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: Australia Page 1 of 2

Listowel, Kanturk and Queensland

By

On June 5, 2025

In Listowel

Hospital chapel in May 2025

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Jew’s Retreat

I was fascinated by the Jew’s Retreat line in Gina Wheeler’s postcard .

She sent us this explanation.

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A New Fire Engine

Danny O’Sullivan ‘s archive of old photos of Kanturk has this sequence from 1958.

God help the poor volunteer firemen in that firefighting gear.

In those days everything had to be blessed. Canon O’Leary and unnamed altar boy carrying the holy water blessed the new fire engine and the firemen.

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St. Mary’s

Text from Listowel and its Vicinity by Fr. Antony Gaughan

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Did you have one of these?

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Cows

Last week I included Kate Slevin’s photograph of cows sunbathing on Rosbeg beach .

Julie Evans responded;

Dear Mary

In today’s Listowel Connection there is a great photo of cows on a beach. I saw this at much the same time I saw the attached photo on Facebook. The cow in my photo was caught up in the catastrophic floods on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales. It comes from a property in Wallanbah and was found 50 kms away, on the NSW coast, washed down the river to the ocean. Poor creature looks exhausted. An amazing story of survival. Its owner was identified by the ear tag and was on his way to collect it.

So many cattle, and other animals, lost in these floods and over 400 homes left completely uninhabitable. The recent flood is being called a one-in-500-years event.

Lovely to keep in touch through your ‘Connection’!

Love

Julie

Julie sent us some more links if you would like to read more about the flooding catastrophe.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-05-23/in-pictures-how-the-nsw-floods-impacted-people/105327638

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/may/23/destruction-everywhere-taree-cleanup-begins-as-nsw-floods-reignite-inter-agency-tensions

https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/nsw-floods-gallery-images-from-on-the-ground-as-extreme-weather-event-unfolds/news-story/29f60a38e71a0495911f05e78f9002fc

It is unimaginable to us who slept in our warm beds last night. The government promises assistance and the Prime Minister is visiting to see for himself. Meanwhile, in South Australia there is drought and terrible winds creating dust storms. The red dust has even blown across to Sydney and the city is shrouded in a dirty haze.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-05-26/sa-gets-burst-of-windy-weather-and-rain/105335724

Truly Australia is a continent of contrasts.

Julie shared this poem

Dorothea MacKellar – Australian Bush Poetry

My Country

© 1904 Dorothea MacKellar

The love of field and coppice, of green and shaded lanes,

Of ordered woods and gardens is running in your veins.

Strong love of grey-blue distance, brown streams and soft, dim skies-

I know but cannot share it, my love is otherwise.

I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping plains,

Of ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains.

I love her far horizons, I love her jewel-sea,

Her beauty and her terror- the wide brown land for me!

The stark white ring-barked forests, all tragic to the moon,

The sapphire-misted mountains, the hot gold hush of noon,

Green tangle of the brushes where lithe lianas coil,

And orchids deck the tree-tops, and ferns the warm dark soil.

Core of my heart, my country! Her pitiless blue sky,

When, sick at heart, around us we see the cattle die –

But then the grey clouds gather, and we can bless again

The drumming of an army, the steady soaking rain.

Core of my heart, my country! Land of the rainbow gold,

For flood and fire and famine she pays us back threefold.

Over the thirsty paddocks, watch, after many days,

The filmy veil of greenness that thickens as we gaze.

An opal-hearted country, a wilful, lavish land –

All you who have not loved her, you will not understand –

Though earth holds many splendours, wherever I may die,

I know to what brown country my homing thoughts will fly.

………………………………

“My Country” is an iconic patriotic poem about

Australia, written by Dorothea Mackellar (1885-1968)

at the age of 19 while homesick in England. After

travelling through Europe extensively with her father

during her teenage years she started writing the

poem in London in 1904[1] and re-wrote it several

times before her return to Sydney. The poem was

first published in the London Spectator in 1908 under

the title “Core of My Heart“. It was reprinted in many

Australian newspapers, quickly becoming well known

and establishing Mackellar as a poet.

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A Fact

Mummy Pig, mother of Peppa and George, gave birth to her third piglet, Evie Pig, in the very maternity hospital in London where Kate Middleton had her three royal children.

