Concrete Bridge across River Barrow

Foundations for what was the then longest reinforced concrete bridge in Ireland were laid in June 1917. It was part of the work on the Athy Wolfhill railway line which had been authorised by the British government under the 1871 Defence of the Realm Act to relieve wartime scarcity of fuel. Work had started on extending the railway line to the Wolfhill coalmines from months previously. Men from Dublin and Belfast were brought to Athy to join the local workers with the promise of 30 shillings per week and free bed for a 60 hour week. The Dubliners soon went on strike, seeking a wage increase of 8 shillings per week and a reduction in the working hours. The Athy men did not join the strike which was eventually settled when the workmen agreed to terms of 5 shillings and 6 pence per day, with some reduction in the work hours. By September 1917 with so many local men, encouraged by the generous separation allowances, having enlisted in the British Army, the local Urban District Council petitioned the chief engineer on the railway project to release 200 men for a short period to help farmers during the harvest. The bridge across the River Barrow was nearing completion in January 1918 but as the entire railway line extension project neared completion on 14th February 1918 the workers went on strike again. Up to 200 men marched through Athy in what was an unsuccessful attempt to get the Athy workers to join the strike. Following the intervention of Denis Kilbride M.P. and his colleague P.J. Meehan of Portlaoise the strike was called off in order to allow the Board of Trade to decide on the workers’ demands. The work continued in time for the Athy Wolfhill line to be opened on 24th September 1918. Operated by the Great Southern and Western Railway Company, the Wolfhill line was in constant use for only a few months as the 10 mile long railway line gave access to the coal pits at Gracefield and Modubeagh. With the end of the Great War the anthracite from the Wolfhill pits and from the Deerpark colliery in Castlecomer, which latter coalmine was served by a newly built railway line from Kilkenny became less commercial to mine. The Castlecomer railway line which opened approximately one year after the Wolfhill line, was the last substantial standard gauge branch line to be built in Ireland. Both railway lines were in charge of the English Board of Works until 1921 when British Government control of the Irish railways ended. In 1924 the Irish Free State government required the different Irish railway companies to amalgamate and the Great Southern and Western railway company which operated the Dublin Waterford line and its various branches became the largest partner in the newly formed Great Southern railway. The railway line to Wolfhill was taken out of use on 12th July 1930, while rail services to Ballylinan continued until 1st April 1963. With the opening of the cement factory in Mullery’s field in 1936 a small branch line was opened to serve the factory which was supplied with material from its sister factory in Drogheda. This branch line closed a few years ago on a date which I would like any of my readers to confirm. Last week the new bridge over the River Barrow as part of the outer relief road began to take shape. Two massive steel girders were moved into place on the south side of the old railway bridge 104 years after the workmen of 1919 had completed their work. It created an enormous amount of interest, with photographs and videos appearing on Facebook and elsewhere recording what is a local historic event. It made me think back to the Planning Appeal hearing in March 2005 to consider objections to Kildare County Council’s plan to erect a bridge across the River Barrow at the rear of the Courthouse as part of the inner relief road project. I engaged with the Planning Inspector and the County Council’s expert witnesses for more than a week during the hearing as I presented a case for the outer relief road, rather than the inner relief road planned by the Council. The County Council inner relief road proposal was to many people in Athy, but not to all, a hopeless attempt to solve the increasingly difficult traffic problems in the town. The outer relief road was the preferred option of the majority of people in Athy, but the County Council would not listen to the local people and with the assistance of a slim majority on the Urban District Council insisted on pressing ahead with a road which would have left all traffic including huge HGV’s travelling through the centre of our town. An Bord Pleanala accepted the strength of the arguments regarding the preference for the outer relief road and for the first time in planning history rejected a local authority’s road plan. It has taken almost 50 years to get the relief road in place and with it comes an opportunity for local businesses to make Athy’s town centre an attractive place to visit and to shop. Writing of bridges reminds me that it is almost 30 years since the issue of a pedestrian bridge from Woodstock across the Barrow to its east side was first raised. Since then the Athy schools on the east side have increased to include all the schools, primary and secondary, in the town. There is an urgent pressing need for a pedestrian bridge to be put in place. Can we look forward to having this essential structure put in place before too long.

