Turf

Slea Head

Photo credit; Graham Davies on This is Kerry

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If today you are complaining about your job, take a look at this turfcutter. Bord na Mona employed men on a casual basis to harvest the turf. They were paid, not by the day or the hour, but by the amount of turf they cut. I don't know if this man was in Lyreacrompane. I doubt he was as most of the photos seem to come from the bigger bogs in the midlands where there were villages of Nissan huts set up during the turf cutting season and the men (there were no women allowed) slept and ate in these huts and spend every waking hour turf cutting.

Men of the Travelling Community used to come to Lyreacrompane for the turf season and these men were a significant cohort of the Lyre workforce.

This photo, also from the great Bord na Mona Archives shows a mountain of turf in the Phoenix Park Dublin sometime during the war. Turf was exported to Britain, as there was as s shortage of coal due to the war.

A Post Box, A Poster, The Cobwebs Glory and A Date with a Story

Pollinator at work

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Saving the turf in the 1940s

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Post Box in Upper Church Street

Any idea what this says?

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Where stories begin

This poster takes up the whole window of the old Lawler's Cake Shop in Church Street. It features some well known Listowel personalities. It's proving s great talking point.

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The Cobweb's Glory

Many people have been in touch about this one.

From Vincent Carmody  

 "That production of The Cobwebs Glory would have been in the late 1940s or the very early 1950s as Eamon Kelly who directed it would have left Listowel around that time, bound for the Abbey Theater. The writers, were a combination of three Listowel men, Bryan McMahon, Michael Kennelly and an O'Connor man from Market Street, I think that his name was Paddy. 

The play was staged secondly by the Listowel Players, with Nora Relihan as producer, with proceeds from the three nights, going towards the upkeep of the boys national school, like many poster s there was no year given, however knowing the cast I would say early 1970s.  The poster is in my book, page 206."

Jim MacMahon shed some more light on the third man; 

it was written by three people , my Dad , Paddy O'Connor and Michael Kennelly. I suspect it was my dad's first dipping of his toe in the water as a dramatist . Both Michael and Paddy were pals in Listowel. Paddy was a very literary teacher, first in St Flannels in Ennis and later in Blackrock college and a literary critic , Jim

Beta OBrien wrote;

The Cobwebs Glory was a play about a greyhound of that name and the author was a combination of writers. Bryan McMahon Michael Kennelly and Paddy OConnor (who spent most of his life teaching in Blackrock College Dublin) The date I guess would be prior to Bryan McMahon getting  involved in serious writing possibly late forties."

And Mattie Lennon sent this;

 I have no way of knowing when that production was staged. But I played Trooper Devane, with the Lacken Drama Group in 1965.

   Am I right in thinking that the play had three authors and that one of them was Bryan McMahon?

Dave O'Sullivan looked up the papers and here is what he found.

Thanks everyone for all your help.

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One for the Diary

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The Rose of Tralee Fashion Show

Quite unexpectedly I found myself at The Rose fashion show on Sunday night. The dome looked magnificent, every bit as good in reality as it looks on TV. We enjoyed a great night's entertainment, goody bags and all.

The Roses on stage

Beautiful bridal wear from my friends in Finesse

They were all lovely.

Turf, Peas, Hopscotch and Revival 2019

An old advertising sign at a pub in Kildare

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Stockpiling Turf

I found this picture on the Bord na Mona Living History page. It shows BnaM workers covering the pile of turf. The practice of covering the stockpile started in 1961 after the damage done by Storm Debbie.

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Peas in a Pod

Raymond O'Sullivan is a great one to follow on Facebook. He is full of interesting information. The following photo and text is his.

Shelling peas for the dinner, thinking about old ways: does anyone believe in marriage divination/prediction anymore? Does this age old custom/superstition still survive in the rational and pragmatic 21st century? Invariably practiced by young girls, you know what I mean, getting the ring in the barm brack at Hallowe’en, putting a piece of wedding cake under your pillow to dream of your future husband, eating a salted herring at bedtime for a similar result, plucking an even ash leaf and reciting certain verses and hundreds more. If a young girl finds 9 peas in a pod the next single male she meets will be her future husband, or, at least, have the same initials.

