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

Tag: Alice Taylor Page 1 of 2

Alice Taylor, Pisheógs, Cotter na Gruaige and Plans for Writers’ Week 2020

By

On February 12, 2020

In Uncategorized

A dog who loves the beach  Photo by Bridget O’Connor

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A Writers’ Week Memory


It must have been 1988 or 1989, because To School Through the Fields was published in 1988 and its author, Alice Taylor is the subject of my story.

Alice Taylor and me in Philips Bookshop in Mallow at a book signing in

November 2019.

Back in 1988 Alice Taylor was starting out on her literary career and she came to Listowel to attend Writers’ Week. I was a Mammy with a little girl who was anxious to take part in the Writers’ Week fancy dress parade. I thought up the perfect dress- up character for Clíona. Easy peasy as all the props and costume requirements were easy to acquire.

I dressed her up in her school uniform, tied a few old books together with a leather strap/belt and found a sod of turf. Ta dah! Alice Taylor goes To School Through the Fields.

As we were dispersing after the parade the bus with the people on the bus tour was just arriving in The Square. Alice Taylor was alighting from the bus when she spotted the little girl dressed as herself. She called us over, gave Clíona a fiver and posed for a photo. Poor Clíona hadn’t a clue who the lady was but she pocketed the fiver all the same. She didn’t really appreciate the fact that she had just met one of Ireland”s up and coming memoir writers.

Statue of Alice Taylor in her native Newmarket, Co. Cork

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Listowel Writers’ Week Art Committee



Jim Dunn, Catherine Moylan, Carol Stricks and Elizabeth Dunn finalising a brilliant Art programme for Listowel Writers’ Week 2020, which will run from May 27 to May 31 2020

I got a sneak peak at what’s in store and its really really good.

I’m on the 50th Commemoration Committee and we are desperately looking for old photos, or stories from the last 50 years of festivals. A big thank you to the people who have sent stuff already but there must be lots of stuff in albums and attics that others would enjoy seeing. Take a look for us, please.

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The Bittling Woman of Rathea


Yesterday’s story from Rathea raised many questions. I think we are all agreed that it refers to some kind of pisheóg behaviour. The dead cow at the end is the clue here.

Dave O’Sullivan found the meaning of the word bittling in a dictionary of Scots Gallic

Dictionary to the Scots language

It would appear she was washing clothes and beating them clean. The reference to hearing her is obviously to hearing the beating sound as she pounded the clothes.

Pisheógs were often invoked to bring good luck to one family and bad luck to another. The death of a cow would be a huge stroke of bad luck. Pisheógs often involved the stealing of milk or butter. A man told me that he heard of a family who could work pisheógs. The person casting the spell would come to the cow house of the person to be cursed, would take the spancel and would work it back and forth under the best cow in the herd. That cow would dry up and the pisheogie person’s cow would produce gallons of milk.

Another story he told me was of a man who could work pisheogs.  When he went to mass on Sundays, when it came to the consecration, he would turn his back on the altar and face the congregation behind him.

(the power of pisheogs was thought to come from the devil)



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Cotter na Gruaige


A Pied Piper story from Rathea in the School’s Folklore collection

About 74 years ago a most unwelcomed visitor occasionally went past the village of Duagh, as it was the main road from Listowel town to Cork City for carting all farm produce. The name of this visitor was Cotter na Gruaige, he used to set charms, and also curse people for little cause and everybody was afraid to meet him. He was conspicious looking. He wore his hair hanging to his waist at his back and his beard hung to his waist in front. His mode of travelling was a pony about 20 years old and spotted like a magpie. 

He often went without causing any trouble but on one occasion while passing through Duagh the school children were at play in the school.grounds and when Cotter na Gruaige came on they threw puddle on him and his pony. He immediately drove his pony into the school yard to accuse the teacher named (Mr James Dore) who met Cotter in the  yard and ordered him out on the road. When on the road Cotter said to the teacher “I am going now but I am leaving you my army.”