Anna Edith Duthie

Anna Breakey was 24 years old when she came to live and work in Athy 74 years ago. She was a native of Ballybay, Co. Monaghan, the third of four children born to farmer James Breakey and his wife Edith. Anna would spend all but the last three years of her life in the south Kildare town. She arrived in Athy three years after the ending of World War II to work in Shaws Department store in Duke Street and lived over the store with the other female assistants until she married in 1953. She had met local man, Albert Duthie, whose late father, William Thomas Duthie, had taken over the watchmaking and jewellery business of William O’Connor in 1905. That business, located at 30 Leinster Street, would continue to operate under the name W.T. Duthie & Son until Anna Duthie, formerly Anna Breakey, retired in 2013. One of my many treasured memories of Athy in the 1950s was the nodding Santa Claus figure high up in Albert Duthie’s shop window in the weeks prior to Christmas. As youngsters my friends and I approached the window in the darkening gloom of winter evenings to bask in the simple belief that anything we asked for would somehow magically appear on Christmas morning. As we grew older and innocent beliefs disappeared, the nodding Santa Claus still attracted our attention, but now as a reminder of the forthcoming Christmas festivities and the school holidays which we looked forward to with eager anticipation. I left Athy in January 1961, spending years in several different towns including Monaghan town, not too far away from Ballybay. I found Monaghan folk to be friendly and helpful and on my return to Athy 21 years later I found Mrs. Anna Duthie displaying the same qualities. During the 1960s and the 1970s I returned to Athy on a regular basis and got to know Anna’s husband Albert. I shared with him an appreciation of all that is good in Athy and Albert shared with me his efforts to highlight the story of his native town. He did this by frequently photographing events and buildings in Athy and also by commissioning the town’s coat of arms which he used on various items sold in his shop. Albert sadly passed away in 1979 at 54 years of age and Anna who had celebrated with him their silver wedding jubilee a year previously would spend the next 45 years without her loving partner. Anna Duthie, like her late husband Albert, always exhibited a great interest in and appreciation of all things Athy. She was a wonderful help to me in relation to unravelling the history of the Presbyterian Church in Athy and always displayed a willingness to share with me information on different aspects of Athy’s story in which generations of the Duthie family once played a prominent part. Anna was particularly helpful in the making of arrangements which saw the first performance of John MacKenna’s Oratorio ‘Still and Distant Voices’ in the Presbyterian Church in the early 1990s. This work which remembered and commemorated the young Athy men who died in World War I was perhaps one of the first times that this long-forgotten aspect of Athy’s history was brought to the public’s attention. Following her husband’s untimely passing Anna Duthie continued the business at 30 Leinster Street. Duthie’s, as it was known by the local people, was an important part of the commercial streetscape of Athy, presided over by the ever friendly and kind lady behind the counter. Anna Duthie continued in business until she retired in 2013 at 89 years of age. I believe that the Duthie family name first appeared in Athy when William Thomas Duthie’s parents arrived here from Perthshire, Scotland with other Scottish families in the early 1850s. It was William Thomas Duthie’s brother James who partnered with Harry Large of Rheban to establish the firm of Duthie Larges. That firm, once a substantial employer in Athy, is no more and the final Duthie link with Athy has now been severed with the sad passing of Anna Edith Duthie. Last Tuesday family and friends gathered in the Presbyterian Church on the Dublin Road for Anna’s funeral service conducted by Rev. Stephen Rea. Anna’s son Alistair and daughter Heather spoke fondly of their mother and father reminding us of a happy family life and Anna’s passion for nature, especially flowers. Anna Duthie and her husband Albert will be remembered with fondness, especially by the older generations in Athy until as John Ellerton wrote ‘The day you gave us, Lord, is ended’.

Rev. Nicholas Ashe and Athy in time of Rebellion 1798

In August 1782, the Irish antiquarian Austin Cooper, following a visit to Athy, wrote “Athy is a small town situated on the River Barrow over which there is a bridge of arches with a small square castle adjoining on the east side. Here is a market house, church and county Courthouse, nothing remarkable in elegance of building. On the north west side of the town is a plain horse barracks and near it another castle”. Two hundred and forty years later all that remains of the buildings mentioned by Cooper is a much altered town hall (then the courthouse) Whites Castle and Woodstock Castle. Also gone are the many small private schools which were a common feature of Irish towns in the 18th and early 19th centuries. One such school was that of Nicholas Ashe where we find a mention in 1791 of one of his pupils, Thomas Lefroy, who would become the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland. Nicholas Ashe was a Church of England Minister who served as Sovereign of Athy following his election to that position in 1797. I am uncertain as to whether Ashe was a member of Athy Borough Council in 1792 when a measure of relief for Irish Catholics from some elements of the penal laws was proposed in the Irish Parliament. Those measures which eventually culminated in the Catholic Relief Act of 1793 were supported by the Duke of Leinster which prompted the Protestant members of Athy Borough Council to instruct their two parliamentary representatives to oppose the relief Bill. Rev. Nicholas Ashe appears from all accounts to have been a man of peace who found himself the subject of harsh treatment by the local yeomanry. Local yeomanry corps were formed after 1796 with membership confined almost exclusively to Protestants. Athy had two yeomanry units, the infantry and the cavalry. The Athy cavalry was formed in 1796 and was officered by Thomas Fitzgerald, a Catholic from Geraldine House, Athy although the corps was largely comprised of local Protestant gentry. The cavalry unit was disbanded in 1798 following the arrest of Thomas Fitzgerald and a humiliating standing down ceremony in Emily Square. This was done during Nicholas Ashe’s time as the town Sovereign. Some months earlier in January 1798 Ashe had written to the Duke of Leinster expressing his concerns at a possible rebel outbreak following claims of an ammunition plot. He expressed the hope that Athy would not be proclaimed and reported how he had liberated boat men arrested and detained by the local army commander. He wrote “Athy proved it’s loyalty last year by entertaining 1100 men over night and giving them money and provisions to assist them on their march to Bantry”. In that same letter Ashe recounted some of the acts of terrorism by members of the 9th Dragoons who were stationed in the local calvary barracks and also by the Cork Loyal Militia who had recently arrived in the town. A few weeks later Ashe forwarded a further letter to the Duke of Leinster expressing shame that while standing alone “against a most virulent party I suffer more than I can express”. In his attempts as town Sovereign not to have Athy proclaimed he had directed that all shops were to shut at 9.00pm. However a Mr. Willock who he claimed “pretended great loyalty to the King and aversion to papists kept his shop open in defiance”. He expressed annoyance at Willock’s action and that of his co religionist Carey – “two Protestants I never saw in church”. Ashe having discovered that Willock sold without licence had him committed to the local jail whereupon Willock hung out his hat with a paper on it which read “Willock was put in jail for his loyalty”. Ashe was extremely upset at what he described as the atrocities committed by the soldiers and having complained about their behaviour found himself “a victim to their malice”. The Duke of Leinster passed on Ashe’s complaint to Sir Ralph Abercromby, Commandeering Chief of the army, who promised to send another regiment into County Kildare. In the meantime Nicholas Ashe complained that his school was destroyed but despite this he continued to seek a peaceful resolution to the ongoing conflict between the authorities and the Irish rebels. Because he was successful in securing the surrender of a large number of pikes in the Athy area the local army commander felt that Ashe must have had links with the rebels and so quartered sixty soldiers with him. As a result the Reverend gentleman was so impoverished that the Duke of Leinster claimed “Ashe was obliged to do his duty as the magistrate in the streets in his slippers”. The brutal and systematic suppression of the people of Athy during 1798 was not confined to one religious group. Reverend Nicholas Ashe, Anglican churchman, first citizen of Athy in 1798 and a man of peace was victimised by local loyalists because of his attempts to advance what he described in his letters as “truth and humanity”. FRANK TAAFFE

