Childers Park in Autumn, Fitzgeralds in the U.S. and new memorabilia for the Lartigue Museum

Photographer in the Park

Deirdre Lyons took these lovely autumnal photographs in Childers Park, Listowel in early Autumn 2018

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Proud of his Kerry Roots

I've been writing this blog now for 7 years. There are over a million posts now out there in cyberspace. Every now and again someone googles something or someone and finds his way to an old blog post, This is what happened to Robert  Fitzgerald when he looked online for information about his ancestors.

He sent an email;

Good Evening:

I recently came across your blog post Farmers and gardeners from Tuesday, 3 January 2012.  The man that you talk about (Thomas Fitzgerald) turns out to be my great, great, grandfather.  I am only recently starting to find out more about the heritage of my family and it is my knowledge that Thomas came to Beaver, Pennsylvania to start a floral business and the many, many descendants of this Listowel gentleman have remained in the same small town for over 5 generations now.  Thomas had a son John (my great grandfather), who had a son John Lee (my grandfather), who had a son James (my father), that led to myself, Robert.  There are of course many other children involved as our family has grown quite considerably from the small Listowel roots. 

I am quite uncertain of any relatives still living in the Listowel area or the entirety of Ireland for that matter, but it is my intent to make the trip out there sometime in the near future and see for myself the humble beginnings of Thomas Fitzgerald and what is now a massive family here in the US. Browsing through some of the more recent posts on the blog, I see that the local area is quite beautiful and certainly full of history and tradition.  

I want to thank you for putting that information out in the blog as I was able to really uncover a lot of family history and learn a bit more about the small Irish town that my family descends from after many generations and what was thought to be lost history.

Very Respectfully,

Robert Fitzgerald

And here is the blogpost he is referring to ;

Here is a man I found on the internet. He has a Listowel connection but I wonder if he is related to any Fitzgeralds who still live around here.

FITZGERALD:   John Fitzgerald and Mary Conway Fitzgerald, of County Kerry, Ireland saw their second son, Thomas off  to Canada in 1862.  Thomas, who was born in Listowel, County Kerry, Ireland, came from a long line of gardeners and had worked at this since he was a boy in Ireland, managing the grounds and hothouses of Lord Colliss, of Tarbert township, County Kerry, Ireland and for 15 years an estate in Glin, County Limerick, Ireland. Thomas was leaving his beloved land to earn enough to bring his intended over and get married.  After 3 years of work in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, he was successful and brought Mary Healey, his intended over and they married.  Their first child was Patrick, born in 1865.  At this time Thomas and his family moved to the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area where he worked as a gardener on a nearby estate. While in Pittsburgh, Mary and Thomas had seven more children; John, who became manager of the Plumbers Supply Company in Erie, Pennsylvania; Thomas M., who was sent to study in Ireland for 3 years, and returned to open a large florist business in Beaver, Pennsylvania; James F.; Annie; Mary Catherine; Edward, who married Catherine Conville and was sent to Erie with his four children to help his brother John with the business in Erie; and William.  Thomas and Mary later moved to Beaver to help in their son Thomas M. Fitzgerald's greenhouses.

Two published biographical sketches provide great insight into the life of the Fitzgerald's of Allegheny and Beaver County Pennsylvania

Update: 10.00a.m. Vincent has looked him up and this Fitzgerald gardener is from Tarbert. He was married in Ballylongford on July 24 1832.

So if you are a Tarbert Fitzgerald and you think you are a relative, do drop an email to Listowel Connection.

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Lartigue Museum Received Fascinating Donation

Recently the Lartigue Museum have put on display some lovely old postcards and photographs donated to the museum by Catherine Kenton

The Gallant Greenville team, The Boro team of 1944and Ballybunion

Eason, Church Street

This used to be Listowel Printing Works and before that was Kearney's

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Sportsfile Picture captures the joy of Ireland's Win

Keith Earls celebrates with his daughters after Ireland's great win on Saturday.

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This is the Boro team who played in the Town League in 1944. Denis Quille sent us the photo.