 Master Dore lived 100 yards from the school, in a nice thatched residence which stands to this day. When school was over Dore walked up home, but to his amazement the thatch of his house was torn and thrown down by an immense crowd of rats. He entered the house but could not eat his dinner as the rats came up on the table. He was half frightened and did not know what to do. He went to the Parish Priest Father O Regan and told him his story. The priest went to see the rats and when he saw them he told the teacher, he should find Cotter na Gruaige and pay him to withdraw his charm. 

Next day the teacher set out on search of Cotter and found him in the evening at the house of a man named Nolan of Brosna. The teacher apologised and asked Cotter to come next day and take away the rats which he promised to do. The teacher came home that night and told his story to everybody including Father O Regan. 

Next day about noon Cotter na Gruaige was coming to the village and crowds flocked round him to see what would occur. Cotter rode his pony to the yard in front of the teachers house, put his hand in his pocket and drew out a bugle which he sounded and out came all the rats on the road. Cotter kept playing his bugle and riding slowly on his pony until he came to a small river South of Duagh named Glashamore. When he came to the river bank all the rats were around him, except one which he asked for, and the teacher said one rat remained in the yard. 

Cotter na Gruaige ordered two rats to go for the missing one and they went immediately and brought the largest rat of all which was blind. He walked between his two Guards led by a cord which he held in his mouth. When the blind rat landed on the river bank Cotter ordered all rats to disappear and all the rats jumped into the river below the bridge and were out of sight in a second and from that day to this no rat was seen at Dore’s house.

COLLECTOR
Dómhnall de Staic
Gender
male
Address
Duagh, Co. Kerry
INFORMANT
father
Relation
parent
Gender
male
Address

Duagh, Co. Kerry

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Poem to an Umbrella Thief, Brothers and Writers at a Book Signing in Mallow

By

On November 6, 2019

In Uncategorized

Killarney Stag

The annual rut is coming to an end but Chris Grayson snapped this magnificent fellow earlier this autumn.

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A Lost or stolen Brolly

I posted this photo last week. It is an umbrella that was left behind in St,. John’s at the launch of A Minute of Your Time.

Seeing the photo, my friend Nicholas was reminded of another incident involving an umbrella which prompted him into rhyme.

This is what he wrote:

The lost umbrella mention  sparks memory of an incident in Abbeyfeale on St. Patrick’s Day in 2012, as the parade proceeded in heavy rain-showers. A good friend of mine left her umbrella down when the rain cleared, and went to chat with her friends. When the rain re-commenced, she went for her umbrella only to find that it had been stolen! A hearty soaking did not cool her ire. I penned the following ditty to commemorate the event, – there might be a sort of  John B. line there too- but she, of her charity has forgiven the thief, I think… To avoid the  risk of upsetting the fairer gender, I have decided the thief must have been a male, though I am not sure…

ON THE STREET IN ABBEYFEALE

Or, The Theft of a Lady’s Brolly,

Which dastardly crime occurred in Abbeyfeale on a Rainy 

St. Patrick’s Day, 2012)

On the street in Abbeyfeale

Loud and high the bagpipes pealed,

And the banners on the breeze did proudly soar;

As the sun came shining bright,

And the rain-clouds dark took flight,

I left my brolly down, the rain being o’er.

To some folks I went to chat,

And sure where’s the harm in that?

It being Patrick’s Day, my pals were all in town;

As the gossip fast did flow,

Of good news – and tales of woe,

A shower of rain once more came pelting down.

Well, I turned to grab my brolly

But then soon realised my folly,

For light-fingers mean had stolen it away!

I had paid for it good money

And it isn’t one bit funny;

That snaky wretch in hell will surely pay!

May the rain and sleet come down,

With no mercy on his crown,

May the sun ne’er heat his bones for evermore.

May his good luck go astray,

May the rain sweep off his hay,

And may Bank and Bailiff ever haunt his door!

Nicholas. 


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Brotherly Love


 These two Athea brothers, I’m told, are still working hard.