Quakers and the Quaker Meeting House in Athy

This year we celebrate the centenary of the establishment of the civic guards later named the Garda Siochana. The new Irish police force was founded following the disbandment of the Royal Irish Constabulary and in its early years by and large followed the RIC organisational structure. Like the RIC the early civic guards were armed. On the 17th of August 1922 the last RIC men left Dublin Castle to be replaced by civic guards. The first recruits to the civic guards were paid three pounds and three shillings per week and even as they entered the service they were regarded with suspicion by the anti treaty side. Indeed Austin Stack, the former minister for home affairs stated that the setting up of the force was not calculated to promote order but rather suspicion, discontent and disorder. Recruits to the civic guards had to have specific height and chest measurements and most significantly had to have a reference from a clergy man. This latter requirement must have continued for some years as my father, a farmers son from north County Longford when he joined the gardai in 1925 did so on foot of a reference given by his Parish priest, Fr. . By 1924 they were 6,300 members of the force which by virtue of the Garda Siochana (temporary provisions) Act 1923 were now officially called “Garda Siochana”. When the first contingent of the newly appointed civic guards arrived in Athy was until recent times uncertain. The late Sergeant John Shaw who joined the civic guards on the 17th of August 1922 wrote to me from Portarlington in September 1980. In that letter he wrote that on the 15th of August 1922 civic guards were sent to Portarlington, Monasterevin, Rathanagan and as far as he knew Athy in order to protect the railway lines and the canal routes to Dublin. He also referenced an incident in Athy on the 26th of August of that year when armed civil guards disarmed C.I.D. men in the town. Another piece of information he passed on to me in that letter was that Sergeant Duggan, who was then the local Sergeant charged three men in a special Court on the 23rd of September. The nature of the offence was not stated but it may have arisen as a result of an armed attack on the premises which was then occupied by the civic guards. I also have a copy letter written by the same Sergeant William Duggan in 1950 which confirms that the civic guards took up duty in Athy on the 15th of August 1922 but he also explains that prior to that a party of 16 armed civic guards were stationed at a protection post in Bert. This I assume resulted from ongoing land disputes in the area resulting from evictions on the versicle estate. Sergeant Duggan’s letter names the 16 men as Michael O’Connor, Peter Curley, Thomas Concannon, Joseph Walton, John Kelly, Joseph McNamara, John Ryan, Michael Summers, Patrick Fitzgerald, John O’Neill, James Dwyer, John Hanley, Peter Tracey, Thomas Kirwan, Michael Hassett and Sergeant William Duggan. The police records once retained at divisional level at An Garda Siochana showed that the first Sergeant in Athy was Coriolanus Lillis who was replaced by Sergeant Ed. O’Loughlin on the 1st of May 1924 who in turn was replaced by Sergeant William Duggan (the letter writer) on the 1st of August 1924. When the civic guards first arrived in Athy they were accommodated in the Town Hall before transferring to the old RIC barracks off in Barrack Lane after it was vacated by the free state army. When the barracks was attacked and damaged during the civil war the police men moved to a hotel in Leinster Street. Sergeant Duggan claimed that it was the Leinster Arms Hotel. However I have a note of being informed many years ago that the hotel in question was the Hibernian Hotel which is now Bradbury’s premises. This year the centenary of the founding of An Garda Siochana is being marked by various events throughout the country. Athy’s Art Centre will be the venue for a lecture on the history of An Garda Siochana with particular reference to Athy as part of a history lecture series which starts on Tuesday, 20th September. Details of that lecture will be published later. The first lecture on the 20th of September will be given by Nessa O’Mara Cardiff on the Barrowhouse ambush in which James Connor and William Lacey lost their lives. This lecture and all the future lectures are free and will be held in the Arts Centre at Woodstock Street.