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Cahirciveen with Family, Boston Listowel Talk, Writers in Town and Diarmuuid and Gráinne

By

On February 26, 2020

In Uncategorized

Cahirciveen




I recently spend a lovely weekend in Cahirciveen with my whole family. Here we are in Kells Bay Gardens on a wet and windy Saturday.




We all did the rope bridge crossing.



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Listowel Comes to Boston



If you live anywhere near Boston this will interest you.

If you need to know a bit more about Vincent, here is a recent video from Listowel.ie

Vincent Carmody



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Writers at Writers’ Week




Movers and shakers of the Irish book world at Listowel Writers’ Week 2019;  Rick O’Shea, Colm Tóibín, John Boyne and Joseph O’Connor.

This year the festival runs from May 27 to May 31.

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Obituary to a Priest from a Family of Priests in Australia


Catholic Freeman’s Journal (Sydney, NSW)- Thu 29 Jun 1939

One of the oldest and best known Priests in the Archdiocese of Melbourne Rev. John Joseph Gallivan, died at Northcote early on Friday week in the eighty-third year of his age. On the previous Tuesday morning he attended the Jubilee Mass of Thanksgiving at St. Joseph’s Home, Northcote, and was one of the assistant deacons to his Grace the Archbishop of Melbourne. 

The announcement of his death caused deep regret throughout the Archdiocese, and especially at Northcote and Sunbury, where he had laboured untiringly for many years in the priesthood.

 Born in Listowel. County Kerry, Ireland, on February 8 1856. Father Gallivan entered All Hallows College, Dublin, and was ordained on June 24, 1880.   Had he lived another fortnight he would have celebrated his 59th year as a priest. He arrived In Melbourne on November 1 of the same year, and his first appointment was that of curate at Old Kilmore to Rev. M Farrelly. In May. 1886, he was appointed parish priest at Gisborne. twenty-five years later, Sunbury, with Bula attached, was made a separate parish, with Father Gallivan in charge and he remained there until 1923 completing forty-three years’ service in the Kilmore, Gisborne and Sunbury districts —six years as curate and thirty-seven years as Parish Priest There was great regret in Sunbury when Father Gallivan left there to take charge of St Joseph a Parish, Northcote. This was in April, 1923. 

In 1906 he revisited his native land after an absence of twenty six years. In June, 1930, he celebrated his sacerdotal golden jubilee, and his fellow-priests tendered him a dinner and

presented him with an address. A jubilee concert was held in the Northcote, Town Hall, and  celebrations were also in Sunbury and  Gisborne, where the jubilarian was most enthusiastically

welcomed. 

The obsequies of the deceased priest took place at St. Joseph’s Church, Northcote, his Grace Archbishop Mannix presiding and preaching the panegvric.

Among the priests who attended were Rev. P. Galvin. P.P of Katoomba, N.S.W.  Rev D. Galvin, P.P. of Springwood, N.S.W. and Rev M Calvin, P.P.. of Footscray, nephews.

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The Fianna in Beale


Local Historical Landmark

In a place near the cliffs three fields from our school there is a mound of earth which is locally called “Darby’s Bed” Leaba Diarmada. It is said that Fionn expected Grania’s hand in marriage but instead of she marrying Fionn she married Dermot. Dermot and Grania had to fly from the wrath of Fionn. They travelled round the cliffs from Ballybunion and they crossed a chasm on a pig’s back. This place is called Léim na Muice. On their travels they rested on a place only three fields from this school and ever since this lump of earth is locally called “Darby’s Bed”. We find on the Sopers’ and Miners’ maps that the right name for this place is “Diarmuid and Grania’s bed”. This place is in the townland of Kilconly.

Michael Lynch, VII, Doon, Ballybunion

June 27 1938

Information from people at home.

Duagh, The Imeldist, Listowel Friday Market and Australian Wildfires

By

On January 6, 2020

In Uncategorized

Ballybunion in late December 2019

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Nollaig na mBan

Today is Jan 6th, the feast of the Epiphany, when the three wise men made it to the stable in Bethlehem. Its the day when we put the last three figures into the crib only to take it all down shortly afterwards as we pack Christmas away for another year. This year I did a bit of a tour of the local cribs. I’ll bring a few photos later on although I think most people are ready to leave the festive season behind by now.

