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: drowning

Mayor’s Award for LWW, Garda John O’Donnell R.I.P.. Auction at Gurtinard House and changes on Charles Street

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On January 28, 2019

In Uncategorized

Listowel Garda Station in 2019




Church Street, Listowel, January 2019


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Mayor’s Award for Writers’ Week

The great literary festival that is Listowel Writers’Week was recognised last week at the presentation of the Mayor of Kerry’s awards,

If ever there was a definition of blue sky thinking, Writers’ Week is a living example. The literary festival goes from strength to strength. Now it is expanding outside a short week in summer into a year long engagement with other festivals and events. The visionary committee well deserves this award.

Accepting the award on behalf of everyone in Listowel Writers’ Week are;

Left to Right; Eilish Wren, Joanna O’Flynn, Máire Logue, Norma Foley (Mayor)

 Madeleine O’Sullivan, Miriam Griffin and Elizabeth Dunn

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The Late Garda John O’Donnell




I told this story before in 2012 but I think it’s worth telling again.

Garda John O’Donnell who was in his early thirties was stationed in Kanturk, Co. Cork.  In the summer of 1940 he was on holiday in Ballybunion with his wife and three young children.  He told a relative that he would have preferred to holiday in his native Burtonport but petrol was rationed during the war  and he couldn’t secure enough fuel for the journey.

On the evening of July 20 1940 he was swimming near Castle Point when a freak wave swept him and other swimmers on to the rocks. John drowned while attempting to rescue two local girls, Vera and Patricia O’Carroll. The girls were eventually rescued by others who were present.

Listowel’s Dr. Joseph McGuire was the coroner who presided over the inquest which was held on the following day. The jury commended Mr. Jack McGuire, then a medical student, for his bravery in taking out a life buoy into rough seas in a vain attempt to  save John O’Donnell who was being dragged out to sea by the strong current.

In an extra tragic twist, the body of John O’Donnell was formally identified by his brother who was then only 17 years old.

In the aftermath of the tragedy, letters were published in The Kerryman calling for life guards on Ballybunion beach and the presence of a rescue boat and a competent crew to man it.

Garda O’Donnell was remembered in Kanturk, where he had been living for six years, as a quiet, unobtrusive, helpful brave man. 

He was posthumously decorated by the state for his bravery. 

This courageous man was the grandfather of the very talented artist, playwright and composer Mike O’Donnell.

Dave O’Sullivan found a few newspaper cuttings relevant to the awful tragedy.

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Auction at Gurtinard House in 1868


In June of 1868, Lord Listowel’s agent, James Murray Home sold everything in Gurtinard House in an “unreserved auction”. The notice was published in the Evening Post of May 23 with a list of items to be disposed of. It makes interesting reading

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Then and Now




Charles Street, January 2019

The Gap, Bridge Road, Recognising Drowning

By

On May 7, 2018

In Uncategorized

Christopher Grayson is a man whose photographs often grace these pages. One of the other strings to Chris’ bow is running.  In this great photo he marries both hobbies. He took the photo while he was taking a rest from running in The Gap of Dunloe.

Sonia O’Sullivan was delighted to meet Chris when he ran the Cobh Marathon, named in her honour, recently.

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St. John’s

An early summer 2018 picture of this Listowel landmark.

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A Rare old Library Photo

Denis Quill sent us this photo of the old library in The Bridge Road. The photo was taken from the church steeple.

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A Timely Warning about water safety


Except in rare circumstances, drowning people are physiologically unable to call out for help. The respiratory system was designed for breathing. Speech is a secondary or overlaid function. Breathing must be fulfilled before speech occurs.

         Drowning people’s mouths alternately sink below and reappear above the surface of the water. The mouths of drowning people are not above the surface of the water long enough for them to exhale, inhale or call out for help. 

When the drowning people’s mouths are above the surface, they exhale and inhale quickly as their mouths start to sink below the surface of the water.

         Drowning people cannot wave for help. Nature instinctively forces them to extend their arms laterally and press down on the water’s surface. Pressing down on the surface of the water permits drowning people to leverage their bodies so they can lift their mouths out of the water to breathe.

         Throughout the Instinctive Drowning Response, drowning people cannot voluntarily control their arm movements. 

Physiologically, drowning people who are struggling on the surface of the water cannot stop drowning and perform voluntary movements such as waving for help, moving toward a rescuer or reaching out for a piece of rescue equipment.