Early years of Garda Siochana in Athy

This year we celebrate the centenary of the establishment of the Civic Guards later named the Garda Siochana. The new Irish police force was founded following the disbandment of the Royal Irish Constabulary and in it’s early years by and large followed the RIC organisational structure. Like the R.I.C. the early Civic Guards were armed. On the 17th of August 1922 the last R.I.C. men left Dublin Castle to be replaced by the newly appointed Irish police men. The first recruits to the Civic Guards were paid three pounds and three shillings per week and even as they entered the service they were regarded with suspicion by the anti treaty side. Indeed Austin Stack, the former Minister for Home Affairs stated that the setting up of the force was not calculated to promote order but rather suspicion, discontent and disorder. Recruits to the Civic Guards had to have specific height and chest measurements and most significantly had to have a reference from a clergy man. This latter requirement must have continued for some years as my father, a farmers son from north County Longford when he joined the gardai in 1925 did so on foot of a reference given by his Parish priest, Fr. E. Mahon. By 1924 they were 6,300 members of the force which by virtue of the Garda Siochana (Temporary Provisions) Act 1923 were now officially called “Garda Siochana”. When the first contingent of the newly appointed Civic Guards arrived in Athy is still uncertain. The late Sergeant John Shaw who joined the force on the 17th of August 1922 wrote to me from Portarlington in September 1980. In that letter he wrote that on the 15th of August 1922 Civic Guards were sent to Portarlington, Monasterevin, Rathanagan and as far as he knew Athy in order to protect the railway lines and the canal routes to Dublin. He also referenced an incident in Athy on the 26th of August of that year when armed Civic Guards disarmed C.I.D. men in the town. Another piece of information he passed on to me in that letter was that Sergeant Duggan, whom he claimed was then the Athy Sergeant charged three men in a special Court on the 23rd of September. The nature of the offence was not stated but it may have arisen as a result of an armed attack on the premises which was then occupied by the Civic Guards. I also have a copy letter written by the same Sergeant William Duggan in 1950 which confirms that the Civic Guards took up duty in Athy on the 15th of August 1922 but he also explains that prior to that a party of 16 armed Civic Guards were stationed at a protection post in Bert. This I assume was because of ongoing land disputes in the area resulting from evictions on the Verschoyle estate. Sergeant Duggan’s letter names the 16 men as Michael O’Connor, Peter Curley, Thomas Concannon, Joseph Walton, John Kelly, Joseph McNamara, John Ryan, Michael Somers, Patrick Fitzgerald, John O’Neill, James Dwyer, John Hanley, Peter Tracey, Thomas Kirwan, Michael Hassett and himself. The police records once retained at divisional level in the An Garda Siochana showed that the first Sergeant in Athy was Cornelius Lillis who was replaced by Sergeant Ed. O’Loughlin on the 1st of May 1924 and who in turn was replaced by Sergeant William Duggan (the letter writer) on the 1st of August 1924. Sergeant Lillis was accompanied by Civic Guards John Hanley, John Kelly, Patrick Fitzgerald and Joseph McNamara. The records retained by the Garda Siochana, particularly relating to its early years are not as complete as one might expect. The records from which I gleaned the information relating to Sergeant Lillis and his successors were compiled in 1930. When the civic guards first arrived in Athy I understand they were accommodated in the Town Hall before transferring to the old RIC barracks off in Barrack Lane after it was vacated by the Free State army. It has been claimed that the policemen left the old R.I.C. barracks after it had been attacked by anti-treaty forces. I have been unable to verify this although I have an unverified note of an I.R.A. active service unit being caught up in crossfire in August 1922 during an attack on the police barracks in Athy. The police men later moved to a hotel in Leinster Street. Sergeant Duggan claimed that it was the Leinster Arms Hotel. However I have a note of being informed many years ago that the hotel in question was the Hibernian Hotel which is now Bradbury’s premises. This year the centenary of the founding of An Garda Siochana is being marked by various events throughout the country. Athy’s Art Centre will be the venue for a lecture on the history of An Garda Siochana with particular reference to Athy as part of a history lecture series which starts on Tuesday, 20th September at 8pm. Details of the Garda Siochana lecture will be published later. The first lecture on the 20th of September will be given by Nessa O’Mara Cardiff on the Barrowhouse ambush in which James Connor and William Lacey lost their lifes. This lecture and all the future lectures are free and will be held in the Arts Centre at Woodstock Street. FRANK TAAFFE

