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: The Lartigue Page 1 of 2

Road Signs and Civil War Disruption

St Patrick’s Day 2023

Canon Declan O’Connor and his neighbours enjoying the 2023 St. Patrick’s Day parade in Listowel Town Square

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Another String to his Bow

Dave O’Sullivan found us this in The Kerryman archive from 1961. These beautiful signs were designed by the great Michael O’Connor.

Would anyone know of the whereabouts of one of these or does anyone have a better photograph of one?

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The Civil War and the Lartigue

Story from Mark Holan’s Irish American Blog

Civil War Toll on The Lartigue

Mark Holan

Anti-government forces in the Irish Civil War attacked the Listowel and Ballybunion Railway several times in early 1923. Damage to the rolling stock and stations of the 9-mile monorail between the two Kerry towns, and the impracticalities of operating such a unique line in the newly consolidated Irish rail system, forced its permanent closure in October 1924.

Passengers and mail on the LBR had been targeted by Irish republican forces during the Irish War of Independence, 1919-1921. In January 1923, during the civil war, armed men forced the Ballybunion stationmaster to open the line’s office, goods store, and waiting room, which they doused with petrol and paraffin oil and set on fire. Within an hour a similar attack occurred at the Lisselton station, about halfway between the two terminuses.

Such destruction is generally attributed to the IRA forces opposed to the Irish Free State. These “irregulars” also cut down about 1,700 yards of telegraph wire and six poles between Listowel and Ballybunion, matching attacks along other Irish rail routes.

Nicknamed the Lartigue after inventor Charles Lartigue, the monorail was “suspended indefinitely” in early February 1923 due to the sabotage. Nearly 40 employees lost their jobs, impacting about 100 family members and ancillary businesses.

With the train out of service, a char-a-banc and motor car service began operating between the two towns, but it also came under attack in March.Once the civil war ended later that spring, the Lartigue was repaired in time for the busy summer season at Ballybunion, a seaside resort. By mid-July, the Freeman’s Journal reported the Lartigue “has already, particularly on Sundays, been taxed to almost its fullest capacity in the conveyance of visitors.”

Like the Lartigue, however, the national newspaper also would have its run ended in 1924.

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Then and Now

2007 and 2023

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Friends Reunited

Mary Sheehy met this lady twenty years ago on a pilgrimage to Lourdes. They met last week by chance in The Flying Saucer café, Listowel.

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A Poignant Poem of Family Love

The Week After St Patrick’s

John McGrath

The week after St Patrick’s, my mother

pressed his suit and packed his case,

drove him to the station for the early train

from Ballyhaunis to the crowded boat,

then on to Manchester and solitude

until All Souls came slowly round again.

I don’t remember ever saying Goodbye.

At seventeen I took the train myself

and saw first-hand my father’s box-room life,

the Woodbines by his shabby single bed.

I don’t remember ever saying Hello,

just sat beside this stranger in the gloom

and talked of home and life, and all the while

I wanted to be gone, get on with mine.

Westerns and The Western kept him sane,

newspapers from home until the time

to take the train came slowly round once more.

Lost in Louis L’Amour, he seldom heard

the toilet’s ugly flush, the gurgling bath

next door. Zane Grey dulled the traffic’s

angry roar outside his grimy window.

Back home the year before he died we spoke

at last as equals, smoked our cigarettes,

his a Woodbine still, and mine a tipped.

My mother would have killed us if she’d known.

The phone call came as winter turned to spring.

I stood beside him, touched his face of ice

and knew our last Hello had been Goodbye.

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Bunclody and The Lartigue Experience, New Maps and Revival 2019

Róisín taking a photograph in the wildflower garden in Ballincollig Regional Park.

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Bunclody, Co Wexford


“Oh, were I at the Moss House where the birds do increase

At the foot of Mount Leinster or some silent place

By the streams of Bunclody where all pleasures do meet

And all I would ask is one kiss from you sweet.”

The streams of Bunclody actually flow down the middle of the street. Cliona and I had a lovely trip to this beautiful picturesque village.

They still have working phoneboxes.

Who fears to speak of ’98?  They still remember their history in this fair town.

I took the below photos in the lovely church which is at the heart of the town.

The church interior was cool and airy on a very warm Sunday. It is beautifully appointed in the modern style.