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Vincent Carmody's essay on Listowel's Sporting Ballads and Ballad Makers 

Continuing from where I left off last week.....

Bryan McMahon is widely remembered, locally and nationally, for the writing of very many well-known ballads, of sporting and of a local nationalistic fervour. Among them, The Hounds of Glenoe (his recall of younger days hunting with fellow townsman, Berkie Brown and others they spent days hunting in the hills behind Banemore) A verse is worth recalling,

See Reynard is golden as there he goes roving,

He twists and he turns, he’s the bracken’s old hue,

He pauses to sniff the mad winds of the evening,

Then pointing his cloosheens he fades from the view,

You’ll pay for your crimes now, my tawny marauder’

The hens and the chickens, the turkeys you owe,

For here they come roaring with music full-throated,

North Kerry’s avengers, the hounds of Glenoe.

 

‘Victory song for Old Kentucky Minstrel’ This was to honour the feat of the greyhound of that name, owned by Ballybunion Bookmaker and Publican, Jim Clarke, winning the famed Waterloo Cup.  It begins;

The Ballybunion Sandhills now, with bonfires are all aflame,

On the green fields of Tipperary, sure, they shout a greyhound’s name,

The coursers of Kilkenny brave, they raise a loud ‘halloo’,

Since Old Kentucky Minstrel won the English Waterloo.

Local ballads, The Town of Listowel, My Silver River Feale, The Valley of Knockanure, The Brow of Piper Hill (this was written in his later years, when he used drive with his wife Kitty out to Smearla Bridge, parking his car, before walking up to the top of Pipers Hill)

In one verse he recalled,

In the evening late, from McCarthy’s gate

I climb to Dillon’s lawn

Below me then in that lovely glen

A picture fair is drawn

O’er the River Feale from Purt to Beale

And home by the ruined mill

A rainbow see, arching fair and free

To engarland Pipers Hill.

Bryan also had a great love of hurling, and among his ballads he wrote two recalling the deeds of famed Tommy Daly of Clare and Cork’s peerless Christy Ring. On the football front he wrote a memory of the 1953 All Ireland Football Final, between Armagh and Kerry, called, ‘Saffron and Green and Gold’.

Garry McMahon inherited his father’s gift of writing ballads and had left a legacy of these before his untimely death.

Even though John B. is remembered locally, nationally and internationally through all his great works, his only football remembrance is one, where he recalls the fete of the Greenville team winning the 1956 Listowel Troy Cup (this was the secondary football competition run by the Listowel football club, known locally as Listowel’s National League in deference to the Town League, which would have been classed as The All Ireland)  John B. would have traditionally played with Church Street- The Ashes,  however when he bought the pub in William Street, he threw his lot and considerable skill with the Greenville team, because, as he often said, the team members were better customers and porter drinkers than the townies.)  

The Gallant Greenville Team, 1956

Come all you true born Irishmen, from here to Healy’s gate

And I’ll sing for you a verse or two as I my tale relate

You may speak about Cuchulann bold or the mighty men from Sneem

But they wouldn’t hold a candle to that gallant Greenville team.

Ha-Ha! said Billeen Sweeney “sure I’ll tackle up my ass

And I’ll put on my new brown suit that I wear going to mass

I’ll hit the road for Listowel town by the morning’s airy beam

And I’ll bring home Berkie’s mutton for that gallant Greenville team”

The dry ball won’t suit ‘em said the pundits from the town

But they pulverised the Ashes and they mesmerised the Gleann

Next came the famous Boro, their fortunes to redeem

But they shrivelled up like autumn leaves before the Greenville team.

“T’was the white trout that done the trick” John L. was heard to say

“We ate ‘em morning, noon and night in the run up to the fray

They hardened up the muscles and they built up the steam

Until no power on earth could beat that gallant Greenville team”

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Deirdre Lyons in a cave in Ballybunion

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A Poem

Some people shared this on the internet for Mothers' Day, March 11 2018 but it's true for everyday.

