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
Still the king of the castle but sheltering from the heat.
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The Blessed Well in Kilshenane
From Closing the Circle, an anthology of the poems of John McGrath
Hare
I met a hare along the road today,
Tall as a greyhound.
He hopped towards me,
hesitated,
hopped again,
stopped to listen
to my freewheel click,
then turned and loped away.
I gazed in grateful awe
as with each simple spring
the distance grew between us,
marvelled how his quiet grace
belied his hidden power.
Then with one bound
he cleared a ditch
and disappeared from view
leaving me to wonder.
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Dancing in the 1970s
Those were the days.
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Church Street Tattoo
Our local tattooist was taking the opportunity in a lull in business to paint his door jamb.
He had a cancellation due to his client getting sunburnt.
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Master at Work
Martin Chute sign writing in the old fashioned way at Sheahan’s, Upper William Street on Saturday July 24 2021.
Martin was so focussed on his work, he wasn’t even aware I was photographing him. This man is the best at what he does. Listowel is blessed to have him working on our shopfronts.
The clubhouse of the pitch and putt club is located next to the Dandy Lodge. Martin Chute has done his usual lovely job on the gable wall. I took the photo on a sunny day. Hence all the shadows.
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Contented Diner
Glass House
John McGrath
I must have ordered onion rings for two.
They’re stacked above my steak like lifebelts;
Pepper sauce and wedges on the side,
salad and a subtle Chilean Red.
Beyond the glass I watch the river rise
swiftly with the tide. Swans
feed frantically, bottoms in the air.
Mine hugs lime-green leatherette.
The waiter smiles, tops up my wine
and leaves. I watch his bottom too,
then raise my fork and stab my plate
like a Polynesian fisherman.
Out on the river, the swans swim on,
pedalling frantically against the tide,
Diving, feeding, pedalling again.
I marvel at their weight-loss plan.
I put down my fork and sigh contentedly,
raise my feet onto the lime-green leatherette,
smile at the waiter as he takes my plate and muse
on why others choose to swim against the tide.
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A Mystery Procession
Éamon ÓMurchú found this marvellous photo among his late father’s things. It was unusual for Luaí ÓMurchú not to note the date and occasion on a photograph but, in the case of this one, he did not so we need your help.
Dave O’Sullivan tells me that the car on the right was registered in Dublin between January 1949 and June 1950. “I’d be 90% certain it’s a Vauxhall Wyvern LIX. They were made between 1948 and 1951. Top speed 62 mph from a 1442cc engine.”
Surely some petrol head will remember the car.
The girls faces are very clear. Someone must recognise them.
A Strange Tale from the School’s Folklore Collection
Little Hands and the Bread Shoes
Once upon a time there lived a man with his wife and son war broke in France, and every Irish man had to go there, and this man had to go also. He wrote letters every day to his wife, and one a wire came to his wife that her husband got killed in the war. She had only one little boy, and he was only a baby. It was a slate house they had. One day as the little boy was sleeping in his cradle, a slate fell off over the window, and a branch of ivy went in the window and it grew around the child’s. The child was about four years when he went to school. After a time the children got the “flu”, and the little boy took it, and he was very sick, and it was worse he was geting, and at last he died. His mother kept a little red pair of shoes under her bed, and when she went up in the room the mice had them eaten, and then she took out a loaf of bread out of the bin and softened it in boiling water; and while she was softening the bread a man went in and asked a piece of bread for God’s sake. The woman said that she had bread inside, and she had a loaf in the bin. The man who asked her was Christ at last the boy was buried, and the threw herself on the grave, and the neighbours pulled her away, and she went to bed after going home, and a few nights after her son appeared to her and said I am in the first step of heaven mother, but the bread shoes are keeping me back, and the night he came he said he was in the second step of heaven, but the bread shoes had kept him back and the next night he came he said he was in the third step of heaven but the bread shoes had kept him back, and then they took off the shoes, and he went to heaven. After a short time the boys mother died, and she went to heaven Collector; Eileen Hannon Age 14-
Informant- Mrs Ellen Foley-Age 74-
Address, Mountcoal, Co. Kerry.