Grave Memorials in St. Michael's Cemetery Athy

It’s almost 40 years ago when with the assistance of FAS, the Industrial Training Authority, I organised a project intended to record all the headstones and grave memorials in the original St. Michael’s Cemetery. Regretfully it was a project which was not completed until many years later. The mammoth task of recording and mapping all the memorials in St. Michael’s Cemetery was eventually done by Michael Donovan, who is one of the unsung heroes of Athy and South Kildare. Michael has devoted many years of his life to recording cemetery memorials, not only in and around the immediate environs of Athy, but also further afield. To date he has completed 42 graveyard surveys, the results of which will be handed over to Kildare County Council to be made available to the general public. For many years tombstone inscriptions were an untapped source of Irish genealogy. They were largely unnoticed, except by those looking for obituary details. The work of copying tombstone inscriptions requires patience and attention to detail and Michael Donovan has spent years in recording memorial inscriptions and by doing so preserving for future generations details of families whose names are no longer familiar to us. He has also photographed the memorials and to date for the 42 cemeteries surveyed he has amassed a collection of almost 6,000 photographs. These, together with the mapping and numbering of graves in the cemetery surveys, ensure the ready identification of the location of every memorial. Grave memorials are an important part of a community’s heritage. They record lives from the past and the various types of monuments or memorials represent in many cases Irish folk art which has survived over the years. A headstone is the only piece of sculpture that most people will ever commission. In Victorian times cemeteries for the rich were gardens of stone, while the buried poor were seldom marked or noted. The local iron foundries provided metal crosses, many of which can still be seen in St. Michael’s Cemetery. The most common iron memorial comprised a cross within a circle with space for a painted inscription. Unfortunately these memorials tend to lose their painted inscription after some years. St. Mary’s Cemetery, where the remains of Workhouse inmates were laid, had quite a number of metal crosses, all of which regrettably were in recent years removed from the graves they marked. In St. Michael’s Cemetery and St. John’s Cemetery, which Michael has also surveyed, there are many fine examples of altar tombs and chest tombs. In St. John’s Cemetery he discovered a small gravestone, previously unrecorded, marking the grave of William Watson who died in 1637. Tankardstown graveyard, which surrounds the original Tankardstown Parish Church, has two 17th century memorials. Throughout St. Michael’s Cemetery can be found many elaborate monuments, mostly the work of 19th century carvers and stone masons. The practice of erecting headstone memorials did not develop until the latter part of the 18th century. Before that many graves were not marked, or if they were it was by footstones, so called as they were small plain stones placed at the bottom of graves. The Shackleton Museum holds two medieval grave slabs, believed to be of the 14th century, which were removed from St. Michael’s Cemetery for safekeeping some years ago. Monumental inscriptions to be found in St. Michael’s cemetery are generally of the genealogical epitaph type where family relationships and dates of birth are outlined. Michael has also recorded interesting supplementary details, generally quotations of a religious nature. One interesting grave memorial located within the medieval church, known locally as ‘the Crickeen’, reads:- ‘This venerable and justly loved Christian died in the 82nd year on 25th November 1849. She closed her edifying life by the fervent practice of those religious duties that ever marked her holy career. Her remains were accompanied to this earthly dwelling by an immense number of every class and creed of the entire neighbourhood which she so long adorned by her eminent and unostentatious virtue. She expired, consoled by her cherished text, from the 6th chap. 55th V of St. John. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood had everlasting life and I will raise him up on the last day.’ In addition to his survey and recording work Michael Donovan, together with Clem Roche, have just completed recording the names of the 3,891 inmates who died in Athy Workhouse or the Fever Hospital between 1871 and 1921. Theirs is a work of great importance, rivalled only by Michael’s extraordinary solitary work in mapping and recording so many cemetery memorials in and around this area. Michael Donovan’s plans for this year are to survey cemeteries in Ballybracken, Kileen Cormac, Kildangan, Timogue, Harristown and Crookstown.