The Stations of the Cross

The adoration chapel

Our Lady’s Altar

This crucifixion window is rather unusual in it’s depiction of the Good Friday

This is the view from the church door

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Today’s Fun Fact


from The Second Book of General Ignorance

Vision is by far the most important of the human senses. 30% of our brain’s activity is used up processing visual information. Smell, the directional aid used by most mammals, accounts for only 1%. Birds, however, are as visually dependant as we are. But birds have one huge navigational advantage over us. It’s called ‘magnetoception’ i.e. the ability to plug in to the Earth’s magnetic field. We may once have had this gift too but we’ve lost the ability to use it.

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The Lartigue Monorail Museum



Every Listowel person should take a trip on The Lartigue. I loved my trip last week and I learned so much Listowel history.

The whole station was looking in tip top condition with colourful flowers everywhere.

These were three of our volunteer rail workers on the Wednesday we visited.

It was a busy day on the train.

We all got a chance to climb into the driver’s section and we got to toot the horn. Our driver, Michael Guerin, offered to take everyone’s photo .

There is a saying that has survived from the days when the original Lartigue travelled between Listowel and Ballybunion. When the train reached a bit of a hill, first class passengers were asked to get out and walk and third class passengers were asked to get out and push.  In the case of the replica Lartigue in August 2019 it was the volunteer workers who had to get out and push. And there is quite a bit of pushing involved as there is a complicated system of to-ing and fro-ing at turntables to get the locomotive facing in the other direction.


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New Signage



Kerry County Council has installed these lovely new maps by local artist. Amy Sheehy.

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Revival 2019




The weather was not so kind to Revival on the Saturday night but the concert goers didn’t mind a bit. The Coronas, Delerentos, Thanks Brother and Hermitage Green lifted the clouds over The Square and everyone had a ball.


Early Sunday morning in The Square and everything nearly back to normal.



William Street, Sunday morning Aug 11 2019

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Meanwhile in Killorglin



Puck Fair is in full swing.

Photos by Chris Grayson

Ungardening, Lough Boora, Walking in Circles and The Lartigue

Róisín in The wildflower meadow in Ballincollig Regional Park

Ungardening is the new craze…..happy days! You just sow the seeds and let Nature take its course. No need to mow or weed or thin or dead head or any of that backbreaking gardening that people have been doing for ages. If Capability Brown were alive today he’d be ungardening.

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Lough Boora Visit


During a recent visit to the Kildare branch of my family, I spent a lovely morning in Lough Boora. This visitor centre is located just outside Tullamore. It used to be a Bord na Mona bog. It is now a cycleway/walkway, sculpture park, wildlife reserve and biodiversity area. It’s well worth a visit if you are ever in the midlands.

These trees are thousands of years old. When they drained the bog, there they were, growing just like this.

Don O’Boyle is the sculptor who made this beautiful and practical bog oak bridge.


This sculpture installation is the Sky train. The local people called This bog train a sky train because when it ran through the bog it appeared to go up to the sky.

Everywhere around there is a mixture of the natural and the man made.

A  crow rests on a heap of discarded stones.

This sculpture represents the four provinces of Ireland.

This one is a kind of optical illusion. The logs appear to go all the way through until you look round the side and see that there is a seat inside a very narrow doorway…ingenious.

This sculpture is made from old pieces of scrapped machines. I thought it was a dragon but it is actually a skimming stone.

I have given you just a small taste of Lough Boora. It’s a great place, very peaceful and energising.

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Today’s Fun Fact


from The Second Book of General Ignorance

People who are lost, walk, not in straight lines, but in circles. A scientific experiment in 2009 proved that people, when deprived of visual clues, walk round in circles. Volunteers were set down in a particularly empty part of the Sahara. When the sun or moon was out, they walked in straight lines but as soon as they were left in complete darkness they walked round in circles. Another group of volunteers were blindfolded and they too walked round in circles, the diameter of the circle being smaller, at about 20 metres. 

The research proved that people have no instinctive sense of direction. We rely on visual clues.

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The Lartigue


I visited The Lartigue for the first time this year last week. I was in luck because it was Michael Guerin’s day for volunteering. Michael is really really knowledgeable about the history of The Lartigue so I’ll be telling you more in future posts.

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When You live in the Literary Capital of Ireland



even ordinary things become rhymes.

