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: Elizabeth Dunn Page 1 of 2

More cartoons, The Joys of Being Cocooned, a poem and a fact

By

On April 17, 2020

In Uncategorized

Millenium Arch and Bridge Road, Listowel in March 2020

<<<<<<<<<


Love in a Time of Pestilence


“Let us live that they may say of us, when things were at their worst, we were at our best.”

I have to take a minute today to thank all the people who have been so nice to me in my cocoon.

 I have the very best neighbours in the world.

As well as doing my shopping, I get the newspaper delivered to my door, a care package for my birthday, a bottle of wine when my cellar was running low and I feared wine may not qualify as essential supplies, and a surprise lunch from Lizzie’s Little Kitchen. This is in addition to the usual jobs the Moylan family do for me, like mowing my lawn, spraying my weeds and providing

over -the- wall chats.

My pharmacist, Oonagh Hartnett made a special delivery of my medication.

I was blown away by this gesture from my friends, Liz and Jim Dunn.

Below is my present from my beloved goddaughter, Elizabeth Ahern. The inscription on the lovely Eileen Moylan bracelet says “Storms make the oak grow deeper roots.”

The oak is the symbol of the Ahern clan, my birth family.

I have become an expert on many social media platforms like Zoom, Hangouts and Houseparty. I video conference with my family and friends on these. My children ring me every day. I have never talked to them so much since they were children and lived with me. I play Pictionary with Cliona on  Houseparty and  I’ve even joined a quiz with Orla Kennelly and her friends. I’ve been to a Zoom birthday party.

I may yet make a TikTok!

The postman has brought me some gems to treasure.

One of the pleasant side effects of this lockdown is the daily contact with my family and friends. My phone has never rung so often.

Photos keep me abreast of what is happening with my family.

My daughter in law, Carine, is making me some facemarks.

I’m baking the recipes my friends share on Facebook. Thank you, Maria Sham, for this one.

I didn’t get to taste this one my sister in law made for Easter.

I’m reading and puzzling.

I light a candle for the front line soldiers and victims of this deadly virus.

Of course I am very grateful to all the blog followers who have offered me thanks and encouragement. I am especially thankful to everyone who is helping me out with content.

I know it’s not over yet, not by a long way, but I’m registering my thanks at this juncture.

<<<<<<<<


A Picture Paints…….

Mike captioned this one Escape from the Nursing Home

<<<<<<<<


 A Covid Rhyme


Today we have a new poet on the block. This is Daniel Murphy’s Banjaxed Limerick.

Banjaxed Limerick #19

There once was a Canon named Caoimhin

Who, wanting no Face Masks in Heaven,

Announced that ’Due to Viral Strife

Not Coviding thy Neighbor’s Wife  

Is now our Commandment Eleven.’



<<<<<<<

I Know for a Fact


The French company Bich changed its name to Bic to stop people in English speaking countries calling it Bitch.


Alice Taylor, Pisheógs, Cotter na Gruaige and Plans for Writers’ Week 2020

By

On February 12, 2020

In Uncategorized

A dog who loves the beach  Photo by Bridget O’Connor

<<<<<<<<<<


A Writers’ Week Memory


It must have been 1988 or 1989, because To School Through the Fields was published in 1988 and its author, Alice Taylor is the subject of my story.

Alice Taylor and me in Philips Bookshop in Mallow at a book signing in

November 2019.

Back in 1988 Alice Taylor was starting out on her literary career and she came to Listowel to attend Writers’ Week. I was a Mammy with a little girl who was anxious to take part in the Writers’ Week fancy dress parade. I thought up the perfect dress- up character for Clíona. Easy peasy as all the props and costume requirements were easy to acquire.

I dressed her up in her school uniform, tied a few old books together with a leather strap/belt and found a sod of turf. Ta dah! Alice Taylor goes To School Through the Fields.

As we were dispersing after the parade the bus with the people on the bus tour was just arriving in The Square. Alice Taylor was alighting from the bus when she spotted the little girl dressed as herself. She called us over, gave Clíona a fiver and posed for a photo. Poor Clíona hadn’t a clue who the lady was but she pocketed the fiver all the same. She didn’t really appreciate the fact that she had just met one of Ireland”s up and coming memoir writers.

Statue of Alice Taylor in her native Newmarket, Co. Cork

<<<<<<

Listowel Writers’ Week Art Committee



Jim Dunn, Catherine Moylan, Carol Stricks and Elizabeth Dunn finalising a brilliant Art programme for Listowel Writers’ Week 2020, which will run from May 27 to May 31 2020

I got a sneak peak at what’s in store and its really really good.

