Wartime Rationing, Bishop in Moyvane and Patricia Lynch's Grey Goose of Kilnevin and Athea in Stripes

Rutting Season 2019

Chris Grayson took this fellow's photo as he took a rest from the exertions of The Rut.

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A Listowel Memory of Rationing

The following story about a childhood memory of rationing, the tea chest, and a kindly adult comes to us from Billy McSweeney

The blog today reminded me of the fear of losing the ration book on my way to Mrs Twomey's shop in the 1940's. The ration book was kept in a cupboard in the kitchen and was entrusted to one on pain of death, to go to the shops. I still have visions and fear of hunger and starvation attached to that infernal book and the awful responsibility that went with it. I still remember the smile on Mrs Twomey's face one day when I ordered ½ stone of Tea and  ¼ lb Sugar. Only those of your readers who are of that age or have an appreciation of the old weights and measures will realise that those order  weights were back to front; hence Mrs. Twomey's smile. The correct order was dispensed naturally and the debit added to the 'Order Book' which accompanied the ration book. My mother paid the 'Order Book' on a weekly basis. This was really serious business. 

Twomey’s shop was an old-style establishment. The front half was the grocery and the back half was a pub. Today it is the Kingdom Bar, at the top of Church Street. For her part I can still see Mrs Twomey, with Kitty, her assistant, weighing out tea from a tea-chest and sugar from sacks into paper bags which when full were tied with cord, to be ready for sale; tea in ¼ lb bags and sugar in ½ stone paper bags . The empty tea-chest was usually donated to a family with a young child to have the four edges of the top covered with horsehair under a wax cloth for protection; and used as a 'cot' to mind a very young child. The cord from the retail bags was saved for future use by the familys. You learned to save everything because it could be of future use. My own earliest childhood memory is being in such a tea-chest at our front door on Upper Church Street and being spoken to very kindly by Joe Galvin, a schoolboy about five years older than myself,  on his way to the  old National school which was no more than 100 metres further up the street probably at 9.00am. One should be very careful of the way you speak to a young child. It could leave a lifelong memory. Joe stopped and spoke kindly to me, a child of no more than 1½ years old taking the morning air in a tea-chest, whereas all the other scholars just passed me by.

These times are returning according to our young Swedish friend that spoke bravely to the United Nations last week. She is a reminder to all of us of how arrogant and wasteful we have become.

Billy McSweeney

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FCA Guard of Honour

I borrowed this photo from the Moyvane website and I posted it with the caption that was attached, i.e. soldiers on Main Street.

Kay Caball recognised her uncle Micheál O'Connor, father of our own Canon Declan, as the soldier escorting the bishop.

Now maybe someone will remember the year and the occasion. Seems to be a big crowd in town for it anyway.

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An Old Favourite

Do you know that in the library they have lots of free books for you to take away? You can also donate books you have read and no longer need.

In this marvellous box of books that the library have taken out of stock I found this treasure. I remember reading it as a child. I loved The Turfcutter's Donkey and all his adventures. I lived about 2 miles outside of town but I very often cycled in to the library two and three times a day. The library is surely one of the best public services we have.

 In case you have never heard of Patricia Lynch I photographed the flyleaf for you.

These are two of the marvellous Sean Keating illustrations from the book.

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Athea in the News

Bridie Murphy took this super duper photograph of Athea's very successful fundraising run for the Ronald MacDonald House. David Twomey in the centre of the picture was the winner of the race but the big winner on the day was the Ronald MacDonald House. Well done Athea.

All caught up in 'er oh-la-la
Clap 'ands, stamp yer feet, Ye-e-a-y
Bangin' on the big bass drum
What a picture, what a picture
Um-tiddly-um-pum-um-pum-pum
Stick it in your fam'ly album

Stick it in your fam'ly
Stick it in your fam'ly
In your fam'ly album

Planting in the Park,Tara Brooch and More Listowel Memories

Giving it Full Blast

This magnificent shot won Jim MacSweeney a bronze medal at a recent photography competition. The photo was taken in Killarney National Park during the rutting season.

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This Listowel public house got a new sign while I wasn't looking.

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1916 Commemorative Garden

 I took this photograph of the 1916 installation from the path beside the pitch and putt course. I went into the garden and photographed details of the planting. It's well worth a visit. It's lovely.

The design for the garden is in the shape of the famous Tara Brooch.

Here is the story of the Tara Brooch from the Irish Central website:

The Tara Brooch is perhaps Ireland’s greatest piece of jewelry dating from the 7th century AD. It remains a popular symbol of Ireland and the country's rich ancestral past.

Although the beautiful brooch is named after the Hill of Tara, traditionally seen as the seat of the High Kings of Ireland, the Tara Brooch has no connection to either the Hill of Tara or the High Kings.

The brooch was supposedly found in August 1850 on the beach at Bettystown, County Meath by a peasant woman. The story goes that she found it in a box buried in the sand, though many believe the brooch was actually found inland but the woman’s family altered the facts to avoid a legal dispute with a landowner.

It was sold to a dealer and then made its way into the hands of Dublin jeweler George Waterhouse. With a keen sense of trends, Waterhouse was already producing Celtic Revival jewelry, which had become immensely fashionable over the previous decade. It was he who renamed the precious item the "Tara Brooch," in order to make it more alluring.

Waterhouse chose the name Tara in order to link the brooch to the site associated with the High Kings of Ireland, "fully aware that this would feed the Irish middle-class fantasy of being descended from them." And it worked. The Tara Brooch was displayed as a standout showpiece at The Great Exhibition in London in 1851 and the Paris Exposition Universelle, as well as the Dublin exhibition visited by the Queen in 1853. Prior to this, it had even been specially sent to Windsor Castle for her inspection.

In 1872, the brooch was added to the collection of the Royal Irish Academy, which later issued its antiquities to the National Museum of Ireland, where the Tara Brooch remains today.

The National Museum notes that “It is made of cast and gilt silver and is elaborately decorated on both faces. The front is ornamented with a series of exceptionally fine gold filigree panels depicting animal and abstract motifs that are separated by studs of glass, enamel, and amber. The back is flatter than the front, and the decoration is cast. The motifs consist of scrolls and triple spirals and recall La Tène decoration of the Iron Age.

“A silver chain made of plaited wire is attached to the brooch by means of a swivel attachment. This feature is formed of animal heads framing two tiny cast glass human heads.

“Along with such treasures as the Ardagh Chalice and the Derrynaflan Paten, the Tara Brooch can be considered to represent the pinnacle of early medieval Irish metalworkers’ achievement. Each individual element of decoration is executed perfectly and the range of technique represented on such a small object is astounding.”

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Maria Sham's Memories of Happy Listowel Sundays

The family in Gurtinard

After dinner on Sunday we would all go to my Grandmother Moloney’s house in Charles Street and take some jelly and current loaf for her. Mam would meet up with her sisters there and enjoy a little gossip.  Our cousins would also meet there and we would all sit on the door step and wait for our uncle Jimmy to get home. He would give all of us 2p for the cinema. Sometimes on a Sunday my brother Paddy would go fishing and we would have a fresh trout for tea.

Grandmother Moloney kept pigs in a pig sty in the back yard and as she was a bit feeble she would ask us children to take the pig food and feed them. I was scared stiff of them and would throw the food on their backs and run. Poor Mud, as we called her, was so glad thinking I had looked after the pigs and fed them. She was a bit deaf and could not hear us giggling. It was this grandmother that bought my first suitcase years later when I was leaving to go to England.

Some Sundays we would go for walks to the spa and through the woods to pick bluebells. The wood looked fantastic like a carpet of blue. Then we'd walk home through gurtenard and up through the graveyard, our arms loaded with bluebells.

The train ran at the back of our house and we were like the railway children. We would sit on the big bridge and watch who came off, anyone we knew coming from England just to see what they were wearing. It was also sad to see people crying as they were saying goodbye, leaving on the train the first leg of their journey to England. It was on this train I also left many years later.

The last train came in about 6.O'clock. Then the railway gates were locked for the night. We could then go and play there. It was quite safe. We would go to the cattle pens and have great times.