Tag: Christmas candles

An entrance to town which some older people call the Canon’s Height or The Custom Gap.

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January Fair

Jan 3 2019 was the first horsefair of the year in town. I forgot all about it so my photos for you are stolen from Moss Joe Browne’s Facebook page. If you like them, there are lots more where they came from

Jason Rogers with Tom “Bawn”McCarthy and his granddaughter Saoirse and Pat Fitzgerald at Listowel horse fair.

The O Connor family from Listowel with Seán Hartigan at the Listowel horse fair.

Bernie O Connell with Pat Sweeney and his grandchildren at the Listowel horse fair.

The following account of fairs long ago is from Dúchas, the National folklore collection.

“Fairs are not held in this district nor does anyone remember fairs being held here. They are held in Listowel which is the nearest town to us. Very often before a big fair buyers or jobbers went around to the farmers’ houses to buy calves and sometimes cattle. This is still carried on. There are no accounts of former fairs being discontinued or of fairs being held on hills, near churchyards, near castles, or near forts. In Listowel the fairs are held in the streets, in the square, and in the market place. No toll was collected in the streets but for every cow you’d carry into the square you’d have to pay seven pence and for every pig you’d carry into the market place you’ have to pay a penny. This money was given to Lord Listowel. Luck money is always given. It is called luck money. For every pig or bonham a schilling is given and for a cow half a crown. If prices are high a pound is given as luck money for a horse but if prices are low five schillings is given. When a bargain is made the seller holds out his hand and the buyer strikes it with his clenched fist. A piece of hair is cut out of the cows side to show she is sold. A dab of paint is then stamped on it. This is done sometimes on the cows back.”

Baile an Bhunánaigh (B.) (roll number 16851)
Location: Ballybunnion, Co. Kerry; Teacher: P. Ó Hailin

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Ballyheigue Races

December 30 2019 Photo: Moss Joe Browne

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Listowel Badminton

I don’t have a date but maybe it’s just as well……

Photo and names from John Junior Griffin

(Many of the ladies would have married in later times but I list the names as I knew them then)

Front row, left to right;

Katsy Kennelly, Noelle O’Donovan, Evelyn Breen, Marie O’Connor, Marina Behan, Pamela Behan, Mary O’Donoghue, Mary McCarthy, Sharon McAuliffe

Middle row;

Ian Nugent, Martin Stack, Michael Quelly, Mickey Kelliher, Derek Dillon, Liam Dillon, Sean Comerford

Back Row;

Jnr. Griffin, Jimmy Dore. Brendan Behan, Tom Heaphy, John Dore

( Sadly, as you know, Martin Stack has since passed away. Many of the others are scattered worldwide)

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Candles

Candles were once a regular item on everyone’s shopping list.

The following was recorded by a child in the Dúchas folklore collection;

My grandmother used make candles out of the fat of cows. She used buy the fat from the butcher and after they killed a cow for their own use. First of all she used put it into a mould and put a cord in the hole at the end of it and knot it. Then she used pull the cord through the mould and pour in the fat and leave it so for a day or two. The candles are about as wide as Christmas candles now.

Collector- Nora Shine, Address, Derreen, Co. Limerick (Kilbaha School)
Informant, Patrick W. Shine. Relation parent, Address, Derreen, Co. Limerick.

Candles were always part of Christmas fare in every house.

Junior Griffin told me this;

Just to follow up on your mention on the one pound Christmas candles in recent times.

I would have sold a lot of those in my years in McKenna’s and before the age of the modern electric candles these were very popular.

I used to do both the white and red one pound candle. The red was a bit more expensive than the white. On querying why so from the representive on one occasion I was told that the white was looked upon as a “household necessity” whilst the red was in what was looked upon as being in the fancy goods department . You would be wondering where our civil servants get the brain storms to make decisions like these.

Kerryman 1994, Christmas candles, a Christmas poem and a Generous Mill owner in Famine time Listowel

By Listowel Connection

On December 7, 2018

In Uncategorized

Canon’s Height

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Kerryman Christmas 1994

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Christmas candles

From Patrick O’Sullivan’s A Year in Kerry

In olden days the Christmas candle was the big white one pounder. Anything smaller was regarded with something bordering on contempt., unworthy of the title “Christmas” candle. They were unfavourably described as “little traithníns of things”. Tháithnín being the Irish for a wisp of straw or a blade of grass. When the electric candle arrived in the mid sixties the newcomer was dismissed as being nothing like a rale candle at all.” I vividly remember all those “rale candles” shining in the windows of the farmhouses as we made our way to midnight mass on Christmas Eve, the nip of frost in the air and the sky “alive with stars.”

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A Christmastime Thought

Maura Brennan Esmonde is one of the faithful blog followers we lost during 2018. Maura was always one to send a joke or a quote or an uplifting or thoughtful poem.

Here is the first poem she sent me for Christmas 2013. In her memory I’m posting it today

TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS,
HE LIVED ALL ALONE,
IN A ONE BEDROOM HOUSE MADE OF
PLASTER AND STONE.

I HAD COME DOWN THE CHIMNEY
WITH PRESENTS TO GIVE,
AND TO SEE JUST WHO
IN THIS HOME DID LIVE.

I LOOKED ALL ABOUT,
A STRANGE SIGHT I DID SEE,
NO TINSEL, NO PRESENTS,
NOT EVEN A TREE.

NO STOCKING BY MANTLE,
JUST BOOTS FILLED WITH SAND,
ON THE WALL HUNG PICTURES
OF FAR DISTANT LANDS.

WITH MEDALS AND BADGES,
AWARDS OF ALL KINDS,
A SOBER THOUGHT
CAME THROUGH MY MIND.

