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: Athea Page 6 of 11

May Day, The demise of the Cuckoo, Athea and Tracey Grimes’ Hair Extensions opens

By

On May 1, 2017

In Uncategorized

Peggy O’Brien of Mallow Camera Club is the photographer

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John B.’s Annual Visitor



By summertime many of my
readers will have heard a particular cuckoo. It is possible that substantial
numbers may have heard the same cuckoo. If this is so console yourself with the
fact that just as no two cuckoos are alike so also are no two notes from any
one cuckoo alike. The cuckoo’s voice changes from day to day and fades away
altogether after a week’s residence in his summer home.

Recently I read a distressing
story about the decline in numbers of cuckoos visiting this country during the
summer. Despite the fact that the same applies to featherless visitors from
America and England should not make our concern for the cuckoo any the
less.While man multiplies all over the globe, the number of birds, particularly
cuckoos tends to decrease. The chief reasons for this is that man requires more
room and sacred retreats where cuckoos once advertised themselves are now
housing estates and factories. I am not arguing against these. What I am trying
to do is warm readers against a time when we will hear fewer and fewer cuckoos.
A time will come when certain luckless individuals will wait in vain for that
magical call which  is part of the fabric
of every summer. This is sure to give rise to shock and distress among the more
susceptible of readers and it is only fair that they should be warned against
the likelihood of summers without cuckoos. Personally I dread the thought but I
have long since insured against it and I would strongly advise others that they
should do the same. In the event of cuckoo failure in the not too distant
future we should be on the lookout for other signs of summer.

It takes a long time for
summer to establish itself. For a week or two it’s no different from its
predecessor. Gradually, however, it takes hold. More flowers appear and birds
grow excited. The sting dies in the wind and all the cows are calved. There are
many manifestations and each of us has his own special means of confirming that
the season is well and truly launched.

For me summer comes with the
arrival of a sixty year old balding Clare man, a chap of roving eye and rosy
cheek. For many years now he has presented himself at my bar counter at this
precise time. He is as constant as the cuckoo or, if you’re that way inclined,
as the Northern Star.

On each visit he brings a
female companion of far tenderer years than he. Yesterday, which was Sunday he
presented himself for inspection at 12.30p.m. He had with him a stout lady who
might have been twenty five or thirty. He seated her and called for a drink.
Two brandies with the barest tint of port wine in each if you please and where
would we get a good lunch, nothing too exotic.

I shake hands with him and he
introduces me to his girl of the moment. This is pure exhibitionism. He wants
to show me what a randy womanizer he is.The girl smiles demurely, adjusts her
buttocks and pulls an inadequate tweed skirt affectedly over fat red knees…….

John B. Keane

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Athea Revisited

I had little visitors during the school holidays. Athea is a place we all love to visit. Jim Dunn had told me that he has resumed work on his masterpiece and that he has refurbished his other mural so we headed for County Limerick at our first opportunity.

We were in luck. As we drove into the village we spotted him. Artist at work.

The girls were fascinated to be part of the village history. If they pass through Athea as adults with children of their own, they will point out Jim Dunn’s mural and say, “We were there when that was being done. We saw the brilliant artist paint a small piece of this magnum opus.”

Isn’t this lovely? I think Jim should definitely paint himself into the picture. As he poses here to show us how one of his characters will look, I think he fits in perfectly with this rural idyll.

We proceeded along down the street to view the upgrading work on the old mural. It has taken on a whole new lease of life. Jim has got an art  student from UL to help him for a while and she and he have restored this local scene to its former glory or, in actual fact, a state exceeding its former glory. Below is some of the detail from this magnificent artwork. All the characters, both real and mythical have local significance.



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Jim Beasley’s Engineering Works in O’Connell’s Avenue in April 2017

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Brand New Business Opens


Tracey Grimes has done a great job with the old Moriarty’s Drapery. She has transformed it into a luxurious and inviting hair extensions salon. I hope she is successful in her new venture. She deserves to be.

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Mayday, Mayday!




Today is May 1st. There are many traditions associated with May Eve and May Day. Here are a few from the National Museum of Ireland’s website

As in much of northern Europe, May Day in Ireland, was a celebration and welcome of the summer.

The May Bush

The May Bush was a decorated bush, which in rural areas was left outside the house. In towns, it was erected in a communal place.

May Poles

Originally tall trees were used but later these were replaced by formal poles erected in the town centre.

May Flowers

May Flowers were picked on the evening before May Day and this was often done by children who went garlanding for flowers. 

Bonfires & Dancing

Dancing was a feature of May bonfire celebrations. It also featured around the May Pole or where communal May Bushes were burnt.

