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: Jack McKenna Page 2 of 3

UCC, Cork, Finesse RaceWeek Window, Paul and Gary O’Donovan’s win and Jack McKenna’s autobiography

By

On September 17, 2018

In Uncategorized

Fuchia in my garden in Autumn 2018

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Town and Gown


Recently I took a trip down memory lane to UCC. It’s a very different place nowadays to when I was a student many moons ago. It is a place very aware of its history.


This hovel which has been erected at the Gaol entrance to the college gives us an idea of the great divide that existed between students at the then Queen’s College and the ordinary folk of the surrounding city in 1845 when the college was founded.

The V under a crown on this finial stands for Queen Victoria and this angel greets you on your arrival at the arch into the Quad.

Irish harp, English Lion and Welsh dragon. I think they thought that the Irish and Scottish people were all the one and so covered by the harp.

 There were certainly no cranes on campus in my day but the college is continually expanding nowadays.

 The statue of Queen Victoria has been replaced with St. Finbarr, in line with the motto of the college; “Where Finbarr taught, let Munster learn.”


These photos were taken in the president’s garden. This was walled in and off limits to students in the 1970s  when I was there.

There is still a rift between town and gown in Cork. While in town I also saw the other side of life there.

I snapped this homeless man sleeping in daytime outside the city library.

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Finesse Window at Race Week 2018


The ladies at Finesse devoted their entire window display in tribute to their friend, Mike Lawlee R.I.P.



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World Champions

The charming self deprecating O’Donovan brothers, world champion rowers…no specific Listowel connection that I know of but all Ireland loves them. They represent the best of us.

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Races week 2018



I took lots of photos but it will take me a while to recover the energy to process them all. Here’ a taster.

It was Ladies’ Day and there was a party going on a bus stop .

Throw me down something. No humans, just ducks in The Feale

Security was tight. Anyone underage and to show that they had no alcohol on them.

This is Cliona McKenna who used to sell race cards here in the good old days when you could get a card and a biro for €1.50

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An Invitation to a Book Launch



One for everyone in the audience

You are all invited to The Seanchaí on Wednesday next at 7.30 p.m. for the launch of an important book, telling the story of an extraordinary Listowel man. The man is Jack McKenna who has reached his 100th year and has led a varied and interesting life.


A Stack with a Listowel connection and a mural

By

On August 19, 2014

In Uncategorized

Fr. Michael J,. Stack and his brother Bob Stack from Listowel, pictured in Dublin in 1940. (photo from the internet site Man on the Bridge) Fr. Stack was later parish priest of Ballydonoghue.

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Jack Maguire and his wife Margaret (nee Hughes) 1940 in Dublin

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Entertainers

Daniel O’Donnell and Dolores Keane phtographed in Killarney recently  (photo from Daniel’s Facebook page)

Honor Heffernan before her recent concert in St. John’s

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McKenna Stack Listowel connection


Recently among the claims for compensation that I included in the blog there was an account of Jack McKenna and the losses he suffered during the Troubles.

Across the seas in South Carolina a regular blog follower read this item with interest and this is the email she wrote;

“I thank you so for your newsy notes and photos.  John Mckenna of Market St is an ancestor of mine though my Great great grandfather Edmund Mckenna and Ellen Stack.  I have been in contact with his daughter in law Susan Mckenna and her husband Jack, through written letters in the past year.

Each morning I look forward to opening up your email with a “cuppa” coffee and smile as I read and view your postings.

Sheila Ryan Falkowski

South Carolina”


I replied to Sheila. The gist of my email,  “Tell me more”

Sheila’s reply;

“Miss Mary, I am only too pleased to share anything with you.  I am 73 and have been doing my Ancestry for about 2 years. I am 100% Irish as I had DNA done also.  All my dads family came from Waterford (the Walls) and Wexford, (the Doyles) and Nenagh, Tipperary, (the Ryans and Guilfoyles).