Athy's Wallboard factory

One of my earliest memories is of walking with my older brothers to the huge fire which broke out at the Wallboard factory in April 1949. I was a month short of my seventh birthday when like so many other Athy folk we all gathered on the roadside at Barrowford to watch ricks of straw on fire. The Athy Fire Station master made the following entry in the station records; ‘I received a call to fire at Wallboard Factory on 14th April 1949. All members of the Brigade were present. When we arrived we discovered three ricks of straw on fire. We remained working until Saturday 16th May. The Curragh and Carlow Brigades were also there.’ A later entry for the month of May listed as fire members R. Webster, P. Delahunt, Thomas Fleming, Jas Fleming, J. Webster, P. Cowman and P. Doyle who attended a fire at Mrs. Quinn’s house in St. John’s Lane. The Wallboard Mills were located on a 17 acre site approximately one mile north of Athy. Irish Wallboard Co. Ltd. had been formed in 1939 to manufacture hardboard from straw but did not commence production until 1949. Two years later it began to use native timber as the basic raw material for the manufacture of the oil tempered hardboard which was marketed under the trade name ‘Lignatex’. The Irish company had become closely associated with the Bowater organisation in 1950. The timber used in the manufacturing process consisted of forest thinning, while steam power was generated by machine won turf supplied by Bord na Mona. Over 12,000 tons of turf was used each year while 3 or 4 weeks turf supply was always kept in reserve. A major expansion programme in 1957 increased the mill’s production capacity by almost 60% and a further expansion scheme, completed in 1966, trebled the capacity of the Wallboard factory in the space of fifteen years. A report in the Nationalist and Leinster Times of 15th January 1949 noted that while equipment installation work in the new factory was nearing completion two local men, Pat Doyle and Ed Hicks, spent some days at Clondalkin Paper Mills studying the working of the various machines in preparation for their duties at Athy’s new factory. I am uncertain as to whether the factory was in production when the fire started on 14th April 1949. Despite that early setback, with the use of timber rather than straw, and the expansion programmes initiated in 1957 the factory was able to produce 60 million square feet of board annually. Two thirds of the factory output was exported. A press report of the 1960s outlined the steps taken at the Wallboard factory to ensure the production of a high-quality product. The factory laboratory where samples from every part of the production process were tested was managed by Jim Flanagan, assisted by John Murphy, Terry Doyle and many others. Three quality controllers were constantly sampling during every stage of the manufacturing process. This was a responsibility of Pat Daly, John Murphy and Michael Ahern, while Kevin McNulty kept an eye on the quality of the turf and the finished board. In the chemical mixing department Arthur Kavanagh was employed in the preparation of approximately ten tons of aluminium sulphate solution each week. Another laboratory man was George Robinson who assisted the chief chemist Jim Flanagan in research and development. The first manager of the Wallboard factory was Richard Shackleton, while the initial production managers employed were Swedish, the fifth production manager was Andy Coughlan whom I understand was a former RAF flight engineer. With many other local factories the Wallboard staff participated in the annual parochial variety festivals which were initiated by the local curate, Fr. Joe Corbett. In 1964 the Wallboard Variety Show was reported in the local press as ‘a pleasant and colourful presentation which won loud applause from the audience.’ The performers included Ena, Joan and Frances Coughlan, Connie Stafford, M. Dooley, P. Dunleavy, N. Wright, M. Holohan, K. McNulty, T. Dooley, S. Fanning, P.J. Loughman, Tim Ryan, M. Rainsford, F. Ryan, S. Finnerty, B. Finnerty and B. Robinson. The laughter, songs and work stopped in December 1978 when the Wallboard factory closed down. Approximately 220 workers were made redundant when production of wallboard transferred to Sweden where it is today still carried on. When corresponding with my good friend Liam Kenny, doyen of Kildare local historians, I invariably refer to Athy as being in the deep south of the county. For a change this Eye comes from the deep south of the island of Ireland to where I have travelled to greet my latest grandchild, Hannah Rose, born just a few days ago in Cork city. Hannah was the name of her maternal great grandmother who was born and reared in Doneraile, Co. Cork. The circle has now been completed.

A look back over the past 1500 Eyes on the Past

It is close on 29 years ago that I penned my first Eye on the Past. This week the 1500th article is printed and I want to take the opportunity to reflect on past articles, the people and events that formed the subject of those articles and to acknowledge the help given to me by so many people over the years. The first article was a short piece of approximately 400 words in which I mentioned the publics growing interest in local history and the opening of what I referred to as “the new vastly improved library service in the Town Hall”. Subsequent articles grew in wordage to 800 words then 1,200 words and that latter figure was maintained until the Kildare Nationalist changed to tabloid form. Prior to my first article I had been researching the history of Athy and 29 years later that research is still ongoing and my long promised history of the town is still not ready for publication. As a “blow in” to Athy from just down the road in Castlecomer but having all my remembered youthful life experiences here in Athy it is understandable that my interest in history should be centred on Athy. It was an interest first encouraged by my teachers in the local Christian Brothers school, especially the late Bill Ryan who was a gentleman, a scholar and an encourager. While I was out of Athy for 22 years my interest in history saw me researching Athy’s past. That research opened up many unknown and some forgotten elements of the town’s story. Even while I had attended the local secondary school and studied history for my Leaving Certificate I had never encountered any significant references to Athy’s involvement in Irish national events. Nothing was ever related to me or my school mates of how the Great Famine affected the local people. We learned of the famine tragedies of the West and the South West of Ireland such as that reported in the United Irishmen newspaper of the 19th of February 1848 which quoting a correspondent of the Mayo Constitution claiming “we had been informed that within the last week upwards of 20 deaths have taken place from starvation in Ballintubbert”. We now know that our local workhouse was the last place of residence for hundreds of local men, women and children who died during the famine and whose remains were brought by cart across Lennons Bridge to be buried in paupers graves in St. Mary’s cemetery. As students we never learned of the young men from Athy who enlisted to fight overseas in World War or the great number of those men whose broken bodies disappeared into the blood-soaked soil of France and Flanders. I had never heard of John Vincent Holland whose act of bravery during that same war resulted in him being awarded the Victoria Cross. These were some of the towns past stories which had escaped the memory of later generations, and which were awaiting to be discovered, for without these stories and the many other stories of local events and local men and women our community’s shared past would be incomplete. In my first article I wrote “Eye on the Past will each week deal with a topic of interest from the history of South Kildare when we will delve into the rich vein of local history which remains to be discovered”. I didn’t know then what an overwhelming rich vein of history awaited to be discovered. I have been fortunate to be contacted personally, by phone, by letter and in more recent times via email by hundreds of persons interested in Athy’s history. Many have sought information of ancestors who once lived in the town or South Kildare while others had generously shared memories and knowledge of past events with me. Eithne Wall who first joined my office in 1982 has typed, with very few exceptions, the Eyes since 1992 and Noreen Day has provided the proof reading necessary to correct my mistakes. The availability of the Eyes on the Past on the internet has led to enquiries from many countries particularly America, Australia, New Zealand and as might be expected Great Britain. Those enquiries have brought home to me how generations of Athy folk can spread throughout the world and how information regarding the past of such a small town as Athy can be gleaned from sources throughout the globe. Our local history mirrors in many ways the national events of the time and we can get a better understanding of our country’s own history by knowing the history of the generations who have gone before us. I am pleased to acknowledge that today Athy people have a better understanding of their own history and this is reflected in a cultural reawakening which was not readily observable a few decades ago. We have a proud history whether it is recounting the men, women and events of the War of Independence or the story of those who went to war overseas during 1914/18. Part of that history is knowing that an international figure such as Polar Explorer Ernest Shackleton was born in nearby Kilkea and undoubtedly walked the same streets we walk today. But above all our towns history is the story of the local men and women, many of whom lived in the back streets and alleyways in Athy in houses which were demolished during the slum clearance programmes of the 1930’s. They were the workers in the brickyards and the foundries and the farm labourers who with their wives and children gave life to the Anglo Norman town founded over 800 years ago. I was privileged to have been able to share some of their stories even if at times I might have unintentionally offended someone’s delicate sensibilities. Yes, there had been a few occasions over the past 29 years when someone has objected to something I wrote or made a point of seeking a correction when none was justified. I remember one reader who sought to correct my research findings regarding the location of the Quaker Meeting House in Meeting Lane on the basis that her mother told her it was elsewhere. I couldn’t persuade her otherwise or indeed ameliorate the fury of the woman who felt I had insulted the former tenants of the soldiers houses in the Bleach by reciting the accommodation details as outlined in the War Office files of the 1920s. However it was not all conflict. The readers have been more than complimentary and I am ever grateful for the continued help afforded to me by so many with my research. A special thanks to one individual who has been writing to me for years with the most beautiful handwriting always drawing my attention to items or persons of interest. He has constantly provided me with additional information but always on the strict understanding that his name is never mentioned. I started off by stating my intention to reflect on past articles but my pen has galloped away without doing what I intended. I hope you have enjoyed the past 1,500 Eyes on the Past and here is hoping that time will be given to me to write some more Eyes and more importantly finish and publish my long promised history of Athy.