Mike Moriarty tells me that the local boys had a rhyme for this:

Post no bills

Play no balls

Kiss no girls

Behind these walls.

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Revival 2019




Revival 2019 was a resounding success. People who know more about these things than I know (that wouldn’t be hard!) tell me that it was the best run festival they were ever at. They are still marvelling at the “real” toilets.

I joined the happy crew of local people and children outside the fence on Friday night. We enjoyed a great free concert.

Everyone loved Sharon Shannon. She kept the whole show going on Friday. People who came indifferent left as firm fans.

Whether whistling, singing, or telling yarns, Finbarr Furey was brilliant. His set went down a treat and he genuinely loved being back in Listowel where he won his first Fleadh Cheoil prize on the uileann pipes many moons ago

Mundy and Sinead O’Connor were on past my bedtime but I’m told they were well received as well.

The Prophet continued, The Garden of Europe in Winter and the Lartigue is 130 this Year

A Chaffinch Hen

Photo taken in Tralee by Graham Davies

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The Prophet by John B. Keane (continued)

(The story so far; O’Callaghan, The Prophet and his friend Canavan were found on in a licensed premises)

“All those,” said
the sergeant, “who live by the sword shall die by the sword.”

“My God, my God!”
said Callaghan, “Why hast thou forsaken me?”

And it came to
pass that after seven days anointed their outsides with soap and water and
their insides with poitcheen and they came down from the mountains to the
fleshpots of Listowel. In the town was a great circus and multitudes had
gathered outside the doors of the taverns 
when the circus was over. Canavan and Callaghan were refused admission
to all the hostelries so they journeyed to Ballybunion where they had not been
before and they were graciously received and given credit and presented with
cold plates for it so happened that there was an American wake in progress.

Days passed and
Callaghan arrived at the Ballybunion publican’s door with a bag of choice
cabbage and a bucket of new potatoes.

“There’s no need
for that,” said the publican.

“Lo,” said
Callaghan, “I was hungry and ye gave me to eat. I was thirsty and ye gave me to
drink. I was a stranger and ye took me in.”

Once at an
American wake in Listowel Callaghan appeared to be exceedingly drunk. The man
of the house told him that he had had enough when he proffered his cup for more
drink.

“You’re full to
the brim,” said the woman of the house.

“I say to you,”
Quoth Callaghan, “all the rivers run into the sea and the sea is not full.”

He was a sick man
the day after and the day after that again but the skies cleared when his
friend, Canavan arrived with the news that there was another American wake in
McCarthy’s in Finuge.

Quoth Callaghan
“As cold water to a thirsty soul is good news from a far country.”

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Garden of Europe in Winter




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Some Facts about The Lartigue

Photo and text from The Lartigue Monorail and Museum on Facebook


LISTOWEL MONORAIL & MUSEUM 2018

Commemorating 130 years 1888 – 2018

There were 3 stations- Listowel, Lisselton and Ballybunion.

There was also a stop at Francis Road.

Tickets to America could also be brought at all of the above stations.

There were 3 main incentives for building the line;

1. To generate tourist traffic as well as local traffic

2. To bring pupils (male) to the recently opened St. Michael’s College in Listowel (1879)

3. To bring sand to Listowel for the farmers there, and further on the on the main line.

The line carried 74,000 passenger since 1913, this number had halved by 1922. Up to 14,000 passengers a day were carried in summer when the line was at its peak usage. An advertising booklet issued c. 1900 described Ballybunion as “cool and bracing in Summer, mild in Winter and had perfect sanitary arrangements. Ballybunion is recognised by the medical faculty as one of the best health resorts in Ireland – ideal for the overworked brain or this seeking recuperation after illness.”

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From my Inbox



Our new friend, Barbara Watts sent us another lovely story from her childhood;

“My mother was in the middle of papering the living room when these cousins –two married couples – arrived unexpectedly.  My mother got in a flap but one of the men insisted that she go to the fish shop to get lunch for them all.  My mother didn’t want to appear rude so she went.  By the time she came back they had finished the wallpapering and put the furniture back! – I love that memory.”



Barbara now lives in Canada but her father emigrated with his family from Listowel to Wales. She has Healys, Hannans and Counihans on her family tree but she is not in touch with any relatives still living in Listowel.