I’m on the 50th Commemoration Committee and we are desperately looking for old photos, or stories from the last 50 years of festivals. A big thank you to the people who have sent stuff already but there must be lots of stuff in albums and attics that others would enjoy seeing. Take a look for us, please.

<<<<<<<<<,



The Bittling Woman of Rathea


Yesterday’s story from Rathea raised many questions. I think we are all agreed that it refers to some kind of pisheóg behaviour. The dead cow at the end is the clue here.

Dave O’Sullivan found the meaning of the word bittling in a dictionary of Scots Gallic

Dictionary to the Scots language

It would appear she was washing clothes and beating them clean. The reference to hearing her is obviously to hearing the beating sound as she pounded the clothes.

Pisheógs were often invoked to bring good luck to one family and bad luck to another. The death of a cow would be a huge stroke of bad luck. Pisheógs often involved the stealing of milk or butter. A man told me that he heard of a family who could work pisheógs. The person casting the spell would come to the cow house of the person to be cursed, would take the spancel and would work it back and forth under the best cow in the herd. That cow would dry up and the pisheogie person’s cow would produce gallons of milk.

Another story he told me was of a man who could work pisheogs.  When he went to mass on Sundays, when it came to the consecration, he would turn his back on the altar and face the congregation behind him.

(the power of pisheogs was thought to come from the devil)



<<<<<<<<



Cotter na Gruaige


A Pied Piper story from Rathea in the School’s Folklore collection

About 74 years ago a most unwelcomed visitor occasionally went past the village of Duagh, as it was the main road from Listowel town to Cork City for carting all farm produce. The name of this visitor was Cotter na Gruaige, he used to set charms, and also curse people for little cause and everybody was afraid to meet him. He was conspicious looking. He wore his hair hanging to his waist at his back and his beard hung to his waist in front. His mode of travelling was a pony about 20 years old and spotted like a magpie. 

He often went without causing any trouble but on one occasion while passing through Duagh the school children were at play in the school.grounds and when Cotter na Gruaige came on they threw puddle on him and his pony. He immediately drove his pony into the school yard to accuse the teacher named (Mr James Dore) who met Cotter in the  yard and ordered him out on the road. When on the road Cotter said to the teacher “I am going now but I am leaving you my army.”

 Master Dore lived 100 yards from the school, in a nice thatched residence which stands to this day. When school was over Dore walked up home, but to his amazement the thatch of his house was torn and thrown down by an immense crowd of rats. He entered the house but could not eat his dinner as the rats came up on the table. He was half frightened and did not know what to do. He went to the Parish Priest Father O Regan and told him his story. The priest went to see the rats and when he saw them he told the teacher, he should find Cotter na Gruaige and pay him to withdraw his charm. 

Next day the teacher set out on search of Cotter and found him in the evening at the house of a man named Nolan of Brosna. The teacher apologised and asked Cotter to come next day and take away the rats which he promised to do. The teacher came home that night and told his story to everybody including Father O Regan. 

Next day about noon Cotter na Gruaige was coming to the village and crowds flocked round him to see what would occur. Cotter rode his pony to the yard in front of the teachers house, put his hand in his pocket and drew out a bugle which he sounded and out came all the rats on the road. Cotter kept playing his bugle and riding slowly on his pony until he came to a small river South of Duagh named Glashamore. When he came to the river bank all the rats were around him, except one which he asked for, and the teacher said one rat remained in the yard. 

Cotter na Gruaige ordered two rats to go for the missing one and they went immediately and brought the largest rat of all which was blind. He walked between his two Guards led by a cord which he held in his mouth. When the blind rat landed on the river bank Cotter ordered all rats to disappear and all the rats jumped into the river below the bridge and were out of sight in a second and from that day to this no rat was seen at Dore’s house.

COLLECTOR
Dómhnall de Staic
Gender
male
Address
Duagh, Co. Kerry
INFORMANT
father
Relation
parent
Gender
male
Address

Duagh, Co. Kerry

<<<<<<<,

An Anniversary Present, Tidy Town Visitors and a Concert to look forward to

By

On October 26, 2018

In Uncategorized

This is the Marian grotto at O’Connell’s Avenue, Listowel.

The grotto in context

<<<<<<<

When it’s your Anniversary and You’re Married to an Artist

This lovely Athea couple, Jim and Liz Dunne, celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary recently.

This is Jim’s anniversary card for Liz. Liz has the finest collection of Jim’s artworks, one for every birthday and anniversary and for numerous other occasions as well.

<<<<<<<<


Footprints and Main Street





<<<<<<<<


Tidy Town Visitors



On Saturday October 20 I ran into my friends from the Tidy Town Committee in The Square . They were n’t painting or picking up litter. They were hosting a delegation from Kilrush Tidy Towns. They were showing them around our lovely town and taking them round to visit their various projects.
Isn’t that a lovely aspect of the Tidy Town movement. Everyone wants everyone else to do well and if one town can help another they will.

<<<<<<<


A Concert in St. Mary’s





Glashas, The Building of O’Connell’s Avenue and Women in Media in Ballybunion 2018

By

On April 23, 2018

In Uncategorized

Photo; Pat O’Meara, Mallow Camera Club

<<<<<<<


The Kerryman Unbuttoned


From a Shannonside Annual, Redmond O’Hanlon writes of his experience of the distinct idiom and expression of Kerry speech

The woman of the
house where I stopped to enquire told me that the people I was looking for lived
only the pelt of a stone from the road. “Mary here will carry you up to the
headland, sir, ”  she added, “but you
will have to jump the glasha.” My proferred escort was a minute barefooted
maiden of about ten summers. Looking at the wisp of femininity and remembering
my eleven and a half stone, I thought of Sinbad, the Sailor and The Old Man of
the Sea. But the glasha was still a problem. What was it at all and how did one
go about jumping glashas? I wondered as we walked on. And did the daily jumping
of such obstacles in Kerry account in any way for the ease with which the
county’s ball players rose for the high ones in Croke Park?  And then light dawned. “Glasha,” I repeated
as I walked along with the wee one, that must be the Irish glaise, a stream.
And so we came to it. I said goodbye to my guide at the headland and duly
jumped the glasha. No bother this to me in those days. A rangy leggy lad I was
then and the jumping of glashas for years to come was to be one of the
privileges of a job that brought me all over North Kerry and West Limerick.

(more tomorrow)

<<<<<<


Communion Class in Scoil Realt na Maidine



Photo credit; Ned O’Sullivan on Facebook

<<<<<<,

Building O’Connell’s Avenue


(Photos and Story from Vincent Carmody’s Living History on Facebook 2016)



In the 10 years after our Civil War, very little was achieved, nationally, in the building of local authority housing. Around 1930, the members of, the Listowel U.D.C. were concerned with severe overcrowding in many properties and the use of many more with very poor sanitary conditions. Following a survey of the town’s housing stock, they presented their findings and sent a plan to the Department Of Local Government. In response they were informed that the Listowel Council had been granted funds for the building of 104 houses. At this time, it was to be one of the largest local authority building contracts in the country.

The contracting tender, in 1932, was won by a local building contractor, M.J. Hannon. This in itself was a great bonus to the town, as it guaranteed a substantial number of years’ work for the town’s tradesmen and laborers, with, of course, a great spin off for the town’s businesses.

Some years ago, I spoke at length, and took notes, from Mr Jim (Red) O’Sullivan of Charles Street. Jim, who had worked with the Hannon Builders since he left school, was officer manager at the time of the construction, (he is pictured in the second last row), unfortunately, with the passage of time, the notes were misplaced.  However, I can recall a number of the things which he told me. The council took soundings on a possible name. One of the early contenders, before they decided on O’Connell’s Avenue, was Eucharistic Avenue, this was on account of the Eucharistic Congress which was been held in Dublin, in the summer of that year. He also explained, that the wage bill per week was, if I remember correctly, in the region of £400. At the time, this would have been an enormous sum of money, Jim would collect the money from the bank first thing each Saturday morning, after which, he would be escorted by an armed detective back to the office. There he would make out the pay packets in readiness for paying each man, at the conclusion of the half-days work on Saturday. All the blocks for the building work were manufactured on site.

The land on which the houses were built had been purchased from Lord Listowel, prior to it being built on, it had been used as meadowing by the O’Donnell family, family butchers in Listowel. The main entrance to the houses was from Convent Street, Later a roadway was built to connect up with Upper William Street. The building of this later facilitated the erection of St Brendan’s Terrace. 

The official opening was on Monday, June 17th 1935. It was presided over, by then Government Minister, Sean T. O Kelly. ( He, ten years later, in June 1945, became Ireland’s second President, replacing the outgoing Douglas Hyde).