Marian processions 

Much of the traditions associated with May have been incorporated into the Marian processions found throughout the country.

Butter stealing

May Day was especially associated with butter stealing: the stealing of the butter profit of the home.

Divining & Forecasting

May was also a time to study the weather and weather in the month of May would forecast what was expected to follow in the summer.




Closer to home people always visited the holy well in Knockanure on Sundays in May




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I’ll miss David Davin Power




To mark his retirement, RTE shared an old RTE Guide cover featuring David with his colleague David Hanley in the early days of Morning Ireland.

Listowel Boy Scouts, Happy Visits to Athea Remembered and Kissane Candles

By

On March 10, 2017

In Uncategorized

Scouts at the Convent

photo: Mike Hannon

I posted this photo last week with the thought that it might have been taken during the big scout jamboree in the 1940s.

Vincent Carmody tells me that it was more likely taken to celebrate the centenary of the the convent in 1944. The bunting would seen to support that.

Anyone know any of the scouts or remember the occasion?

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My First Visit to Ireland Winning essay


Irish Central is a website very popular with Irish American people. Recently the site ran a writing competition. The task was to write an account of your first visit to Ireland. The competition was won by Rosemary Griffin and her visit was to her father’s family in Athea, Co. Limerick.

Here are the photographs Rosemary sent to Irish Central to accompany her story and below is the winning essay.

My First Trip to Ireland by Rosemary
Griffin

These are some of my earliest
memories.  The smell of the turf fire, the sound of the stream, the
overwhelming warmth and familiarity of people I had never met…  

It was the summer of 1968 and my Irish-born father and
Irish-American mother packed up my 6 year-old brother, my two-year old sister
and my three-year old self to spend the summer with my Dad’s family in Athea,
County Limerick.  He hadn’t been home in seven years, and this was the
first time his family would meet us.  My mom changed us into pajamas as we
crossed the Atlantic, and I woke up to the most glorious view of Galway Bay.

It is hard now to wrap my head around what a different
place the Ireland of 1968 was.  We took our baths in a steel tub by the
fire.  We watched my uncle herd cows and milk them by hand.  We took
turns riding the donkey in the front yard.  And we ate chicken for the
dinner that had laid the eggs we ate for breakfast!

The very first day we arrived my sister bolted out of the
car and, as she ran excitedly, fell into the well at the bottom of the stream
that ran alongside my father’s home house.  Later we learned that the milk
(and other adult beverages!) would be floated in the stream to keep them cold
with the lack of indoor electricity.  The day my sister fell into the
“refrigerator” is a highlight of family lore to this day.

 Later that first week we went
into town to buy the Wellingtons that everyone told us would be necessary to
truly enjoy the fields for the summer.  I had seen the big, black rubber
boots and was not impressed.  But the moment I laid eyes on that bright
blue pair in just my size I was hooked!  My brother and sister and I ran
and splashed and jumped and climbed with our cousins for six weeks.  They had
to pry those blue wellies off my feet to get me back on the plane to New York.
 

But what I remember most is the constant flow of family,
friends and neighbors.  I remember the sound of the music and the taste of
the Taytos as we all went to the pub on a Sunday afternoon.  I remember my
grandmother making fresh bread each and every day.  I remember the burlap
bag that my grandfather filled with turf and let me pretend to carry.  And
I remember the joy of seeing my father with those he had left.

Sometimes I wonder whether my memories are real or
sparked by the small, square, date-stamped photos that were taken to describe
our summer to friends and family back home.  I’ve been back 18 times and
Ireland today is, of course, a very different place.  I am not one who
idealizes the past.  The Irish cousins who taught me to run through the
fields are grown-up friends who have all not only been to visit us in New York
but also have traveled the globe.  I don’t need the wellies or the turf
fire or the cows to remind me.  Although I no longer change into pajamas,
I know when I see Galway Bay that the memories are real.  I think I knew
then that Ireland was not just a place.  It was – and is – a part of me.

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Kissane Candles


We’re planning a wedding in our house and let me tell you that Listowel is one of the very best places to do this job. Absolutely everything can be sourced locally, everyone in the business is really professional and helpful and makes the whole experience a joy. I’m absolutely banned from revealing any details before the big day but I can give a sneak peak today at one little trip we took in the pre wedding trail.


We met Joe Kissane in his candle shop in Tarbert. He has met every kind of bride and bridezilla and he is infinitely patient. You can ask him to pull out every candle in the shop and he wouldn’t complain. Drawing on  his vast experience in the business,  he was full of helpful suggestions and advice.