When Athy was the largest town in County Kildare

In 1841 Athy had the largest population of any town in County Kildare. With 4,980 persons living within the town boundaries, it exceeded the population of Naas by over 300. Newbridge was only a sizeable village with a population of 1,177 while nearby Portlaoise fell short of Athy’s population with 3,702 inhabitants. Ten years later Athy’s population had increased to 5,263 as a result of the workhouse numbers which masked an actual fall in the towns native population over the course of the Great Famine. Naas in the meantime had begun to match Athy in terms of population numbers with 5,184 inhabitants. Both towns were to show substantial population losses by 1911 when Athy was recorded with 3,535 inhabitants with Naas overtaking Athy as the largest town in the County with 3,842. In fact, the first time Naas showed a higher population figure than Athy was in 1871 with approximately 100 more residents than the South Kildare town. The ups and downs of urban population figures no doubt were reflected in the range and extent of local commercial activity. Here in Athy, we have witnessed even within the past two or three years several businesses which have changed hands or gone out of business. As I write this article, I can only recall two local business still operating in Athy as they were 100 years ago. Indeed, O’Brien’s of Emily Square was the name over the shop as early as two or three decades before the new century arrived, while Doyle’s of Woodstock Street opened many years later. Both pubs operated at a time when Athy with less than half the population it has today, was home to 44 public houses. One of their commercial colleagues at that time was A. Duncan & Son, Drapers and Outfitters of Duke Street which business was bought out by Sam Shaw in or about 1914 and which business is still the anchor tenant in Athy’s main shopping street. Many other firms now long forgotten once traded in our town. Who remembers James Reid & Son, Family Grocers and Publicans of Leinster Street or William Triston, Solicitor of Duke Street. Both carried on business in Athy in 1916 as did Henry Hannon & Sons, Millers of Duke Street and Columb Geraghty, Grocer and Publican of Market Square. Thomas Lumley merchant tailor worked in his workshop in Athy until he retired on the 23th July 1917. Amongst those who continued in business for some time after that were P.J. Corcoran, principal of the Athy Auctioneering Company and Daniel Toomey, Builder and Contractor. Many of today’s older generation will recall Glespens Carriage Builders who carried on business in 1917 and much later. In the 1950’s Glespens occupied premises in Duke Street but has anyone heard of John P. Glespen who in 1917 advertised himself as “Carriage Builder and Designer, Wheelwright, Harness Maker and Motor Car and Cycle Agent” with premises in Nelson Street and Offaly Street. Edward Vernal was plying his trade as a General Smith and Horseshoer in Leinster Street in 1907. The Vernal forge was located in St. John’s Lane immediately behind Mrs. Haslem’s house when I was attending the Christian Brothers School in the 1950’s John Blanchfield operated out of 26 Leinster Street as a pork butcher and sausage maker in 1916. Was he, I wonder, related to the saw milling Blanchfield family at the top end of Leinster Street. A business not previously known to me was that of the Miley Brothers who had the General Supply Store in Duke Street in 1916. Names still remembered today and found over business premises in Athy over 100 years ago include Duthies of Leinster Street. W.T. Duthie, Watchmaker, Jeweller and Optician had been in business for several years prior to 1917 and his son, Albert, would later take over the business. On the far side of Crom a Boo Bridge in 1917 was the Grocery Tea, Wine and Spirits Stores of Cantwell’s of Duke Street while George Dillon of 19 Leinster Street advertised Spiced Beef as a speciality to order. Michael Murphy carried on business in the Commercial House facing the Market Square as a Clothier, Hatter offering “ boots and shoes in great variety”. Around the corner in Stanhope Street was another Murphy, this time with the forename Patrick who ran a General Grocery and Provision Business. David Walsh, Family Grocer, Hardware, Seed and General Merchant “with a variety of Guns and Ammunition always in stock” had his premises at the corner of Chapel Lane and Leinster Street. Other businesses in Athy in the early years of the 20th century included Athy Gas Company, Hibernian Bank, Duthie Large Foundry and Iron Works, Leinster Arms Hotel, D&J Carbery Builders and Athy Tile and Brick Company. These firms are no longer in Athy and their absence reminds us that the ever changing needs of new generations require new and improved commercial outlets to serve their needs. 100 years ago the market town of Athy with a population of less that 4,000 boasted of 44 public houses. Today our main streets show a monopoly of hairdressing salons, betting shops, charity shops and fast food outlets. Times indeed are a changing.