FOR THIS HOUSE WAS DIFFERENT,
IT WAS DARK AND DREARY,
I FOUND THE HOME OF A SOLDIER,
ONCE I COULD SEE CLEARLY.

THE SOLDIER LAY SLEEPING,
SILENT, ALONE,
CURLED UP ON THE FLOOR
IN THIS ONE BEDROOM HOME.

THE FACE WAS SO GENTLE,
THE ROOM IN SUCH DISORDER,
NOT HOW I PICTURED
A CANADIAN or U S SOLDIER.

WAS THIS THE HERO
OF WHOM I’D JUST READ?
CURLED UP ON A PONCHO,
THE FLOOR FOR A BED?

I REALIZED THE FAMILIES
THAT I SAW THIS NIGHT,
OWED THEIR LIVES TO THESE SOLDIERS
WHO WERE WILLING TO FIGHT.

SOON ROUND THE WORLD,
THE CHILDREN WOULD PLAY,
AND GROWNUPS WOULD CELEBRATE
A BRIGHT CHRISTMAS DAY.

THEY ALL ENJOYED FREEDOM
EACH MONTH OF THE YEAR,
BECAUSE OF THE SOLDIERS,
LIKE THE ONE LYING HERE.

I COULDN’T HELP WONDER
HOW MANY LAY ALONE,
ON A COLD CHRISTMAS EVE
IN A LAND FAR FROM HOME.

THE VERY THOUGHT
BROUGHT A TEAR TO MY EYE,
I DROPPED TO MY KNEES
AND STARTED TO CRY.

THE SOLDIER AWAKENED
AND I HEARD A ROUGH VOICE,
“SANTA DON’T CRY,
THIS LIFE IS MY CHOICE;

I FIGHT FOR FREEDOM,
I DON’T ASK FOR MORE,
MY LIFE IS MY GOD,
MY COUNTRY, MY CORPS.”

THE SOLDIER ROLLED OVER
AND DRIFTED TO SLEEP,
I COULDN’T CONTROL IT,
I CONTINUED TO WEEP.

I KEPT WATCH FOR HOURS,
SO SILENT AND STILL
AND WE BOTH SHIVERED
FROM THE COLD NIGHT’S CHILL.

I DIDN’T WANT TO LEAVE
ON THAT COLD, DARK, NIGHT,
THIS GUARDIAN OF HONOR
SO WILLING TO FIGHT.

THEN THE SOLDIER ROLLED OVER,
WITH A VOICE SOFT AND PURE,
WHISPERED, “CARRY ON SANTA,
IT’S CHRISTMAS DAY, ALL IS SECURE.”

ONE LOOK AT MY WATCH,
AND I KNEW HE WAS RIGHT.
“MERRY CHRISTMAS MY FRIEND,
AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT.”

The poem was written by a marine

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Folklore and Truth

Every so soften I include in a blog post an item from the Dúchas collection of folklore. This lore was collected by school children from their elders. Much of it is old wives tales, superstitions and gossip and really needs to be taken with a pinch of salt.

I posted this item last week;

This account of the Famine in Listowel was contributed by a W. Keane to the schools’ Folklore collection and is now in the Dúchas collection.

The old mill by the river in Listowel (once N.K.M. factory) was built out of the stones of the part of Listowel knocked by Sir Charles [?] in 1600. The time of the famine the mill was full of corn and soldiers were placed on guard to mind it. Leonard was the man in charge of the mill. They used the bags of wheat inside and there were soldiers outside the door and the people used to go down to get the wheat and they used be fighting the soldiers. Finally the wheat went bad and had to be thrown out in the River Feale.
Cars used go out every day from the workhouse in Listowel to collect dead bodies & they used be carried to Gale Churchyard. But as Gale church was too far from Listowel they got a field near the town on the road to Ballybunion now known as Teampulleenbawn where they buried the bodies in pits or else with coffins with sliding bottoms, & used the coffins all over again. There were auxiliary workhouses: St.Michael’s College, Listowel, was an hospital; Stalls in Clieveragh known now as “The Barn” was a workhouse & “The Model Farm” on the Ballybunion Rd. “The Model Farm” is so green amid a stretch of poor land. The people say that it was the sweat of the paupers carrying manure on their backs that made it green. You’d get £33 for a pig.

And then I got this via email.

With regard to the Leonard man at Listowel mentioned above (Maurice Leonard was the mill-owner) and the wheat denied to the starving people in Famine times, TF Culhane wrote on Page 111 of his book, ‘Home Thoughts from Abroad,’ that the Listowel mill-owner, Maurice Leonard, was remembered as having given ‘six thousand barrels of flour’ to the starving during the Famine years.

I’m happy to put the record straight.

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Thoughts

My most recent week of thoughts for the day is at the link below

Just a Thought; Radio Kerry

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Book launch

On Sunday Dec. 9 2018 at 7.00p.m. in The Listowel Arms, Vincent Carmody will launch another title to add to Listowel’s canon.

Listowel , a Printer’s Legacy is the story of printing in North Kerry from 1870 to 1970

In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries printed posters and pamphlets brought us news of auctions, plays and other entertainments, upcoming fairs and markets and a host of other information.

This book is an important part of our social history. Sunday evening promises to be a great evening with Billy Keane as MC and Gabriel Fitzmaurice, Seán Kelly, Bryan MacMahon and Kay Caball speaking.

I photographed Vincent at his door on Thursday December 6 2018, chatting to a fellow local chronicler, Michael Guerin.

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: Christmas candles

January Horse Fair 2019, Badminton in its Heyday and a bit about Candles

Kerryman 1994, Christmas candles, a Christmas poem and a Generous Mill owner in Famine time Listowel