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Cuteness overload here. The two lovely little boys, pictured below, are twin brothers, Eamon and Brendan ÓMurchú.

This is how they look today, pictured at the launch of A minute of Your Time with their brother, Aidan.

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A Minute of Your Time


I was in the company of 5 other  writers in Philip’s Bookshop in Mallow on November 2 2019.

Here am I standing out in pink with Darina Allen, Clodagh Finn, Philip O’Flynn, Alice Taylor, Kevin Quaid, me and John Spillane who was the singing M.C.

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One for the Diary



We are very lucky to be getting this chance to hear this popular motivational speaker and writer in Listowel

Daithí OSé, Listowel a “pauperised town” in 1831, Mill Lane and a poem by Alice Taylor

By

On October 13, 2017

In Uncategorized

Chris Grayson was in Barrow

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Before He was Famous

From The Kerryman archives…August  2001

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Poverty in 1831



(Extract from a debate in The houses of Parliament discovered recently by a blog follower)

…..The electoral division of Listowel as
defined by the a commissioner consisted of the town and parish of Listowel, the
parish of Finuge, including a small portion of the parish of Dysert. Mr Hawley,
in the course of his observations called Listowel a “pauperized town” and such,
Mr. Collis was sorry to say, was the case. In confirmation of that statement,
`Mr. Collis held a document which was put into his hand previous to his coming
into the room, by his friend Rev. E.M. Denny.

This document detailed the state of poverty
in the town of Listowel and its minuter districts during the trying and scarce
summer just past- a period of famine he might call it. It appeared from that
document that in one locality, Glounafous, consisting of 236 houses, 1175
paupers had received relief through the medium of the charity meal while 4,000
paupers in the town and the immediate vicinage, had daily obtained relief. He
found that the entire of the parish consisted of 4,300 acres, which, with
Finuge gave an area of say 6,000 acres for the electoral division of Listowel.
The population in 1831 was about 4,900 souls, considerably exceeding the
adjoining parishes: although these parishes contained a much greater amount of
surface, equaling Listowel in quality of soil. This position Mr. Collis
illustrated forcibly by interesting statistical details, contrasting the
quality of the soil and population.

Mr. Collis went on to show that the
population of the town of Listowel alone exceeded in 1831 that of the parish of
Knockanure and Lisselton, and nearly equaled Killeheny, Galey and Murhur. Of
the entire parish of Listowel the preponderating proportion was in the town of
Listowel. Of these residents in the town the majority were paupers migrating
from other districts- very generally from the surrounding parishes. He was, he
thought, justified in assuming that in the district proposed for the electoral
division a relative proportion of the lands to the population would be one acre
to one individual.

Mr. Hawley; You calculate according to Irish
acres?

Mr. Collis said the comparison still held.
Finuge, a poor district was added to Listowel; but the addition would rather
prove an incumbrance than a means of lessening the burden that threatened to
press upon Listowel. Finuge was a miserable parish. Galey with its population
of 2,900 souls and surface of 1,300 acres, had no pauper population. The
average in that parish would be as four acres to one inhabitant – in Murhur two
to one. In the other parishes to which he referred the proportion was equally
favourable; while in Listowel with its dense and pauper population the
proportion was as one acre to one individual.

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Fresh Flowers by Alice Taylor



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Mill Lane in October 2017





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International Soccer in Listowel




It was the occasion of the official opening of the new soccer pitch at Tannavalla. Aiden O’Connor, who was chair of Listowel Celtic at the time came into the secondary school to tell the girls about the game and to introduce the two local lads who were to play on that evening.

Guess what year?