Athy in the 1840s

The worst effects of the famine which had ravaged Ireland following the failure of the potato crop in 1845 had abated by the time 1853 arrived. William Byrne was then station master in Athy, a position he held for the previous four years and where he would remain for the next six years. Athy boasted many trades in 1853, including a Fack and Hook Maker, a trade practiced by Michael Cushian who found himself on the wrong side of the law on assault charges. Julia Bradley, dressmaker, was summoned by her mistress, Mrs. O’Neill, for leaving her indentures without fulfilling her term. She was ordered by the Court to return to her ‘master’, otherwise she would be jailed for the remainder of her apprenticeship. Also in trouble were the four paupers brought before the local petty sessions by the Master of the workhouse for refusing to work and disobeying the Master’s orders. They each got one month’s imprisonment with hard labour. Early in the year eight locals were summoned by order of the Town Commissioners for exhibiting turf for sale in a place other than that designated for such sales by the town fathers. Athy resident Mrs. Walsh was one of sixty passengers who drowned when the steamer, ‘Queen Victoria’, sank in Dublin Bay on Tuesday 15th February of that year. Forty passengers survived, including her husband. The Presbyterian families who had arrived the previous year from Perthshire Scotland to take up tenancies of the Duke of Leinster’s lands in the Athy area, gave public notice that their meeting house was a place of religious worship and registered for solemnising marriages. Controversy arose when the vacant position of Coroner for South Kildare prompted an advertisement to be inserted in the Leinster Express expressing ‘regret that the election of Coroner has endeavoured to be made a political and religious question’. The contest was between James Butler who although an Anglican had the support of the Roman Catholic voters and Dr. Carter, another Anglican, who was eventually appointed. Two years after the abolition of Athy Borough Council the newly elected Town Commissioners for Athy, numbering 21 in all, whose numbers included the Catholic Parish Priest Fr. John Lawler and the Anglican Rector, Rev. Frederick Trench, agreed to have a certain number of Catholics and Protestants as Town Commissioners and to have a Catholic and Protestant chairman on alternate years. Michael Lawler, who was Chairman of the Town Commissioners in 1853, wrote to the press in July 1858 stating that ‘we have never deviated from our original compact’. Michael Lawler was one of the 21 Town Commissioners who was sworn into office before Lord Downes and John Butler on 18th February 1842 at a ceremony held in Athy’s Courthouse which was then part of the Town Hall. During his long service as a Town Commissioner he was elected Chairman on three occasions, 1853, 1876 and 1890. Lawler who died on 20th October 1900 and was buried in Barrowhouse, started in business in Athy in and around 1840. He had a licenced premises in Leinster Street immediately adjoining Whites Castle which was subsequently purchased by Edward T. Mulhall in November 1900 for £500. Edward Mulhall was described in the press reports of the time as having worked in Lawlers licenced premises as ‘the foreman and manager’. Michael Lawler gave what the local press described as ‘a sumptuous entertainment to upwards of 60 persons on the advent of his inauguration to the chairmanship of the Town Commissioners. The dinner was given in a spacious room in Mr. Lawler’s private residence.’ Michael Lawler lived at Park House in Duke Street which was later acquired by McHugh’s chemist. Alexander Duncan, a local trader, in a speech to the dinner guests said ‘those gentlemen who had but lately seen the town, could not well appreciate the progress it had made in the last 20 years. If they were to know the sanitary conditions then and compare it with the present appearance, they would in the fullest acceptance of the word admit that Athy had progressed.’ Four months later an extraordinary meeting of Athy Dispensary Committee was held to consider the medical officers report regarding the filthy state of the town. It was an issue which Michael Lawler returned to the following October when he claimed ‘Athy is a different town to what it was 21 years ago. