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: Chris Grayson Page 2 of 5

Christmas Shop, More Photos from THE launch and Dublin Marathon 2019

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On October 28, 2019

In Uncategorized

Harvest Home


This lovely display is in Abbeyfeale church.

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Christmas is Coming


Displays in Listowel Garden Centre Christmas Shop

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Memories of the Launch of A Minute of Your Time


Mother and daughter Anne and Cora Darby on stage as Anne read a reflection which was prompted by an incident involving Cora.

My old friend, Assumpta O’Sullivan came from Dublin. She is originally from Killarney.

Barbara Walshe was there on the anniversary of her dear father’s death. Many of the reflections in my book are about grief and remembrance.

Brenda Enright was there.

I have known Bridie O’Rourke almost since the first day I came to Listowel.

Canon Declan read me from the altar and reminded the congregation that I was launching my book across the road from the church straight after mass.

Helena Carmody was one of many of my friends from the Vincent de Paul shop who came to enjoy the night with me.

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Chris Grayson, Wild life Photographer and Runner



On the left is Chris Grayson whose  beautiful photographs I often feature on Listowel Connection. He and his friend, Fozzy Forrestal acted as pacers in yesterday’s marathon.

Tennis players in action, A Mystery Box, Olive Stack Gallery and Thumbing in Kerry in 2012

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On February 22, 2019

In Uncategorized

Keen photographer, Chris Grayson, is often out and about with his camera. He has a fascination for old abandoned houses. He lets the picture tell the story. It is often a very sad one.

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Coming to the end of the Tennis Photos


I have really enjoyed bringing you these photos of young people now in their thirties and forties, a cohort who dont often contact me re Listowel Connection. I hope they have enjoyed reliving their tennis days through Danny’s photographs.

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A Mystery Box



While walking on Charles Street the other day, I spotted this box attached to a road sign. Does anyone know what it is?

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When an Artist has a Shop




Isn’t this so stylish?

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Thumbing A Lift


In the good old safer days, thumbing was an accepted way of getting from A to B. Many motorists were obliging and usually stopped for a hitch hiker.

Recently in The Leinster Leader a journalist called Robert Mulhern recounted his exploits with this method of getting around. Here is an extract from the piece which tells of his experience in Listowel…

Travelling from London to Listowel for the races in 2012, I realised upon landing at Kerry Airport that there was neither a bus nor a train to Listowel, or anywhere else it seemed.

It was a beautiful late September evening, so I stood out the front of the terminal considering my options, when a woman I’d been chatting with on the plane recognised me and stopped.

“I’ll drop you to the cross, about five miles away,” she said. “You’ll get a lift easy enough from there.”

When we got to the cross, the first car I hailed pulled in. It was a jeep actually.

“Where ye for?” said the driver.

“Jet O’Carroll’s,” I told him, “near the Main Street.”

On the drive in he told me he was the general manager of Listowel Racecourse.

Then he dropped me right to the door of Jet’s, and threw in some complimentary tickets for the next day’s racing.

Of course this way of getting around is long out of fashion.

But I’ve long thought that, with its low carbon, energy efficient stamp, this thumbing lark is the very transport solution that would be front and centre of any environmentally conscious transport strategy.

Robert Mulhern is a London based journalist contracted to RTE’s The Documentary on One. To contact him, email mulhernrobert@hotmail.com

Group Cert English, Listowel people at Raceweek and Peggy Rorke’s cure

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On September 11, 2018

In Uncategorized

Robin on bramble Photographed by Chris Grayson

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Group Cert English paper 1963

The Group Cert was an exam that was taken by pupils in Vocational schools. There used to be a segregation of pupils into academic schools which taught subjects like Latin and Greek as well as the core subjects, and vocational schools which prepared pupils for the world of work. These vocational schools alone had an exam after two years called Group Cert. Many pupils then left to take up apprenticeships or to go into jobs.


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…And Lion




This iconic piece of stucco is being refurbished.

