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: Junior Griffin Page 3 of 11

Moriartys, Handball Memories , Pres. memories and Listowel Brownies

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On February 5, 2019

In Uncategorized

Spring 2019




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Then and Now on William Street

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Down Memory Lane to the Ball Alley



A man called Enda Timoney is compiling a history of handball in Ireland. His research brought him to Listowel Connection and Junior Griffin’s account of hand balling in Listowel in the 1940s and 50s.

Here is another memory from Junior;

“By all means Mr. Timoney can use my few words, in fact I would feel honoured. I think it is great that he is contemplating  writing a history on the handball alleys.  There was a time when we literally had nothing in our pockets and handball was our main sporting outlet as it really cost us nothing. 

In fact as young boys during the war years some of us in the Bridge Road made a bit of money out of the handball.

On a Sunday morning the alley was packed with many young, and not too young, men awaiting their game of handball.  No emigration.  A few of us budding  entrepreneurs from the Bridge Road would have picked up one old penny somewhere, when there was 240 pence to the old pound, and we would make our way to  lovely old lady named Mrs Dowling about a mile outside Listowel and buy apples from her and then go back to the alley and sell our apples. Our aim was to make a profit of 3 old pence, 2 pence for the Sunday matinee and the one penny left would buy us 2 squares of the old Cleeves slab toffee. Our week was made, we wanted nothing else. The two squares were joined together and we would break them by hitting them against the metal leg of our seat in the local cinema. More than likely a square, or maybe both, would hit the ground, but the word hygiene was not on our dictionary in those days. What a lovely, carefree life it was.

The end of the war changed all that, as most of the hand ball young men of that era emigrated to different corners of the world. As I got older I played a lot of handball myself and gave many years as secretary of the local club.. The game of handball meant a lot to us in those days and I honestly believe that as young boys and then as young men it kept us out of harm’s way as the game of handball was such a brilliant game to play.”

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I can’t Imagine for what this was prescribed





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A Facebook Memory

This photo was shared by Anne Marie Healy and Gillian Finucane on Facebook.

First class , Presentation Primary, Listowel in 1970. I think someone did a spot of colouring!

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Another One for the Girls


I think the year is 1982



Garden of Europe, Quarter Days and the opening of the St. Vincent de Paul Day Centre

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On January 14, 2019

In Uncategorized

Garden of Europe in January 2019


The Garden looks very bare, pruned and cut back in anticipation of Spring. Daffodils are springing up everywhere.

Below are some photographs Junior Griffin took on the day of the official opening. Have you ever wondered why, in a garden dedicated to all of Europe there is such a heavy German and specifically German Jewish presence. Well, I have been told the answer because that question puzzled me for a while too.

The Garden of Europe on the site of the old town landfill  was the brainchild of Paddy and Carmel Fitzgibbon. This marvellous idea got wholehearted backing from Listowel Rotary Club. That club did most of the hard work to get this project to completion. The original idea was to have a piece of artwork in each country’s garden. But only one embassy responded to the request for the piece of sculpture. Germany gave the magnificent Schiller bust. It was thoroughly appropriate to send a bust of their greatest poet to a town renowned for its poets and writers. So thus evolved the idea to make it into a peace garden to include a commemorative art installation remembering Europe’s darkest days and so the Holocaust memorial came to be part of the garden

These are some of the local Rotary Club members and some of the dignitaries who attended the opening.

The centre of attention here is Mervyn Taylor T’D. I think he was invited to represent the government because he was Jewish.

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Quarter Days

Many of my readers will have never heard of quarter days. Let me tell you they were once the most important dates in the calendar.

Before we had the Gregorian calendar in 1752 we had the Regency calendar. Ordinary people didn’t have calendars so all they worried about were the seasons. The seasons were marked by quarter days. The year began on the first of these quarter days, Lady Day, on March 25. The other quarters were based on religious feast days making it easy for the peasants to remember. These were, Midsummer Day, Michaelmas Day and Christmas Day. All rents and other debts fell due on these quarter days. The following account from the Knockanure blog hits the nail on the head here.

Lady Day in Knockenure

The Christmas festivities were hardly over, when the general topic of the day in this parish, from fifty to a hundred years ago, was who would be evicted this Lady Day no one dared to ask the estate bailiff. Batt and his undermen, the rent-warner too was not asked so the whole thing remained a mystery until the day arrived. But the timid folk had already made their ground sure that they would not be among the evicted ones by making presents to the estate bailiff. The fiery sons of the soil, too proud to bend the knee waited for the day like caged lions and were it not for sheer dread on the part of Batt and Co many of them would be homeless. The funny thing about it was not sufficient to pay the half-gale rent the tenant should also give over possession this was done by taking a wisp of thatch from over the door and handing it to the estate bailiff then if he had any friend of his own for the place the unfortunate tenant was evicted. Some farmers got possession through these happenings.


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Were you There?


Junior Griffin took these photos at the blessing and official opening of the St. Vincent de Paul day centre. I have no date but maybe someone reading this remembers the day and will tell us all about it. The Day Centre is located behind The Plaza and it is from here that the meals on wheels service works.




Billy MacSweeney Remembers, Leahy’s Corner, and a Listowel Connection to Ireland’s Fittest Family

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On October 24, 2018

In Uncategorized

A nun and a church…images of Listowel Town Square

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Leahy’s Corner



Before it was Leahy’s it was O’Callaghan’s and it was the first slated house in The Square, Vincent Carmody told me.

Now a trip down memory lane, memories evoked by photos of Leahy’s Corner.

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Billy MacSweeney Remembers the Listowel of his Youth

“Ag dul siar ar m’aistear le solas mo chroí”

This corner of The Square is known locally as Leahy’s Corner. Billy MacSweeney remembers it well as it was when he was a boy growing up in Listowel

When I was a boy it was normal for the children of the town to wander throughout not only the countryside but also the town. I was an 
inveterate wanderer. Listowel was a very safe place to grow up – safe 
that is from everything but climbing and falling out of trees, falling 
into the river Feale when fishing or being poisoned by the things we dug 
up or picked from the hedgerows to eat. We also had to beware of the 
bull in Foley’s field along the banks of the river when heading for the 
‘Diving Board’, the ‘Rocks’ or the ‘Falls’ to enjoy the swimming. We 
accepted that if we did something wrong we were punished by a ‘clip 
around the ear’ from the nearest adult and this was accepted as right 
and proper by all other parents of the area. You learned never to 
complain at home because if you did another ‘clip’ was administered 
immediately by your parents. You thus learned right from wrong.   A real 
Huckleberry Finn existence!

We would ‘attach’ ourselves to adults when they were doing interesting 
things. In particular I remember Jack Leahy who lived at the corner of 
the ‘Big Square’. Jack had a horse and cart that he used to collect 
gravel from the banks of the Feale for local builders. He had to ford 
the river with the horse and cart to access the bends in the river where 
the gravel collected. I used jump up next to Jack and go with him on 
these adventures and he always had a spare shovel on board so that I 
could give a hand. What fascinated me in the evenings is that he would 
unhitch the horse from the cart in front of his shop and lead the horse 
through the front door at the side of the shop, through the hallway, 
into the stable at the back. I remember Jack as a caring and gentle man. 
Ar dheis De go raibh a anam or ‘ Ar ḋeis Dé go raiḃ a anam,  as it was then.

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Cousins at a wedding


I met Junior Griffin at the hotel on the day after a family wedding. He was saying goodbye to his Sharry nephews, Michael and Paul.  Michael is based in Coventry and Paul is in Singapore. To my delight they revealed that they are fans of Listowel connection.


Griffins and Sharrys in Listowel Town Square on Sunday October15 2018

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Listowel’s Fittest Family?




Roibeard Pierse and family are taking part in the TV Show Ireland’s Fittest Family.

All of Listowel is behind this brave young crew.

Miss Ryan, Daniel O’Connell in Abbeyfeale and More from Listowel Races 2018

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On September 25, 2018

In Uncategorized

It’s Official. Listowel is Ireland’s Best Town 2018



It’s been a massive community effort led by a brilliant Tidy Town Committee.

I have rarely seen people so proud of their town as Listowel people are.

Listowel is a beautiful town to call your native place and it’s a beautiful town to blow in to.

We are so blessed!

Here are a few photos to celebrate our big win in the Super Valu Tidy Towns Competition 2018







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Do You Remember Miss Ryan?




One of my roving reporters ran into this lady on a trip to Galway. This is what he says about  her.

Miss Ryan of Waterford taught art in Listowel. Remembers well Mr Drummond, Mr Fitzgerald, Mary B’s Hotel. Miss Moloney, Matt Mooney. She had also copper work, very much like Tony O’Callaghan’s work, but had no name for its maker.


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 From Echoes of Abbeyfeale

A letter written by Daniel O’Connell in January 1836 to Mr. Leahy, The Square, Abbeyfeale reads as follows: 

Sir,
I will be at your house about two o’clock on Sunday – have four horses ready for me by twoo’clock – take care that the drivers have mass. I will not arrive until after last mass and will not allow any man to drive me who miss mass. 

Truly Yours
Daniel O’Connell 

On November 4th1 836, Daniel O’Connell had the services of a driver and four horses from Abbeyfeale to Newcastle. The four horses were Jack and Major, Nancy and Grey. O’Connell paid one pound and eight shillings for this service. His driver was paid seven shillings. We
are indebted to the owner of Leahy’s Inn for meticulous book-keeping. He was Mr. David D. Leahy, son to Daniel Leahy. In 1832, at Leahy’s Inn a gentleman got dinner for one shilling; lodging for one shilling; breakfast for one shilling and two pence; livery for two shillings and sixpence; oats and feed for horse eight pence; for the weary traveller a glass of punch cost two shillings.

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Friday Sept 14 2018


 Style and more from The Island

This is the colourful scene outside the Budweiser tent as the beautiful ladies wait for the tap on the shoulder to say you are in the top 10.

Fashion is a top to toe thing.

These three beautiful girls could have bagged the three young racers prizes but the lady in the middle had no hat and that’s a requirement. As it was, her two friends caught the judges eye and were rewarded.

Some local men were a day late for the best dressed man competition but they posed with some local beauties anyway.

Those pheasant feathers are surely the work of our best known local milliner.

Good friends, Máire and Keelin were catching up and having a look at the fashion at the same time.

Oh, the stress!

Maud and Eleanor, like myself, chose a ringside seat.

Cliona caught up with her former teacher.

The O’Halloran family were enjoying a return to one of the haunts of their youth. Marie, on the far right, told me that she enjoys Listowel Connection in Sydney.

I was delighted to photograph these, my local friends. 

Bridget came from County Limerick for the day.

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Vincent Carmody Sheds Some Light on another photo



I don’t think the photo was taken outside Buckley’s ( It was known as Nora Lynch’s). Sheamus Buckley would have been the photographer.The window is not right for Buckleys, they had a sectioned window, similar to what is there today, with a bar across the front for protection. It may have been Mary Ann Relihans’ or else a bar downtown.

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This witty letter writer to The Irish Times seems to have got it right 



Convent street, Listowel Visual Arts Week 2018, Cruinniú na nÓg

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On July 9, 2018

In Uncategorized

Photographer’s Heaven, Cnoc an Óir

Photograph of Pixie O’Gorman by Mike Enright

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Lofty’s Corner


Once upon a time this was a great hang out as the students alighting from or waiting for school buses bought and consumed their supplies.

This is Horan’s. it used to be a private house and then a blind shop.

Convent Street Listowel

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Visual Arts Week 2018 Community Art in The Square

My friend, Junior Griffin, himself a handy artist, was taking a go at painting the collaborative work on the Saturday of Listowel Arts Week 2018.

The sun was shining and people who were passing by were invited to paint a little of a four part canvas soon to be assembled as an artwork.

The event was run as part of Cruinniú na nÓg so there were many youngsters only too willing to have a go.

Cruinniú na nÓg was happening in The Seanchaí and St. John’s.

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Evening in Ballybunion





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I’m Dogsitting




My house guest  this week is Molly. She is having a Kerry holiday. Yesterday I took her to a well known Listowel landmark and she was suitably impressed.

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