I am documenting the whole process in photographs so look out for our experience of Finesse Bridal, Listowel Arms Hotel, St. Mary’s, Bailey and Co., MK Beauty, McAuliffe Flowers, Listowel Printing Works and more local people in due course.


The Gallant Greenville team, Namir Karim and Blackbirds

By

On February 27, 2017

In Uncategorized

Zebra in Fota



Photo by Chris Grayson




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There is nothing like a bit of local rivalry to inspire a poet.

The Gallant Greenville Team 

by John B. Keane

Come all ye true born
Irishmen

From here to Healy’s Gate

And I’ll sing for you a verse
or two

As I my tale relate.

You may speak about
Cuchulainn bold

Or the mighty men from Sneem,

But they wouldn’t hold a candle

To that Greenville team.

“Ha-ha!’ says Billeen
Sweeney,

“Sure I’ll tackle up my ass

And I’ll put on my brown suit

That I wear goin’ to mass.

I’ll hit the road to Listowel
town

By the morning’s airy beam,

And I’ll bring home Berkie’s
mutton

For the gallant Greenville
team!

“The dry ball won’t suit
’em”,

Said the pundits from the
town,

But they pulverized the Ashes

and they mesmerised the
Gleann.

Next came the famous Boro,

Their fortunes to redeem,

But they shriveled up like
autumn leaves

Before the Greenville team.

“’Twas the white trout that
done the trick,”

John L was heard to say.

“We ate them morning, noon
and night

In the run-up to the fray.

They hardened up the muscles

And they built up the steam

Until no power on earth could
beat

The gallant Greenville team.”

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Dear Old Athea

From; Born in West Limerick on Facebook

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This is Namir Karim with his friend and work colleague, Brigitta pictured in Scribes of Church St. Listowel



From Iraq to Listowel


(a love story)

There is nothing ordinary
about Namir. Just one of the extraordinary things about him, is that he is an
Iraqi Christian. Above and beyond that he is a Christian, a living example of
Faith Hope and Charity. His latest Christian act is to start a Friendship Club
in his restaurant in Ballybunion. Twice a week he  hosts a kind of men’s
shed for everyone. He  provides the venue and people can come and sit and
talk and just enjoy a bit of company. Everyone is welcome and if people would
love to come but have no way of getting there , Namir will do what he can to
solve that problem too.

So who is Namir Karim and how
did he find his way to North Kerry?

Namir met his wife who was
then his girlfriend in Iraq. Namir’s mother was very seriously ill and she was
being cared for in a hospital which was run by an Irish organization on behalf
of the Iraqi government. Kay Carr was nursing in this hospital and she grew
fond of her very ill patient and maybe a little fond of her son as well. Kay
advised the Karim family to take their mother home to die. She told Namir that
his mother would go straight to heaven. She had done her suffering on earth.
Namir remembers that as his mother left the hospital, Kay had tears in her
eyes. “ I wondered if the tears were for my mother or for me. Either way it
made me feel good.”

Namir contrived an excuse to
return to the hospital to see Kay. He said that he was having trouble with some
of his mother’s equipment. Kay offered to come to help the family sort it out.
Kay took a big risk in visiting an Iraqi home. Fraternising with the local
people was forbidden for the staff at the hospital. Kay stayed for dinner at
the Karim home that evening . Both she and Namir knew that this was more than
good friendship.

When Kay returned from a
short visit home to Ireland, Namir asked her out. They began seeing each other in
secret and they pledged their love to one another. All students in Iraq at the
time had to spend at least two years in the army. Namir was doing his
compulsort service in the army. He was in his final years of training to be a
civil engineer. A fellow soldier told a superior officer that he had seen Namir
with a ‘foreign’ girl. He got five days
in jail for the offence.

When Iraq invaded Kuwait
Namir’s national service was extended by a year. Initially Kay and the other
Irish citizens were not allowed to leave. Saddam Hussein’s regime was at its
height and it was very dangerous to flout any of his laws. Eventually Kay and
the others were allowed to leave. She bad a tearful farewell to Namir and they
promised they would find a way to be together once the war was over.

When the Gulf war started in
January 1990 all communication with Baghdad was stopped. Namir wanted no part
of the war and he devised a plan to escape active service. There was a rule
that if a soldier donated blood, he was given a week off. During this week,
Namir escaped with his family to a Christian area in northern Iraq. Due to a
very happy coincidence, his disappearance went unnoticed as the office building
based in Baghdad was bombed and destroyed and all records of who should or
should not have been present were destroyed.