My moms side are the Mckennas, Stacks, and a Jane Ffoulkes, (I guess originally from a place called Thurles? evenutally to Kerry- my Edmund Mckenna( B: abt 1802, married an Ellen Stack , birthed abt 9 or 10

children of which I have 8 baptismal records, one of their daughters, Bridget Ellen born abt 1840, came to the USA about 1852, lived in Macon, Georgia during Civil War-married a Philip William Flood in 1860 in Macon.  He came from Cty Cavan and was a mason, served for the South during the Civil War-  they moved to Manhattan, NY in 1868 and had 11 children, 8 of which survived.

Ellen Stack was my great great grandmother on my moms side and her name is listed as Ellen Stack on my great grandmothers death cert from New York City in 1926.  I just can’t seem to find Ellen Stacks fathers name, but suspect it is perhaps Maurice as Maurice is a name featured several times starting with a son of Ellen Stack and Edmund Mckenna.  I am surely aware of the Irish naming patterns.  Oh the mysteries of life as we search for our dearly departed and ponder their trials and tribulations and imagine their clothing and daily lives.

Every time I see “Listowel connection”  a little butterfly flutters in my “tum” and what a lovely start to my day!

I am more than happy to extend an email invitation to my Ancestry trees as they are public, but will only do so if you are interested.  And I shall continue to comment if you don’t mind.  I do hope Jack and Susan are faring alright-they are of an advanced age however very strong and of good health.

Regards

Sheila Mary”


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Unusual image from WW1


photo from Limerick 1914 on Twitter

“A German messenger dog races to the rear to deliver a message.” (c. 1916)

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Listowel Mural




Work is underway on this mural at the side of Existance Youth Café

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Rose of Tralee sculpture

(photo: Official Rose of Tralee twitter feed)

Some Roses take a photo of escorts at the new sculpture on a roundabout just outside Talee


Mario Goetze, God’s Acre, Turf cutting and a trip down Memory Lane

By

On April 29, 2013

In Uncategorized

We knew him when he was only a lad.

This is a photo of Shane Murray(Ireland) and Mario Goetze(Germany) taken in Listowel in 2008.

This is the same Mario now aged 20 in his Borussia Dortmund colours. He is in the news because he practically single handedly beat the great Real Madrid on Weds. last.



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Last Wednesday night in St. John’s we were treated to a rare glimpse into Listowel in times past, as seen through the lenses of John Lynch and Jack McKenna.

John McKenna played some apt tunes on the the piano as we watched footage never before seen in a public setting in Listowel.

Jack McKenna has been recording life in his native town since the 1940s. He recorded the FCA in the Square as they drilled in preparation for invasion in the 1940s. He recorded Seamus Wilmot’s funeral, Dick Pierse’s wonder horse, the Feale under ice and a frosty Sunday morning in the Square in the 1950s. 

These are just some of the gems we watched on Weds. night.

The feeling was one of attending an old black and white silent movie, but one set in a familiar location. It was a privilege to watch these old movies in the company of the film makers.

I took a few photos of attendees on the night

Claire and Bernie Carmody

Liz and Marie McAulliffe

Jim Sheahan and John Lynch
Sue and Jack McKenna with Sue Taylor
Veronica Corridan and friend

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Dick Carmody took a great interest in the posts about An Teampall Bán. He shares this poem with us which he wrote earlier this year . The poem is about God’s Acre, a burial ground of unmarked graves in Ballybeggan, Tralee. This graveyard dates back to The Famine and times of other tragic sufferings.

God’s
Acre

God’s
Acre bids me enter through the well trodden stile of crafted limestone

Man’s
handiwork separating the living from the dead, the busy from the rested

Therein
repose the remains of the unmentioned, unlisted and oft forgotten

In
distant times of want, denial and inhumanity they came here for final rest

Alone
they sometimes sought it out, cold refuge against an even colder neglect

Last
faltering steps taken to meet their Maker in the soft embrace of Mother Earth

Or in
make-shift carts a final journey shared from workhouse or roadside refuge

Drawn
over limestone paths by souls rehearsing their own inevitable last journey.

In
our own time of plenty and opportunity we still seek out this relic from the
past

Stepping
inside from a world speeding by, we each find our own personal recess

Arriving
to repose the burdens of our living with the memories of those deceased

The
Stations, the Grotto, the Altar and the Cross all give us comfort on our way

Departing
we are relieved, comforted and renewed by this sanctuary to our dead

God
surely chose his Acre wisely, its great value not being of our choiceor making.