         From beginning to end of the Instinctive Drowning Response, people’s bodies remain upright in the water, with no evidence of a supporting kick. Unless rescued by a trained lifeguard, these drowning people can only struggle on the surface of the water from 20 to 60 seconds before submersion occurs. (Source: On Scene magazine: Fall 2006 page 14)

This doesn’t mean that a person who is yelling for help and thrashing isn’t in real trouble — they are experiencing aquatic distress. Not always present before the instinctive drowning response, aquatic distress doesn’t last long, but unlike true drowning, these victims can still assist in their own rescue. They can grab lifelines, reach for throw rings, etc.

Look for these other signs of drowning when persons are in the water:

o   Head low in the water, mouth at water level

o   Head tilted back with mouth open

o   Eyes glassy and empty, unable to focus

o   Eyes closed

o   Hair over forehead or eyes

o   Not using legs

o   Hyperventilating or gasping

o   Trying to swim in a particular direction but not making headway

o   Trying to roll over onto the back

o   Appears to be climbing an invisible ladder

So, if a crewmember falls overboard and everything looks okay, don’t be too sure. Sometimes the most common indication that someone is drowning is that they don’t look as if they’re drowning. They may just look as if they are treading water and looking up at the deck. 

One way to be sure? Ask them, “Are you alright?” If they can answer at all, they probably are. If they return a blank stare, you may have less than 30 seconds to get to them. And parents — children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, you need to get to them and find out why.

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Something old, something new

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On September 26, 2011

In Uncategorized

Today Vincent shares with us another of his insightful but somewhat sad memories of Listowel  in the not so long ago.

Vincent Carmody’s Recollections

Listowel’s Private Maternity Homes.

The blog of Wednesday 21st September contains a nice picture of the highly decorative house front of 60 William Street. Now containing the chiropody practice of Gina Scannell, this house was once, as the blogger rightly named it, a cottage maternity home.

This maternity home was run under the supervision of Nurse Nora Chapman (nee Moriarty) from the mid 1940’s until the late 1960’s. Nora trained and worked as a midwife in England. She had returned to her hometown to take up a position in the maternity unit of the newly opened Listowel District Hospital in 1940.  Some years later she decided to open up her own maternity facility at her home in William Street. She was assisted here by her daughter, Doreen, who had also trained as a nurse. The doctors who attended here were Dr. McGuire and Dr. Corridan.  

There was an identical cottage at number 58, long since knocked, also owned by the Moriarty family, (where the Chinese Restaurant is now and which housed at various times, Mangan’s Garage, Maloney’s Garage and Printing Works and Lonergans Supermarket)

Another such maternity home was operated at 65 Church Street, this under the supervision of Nurse Catherine O Donavan (nee Adams). She was originally from Glin, Co. Limerick. Catherine, who had done her training in the Rotunda Hospital in Dublin, applied for the position of District Maternity Nurse in Glin. Failing to be appointed there; she applied for a similar position in Listowel, where she was successful. She opened her maternity home in the early 1920’s and it closed when she retired back to her home village of Glin in the early 1960’s. One of the doctors who attended at this home was Dr. O Connor of the Square. A constant and faithful employee of Catherine’s, was a well known popular local woman named Hannah Irwin. When Nurse O Donavan left Listowel, Hannah went to reside at a house in Colbert Street with her long time friend, Bridie Burns.

A tragic event which occurred on July 1st 1949 must have had a deep and lasting effect on Nurse O’ Donavan. Her nephew, John Gabriel Commons, was brought from Dublin on the previous evening by his father and mother for his summer holidays in Listowel. The next afternoon he joined with several other boys from Church Street who were going swimming in the local river. They went to a location known as the Corporals. As they swam John Gabriel got into difficulty and had drowned before he could be rescued.  

The third such maternity home operated both as one and also as a cottage hospital. This was Greenlawn Nursing Home, (afterwards The Kennedy Home) this was both owned and operated by Dr. Johnny Walsh.

And now to something new.

Yesterday was one of those “pet days”, as we used to call a fine sunny day appearing out of season, so we headed out to Ballybunion. Isn’t it lovely?

While a horseman exercised his horse, a bridal party were setting up a photo shoot.

Collins’s was enjoying a steady trade on its last day of opening. A sign in the window wished us all a good winter in its inimitable Kerry way.

      

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