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Wouldn’t it Lift your Heart?
This is my grandnephew in the U.S. dancing with his great grandmother at a family wedding.
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Drought 2021
The River Feale at the Big Bridge is at a very low level.
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Elegy to Road Kill
Fox
by John McGrath
I killed a fox last night
outside the graveyard wall.
Too late to brake I caught
a flash of golden fur
in headlight’s glare,
Felt the thump and crunch
of steel on bone,
Slow-motion silence,
Disbelief and then,
certitude
that fate had mindlessly conspired
to lead us to this place,
this point in time,
this intersecting line
where two lives intertwine
with tragedy.
One of us remained
outside the graveyard wall.
One moved on
and died a little too.
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The Mural is Finished
I took the following photos on July 24 2021 as the muralist just finished the artwork. I took a few long shots to give those of you not in town an idea of where it is and to put the scale of the work in context
Keelin Kissane, winner of An Post writing competition with her mother, Vourneen, a representative of An Post who sponsored the competition and Sr. Consolata and Sr. Sheila Mary of Presentation Secondary Scho0l, Listowel.
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Just a Thought
My reflections in the Just a Thought slot as broadcast on Radio Kerry last week
The first of the murals at the end of Colbert Street was nearly finished when I photographed it on Thursday last July 21 2021. Listowel’s Siobhán Mooney was helping the artist with the final touches in the sweltering heat.
The quotation is from Brendan Kennelly
“All songs are living ghosts. And long for a living voice.”
By the time you see these the mural will be finished.
An Irish Independent article contributed by Éamon ÓMurchú
April 19 2001 12:11 AM
SURELY the most surprised person in the hall at the recent 30th annual Listowel Open Badminton Week tournament was Junior Griffin ‹ the genial Listowel man who writes the weekly badminton notes in this newspaper. Totally unannounced, he was presented with a specially designed copper plaque to mark his involvement with the prestigious tournament since its inception in 1972. The plaque is the work of Listowel man, Tony Callaghan.
“I had a piece of glass put in my hand and I thought it was only a committee photograph that was being taken without realising that I was being set up,” said Junior. “It really is a lovely plaque.
“I got the Open tournament going in 1972 and gradually we brought in other counties. Unfortunately this year a lot of them didn’t come because of the Foot and Mouth restrictions. Tipperary in particular have been really great supporters of ours over the years. They make it a kind of a social weekend. The tournament has grown over the years.”
Strangely enough, Junior Griffin’s first love was handball and he excelled at it in the old alley which is still to the good and which immediately catches the eye as you pass over the bridge on your way into Listowel from Tralee.
“The handball court was the place that kept us out of harm’s way,” he said.
Junior recalled how he became involved in the game of badminton.
“Eric Browne, the bookie, called me one night in 1964 and asked me would I go up to the badminton hall, which I did, and I became involved in it there and then. As I remember it, Eamon McSweeney,, of the ESB, and Louis Quinlan, of Tralee, collared me in 1975 and asked me would I go forward as chairman of the County Badminton Board. Then, in 1980, I became secretary of the Munster Badminton Council. Junior still holds both offices to the present day.
“Unlike the GAA, it is awful hard to get people to work as far as badminton is concerned,” he said.
Of course, Junior has been immersed in the GAA since he was a youngster. Badminton may take up most of his time, but he still manages to work as a stilesman at venues all over the county, as well as at all the big Munster championship games in football and hurling.
Junior works in the fancy goods department at McKenna’s in Listowel and is due to retire this year.
“I started in McKenna’s on the Monday before Kerry played Armagh in the 1953 All-Ireland football final,” he recalled. “I started in the workshop. Now I’m in the Fancy Goods section where we sell everything from Waterford Crystal to pots and pans.”
At one stage he was secretary both of the handball and badminton clubs in Listowel. But then the man’s capacity for work and his organisational ability is second to none.
He loved his game of badminton himself “Unfortunately the old back has kicked up’.
He candidly admits that badminton has lost some ground of recent years.
“Indoor sports have gone down,” he said. “People today have far more choices. You have the leisure centres and then people like to play the Internet. You also have the Play Stations and all these keep people in at night when they would be better off at the badminton court. Like I said, people have far more choices today.”
Illustrating the point, he revealed that where there were 24 badminton clubs in the county nine years ago, today there are only 13 clubs. But the game is still thriving in Listowel, Tralee, Dingle, Castleisland, Killarney, Moyvane, Cahersiveen, Causeway, Ballyheigue and Sneem.
“Teresa Broderick from Tralee won the first tournament in Listowel in 1972 and she was back to win the Veterans title last week,” he said. “She has given great service to the game.
“A lot of places have built parish halls over the years and badminton always fitted in nicely with that kind of a set-up.
“We are after a very good year in Kerry. We won the Class 3 title for the first time since 1985 and that’s a really good achievement. Lorna Keane, who won the Supreme Sports Star Award a few years ago, was the manager of the team. Her mother, Sheile Hannon, is secretary of the County Board.
Reflecting on bygone days in the sport, Junior recalled such well-known names in Kerry badminton as Louis Quinlan, Paul Skuce, Paddy Drummond, Vincent Freeman, Mrs Kelliher (County Badminton Club), Jo O’Donoghue, Carmel Fleming, Angela O’Sullivan, Phil Moriarty and Dominick Foley.
The industrious Listowel sportsman intends keeping the momentum going in his efforts to keep badminton to the forefront in the sporting life of the county.
“A lot of towns are getting new houses which means that people are coming to work in these towns.
“You can walk on the beach in Ballybunion in the summer, but in the winter you need something to do,” he said. “Badminton is the perfect game for the winter and it also has its social side.”
Keenly aware of his long and faithful involvement with the game of football, I asked him what he thought of Kerry’s chances in this year’s championship.
“I’m always afraid of Cork and this year will be no different,” he said. “Of course, Kerry had a very hard campaign last year. But the four trips to Croke Park were wonderful.
“I remember my first trip to Croke Park. It was back in 1951 for the All-Ireland semi-final replay between Kerry and Mayo. That was won by Mayo and they went on to win the All-Ireland ‹ the last time they won it, in fact.
You had men like Sean Flanagan, Paddy Prendergast and Paraic Carney playing with Mayo and the likes of Paddy Bawn (Brosnan), Eddie Dowling, Jackie Lyne and Jim Brosnan playing with Kerry.
“My next trip was for the ’53 final, the week I started work. I was there again for the ’54 final in which Kerry were beaten by Meath. Then in ’55 we went up thinking we hadn’t a chance against Dublin and we all know what happened. One of my great favourites on those Kerry teams was John Cronin.
“I would give Kerry a good chance in this year’s championship and especially if Maurice Fitzgerald is fit. It’s the coolness with which he takes the frees and who can forget the first match against Armagh last year. The way he put the ball down forty yards out and booted it over the bar. It was absolutely wonderful.
“Mick O’Connell and Eamon O’Donoghue were able to read each other’s game. It’s the same with Maurice Fitzgerald and Mike Frank Russell. It was marvellous the way O’Connell could deliver a pin-point pass to Eamon. “He’d land the ball right in his hands.”
But Junior has a word of advice for Páidí Ó Sé and his players: “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown,” he warned. “Kerry are there to be shot at.”
Meanwhile, Junior Griffin is happy that he has overseen another successful year for badminton in the county.
“We hope to see even greater honours come our way in the years ahead,” he added.
A great sportsman who has given a lifetime of service to his county in every one of the sports he has espoused.
He’s known to a huge number of people as the genial person manning the stiles at various GAA venues around Kerry and indeed Munster. But in the more intimate milieu of the badminton fraternity he is regarded as a doyen. A man with a passion for anything he puts his mind to.
It was a fitting tribute from his club in Listowel to honour him in the manner they did at the recent Open Week.
Junior Griffin a true ambassador for the game of badminton.
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An Old Post box
This picture of an old unused box was shared on Facebook by Vanishing Ireland. It’s location is somewhere near Milstreet in Co. Cork.