Arch, National Treasures, an Alice Taylor poem and Chutes’ Stores

By

On October 12, 2017

In Uncategorized

Bridge Road through the arch, October 2017

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I Remember, I Remember


From Facebook

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National Treasures



If you have kept something as a souvenir of a different time in Ireland, now is the time to share it with the nation. RTE have initiated this great project to collect images of stuff that tell us something about who we are and what life was like in Ireland in the twentieth century. Mostly what they want is stuff that was valued or treasured in our lifetime but mostly now has no value whatsoever except as a reminder of something that defined us. Here are few examples;

John F. Kennedy and his wife Jackie were our golden couple in the 1960s. They were our very own Charles and Diana and the Kardashians all rolled into one. Many homes had their image somewhere on show. This wall plate was typical. Note the closeness of the couple, man slightly overshadowing his good looking young wife, all square jawed and squeaky clean. The  Irishness of his lineage is emphasised in the shamrock shaped cut outs in the ribbon plate.

This was a milk formula that was very popular in the Ireland of my youth. Every home had one of these tins for keeping odds and ends in. We had one for saved bits of twine. Mothers would run a mile now if they saw Full Cream baby food. As for the image of the baby in the oversized crown….words fail me.

Remember saving stamps? They featured an acorn and the selling point was, Be a squirrel and save up your pennies as the squirrel saves nuts for a time of want.

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Poem by Alice Taylor




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Refurbishment underway here


Debs 1991, Ballybunion and Newmarket

By

On May 15, 2017

In Uncategorized

Jim MacSweeney’s photo of a sparrow hawk won him a prize at the Rebel Cup photography competition.

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St. Michael’s Debs 1991



This photo was given to me by James Scanlon and he did the best he could do with the names.  James, whose family owned The Spinning Wheel  had left Listowel as his family went to live in Limerick before the Debs but he came back for the night out.

Included in the photo are Liam Kelly, Gerard McGuinness, Don Keane, Evan MacAulliffe, Shane Comerford, Mike Carmody, Seán Pierse, Eddie Bolger, John O’Riordan, Berkie Browne, Frank Quilter, Aidan O’Connor, Shane Hartnett, Michael Mann,Victor Sheehan, Donny O’Connell

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Ballybunion by the Sea


I’m going back to Kerry, From the Land of Liberty, 
To my little Irish home town, Ballybunion by the sea,
To walk along the old Slip Road, Where the breezes softly blow, 
And to get out to the ocean, Where the tides of memory flow.


To walk along the beach, Down below the Castle Green. 

Up to the lovely Cliffs of Doon, The likes you’ve never seen. 

From Listowel to Ballylongford and back into Tralee.
There’s no place else in Ireland like Ballybunion by the sea.


I’ll take a walk down Main Street, And see my friends from home, 
Go tell my own true sweetheart, I never more will roam,
Go tell the lads I’m coming back, That’s where I want to be,

 In my little Irish home town, Ballybunion by the sea.

In my little Irish home town, Ballybunion by the sea.


This song was written by Pecker Dunne and recorded by Larry Cunningham  Here

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Newmarket, Co. Cork


Newmarket is one of the small towns you pass through if you take the Rockchapel road to Cork. Let me tell you an interesting fact about Newmarket. It has three public statues and they are all women.

Alice Taylor is a very successful writer of novels, short stories and memoir. Her first runaway success was a memoir of growing up in Newmarket called To School Through The Fields. Her gift for nostalgia and vivid descriptions of a way of life that was dying caught the mood of the time and following their first success she has gone on the write numerous books describing village and parish life in her adopted Inishannon. She is a frequent visitor to Listowel Writers’ Week.

 Sarah Curran is a less down to earth heroine. She defied her family to allow Robert Emmett to court her and is seen by history as a tragic romantic figure.

 This doorway beside the statue of Curran struck me as a little odd. Did you ever see a padlocked door leading to a Main Street?

The third lady commemorated with a statue is Our Lady of Lourdes whose grotto stands at the east end of the town.

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“The French are on the sea and old Ireland will be free”




Ita Hannon photographed this French Navy training ship in the Shannon estuary last week.

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Circle of Friends




Lyreacrompane Development Association posted this photo to Facebook. It shows friends of  the late Fr. Pat Moore  circled around Mario Perez sand art tribute in Ballybunion on May 11 2017.

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