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Fr. Pat Moore R.I.P.

Duagh people remembered their good friend and beloved parish priest at Christmas time 2019


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Do You Remember This?

The Imeldist was a little booklet published by the Dominicans and sold in schools around

the country. It was filled with little moral stories and poems.  If anyone kept one please share it with us.

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Listowel Friday Market

I subscribe to en email service from Google called Google Alerts. Every so often I get an email alerting me to something that is happening in town. Sometimes it’s news, sometimes it’s not. Last week this was what it sent to me. 

Listowel Farmers’ Market is a the longest-running food market in Kerry with tens years under its belt. It is a hubbub of activity every Friday and brings vibrant life to the town square. You can’t miss it!

Address: The Square, Listowel 

Date/Time: Fridays 9am-2pm 

Contact: Anita Bodenham 

Phone: (087) 3936698 

E mail;  anitabodenham@nekd.ie


Maybe someone is making a New Year’s resolution to take a stand at the market. Maybe someone reading this has a great business idea and this might just be the impetus he needs to take his business to the Square on a Friday. Despite its title, I dont think there are too many farmers there these days.

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Pray for Australia


This reflection comes from the Redemptorists in Australia

Inexhaustible fire!

The climate is changing. The oceans are warming and drying lands have become frighteningly fire prone. Global warming bears down on humanity and indeed all of nature. Seasonally on red horizons and under black skies the world witnesses more frequent and ferocious bush fires, wild fires, forest and grassland fires.

Most people marvel at the interrelated systems that make up the universe and which have birthed the living earth, our home. Humans gazing into nature’s mirror see themselves as part of earth’s systems and know now it is time for systemic change. For such change to take root we have become urgently aware that humanity has a part to play.

Not only are humans the children of the earth, we are its stewards. Today people know that partisan responses to a warming earth are at least passé and at most irresponsibly destructive. They know that unless nations, vested interests, political parties and people on the street get beyond partisanship the earth will continue to burn as humanity flounders in a vale of tears.

Speaking of fire, Chilean poet Pablo Neruda (1904-73) mused: “Of all the fires, love is the only inexhaustible one.” It seems therefore that only love and its derivatives – respect, listening, cooperation and commitment will guide humanity to the new heaven and new earth of divine promise and human hope.

God of the universe, move our hearts, clear our minds and lead all peoples to bless the earth with a love for all that is good, all that is generous and holy, all that has been given us. Come Holy Spirit and renew the face of the earth. Amen.


Listowel girls, Australia, Craftshop na Méar and Evelyn O’Rourke: surviver

By

On March 13, 2014

In Uncategorized

Brenda Donovan,  Mary,Quill,  Noreen Kelliher, Marie Sullivan,  Mary Kenelly  and Patricia Tatten 

Patricia Tatten sent me this lovely photo of a group of Listowel girls, all of whom did their Leaving Cert. in Pres. in 1971. This photo was taken a few years earlier.

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A long way from Lovely Listowel!

My friend, Mary Sobieralski is back from a trip to Australia with her son, Mark. Here are a few photos she took on her travels of a very different lifestyle to ours here.

They saw all the sights and even got up close and personal with a joey.

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This is a photograph from the internet of the new Kansas City Library.  Cool or what?

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This photo from the RTE archives was taken in Limerick in 1968

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News from Craftshop na Méar

This lovely lady is Eibhlín Ní Ghliosáin of Tigh Polly Couture Dolls’ Clothes

On Saturday last she gave us a demonstration on how to make and envelope bag.

Some of the attentive class
choosing a button
putting finishing touches
Eibhlín top sewing
the bag
The lovely Sharyn draws the winning ticket
Yipee, I won……Happy Days!

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The lady on the far right in the below photo is Evelyn O’Rourke of RTE. She is pictured with myself and Kay Caball in The Seanchaí during recording of the Tar Abhaile programme we made  for TG4.
Why is Evelyn in the news?
You might have seen her on The Late Late Show promoting her recent autobiographical book, Dear Ross, where she recounts her extraordinary tale of finding herself pregnant while still on maternity leave and then discovering that she has breast cancer while still in the first trimester of her pregnancy and with a 6 month old baby at home.
When we met the lovely cheerful ever smiling Evelyn, we had no idea that she had behind her a tale of pain and suffering as traumatic as any we were about to tell her.

