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
Roses at Listowel’s Civic Plaza in early summer 2025
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Listowel Literary Festival 2025
The Kerry Irish Novel of the Year 2025; Time of the Child by Niall Williams
I’m delighted that my favourite book won.
Rhona Tarrant did a great job as MC on Opening Night of Writers’ Week. She is here with her parents, Gerard and Jenny
Sally O’Neill is a regular supporter of all things literary in Listowel.
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Street Name Confusion
This is the Convent Street Clinic.
This is the sign on the wall of the Convent Street Clinic.
This house is located directly across the road from the Convent Street Clinic.
This sign is on the house directly opposite the Convent Street Clinic
So for this street it’s a case of Market Street, Convent Street, Sráid an Mhargaidh or Gleann an Phúca, take your pick. They are all correct according to the street signs.
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Essay Writing Success
Picture and text from Facebook
A transition year student from Co Kerry has been named as winner of the Law Society of Ireland’s national Gráinne O’Neill Memorial Legal Essay Competition 2025.
Hazel Barrett, a student at Presentation Secondary School in Listowel, raised the trophy at a special awards ceremony held at Blackhall Place last Wednesday.
Now in its third year, the annual competition invites TY students from across the country to submit a 1,500-word legal essay on a specific topic.
This year, over 350 essays were submitted by students from 52 schools across 16 counties, each exploring “the role the law can play in addressing hate crime”.
The competition aims to inspire young peoples’ legal learning by encouraging students from a wide range of backgrounds to consider contemporary justice issues.
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Listowel Arms Hotel
Photograph: May 2025; text: Listowel and its Vicinity by Fr. Antony Gaughan
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Kanturk, My Hometown
Here I am in my old home with my only brother, Pat. I love going home. It is the most welcoming, most hospitable house you can imagine, thanks to my lovely sister in law, Breeda.
This was the reason for my visit.
Duhallow Heritage Society allowed me to read a reflection as part of the great night of reminiscing and reconnecting. I’ll tell you more tomorrow.
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A Fact
The phrase ” That will cost you an arm and a leg,” comes from the Victorian era. The Victorians loved to have their portraits painted. The more of the body you included in the image, the dearer the commission. So they were often painted with just head and shoulders. An arm and a leg cost extra..
Áras an Phiarsaigh in glorious sunshine in May 2025
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Patrick Street/ William Street Upper or Pearse Street
One of the most famous premises on this street, references Patrick Street
Further along, on the same side of the street is another well known premises.
I rest my case.
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The Horse Chestnut in May
(Mick O’Callaghan teaches us a thing or two about the beloved horse chestnut)
It was Tuesday May 20th, 2025. We were after a sustained period of dry weather and the ground was very dry. Some plants were somewhat stunted in their growth.
I cut all the lawns at home and at our daughter’s house because rain was forecast for the afternoon.
Now that domestic chores were attended to, I betook myself to Courtown Woods for a forest walk and to follow up on the progress of the Aesculus Hippocastanum or, in everyday parlance, The Horse Chestnut Tree.
When I walk in Courtown woods I invariably walk along The Horse Chestnut Walk and take lots of photos of the tree lined avenue. I watched the huge gaunt skeletal trees in winter and longed for some new life to appear on their naked branches. In late February I observed little green buds appearing which morphed into red centred green leaves and then during April and May the large soft green palmate shaped glossy leaves appeared. I photographed each stage of the trees’ development. It is truly a captivating transformation to behold in perfect woodland peace at close quarters in Spring and early summer. Another major benefit is that this colourful nature show is totally free to view.
Now as I feast on nature reawakening from its winter hibernation in the peace and solitude of the Courtown woods I recall our school botany classes. I remember teachers and later college lecturers describing the palmate structure of leaves with five or seven leaflets emanating from a single stem and fanning out like fingers. In my own teaching life, I remember collecting leaves from various trees and drying them out between sheets of blotting paper to make scrapbooks. I still have some of them after all the years.
In Kerry we were living in an area where a lot of deer thrived on the higher ground and in Killarney National Park. Teachers described their antlers as being of a palmate structure in our zoology classes.
After that little stroll down memory lane, it is time to return to Courtown forest and my beloved horse chestnut trees, The huge leaves were providing a canopy for the beautiful flowers which are unique. Today I was so lucky because it was so calm, and I got some great photos of the leaves and of the pink and white horse chestnut flowers.
They bloom in upright clusters of flowers called panicles and the bees and other pollinators just love them for their colour and pollen.