Dick
Carmody                                    January,
2013

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Lovely photo of men cutting turf on a raised bank, one sleánsman and one catcher  carrying on an age old tradition.

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I took this photo a few years ago at the unveiling of the John B. sculpture in the Garden of Europe. Billy Keane is surrounded by a bevy of local beauties.

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This was the only photo I could find on the internet of Miriam O’Callaghan accepting the inaurgual Mary Cummins award for outstanding achievement by an Irish woman working in the media. It was presented at the First Women in the Media event held in Ballybunion last weekend. The event was a great success by all accounts.

The Bog2Beach challenge was a great success as well. If I come across any photos in my research or if someone would like to send me some of photos of either event I’d love to share them.

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Yesterday I went to Kerry Parents and Friends Garden Fete. Here is alittle video I made and I’ll post some photos during the week.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFLWmhd5kBY&feature=youtu.be

old photos, Stack clan adoption cert and Social Scientists

By

On February 26, 2013

In Uncategorized

 William Street people

 Jer took this great picture of Jack McKenna in 2007

Old Tralee

This cert is available for a €5 donation to 2 local charities. It gives you the right to call yourself a Stack for the duration of the festival.

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Jer found this lovely tribute to a nurse and a mother in the Knockdown Notes. Knockdown is a neighboring town in Co. Limerick.

KNOCKDOWN News

My neighbour, Eileen O’Grady Kilmartin has retired after 44 years nursing in London. Eileen, after doing her Junior Cert in Dore’s School in Glin, started her career doing Nursery Nursing in Temple Hill, Blackrock, Co. Dublin. This was run by the Sisters of Charity but they did not always live up to their name, Eileen laughs. My own memory of this time is that Eileen and her mother Peg wrote to each other by return of post all the time she was there. I used to post the letters when I was going to school. She then went to Hackney Hospital in London – where she had been born! She was the youngest nurse there who ever received Sister status. In Whip’s Cross Hospital she did her midwifery and received her S.C.M. degree in 1976. She then nursed in Chase Farm Hospital in Enfield til last Thursday 14th February. Though she did midwifery for many of her years she also did District Nursing during her career. But though now retired Eileen is not intending to be idle. She is presently at home in Glenbawn to see her parents and intends doing voluntary work when she returns to London.  The following is a tribute to her written by her daughter Orla on the day she retired. “So my Mama retired today; and although I’m so happy for her, I’m also feeling acutely ashamed….. I remember moaning about the indignity of being the last girl collected from school and miserably wandering through Hadley Wood, never understanding when she’d reply “but I don’t have the kind of job I can just leave at a certain time”. I never considered how tired she must have been while working dreaded ‘nights’ and long days on labour ward, just to give me the kind of education I took for granted, for an expensive education means so little when one is an acne-ridden-hormonal-teenage monster. Today, FINALLY, I understand. I know from the student who cried telling me how great my Mum was as a mentor; the Muslim lady, with little knowledge of English, who took FOUR buses just to see my Mum and give her a card and present; the young couple I’d probably have dismissed as being ‘chavs’, who told me that Mum never made them feel like they were ‘wasters’ but would encourage them, telling them they were capable of anything; and the young girl who told me that my Mum sat with her on her bed for hours on her day off, just holding her hand when she was diagnosed with Post Natal Depression. So, yes, I finally ‘get it’, I truly do; I understand that my Mum was a credit to her profession, and that I am so undeserving to have her as my Mother. One of her former patients, now a current midwifery student, said that she’d like to be half the midwife my Mum is. Well I’d like to be a quarter of the lady she is. Genuinely, I’m the most blessed girl in the world.” What a lovely tribute by Orla. We wish Eileen many years of happy retirement and many more visits to Glenbawn.

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Good job!

The boys school yard is finished and looking very swish now.

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Remember last week we had a conferring of diplomas from the 1950s. Below are the 1970s bunch

Social Science Class  Listowel c1970, some of class At UCC for day out. Study was held in The Technical School under Fr Galvin and visiting lecturers. Many of the participants are still active in the community.