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Dates for the diary…….promising to be a great weekend.

Let it snow…. 1943 /45 photos, St. Michael’s young scientists

By

On January 14, 2013

In Uncategorized

Snow is forecast for parts of Ireland this week. Surely better than what they are experiencing in Australia. How will our young people who have emigrated from our temperate climate tolerate this?

From The Sydney Morning Herald

Red alert for freak weather

Date: January 11, 2013

Peter Hannam

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begin in 1 seconds.

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It is the heatwave that laps east and
west and seems hard to dislodge. Even tropical cyclone Narelle, wandering off
the north-west coast of Western Australia, has so far failed to budge the giant
heat cell over the continent.

“The system is holding its
shape,” said the manager of climate monitoring at the weather bureau, Karl
Braganza. “You are still getting the hot core over the inland.”

But the core is stretching eastward again, sending the mercury higher for
populated regions ranging from Victoria to Queensland. Brisbane had its hottest
night in seven years, with the temperature dropping to 25.8 degrees but the
city “was very humid so it felt more than that”, said Weatherzone
meteorologist Melissa MacKellar.

Sea breezes are forecast to keep the temperatures in Sydney around the harbour
to peaks of 30 and 34 degrees on Friday and Saturday, according to the latest
forecasts. But move only about 25 kilometres west to Bankstown, and days of 41
and 39 await.

Melbourne can expect 37 on Friday before a cool change arrives and keeps
temperatures down for a week. Most other parts of Australia won’t get much
relief.

“Our models are showing the high
pressure system dominating weather over southern and south-eastern regions of
Australia for the next week,” said Ms MacKellar.

The first eight days of 2013 made it
into the top 20 hottest days for Australia in more than a century in terms of
the average maximum temperature. The mean temperatures – averaging maximums and
minimums – smashed the previous record on Monday and then again on Tuesday.

The mean of 32.32 degrees on Tuesday
was almost half a degree higher than the record that had stood for more than 40
years until this week.

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This is a long story but an interesting one. Once upon a time in the 20th century Listowel had many photographers. One of these, when he was folding up his business, gave a box of “contact sheets” to Bryan MacMahon. Contact sheets were pages of tiny little previews of the actual pictures. Bryan kept these safely all his life and, no doubt, he knew the people in the photographs. 

Maurice MacMahon, when he was dealing with his father’s papers found only one of these sheets left. We will presume that Bryan had given the others to someone and not got them back. Anyway Maurice realized that these photos would be of enormous interest to Listowel people but he had no names for any of the people who were the subjects of the photos. 

Then followed the long story, involving Jimmy Deenihan, James Kenny, John Lynch, Dylan Boyer and ended with me. Everyone told me that the best person for recognizing people in photos is Margaret Dillon and they were right. Margaret has been assiduous in her tracking down of these people and now there are another cohort of people involved in identifying these Listowel people from the 1940s. Margaret has established that many of the people in the pictures were employees of McKenna’s and the photographs were taken beside Walshe’s drapery shop which later became part of McKenna’s.

Here is the first tranche of these photos with the information that Margaret has managed to glean about them.

The man on the left is John Michael Murphy who still lives in Church St. Margaret called to him to see if he could identify his companion. He couldn’t but thinks that he may have come from Ballylongford.

This stylish lady is the late Tess Murphy of Greenville. In one of these ironic twists she is actually Margaret’s god mother. She passed away a few years ago.

This man about town is Jack Ashe, uncle of Mary and Haulie who still live in Listowel. Jack lived at Convent Cross with his sister, Nora who ran a sweet shop.

(more to follow)

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I kid you not!!!!!!!!

Yes, it is what you think it is… the latest gadget to keep your toddler happy while he sits on the throne. Words fail me!

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From last week’s Kerryman…young scientists in 1983

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Did you watch this fellow and his road trip from Listowel to Tralee?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=recuQLATiGo

It has been pointed out to me that while the clip was published on Nov 6 2012, the video must have been taken much earlier because there are no roadworks and the road is in the old layout. Well spotted!

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