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Raceweek Back in the Day


Seamus Buckley’s photos show spectators watching the barmen’s race during race week sometime in the 1950s or 60s

Yesterday’s Raceweek photos brought this response from Gerard Leahy;

Great memories Mary, and you are correct, all of us emigrants cast our minds back to Listowel during Race Week. I loved seeing the old Race Cards. Stuart Stack ( Damian Stack ‘s father) used to distribute bundles of cards to us kids on Race morning and we would sell them up and down the street, the square and the pubs for a shilling, making 100% profit. So many memories of Race Week but Jimmy Hennessy, King of the Wrenboys will always stand out!!!


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Did Her Sister make a Miraculous Recovery?



I photographed this headstone in the nuns’ graveyard at the Nano Nagle Centre in Cork. The Nano Nagle Centre, which is well worth a visit, holds the graves of both  Presentation and the Ursuline sisters. It is on the site of the old South Pres. I’ll be coming back to it here because I made a second visit there recently and was fascinated by the marvellous work of preservation and information that The Presentation Sisters have done at this site which is a museum, a peaceful garden and a visitor centre. I’ll have to go back a third time because, by bad timing, I missed the guided tour by Sr. Bride Given, formerly of Listowel whom I am told is an excellent guide.

Back to this child, Anne Rorke of County Dublin who was buried with the nuns.

Dave O’Sullivan did a bit of research for us and the story he found refers to Anne’s sister but sheds enough light for us to  surmise about Anne and her fate.

The Andrew Rorke referred to in this cutting is obviously Anne’s father. In 1840 he belonged to the ‘Friends of Civil and Religious Liberty”,  was a follower of O’Connell’s and obviously wealthy enough to be able to send his daughters to the Ursuline Boarding School  in Cork to be educated.

The next newspaper story is the fascinating one.

For those of you who have difficulty reading the newspaper cutting, here is the gist of it;

Margaret (Peggy) Rorke of Tyrrellstown in Co. Dublin contracted measles while a boarder in the Ursuline Convent School in Cork. This is 1823 when an outbreak of measles could result in deaths in a crowded community. Anyway Margaret was in a bad way, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat,  could only sit in a chair because to lie prone would have resulted in her lungs filling up with fluid.

In this state she is attended by the nuns and is preparing for death, when they send for a famous priest and miracle worker to give her the Last Rites, then called Extreme Unction or Holy Viaticum (Bread for the journey to heaven). 

This priest is Prince Alexander Leopold Franz Emmerich of Hohenlohe-Waldenburg-Schillingsfürst


He performs the last rites on the dying girl, she spends some time in prayer and, lo and behold, she throws off the covers and walks for the first time in three months. She is completely and undeniably cured.

The newspaper comments


“Peggy Rorke’s cure will ne’er be forgot

By those who were there and those who were not”

From this story we can surmise that her sister Anne died of some complication of measles in 1815.  Because they had suffered the loss of one daughter, the family would have done anything to save the life of Margaret, including bringing a miracle priest from Germany. Daniel O’Connell may even have had something to do with it.

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Sunday at the Races


Sean and Killian were with me in Kerry for the weekend. We went to The Island on Sunday and we had a great time. Not too much luck with the horses but a good time nonetheless.

There was a great crowd in attendance.

Milk stands, Ladies golf, Adare for Tea and and A New Irish Rose of Tralee

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On August 23, 2018

In Uncategorized

Running in Carrantoohil




Chris Grayson running in The Devil’s Ladder

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 Do you Remember the milk stand?

They’ve kind of made a feature of our old milk stand in the yard at home. My brother doesn’t have cows any more so the old stalls have been put to other uses. He found an old milk churn and put it on the milk stand as a reminder of the old days. The idea of the stand was that when the churns were full of milk and therefore heavy to lift, they could be rolled from the stand on to the donkey cart. At milking time this stand would be home to a gaggle of mewling cats, all begging for their ration of the warm milk. This was in the day when my mother milked the cows by hand.

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A Famous Ballybunion Golfer

I took this photo of a picture in The Bunker Bar in Ballybunion. This is Mrs Rosalie Venn. She was a Shortis from Ballybunion. She was the first lady captain of Ballybunion Golf Club in 1941. Her daughter, Angela Gilmore, became lady captain on 1971.

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Tea for Two



Have you been to Adare Manor since it’s make over?

I haven’t.

But people I know who went rave about the opulence and luxury of the place. This is the little tea caddy my friend brought home. I’m glad she told me that it was special before I drank it or I’d never have guessed, Underwhelmed!

In my humble opinion the cup of tea I had with Judy MacMahon a while ago was far superior.

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International Rose of Tralee 2018



Kristen Mate Maher is not your stereotypical Irish colleen. She is a stylish confident accomplished young lady who will be a great representative for Ireland in her year of Rose duties.

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Listowel letter in yesterday’s irish Examiner



Nature photos, BlazeAid, Big Maggie in 1969 and 2018 and Welcoming the rain in summer 2018

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On August 2, 2018

In Uncategorized

Nature Photography

Photo; Chris Grayson

Readers of this blog know that I love a good wildlife photograph and one of my favourite wildlife photographers is Chris Grayson. The above photo is one that he entered for an Irish Times biodiversity competition. He didn’t win but when you look at the others he was up against, you’ll agree that it was a huge achievement to be shortlisted.

Here is the link;  11the Annual Biodiversity Photographer of the Year Competition 2018

and here is what Chris said about his image;

Blue Tit by Chris Grayson: “I took this pic in my Garden in Glenbeigh, Co Kerry. This beautiful Blue Tit and partner are happily nesting in a tiny gap in the stonework of my house. I caught this shot as she/he headed very quickly into the nest. They’ve been a joy to watch daily collecting caterpillars to feed their nestlings. Beautiful to see every day.”

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Bert Hickie and a Different kind of volunteering



Bert, who grew up in Duagh follows Listowel Connection from Melbourne

He wrote:


Hi Mary,

  I love your blog & your entry about Molly made me LOL as I used to breed Cocker Spaniels when I lived in Duagh as a gorsoon to make pocket money which was spent quickly & foolishly, in hindsight. 


I have lived in Melbourne Australia since 1971 but I’m still considered Irish because I never lost the “accent” so they tell me . I retired in 2014 & started travelling around Oz in a campervan, & I’m on my second trip to Western Australia at present , but I also volunteer with BlazeAid, an organisation that helps people affected by fire, cyclones, floods, & droughts. 


BlazeAid.com

 I’m currently at a blazeaid camp in Cobden SW Victori,  replacing fences destroyed in “the St Patrickis Day bushfires” .  Its the middle of Winter here & its very similar weather that we used to get in late Nov in Irl. Cold,wet mud everywhere, thunderstorms, hail & sleet & sometimes frost in the mornings, but its all in a good cause & we get well looked after.



Your blogs keeps me in touch with all the local happenings in Listowel & the surrounding districts & sometimes little snippets of information that take me back to my days at St Michaels when I shared the same class as Batt Hannon, Seamus Brown, Michael O Keeffe Jim Keane, Maurice McMahon ,”Martin Sheehy & David Shaughnessy & Teddy Halpin,”all three  of whom I believe are deceased, also in that class was Thomas O Connor, Eugene Doyle ,John Moran, but my memory fails me on the other names.

Unfortunately, I cant say my days at St Michaels were happy ones.


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John B. Keane’s Big Maggie




Big Maggie was first seen in a professional production in The Olympia in 1969. In the audience was a Kildare impresario, Paddy Melia. He couldn’t wait to produce it with his amateur actors, The Kilcullen Players. An approach was made to John B. and, lo and behold, The Kicullen Players in Kildare produced the first amateur Big Maggie. They took it around to several drama festivals to much critical acclaim.

Dave O’Sullivan found the newspaper accounts for us.

My connection with the Kilcullen Players is to Johnny O’Neill who played Byrne. My daughter is married to his grandson.



Johnny’s daughter, Mary was only 10 when her dad played the part and she wasn’t allowed to see it.  So when the Corofin Dramatic Society  performed it In St. John’s, Listowel as part of of the Remembering John B. festival, Mary was delighted to finally get an opportunity to see the great play. Let’s say she understood why her parents deemed it unsuitable.




Mary (O’Neill) Mc Kenna and her husband Tony met Conor and Joanna at the festival.



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Welcome rain


After weeks of drought It’s great to welcome a drop of rain.

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