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February Programme looking very tempting in St. John’s Listowel


Thur 1st to Wed 28th

Recent Work

A mixed media exhibition of new work by Sean Walsh, Tipperary.


Fri 2nd

Bronte

A play on the life of Charlotte Bronte, best known as the author of Jayne Eyre, directed by Declan O’Gorman and featuring Sharon McArdle. 


Sat 3rd

Kevin McAleer – Guru

A new show from the master comedian/storyteller covering such topics as tai chi tea, avocado dream therapy, coffee visualization and moon walking with wolves.  His latest book, The Idiots Guide to Low Self Esteem, is now available.  An evening of divine light entertainment not to be missed. 


Tues 6th

In Between – Film Club

Directed by Maysaloun Hamoud, the film tells the story of three Arab-Israeli women who share an apartment in Tel Aviv and try to balance their traditions with the modern world.  In association with Access Cinema.


Wed 7th

The Vanbrugh with Michael McHale

Pianist Michael McHale will join The Vanburgh in a programme featuring works by Mozart, Stanford and Dvořák.


Fri 9th

Pat Coldrick – Classical Gas Tour

With a unique approach to classical music and arrangements of modern music classics and masterpieces, Pat has attracted a whole new audience for his music selling out The National Concert Hall on several occasions.


Thur 15th

Don Stiffe – The Long Overdue Tour of Kerry

A welcome return by the Galway folk singer fresh from his Carribean Cruise with The Ladies. 


Fri 16th

The Best of Traditional

With Donie Nolan – accordion and vocals, Liam Flanaghan – fiddle and Caoimhín ÓFearghail – pipes and guitar. 


Sat 17th

The Golden Years – The Songs We Love To Sing

Irelands most popular tenor, Frank Ryan, will be joined by thrilling young soprano, Sarah O’Mahony, in a melody filled presentation with songs from The Bohemian Girl, The Candy Store on the Corner, The Whistling Gypsy, Josef Lockes “Hear my Song, Violetta” and Whiskey on a Sunday among a host of other golden hits. 


Wed 21st    

Strutting & Fretting

On the last night of a spectacularly unsuccessful tour of Macbeth, the lead actor sits in his dressing room and muses on the pitfalls of the theatrical life. Strutting and Fretting is a hilarious and thought-provoking new comedy from the wicked pen of Chris McHallem. Directed by Michael James Ford and presented by Bewley’s Café Theatre. ‘A cynical look at the acting profession elevated into total charm by a fine actor’ Emer O’Kelly, SUNDAY INDEPENDENT


Fri 23rd

On The Road With Johnny Barrett

A film presentation on one of the best known entertainers in the south west.  Join Johnny on the road to Lisdoonvarna, Killarney, Charleville and Nenagh.  With Kay and George Devlin – Irish and international ballroom dancing champions, Irish dancers and musicians.


Tue 27th

The Man In Black

The No. 1 Johnny Cash show across the USA performed by Terry Lee Goffee and his band from Cambridge, Ohio.

Artisan Food, A Poem of Exile and more Christmas Windows

Happy dog following his owner in Listowel Town Park recently

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Artisan Food at Listowel Food Fair


On the Sunday of Listowel Food Fair there was a great market of artisan food in The Listowel Arms. It was the Sunday of November prayers for our dead in John Paul Cemetery so I was late getting to the fair. It was well worth the visit. Here are some of the goods for sale and to sample. Some people were already sold out by the time I got there.

 These chutneys and relishes are by Chicco. They are delicious. I bought some for the Christmas cold meats

This Kerry cheese is completely organic. I stayed clear of this out of respect for my heart but people who tried it said it super.

This Charleville man had cheese products as well and was proudly displaying the prize he won at the fair.

I didn’t even go close to this charming lady to photograph her. She makes the most delicious ice cream you will ever taste and its all handmade in Kenmare.

This happy crew from Killocrim school were promoting their unique cookery book. It is a collection of recipes that the children made with their families and the book has lovely photos  as well. It will be a treasure for years to come and a cause well worth supporting.

I ran into my friend Billy Keane and his family. They were very proud to have their recipe included in the book.

Norma Leahy and her family were there with their Carralea Kefir. This dairy product is really good for your gut health. I’m trying it at the moment.

This is the lovely family behind Brona chocolate products. Jimmy is just a friend. He had no part in making the chocolates.