It depends on the strain of peas, but the average seems to be 6-7 peas to the pod. 9-pea pods are not all that unusual though, and, if it were not for sexism and ageism, I might be Sultan of a handy harem before the year is out. A word of warning to any young lady contemplating a raid on my garden in search of a 9-pea pod, the first single male you meet will probably be a very disgruntled and grumpy old gardener.

I (your blogger) grew up not far from the Erin Foods factory in Mallow. In summertime during the pea harvest, lorries piled high with pea vines passed by our house several times a day. If two lorries passed at our gate, they were forced to pull in close to the roadside in order to pass safely. Invariably the overhanging branches of our trees would dislodge some of the vines and we, children, loved to retrieve these before they fell to the ground and were rolled over by traffic. I can still taste the delicious raw peas.  Happy days!

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Hopping in for a Cuppa

Bitesize ias a busy friendly cafe in Ballincollig, Co Cork. it always has a saying to make you smile on its sandwich board and invariable a bowl of water for the pooches. Now that the children are off school it has a hopscotch grid at the door. Here is my granddaughter, Róisín, hopping in for a milk shake.

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Great weekend of Music in Store

Listowel Singers, turf cutting and Roly Godfrey, Painter and Jim Quinlan R.I.P.

Minnie in Ballybunion at sundown photographed by Bridget O'Connor

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Listowel Singers

This old photo of the Listowel Singers was shared on Facebook by Ned O'Sullivan. He enjoyed the joke of the seagull on his head.

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Changes to Tralee Streetscape

I took these photos just before it was completely demolished

PHOTO; Historical Tralee on Facebook

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A Day in the Bog

Many people will remember this, a barrow load of turf. I remember that when we cut breast slane turf on our own bank, we used to load the barrow with 2 rows of four sods, then three sods, then 2 and 1 on the top, making 20 sods per barrow. The wheeler would empty the barrow on the spread ground and when you came in the next barrow was ready to go. No rest, you had to keep going. Of course there were different traditions and ways of cutting and spreading turf around the country. This photo dates from the 1940s.

Photo and text from Tony McKenna

I wonder if these barrows were used in North Kerry. I certainly don't remember them and my recollection of the bog was that the ground would be far too soft to roll a loaded barrow on.

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Roly Godfrey, Painter

We know the subject but we don't know the artist yet. Patrick Godfrey came across this portrait of his grandfather, painter Roly Godfrey. It was painted by a local artist and the setting is The Harp and Lion bar and the year is sometime in the 1980s.


I came to Listowel first in 1975. One aspect of the town that fascinated me was the number of painting and decorating firms it had. I came from a place where everyone seemed to so their own painting. I remember two professional painters but they were mostly employed by businesses with high outside facades to maintain.


In contrast, everyone in Listowel seemed to employ professionals to paint their shops and businesses. I think it is a mark of the pride people took in how their shopfronts looked and a desire to always put on a show for the visitor. It is this pride in the town and this desire to employ the best people to decorate it that has eventually led to the winning of Ireland's Tidiest Town Award in 2018.

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+ Jim Quinlan R.I.P.+

Kerry Crusaders running and cycling clubs were founded to remember a man who died while he was out cycling, Howard Flannery.


There was a poignant scene on Church Street Listowel on Monday April 1 2019 as cyclists in Crusaders cycling gear peddled slowly in front of the hearse carrying the coffin of their fallen comrade, Jim Quinlan.

Jim's cycling brothers gave him a great send off. His friends in the Listowel Folk Group sang him to his rest.


Jim was one of those people who are the salt of the earth. He was a great community and parish man, contributing always with a will and a smile. His adopted Listowel is diminished by his untimely passing.

Happiest in the company of his beloved Nóirín, I snapped Jim on a chance encounter in Ballybunion last year.


Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam uasal.

New York, Ballybunion, Red Cross and Turf

January 2018 in Midtown Manhattan

The temperature was -12 when Danny O'Connor, formerly of Gurtinard, took this photo.

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Old Ballybunion

The Ladies' Beach back in the day.

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 Listowel Red Cross in the 1960s. Does anyone recognise anyone?

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Turf Then and Now

These are stooks of turf standing drying in the bog fadó.

This is the scene in the bog at the end of summer as the turf is saved and ready to be bagged and brought home.