DEATH IS SMALLER THAN I THOUGHT

by adrian Mitchell

My Mother and Father died some years ago
I loved them very much.
When they died my love for them
Did not vanish or fade away.
It stayed just about the same,
Only a sadder colour.
And I can feel their love for me,
Same as it ever was.

Nowadays, in good times or bad,
I sometimes ask my Mother and Father
To walk beside me or to sit with me
So we can talk together
Or be silent.

They always come to me.
I talk to them and listen to them
And think I hear them talk to me.
It’s very simple –
Nothing to do with spiritualism
Or religion or mumbo jumbo.

It is imaginary.
It is real.
It is love.

Snow, Storm Emma, Writers' Week team, Some words of wisdom and some old stuff

The Week we went Mad

Today is March 5 2018 and Ireland is picking itself up after one of the strangest weeks I have yet witnessed. We had an extreme weather event when a snow storm from the west met a wind storm from the east and we witnessed blizzard conditions.

We went mad. I think everyone ate sandwiches and soup for a week as supplies of sliced pans and vegetables sold out faster than they traditionally do on Christmas Eve. 

Slimming World  and Weighwatchers will make a killing from this.

Marie Moriarty took these photos in Garvey's Super Valu, Listowel on March 1 2018 at 10.30 a.m.

.........

Then we went outdoors and we made snowmen, snow women and snow dogs, igloos and even a sneachtapus.

A Kerry snowman...more specifically a Kilflynn snowman.

A Lithuanian/Kerry snowman

An igloo under construction in Kanturk. Igloos and snow sculptures were popping up everywhere.

 sneachtapus

This creation trumps them all.

A video appeared on Facebook of downhill skiing in Moyvane.

Aisling and her sisters made a Cork snowman in Ballincollig.

Meanwhile my Kildare based family were snowed in.

I am so lucky to have neighbours who look after me. Eddie Moylan shovelled the snow from my drive and Helen Moylan brought me a delicious dinner when our trip to Allos had to be called off.

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Glentenassig by Deirdre Lyons

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Ladies Who Lunch

No, they are not really ladies who lunch. The Writers' Week team were bidding farewell  to their German intern when I met them in Scribes last week.

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On 3/4/17 Fr. Pat Moore posted on his blog.

Worth repeating 

"Be patient towards all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves...do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given to you because you will not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now."

Rilke

"Everything that is in God, is God"

Meister Eckhart 

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Listowel girls?

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Drink Aware

Billy MacSweeney found this poster which was issued as part of an anti drink campaign in 1919. I think they'd put you off drink alright.

St. Bridget, John B. and The Prophet and Wine from the bog

St. Bridget's Day, February 1st.

The story is told that, one night, Brigid went to sit with a dying man. He was a chieftain, and members of his household hoped Brigid would speak to him of Christ, and perhaps convert him before he died. However the man was very ill and couldn’t listen to such talk. So Brigid prayed for him instead. As she sat by his bedside, she picked up some of the rushes scattered on the floor. (This was typical of the time, rushes were warm and kept the floor clean). She began to weave rushes into a Cross, and as she did the Chieftain asked her about it. She wove and spoke of Jesus and prayed for the Chieftain. He came to know Christ that night, was baptised and died in peace.  

St Brigid’s Crosses are traditionally made by Irish people around her feast day. Many homes place them over a door lintel or in the thatch of a house.

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Greyhound success

Batt and Gertie O'Keeffe accepting a trophy.

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The Best Storyteller of Them all

I don't know if the characters in this story by John B. Keane are real or imaginary. If they were real, Listowel certainly bred some great characters back in the day.

The Prophet by John B. Keane

Few characters have appealed so much to my readers as the Prophet Callaghan. He is dead now with over a score of years but he is fondly remembered by those fortunate enough to have known him. It’s not because he was such a prodigious drinker of whiskey and porter that he is remembered; rather it is because he was a dab hand at quoting from the scriptures and other apocryphal sources.

In fact this is why they named him The Prophet. His uncanny ability for coming up with apt quotes at just the right moment first came to light during the war years after he had cleaned out a pitch and toss school in Listowel’s famous market sheds one rainy Sunday afternoon. With his winnings of several pounds, a small fortune in those days, he repaired with his friend, Canavan, to Mickey Dowling’s public house in Market Street but was refused admission as it was after hours.

It was the same story in every pub from Pound Lane to the Customs’ Gap. The forces of law and order, to wit the Garda Síochána were unusually active. The guards would explain later in their homely way that there had been letters to the barracks that certain law breaking publicans had been mentioned in dispatches.

As Callaghan went homeward that night with his friend Canavan, he remarked as he jingled the silver coins in his pockets “What profiteth it a man if he gain the whole world and he can’t get a drink after hours?”

Another Sunday night the guards raided a pub in Upper Church Street. This pub was always regarded as relatively safe as it was so near the guards barracks. Anyway Canavan and Callaghan were ‘found on’. When asked by the guard to account for his presence on a licensed premises after hours, Callaghan replied that he was only following the precepts of Saint Matthew.

“I don’t follow,’ said the sergeant.

“Ask and it shall be given,” Callaghan quoted, “Seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened, and lo and behold,” Canavan continued, “I knocked and it was opened and that is the reason I am here.”

(more tomorrow)

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New Follower

I received a lovely email from a new follower in Canada.

Dear Mary,

I have recently signed up to receive your e-mails and I am glad I did. My father was from Listowel (migrating to Wales with his family in 1921 at 8 years old) and sadly I have only visited once – 20 years ago. So, I am catching up on what I should know by reading your blog.

I felt compelled to write after reading the gift from America story.  That brought back memories.  My Aunt became a nun at 17 after being a novice for a few years (I don’t know if this is true but we we told that the nuns came around the doors in the late 19th early 20th centuries asking to take girls off the hands of poor families to give them a better life??).  She then went to Texas.  Every Christmas she would send a box filled with towels and matching face cloths edged with crochet (to make the fabric stronger and therefore last longer), talcum powder and soaps.  These were probably items she saved during the year. We loved receiving and opening the boxes.  However, my mother was mortified each year when the postman deliver the parcel to our door in Wales as the customs' note in bold lettering was always the same: Old clothes for the poor! 

Keep up the good work,

Barbara Ann Watts

Calgary Alberta Canada

PS The crocheting worked as 50 years later they are still going strong

PPS As you were posting pictures of snowy winters around the world we were experiencing –35C  weather! 

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Peat Wine!

Dara O'Briain spotted this on the shelf at Knock airport and posted the photo on Twitter.
Looks a bit steep at €40.. certainly not dirt cheap

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A Walk by the Feale with camera

Deirdre Lyons took these photos on the river walk as the flood subsided in late January 2018.

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More Famous Needlework

Source: Mark Stedman via RollingNews.ie

Women have the vote for 100 years now. To celebrate this Vótáil 100 is having various celebrations and sharing of artefacts.

The above buttons were part of a set of 8 which were embroidered by Countess Markievicx while she was a prisoner in Holloway.

This photograph of former Irish female politicians (with some re-enactors) was carried in various media. I saw it in The Journal.

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Lord Listowel loses out on The Golden Thimble

Yesterday I posted this newspaper clipping.

Dave O'Sullivan did a bit of research. He found out that the competition which Lord Listowel entered was held in 1925.

I felt saddened to read that it was an initiative to help the "disabled soldiers embroidery industry.

Does it Matter?  by Siegfried Sassoon

Does it matter?—losing your legs?...
For people will always be kind,
And you need not show that you mind
When the others come in after hunting
To gobble their muffins and eggs.

Does it matter?—losing your sight?
There's such splendid work for the blind;
And people will always be kind,
As you sit on the terrace remembering
And turning your face to the light.

Do they matter?—those dreams from the pit?
You can drink and forget and be glad,
And people won't say that you're mad;
For they'll know you've fought for your country
And no one will worry a bit.