoist himself up to the clock in order to access the movement of the clock.

Junior’s mother was worried sick that some harm might come to her husband in this makeshift hoist so she sent Bert and Junior to the Catholic church to light candles and to pray that no harm would come to their dad.


Bert, R.I.P. and Junior

Mr. Griffin repainted the numerals and he brought the two huge hands home to paint them. Junior remembers that the big hand measured five feet and the small hand was 3 feet long.

There remained one final problem to solve but John Griffin was a dinger at solving problems. If he couldn’t do something himself, he knew someone who could.

The last piece of repair work needed was the vital pin that held the hands in place and allowed them to turn as well in order to tell the time. This was a job for an engineer and John Griffin knew just the man, his friend Michael Graham. Michael lived in Dublin but he had a Listowel connection in that he was married to a North Kerry woman.

Michael made the vital pin. The clock was in working order again. 

Now there is a lovely postscript to the story, Junior told me that Michael Graham, the man who made the vital pin was married to Canon Declan O’Connor’s aunt.

Canon Declan with Jimmy Hickey.

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Listowel Arms from Convent Street



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St. Patrick’s Hall, Listowel




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Star Pupil




Fifteen Graduates is a Facebook page for graduates of Jamie Oliver’s apprentice programme. This is what it says about our own John Relihan

“Great to see graduate John Relihan at Fifteen today. John has become a Food Ambassador for Ireland and he has been busy travelling all over the world in that role. For St Patricks Day on the 19th of March this year John will be back cooking in Trafalgar Square again – we will send an email out soon as he will be looking for other graduates to come along and cook with him on the day as well. Keep up the great work John “

Lá Fhéile Bride, some photos and memories of Listowel in the fifties

By

On January 31, 2017

In Uncategorized

Lá ‘le Bríde





Tomorrow is February 1 2017, Lá Fhéile Bríde. The photo from the internet is of Bridgitswell in Kildare. She is our patron saint, of equal status with St. Patrick. Today we celebrate her and by tradition, we hang her cross to ward off evil.

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Beale on the Wild Atlantic Way

Ita Hannon loves her native Béal and you can see why. This is just one of the many beautiful scenes she has captured and shared with us.

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Trip to Trinity

Presentation Secondary School students paid a recent visit to Trinity College Dublin.  

(photo; Twitter)

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Ballybunion Sea and Cliff Rescue

Isn’t this a super photo? It was taken on Christmas Day in Ballybunion and posted on the internet.

 I apologise for not noting the photographer’s name.

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Broderick’s Bar, Tae Lane, Listowel


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Summers in the 1950s Remembered by Maria Sham

During the summer school holidays we would take jam pots and go to Teampaillín Bán. I think the name means in English the little white graveyard. People were buried in a mass grave there during the Famine, only we did not know that then. Years later my brother Neilie got a group together and had a monument erected there to all the people of the famine who are buried there. The walk was on the Ballybunion road and I can still smell the tar on the road melting with the heat. In Teampaillín Bán there was a stream and we would paddle and catch kissans [little fish] and bring them home in our jam jars; the poor things did not survive long; we killed them with kindness over feeding them.

Also trips to Ballybunion, that was fantastic, Mam and Aunty Angie would bring tomato sandwiches, a large apple pie in a roasting tin and ‘ currant loaf, we would get a tray of tea at Collins’, (which was a house just off the beach) a large pot, milk, sugar and cups, all for I think 2 shillings. First we ran into the sea only in our knickers as we did not have swimsuits. After we would have our tea and it was fantastic. Even if the tomato sandwiches were full of sand nobody cared. Before leaving Ballybunion we would get our sand buckets and when the tide was gone out we marched off to the rocks and filled our buckets with periwinkles that we would boil when we got home. I remembered going to Ballybunion once with my aunt Eily in the donkey and cart, there was not that many motor cars or buses on the roads then.

At the back of our house there were a lot of elder bushes and we would hold concerts there. Admittance was a piece of broken china or a bottle top. We would dress up and pretend all kinds of things. We would put the elder flowers in our hair and pretend to be princesses. We would make mud cakes in empty polish tins and decorate them with daisies. We would have pretend shops.

As we got older it was not all play, Doreen and myself had to do jobs in the house i.e. wash up and clean the windows. There were brass rods on the stairs we had to clean with Brasso. Another job for us girls was to clean all the shoes for everyone on Saturday for Sunday mass.

My education finished at the convent at the early age of 15 followed by 2 years at the local technical college.

I left for England in March 1959 on the first step to my future.

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A Few Names



Marie Shaw thinks she recognises a few faces in Maria Sham’s photo.

This was a younger class for me but I THINK I recognize a few girls.

Third from left, back row is definitely Joan Relihan (Brennan)

Fourth from right, back row looks like Anne Wixtead.

Margaret Dillon, front row in plaid.?

Cathy Mae Leahy or maybe her sister Eleanor, front row, first on right and Maeve Mooney, second from right, front row.

God, that’s a long time ago.

Keep the memories coming Mary!

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