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Interesting article here about George Sandes of Newtownsandes/Moyvane fame

http://sandesancestry.net/george-sandes-terror-north-kerry

More on The Cows Lawn and a class of little lads

By

On November 19, 2012

In Uncategorized

Margaret Dillon has kindly given me copies of the witness statements from 1918 when local people took on Lord Listowel in an effort to get him to open the Cows Lawn for local people to plant root crops to alleviate food shortages .

I’ll remind you first of Kay Caball’s account:

“In February 1917, with shortages & rising food prices due to the
war, Listowel Urban Council requested the Earl of Listowel to ‘make two large
fields, known as the “‘the two lawns” available for cultivation for the poor people of the town’. There was an unproductive series of letters
exchanged between the Urban Council and Lord Listowel. Jack McKenna, Chairman
of the Urban Council pointed out that all they were seeking was permission to
use ‘vacant’ land as tillage. He stressed how important this would be in the
context of food shortages being experienced at the time due to the Great War,
that ‘even in London the Royal Parks are being ploughed for tillage’. His plea
was in vain.

Finally the UDC and a number of other prominent citizens formed the Sinn
Fein Food Committee with a view to acquiring this land as tillage. There was a
general feeling of frustration building up with the petty restrictions and the
number of permissions which had to be sought from Lord Listowel.. ‘Negotiations’
were opened by Sinn Fein with two local men who had permission to graze the
Lawn at the time, in order that the Food Committee might proceed with their
aims of turning the ground into tillage. It would appear that ‘negotiations’
might be a misnomer, something that rankled with the families concerned in the
following years.

Getting tired of waiting for permission, the Food Committee with the
help of Volunteers from Moyvane, Knockanure, Finuge, Rathea, Ballyconry and
Ballylongford, ploughed up the ‘front and back lawns’ concerned on 25 February
1918. The members of the Committee were jailed for a month on May 23rd.”


John McKenna
 The 5th Lord Listowel son of the 4th earl
Sinn Féin

Pictures from Listowel and Its Vicinity by Fr. Antony Gaughan

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I have not done these valuable historic documents justice. The only way I could save them from my scanner was as pdf files  and then I couldn’t copy and paste them here so, in the end, I just photographed the documents for you so forgive the overlapping please.



These brave men who took on the might of the landlord served one month each in Cork jail.


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By a strange co incidence, as I was writing today’s post , my husband drew my attention to an article in the paper about a conflict between the present Lord Listowel and his local council and some local activists.

Earl of Listowel told to find common ground with campaign group fighting to block his proposals to knock down Swains Lane shops

Published: 15 November, 2012
by DAN CARRIER

A PROPERTY-owning peer who plans to knock down a parade of shops in Highgate has been told his scheme will not get planning permission and he needs to scale down his proposals.

The Earl of Listowel, who owns property in Swains Lane which includes a café, florist, greengrocer and deli, has earmarked the street for redevelopment.

It is the third time in 10 years the Earl has tried to replace the parade with a larger, four-storey mix of homes and businesses. But his plans have been dismissed by council planning officers.

Now he has been asked to attend a meeting with people from campaign group Save Swains Lane to find common ground.

The 1,100-people-strong Save Swains Lane group have organised a survey of views on the plans via their website. They have garnered over 500 replies to date.

They have suggested thrashing out ideas with the owner, which could include looking at whether high-priced flats on a new low-level first floor could help finance smaller retail units on the ground floor. Rents could be capped to make it affordable for independent traders.

Group member and architect Julian de Metz said: “We are not surprised at the council’s response. It concurs with advice that they gave in 2001 and 2003. Nothing has changed since then.”

Council officers told the Earl’s designers the block was too high, and that they were not convinced of the design nor the size of the retail units.

A spokesperson from the Earl of Listowel’s planning company Nathaniel Lichfield said: “We are now reflecting on how we could revise the scheme. We have met with the Save Swains Lane group and have had constructive discussions.

“We will meet again and we will seek to strike a balance between the needs of the community, the council and the client.”

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More Likely lads

No year for this one, I’m afraid



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Sonia O’Sullivan on The Connor Pass yesterday

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