When the war ended, Namir
returned to the city and gave a Red Cross worker he met a letter to get to Kay,
who he knew would be worried sick about him. Namir began to plot his escape. He
planned to get over the border into Jordan and if Kay still wanted him he would
sell up what he had in Iraq and fly to her.

Easier said than done. Iraq
did not want skilled engineers leaving at a time when it was trying to rebuild
the country after the devastations of war. Kay still loved him but getting to
her proved very tricky and involved a lot of lying. Love found a way and Namir
and Kay were reunited at Dublin airport on November 5 1992, a day before Kay’s
birthday. They married in a registry office when Namir’s visitor’s visa ran
out. They had their proper church wedding in Kerry in June 1992 with lots of
music, dancing and celebration.

Namir lost no time in assimilating into the Kerry community in which he now lived. He built on the skills he had learned from his mother who was a great cook and crafter. Namir started work in his brother’s restaurant, The Captain’s Table. Since leaving there he has gone on to own his own restaurants and  shops. Nowadays in 2017 Namir has two restaurants, Scribes in Listowel and Namirs in Ballybunion. He also has Craftshop na Méar in Listowel.  Namir has played badminton with the Listowel club and soccer with Lisselton Rovers.

Namir and Kay have two lovely adult children, Roza and Peter. Roza is named after Namir’s beloved mother who was the Cupid who brought Namir and Kay together.

Namir and Roza

More tomorrow


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 Blackbirds singing in the Garden of Europe


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Mea Culpa


Frozen River Feale 1963

Totally my fault that the link to this great video didn’t work previously.  I have now made the video public. I am grateful to  Charlie Nolan for alerting me to the problem.

This short video was shot by Jimmy Hickey and digitised by Charlie Nolan. It shows some local people walking and skating on the frozen river. Charlie has accompanied the track with the heavenly voice of Joan Mulvihill, who is far too young to remember the frozen river, singing My Silver River Feale.  It’s well worth a watch. Sorry again for messing it up the first time.

Con Colbert of Athea, Taur and when Moyvane won the Con Brosnan Cup

By

On October 4, 2016

In Uncategorized

St. John’s Theatre and Arts Centre, Listowel Square, Early Morning




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Con Colbert of Athea



Captain Con Colbert was 28 at the time of his execution in 1916. He was born into a republican family on a small farm in Athea. When his mother died, Con moved to Dublin to live with his sister. He is described as being full of fun but very serious about the cause of Ireland’s freedom.

He was in love with Lucy Smith whom he described as “the nicest girl in Dublin”. During the Rising he was involved in the takeover and occupation of Jameson’s Distillery. He was sentenced to death and he was shot by firing squad on May 8 1916. (Source; Simplified History 1916 by J. O’Reilly)

Athea remembers him in a street name, community centre and numerous organisations.

This recently erected bronze bust which was unveiled during a weekend of celebration is a fitting memorial to one of Athea’s most famous sons.

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Coco pop up shop









I met the lovely Sharon in  Coco, a shop that has popped up in The Square recently.

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Tour Roman Catholic Church



Dotted all over the countryside are beautiful churches which soon will be locked up and unused. Not so Taur, Co Cork. This little place a few miles outside Newmarket has a beautiful church perched on a hillside. Though a small and scattered parish they still have a priest. Will he be their last?


This is the view from the church door.



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A Moyvane ballad



THE CON
BROWNIAN CUP 1982

By: Cormac O’Leary

Our
thoughts often hover to that day in October 

When footballing history was made

 When the boys from Ardfert thought that
Moyvane they’d best

 But their hopes very quickly did fade. 

In the
town of O’Dorney, we played them 

And the tale is quite easily told,

 For when the great game it was over ‘Twas a
win for the Green and the Gold.

Chorus.

I pledge you Moyvane men and the deeds they have
done,

The gallant Con Brosnan, Tom Stack on Red Rum:

Their memories we’ll cherish those good men and
true,

And here’s to the men Of Nineteen Eighty Two.

2. I’ll start with our goalie, The great-hearted
Jodie, 

He cleared balls, from near and afar,

 And great at
full-back was the young Ritchie Stack, 

In football he sure will go far.

On the right was the gritty Noel Sheehan, He
stemmed the on rushing tide,

And sound as the Rock of Gibraltar Mike Mulvihill
held the left side.

(Chorus)

3. And fit as a fiddle, Johnnie Stack in the
middle, 

His fetching was something to see;

Those two gallant triers With dash and with fire, 

Eamonn Fitz and the young Bobby Sheehy.

Sean Walsh had a great game at centre, 

 high in
the air he did soar,

And Hamish was never once beaten,

And two lovely points he did score.

(Chorus)

4. Now Thomas and Eamonn on the wings they were
flying,

 They played
with great dash and great flair.

Teddy Keane like a beaver Was ever so eager,

And Donal commanded the square. On the forty, sure
Johnny was brilliant,

And shone like the bright Polar Star

 And clever
in every endeavour, Paddy slipped a few over the bar.

(Chorus).

5. Our substitutes too, All good men and true,

 Ever ready
to answer the call

To our Chairman and Trainer, Selectors all four,
Great praise to them one and all.

Old timers like us too were happy And our glasses
we quickly filled up

And toasted the young generation, Who brought home
the Con Brosnan Cup.

(Chorus).

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A Great Month for Music in St. John’s


Be sure to check out the programme of events in St. John’s in October because it has music for all tastes. The great RTE Vanburg Quartet are coming, as is Johnny McEvoy and, if you love Irish music, Cormac Begley of the well known  West Kerry musical family is in concert with special guests on Thursday October 27 2016.

Murhur School, Corn Dollies and Organ Donation

By

On September 6, 2016

In Uncategorized

Murhur School in the late Eighties


 Photo from Moyvane Village on Facebook

Teachers in Murhur NS in the late eighties. 

Marie O’Callaghan, Ena O’Leary, Patricia Houlihan, Gabriel Fitzmaurice.

Mary Madden, Nola Adams and Anne Prendiville

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Listowel Handball Alley as it looks nowadays

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A Corn Dolly





The late Seamus Heaney knew these corn dollies well. In his childhood he saw them being made in his native Mossbawn. He captures the memories and associations of these ancient amulets better than anyone else.

As you plaited the harvest bow

You implicated the mellowed silence in you

In wheat that does not rust

But brightens as it tightens twist by twist

Into a knowable corona,

A throwaway love-knot of straw.

Hands that aged round ashplants and cane sticks

And lapped the spurs on a lifetime of game cocks

Harked to their gift and worked with fine intent

Until your fingers moved somnambulant:

I tell and finger it like braille,

Gleaning the unsaid off the palpable,

And if I spy into its golden loops

I see us walk between the railway slopes

Into an evening of long grass and midges,

Blue smoke straight up, old beds and ploughs in
hedges,

An auction notice on an outhouse wall—

You with a harvest bow in your lapel,

Me with the fishing rod, already homesick

For the big lift of these evenings, as your
stick

Whacking the tips off weeds and bushes

Beats out of time, and beats, but flushes

Nothing: that original townland

Still tongue-tied in the straw tied by your
hand.

The end of art is peace

Could be the motto of this frail device

That I have pinned up on our deal dresser—

Like a drawn snare

Slipped lately by the spirit of the corn

Yet
burnished by its passage, and still warm.


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Ladies’ Day Just got Better



This is the bus the kind folk on Listowel Race Committee is going to hire to take ladies to The Island on the Friday of the Races. I’m not sure if you can avail of it if you are not wearing high heels and if you would just like a lift.


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A Sermon and a story for you


While I was in Asdee church I picked up their August 2016 newsletter and I read this story. I’m cutting it short here but it is attributed in the newsletter to Tom Cox;

In 2013 a Brazilian millionaire announced that he was going to be like the Egyptian pharaohs and bury his treasure with him. His greatest treasure was his Bentley.

He was lambasted in the media for this ostentatious show of wealth and foolishness so he called a press conference at his house. The media turned up in big numbers to see if he would really carry out his promise. Diggers were at work in the garden digging a big car sized hole.

But Mr. Scarpa didn’t bury his beloved car.

Instead Mr. Scarpa delivered this message, “I didn’t bury my car, but everyone thought it was absurd when I said I would. What is more absurd is burying your organs, which can save many lives. Nothing is more valuable than life. Be a donor and tell your family.”

Now the story

Regular readers will know that my only sister died in 1964 of kidney failure. She had been ill for a year before she died and she was in and out of hospital frequently. Her best friend was a girl called Marion and they were thick as thieves. If kidney donation was an option, they would have given one another a kidney in a heartbeat. For that year while they were apart they wrote regular letters to one another and they invented a secret code to write private things about boys just in case the letters fell into the wrong hands. All very innocent girly stuff. They were only 15.

Marion kept all the letters and has treasured them all these years. Her friend’s death had a profound effect on her and she has never forgotten her. 

Recently she took one of these letters to a tattoo parlour and the tattoo artist scanned my sister’s signature along with the coded message and Marion had it tattooed on her forearm.

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