Machine cup turf drying in the bog.

Sods of machine turf.

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My Own Micko Story

Dave O'Sullivan found this in The Kerryman archive from 1981

For those who don't remember the controversy, it concerned commercial sponsorship of county . teams.

Kerry was one of the first counties to accept endorsements and to do media ads.

The reference to stripes is to the famous Adidas three stripes logo. 

The Mulvihill was Liam Mulvihill the then director general of the GAA.

The Bog, The Children, the nuns and Ryan Tubridy at Writers' Week

It's That Time of Year

Photo by Jason of Ballybunion Prints Beach

Not everyone can lie all day on the beach. For some people the fine weather means one thing...a trip to the bog.

 Bog cotton photographed by Maire Logue

Turbery and turbines photographed by Maire Logue

Some people are a little further along with the turf harvest. The Hartnett family of Upper William Street have their turf home and stowed.

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The early days of Presentation Presence in Listowel

The cross gave its name to the first convent here. It was known as The Convent of the Holy Cross.

Here is a newspaper account of the death of one of the founding sisters

Irish Examiner , Friday, October 21, 1864

DEATH OF REV. MOTHER TERESA KELLY PRESENTATION CONVENT, LISTOWEL.

NOT only the religious and Catholic laity of the diocese of Kerry, but the large circle, besides, by whom she was known and venerated, will feel with regret that the blank left in her community by the death of Reverend Mother Teresa Kelly on Wednesday last, will be long before it ceases to be suffered from. A long life of activity, intelligence and holiness, under trying circumstances, endeared her to all who know her personally or by report.

Upwards of fifty years ago Miss Kelly entered the Presentation Convent, Killarney, and soon after passing through an edifying novitiate was appointed superioress. In this important office she distinguished herself by bar prudence and zeal alike; her charity knew no limit, and yet she never involved her community in embarrassments. During her term of office in Killarney, the first of the monks of La Trappe, whose abbey is now so well known at Mount Melleray, near Cappoquin, came to this country from France. They were penniless, and depended for support on the charity of the people. The first of those who stretched out the hand to help them was Rev. Mother Teresa, her influence procured them a house to live in, and her pecuniary aid to their establishment in Ireland was important. Visitors to the Abbey of Mount Melleray may hear of a lady who is publicly prayed for by the monks as a great benefactress to their order, well-known to the older brothers, this lady is Mother Teresa. All, but a few old monks on crutches, have died, of the brothers who came over from France, and as silence is one of the chief disciplines of La Trappe, few of the present community know the name of the lady for whom the public prayers are offered.

Having filled with honour the office, of superioress at Killarney for several years, Mother Teresa, with a few sisters, left the community to found a convent at Milltown, a small town at the bend of Dingle Bay. Under her able government, this undertaking prospered, and the schools attached were filled with the children of the peasantry and townspeople. Here Mother Teresa remained until she had passed her fiftieth year. At this period of life few men or women undertake new and important works, but Mother Teresa, hearing of the great want of educational establishments in North Kerry, consented to break her attachments to the convent she had founded and made prosperous, and begin anew in Listowel. She founded the convent of Holy Cross in that town onwards of twenty years ago, with three assistant sisters. Of her acts of charity during the famine, years no praise could be too loud. She was the chief reliance of priests and people in that district during that dreary period. Her small community gradually gained accessions, and on the day of her death she had the happiness to see it one of the most prosperous and beloved of the Presentation Convents.

Many priests on the foreign and home missions owe the means which enabled them to prosecute their studies to this holy woman, and would regret her loss were they not assured that she has passed to a place where the virtues she practised and the peace she loved and taught here are eternal.

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The National Children's Literary Festival at Writers' Week

Here are some of the marvellous events which the lucky children enjoyed.

RTE Juniors held a very popular workshop.

Here are the RTE Junior stars with Norella and Maria of Listowel Writers' Week.

Singer/ Songwriter, Enda Reilly held two songwriting events, one as Gaeilge and one in English.

Kenny the Clown made balloon animals for the children.

Children's author, Sarah Webb was omnipresent during the festival.

Ryan Tubridy and P.J. Lynch told the children about how they came to work together on the popular children's book, Patrick and the President. They signed and posed for photos and were gracious and patient with all their young admirers.