The first residents had taken over their houses, prior to the official ceremony. In the main these were couples with young families. Today, a third generation of these families own many of these houses. Over the years there has been mass emigration from the area. However, those who remained, have contributed greatly, to the, social, cultural and sporting history of the town. 

The pink photograph is of a  pamphlet which was distributed to the local businesses, asking them that they allow their employees time off, to participate in the ceremony.

Local men who were part of the official party are seen here in conversation withe the minister. They are Eamon Kissane, T.D., Eddie Leahy and John McAuliffe in conversation with Minister Seán T. OCeallaigh.

<<<<<<

Women in Media 2018



I was in Ballybunion at the weekend for this super event. John Kelliher photographed me with some of the Writers’ Week gang who were there enjoying a festival at which they didn’t have to work.

Of course I was working away on your behalf. John snapped me as I snapped another photo for Listowel Connection. I’ll bring you my report during the week as well as an account of my trip to St. John’s for Many Young men of Twenty and to the Seanchaí for the history lecture.

John Kelliher’s photo of me taking a photo of some Limerick ladies with Rachel English

Elizabeth Dunn, Annette Fitzgerald, Rachael English, RTE journalist and author, Mary Cogan and Elish Wren

Photos; John Kelliher

Last of my Photos from Listowel Writers’ Week Opening Night 2017

By

On June 9, 2017

In Uncategorized

May 31 2017 was a lovely evening in Listowel Town Square. St. John’s presided over The Square as it has done for hundreds of years and the best Writers Week ever was about to get underway in The Listowel Arms.  And I was there……

<<<<<<


People at Opening Night


“If I picked out one highlight though, one moment that’s opened a new door in my mind, it was Richard Ford on Second Acts. Richard opened the celebrations and my heart soared as he spoke about the very issue that is playing constantly on my mind right now – and one I had only minutes before been discussing in the bar with Richard Skinner, Director of the Faber Academy, the second novel. I had only just been saying to Richard that the first novel is like the love of your life, a grand passion but with the second, you get 50,000 words in and start to feel queasy as you wonder should you even be going out with this one – in today’s Tinder world, should you have swiped left perhaps?”   Rose McGinty

I don’t agree with Rose on this one. Rose is a writer and here for a literary festival. I am a local and here to share the enjoyment of local people in rubbing shoulders with the greats of Irish literature and also the up and coming writers and future stars. 

Actress turned author, Ruth Gilligan came with a posse of friends.

Gabriel  Fitzmaurice

Catherine and Con Kirby

Jim and Dónal Daly

Eamon OHargáin

Maria McGrath with Sarah Webb and Óisín McGann

Norella Moriarty, Liz Dunn, Bernie Carmody and David Browne

In Killarney this morning a proud mother is opening Listowel Connection and seeing her lovely son at work at Listowel Writers’ Week.

This is a photo of two John Griffins. The older of the two is John Junior Griffin and the lovely young man on his left is John Griffin of Killarney. This John’s mother is a Hannon from Listowel and a follower of this blog.

John was in Listowel working as a sound engineer during the festival. I kept running into to him as he lugged his big amplifier from location to location on morning walks. He was invariably polite, pleasant and professional – a credit to his Listowel family.

Catherine Moylan was first on stage.

She urged us to make friends with our neighbour. No better woman than Norella for befriending people.

Next up John Spillane

Then Liz Dunn

 Colm Tóibín

 Richard Ford

The silver award sat on the table awaiting presentation to Brendan Kennelly

This was my highlight. Brendan sat down and regaled us in his mellifluous tones with stories and songs. He recited his most famous poem, Begin, which he told us came to him in a moment of inspiration after major heart surgery. He sang John B. Keane songs and he held the audience in the palm of his hand as of old. He was where he clearly loves to be, holding court among his own people and fellow writers and lovers of literature. It was a special moment in time.   And I was there…..

Looking westward I beheld an unmistakable forehead among the crowd near the door. Alan Cumming had entered the room. What a lovely man. He posed for photos and chatted like one of our own.

I forgot to mention that among all of this there was prize giving. Kit de Waal won the big one with her novel, My Name is Leon and Vona Groarke won the poetry prize. Lots of other people also won prizes. You can see the full list on the Writers’ Week website.  And Laura Enright sang…heavenly voice!

What a night! And I was there…

Page 1 of 2

Next

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén