The People's Park, Brian Hughes Piper and Whistle Player

In Eye on the Past No. 1513 I wrote of the Peoples Park and suggested that the Park provided for the people of Athy by Augustus Frederick Fitzgerald, the 3rd Duke of Leinster, was opened sometime in the 1850s. Referring to the arrival of the railway in Athy in 1846 I believe that the Crib Road, now known as Church Road, was constructed at the same time. A misplaced map recently discovered by Paud O’Connor in the Trinity College library collection helps to confirm that the road was indeed laid down as part of the railway development work in Athy. The map discovered by Paud was misfiled in the collection of John Rocque’s map books. It had been prepared by Clarges Greene in 1850. Greene of Dominic Street, Dublin had prepared a map of Athy in 1827 for the Duke of Leinster on a scale of 80ft. to 1inch. That manuscript map showed with great detail and clarity the entire town of Athy on a single sheet measuring 56inches x 82½inches. The 1850 Clarges Greene map was prepared as part of a survey of ‘Boherbuey in the manor of Athy’ for the Duke of Leinster. It showed the newly developed Southern and Western railway line and the station house, with the fairgreen on the north side of the line and a very small St. Michael’s burial ground. What is of interest are two roads each described on the map as ‘new road’. The first is what later became known as the Crib Road, while the other new road is the present Kildare Road. The original road to Kildare, but then described as a street located as it was in the centre of Athy, was the present Stanhope Street. In Rocque’s map of east Athy prepared in 1756, what we now know as Stanhope Street was then called Cotters Lane and subsequently Kildare Street. So the extension of the railway to Athy in 1846 gave us two new roads, the current Kildare Road and the Crib Road and undoubtedly led to the development of the lands encircled by the new Crib Road as the Peoples Park. Incidentally the name Crib comes from the metal cribs or circular barriers which were put around the young trees planted on both sides of the new road. The trees are no longer on Church Road but I do recall them when as a youngster with my pals in Offaly Street we played on the road which we always knew as the Crib Road. The cribs were long gone at that stage, but the name remained. When writing Eye on the Past No. 1529 of the Garda Siochana members who played Gaelic football for Athy Gaelic Football Club and Kildare County senior team I omitted to mention another great football player Colm Moran. Colm was for many years a stalwart on the Athy senior team and played on the 1987 Athy championship winning team. He featured on the Kildare County senior team for several years and retired recently as a member of the Garda Siochana. The Athy Gaelic Football Club’s association with An Garda Siochana is a unique and proud relationship stretching back to the 1930s when Garda George Comerford played for Athy and continued up to our time by Johnny McEvoy, Brendan Kehoe, Mick Carolan, Anthony McLoughlin, Eamonn Henry and Colm Moran. I missed the recent launch of Brian Hughes’ new CD as I was travelling from Cork that evening but from all accounts a great night of traditional music was enjoyed by all. The musical talent which has originated in Athy in recent years is quite extraordinary given the town’s relatively modest population size. Brian Hughes, a wonderful piper and whistle player, has featured on several CD’s to date and his growing reputation in the world of Irish traditional music is a measure of his masterful musical skills. I have often sought to make connections between Athy’s street bands of previous generations and the musicians of today without convincing even myself that there is a continuous generation link between them. Whether or not we can make that connection there is no doubt that Athy’s current crop of star performers, Brian Hughes, Jack L, Joe Byrne, Picture This, the Sullivan Brothers and Fran O’Mara are part of a great music making tradition which embraced several generations of Athy folk. This year’s famine commemoration service will be held in St. Mary’s Cemetery, located opposite St Vincent’s Hospital, on Sunday 15th May at 3pm. In the grounds of the hospital, formerly the Workhouse, can be found James McKenna’s famine monument. The famine monument, which I understand Kildare County Council agreed to erect in St. Mary’s Cemetery, has not yet materialised. The service on May 15th gives us an opportunity to publicly honour Athy’s famine dead with dignity and reverence and to recall a period in our community’s history which cast a shadow over Ireland’s subsequent years.