Orla Walshe runs a cookery school at Ballydonoghue. Her chocolate biscuit cake is to die for.

Completely sold out. The picture tells its own story.

Wellness bread products are a Listowel success story.

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This poem is especially for Maria Sham, who loves it.

The Exile’s Return

(John Locke, 1847-1889)

T’anam chun Dia! but
there it is –

The dawn on the hills of Ireland,

God’s angels lifting the night’s black veil

From the fair sweet face of my sireland.

Oh! Ireland isn’t it grand you look,

Like a bride in her fresh adorning,

And with all the pent-up love of my heart

I bid you the top of the morning.

This one brief hour
pays lavishly back,

For many a year of mourning,

I’d almost venture another flight,

There is so much joy in returning,

Watching out for the hallowed shore,

All other attraction scorning,

Oh: Ireland don’t you hear me shout,

I bid you the top of the morning.

Ho, Ho, upon Glen’s
shelving strand,

The surges are wildly beating,

And Kerry is pushing her headlands out,

To give us a kindly greeting,

Now to the shore the sea birds fly,

On pinons that know no drooping,

Now out from the shore with welcome gaze,

A million of eaves come trooping.

Oh! Fairly, generous
Irish land,

So Loyal, so fair, so loving,

No wonder the wandering Celt should think,

And dream of you in his roving,

The Alien shore may have gems and gold,

And sorrow may ne’er have gloomed it.

But the heart will sigh for its native shore,

Where the love-light first illumed it.

And doesn’t old Cobh
look charming there,

Watching the wild waves motion,

Resting her back against the hill.

And the tips of her toes to the ocean,

I wonder I don’t hear the Shandon bells,

But maybe their chiming is over,

For it’s a year since I began,

The life of a western rover.

For thirty years “A
chuisle mo chroi”,

Those hills I now feast my eyes on,

Ne’er met my vision save at night,

In memory’s dim horizon,

Even so, ’twas grand and fair they seemed,

In the landscape spread before me,

But dreams are dreams, and I would awake

To find American skies still o’er me.

And often in Texan
plain,

When the day and the chase was over,

My heart would fly o’er the weary ways,

And around the coastline hover,

And my prayers would arise that some future date,

All danger, doubting and scorning,

I might help to win for my native land

The light of young liberty’s morning.

Now fuller and turner
the coastline shows

Was there ever a scene more splendid!

I feel the breath of the Munster breeze,

Oh! Thank God my exile is ended,

Old scenes, old songs, old friends again

There’s the vale, there’s the cot I was born in

Oh! Ireland from my heart of hearts

I bid you the “top o’ the morning”


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Slavery and the Hiring Fair

This is a photo from the Library of Congress. It dates from the days of slave auctions in Illinois. I don’t think there was ever any official slavery in Ireland. Women who were forced by circumstances to work in the Magdalen Laundries might disagree. There were, however, hiring fairs.

These fairs were often held on the same day as a cattle fair when farmers were in town. Labourers weren’t auctioned as slaves were. Labourers agreed to work for a farmer, usually for a year, at an agreed wage. They earned little more than their bed and board. This system was in place in most European countries. In fact hiring out your labour goes back to biblical times.

In between the fairs if a spailpín or casual labourer was unemployed he would often walk from one farm to another in search of a few hours work.  Paddy Drury was one of these wandering workmen. Jim Sheahan remembers him coming to their house in Athea. Even if they didn’t have work for him, they fed him and he was content to sleep on a chair until he headed off again.

Fear of a lash of his tongue meant that Paddy usually could be sure of a chair to sleep in in most houses he visited.

Paddy was like the bards of old who could rhyme off a blessing or a curse on the spot.

Once when he and the other workers in a house where he was employed were served up bacon so tough that none of them could chew it, he extemporised;

Oh Lord on high

Who rules the sky

Look down upon us four

Please give us mate

That we can ate

And take away the boar.

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More Christmas widows


Listowel shop windows this year have a train travel theme. Utopia’s window is really stylish and minimalistic.

The IWA window is gorgeous.



The Mermaids features old photos of the real Lartigue.

Stack’s Arcade is gorgeous.

Betty McGrath’s Listowel Florist’s

The Gentleman’s Barbers

Kay’s Children’s Shop has an excellent replica of the Lartigue on its snowy scene in the window.

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