Last week when I visited all the clusters were a nice shade of pink but today, I noted a change as an appreciable number were white. This change of colour indicates to the pollinators that the white ones had been pollinated, and the pink ones now needed to be pollinated.
It was the difference in the colour and texture of the leaves that fascinated me most.
When I came home, I examined my photos, and I noted some remarkable colour and texture transformation in the leaves since last week, I also noted that some of the petals of the pollinated flowers were falling to the ground.
The leaves had changed from the soft tender light green leaf to a darker green. They were an entirely different tougher textured version. As the leaves change the next phase in the lifecycle is about to begin. They will start forming the spiky green fruits which will develop into lovely shiny conkers and so another cycle draws to a close and the leaves will fade away and die.
Sadly, today I saw a parent pulling down a full panicle because his child wanted it. As I was passing by the child showed me the lovely flower. I had to tell the parent how much nicer it would have been if it was left there to mature into a conker. He turned to his wife and told her about the conker. She was not interested she said because she was dying for a cup of coffee.
I was on the home straight when a granny with her grandchild and dog were approaching. Granny was oblivious to my presence as she was texting away on her phone when the 3-year-old child shouted, “Granny put away your phone.” Granny continued texting. As they were passing the child shouted again “granny, put away your phone and talk to me” Granny continued walking and texting while the little dog barked and pawed the ground with boredom. I continued walking home
Adults please put away those phones for a while and set the good example. There should be a competence test and a written exam before people could purchase a phone. Their ill use causes a lot of problems.
Anyway, the welcome rain has returned for a brief visit this evening and our arid plants and lawns are relishing it. You’re welcome rain but please don’t hang around too long
As they said in my school days
“A wet and windy May fills the barn with corn and hay.”
Our dry May this year seems to be filling them with top class silage.
Ballybunion Golf Club in Association with Ard Cúram
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Bord ns Mona in Lyracrompane
Tony McKenna posted this photo on Facebook in January with this caption.
“We might have posted this a few years ago. It shows the tipper at Barna Bog, Co. Kerry. The caption states the photo was taken by Mr. E. Switzer in April 1948. However Barna didn’t officially start producing turf until 1950, so is it Barna or Lyrecrumpane? Switzer worked for BnM in the early days, he was reputed to have lost an eye in the first World War and the family had a shop in Grafton Street.”
Then in the comments some people with local knowledge helped him out.
This photo is of the Tip at Lyreacrompane as it stands today. I never remember it having steped walls at the sides as in the Switzer photo but I wouldn’t remember back beyond 1955. Perhaps it was altered. I will check with locals in Barna for any memory that might solve the mystery…
Joe Harrington
and
Denis Lenihan wrote this
“Definitely Barna, The truck is Cadbury’s Rathmore. At this time it was hand cut turf. Next came a spreader which was filled by hand before the bagger arrived. A brilliant quality photograph.”
And then this;
Interesting in a quiz, you know the answer instantly but given time doubts set in. Same here I withdraw the words definately Barna. The tiphead in Barna and Lyreacrompane were identical as far as I know and theres little background. There is another photograph of that truck taken from the side. The truck was new and was brown the Cadburys colour. It has a Cork Reg. and Cadburys factory is on the bank of the Blackwater but on the Kerry side of the river.The man with his back to the camera could be the manager Jerry o Leary, he was a slender man that always wore a hat. In the view from the side the embankment is Barna, much higher on the right than the left. Lyreacrompane is on flat ground.
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Cad as Duit?
When is Church Street not Sráid an tSeipéil?
Answer: When it’s Listowel, Co. Kerry’s Church Street.
This Listowel solution to a Listowel problem has been puzzling a few people since I raised it here.
Will you look at this one? The Púca is the devil who would catch you if you were out late and not minding your own business. How come he shares a name with Convent Street.
When I wrote about St. Patrick’s Day stalwarts previously, I missed one man who is the heart and soul of the entertainment on St. Patrick’s Days in Listowel for as long as I am in town. That man is our own dancing master, Jimmy Hickey. This year his dancers were the highlight of the day at the St. Patrick’s Day mass in St. Mary’s parish church.
Another stalwart of St. Patrick’s Days in Listowel is Anne O’Connor/ Brosnan. Presentation Primary School marching band under her stewardship has provided the musical colourful element to the parade. Her family have taken up the mantle and over the years we have watched Mairead and Patrick entertain us from the stage.
This year Patrick’s stage was the step of the altar. This video is a joy to watch. Notice too his dancing teacher, Jimmy Hickey watching proudly from the wings as his star pupil struts his stuff.
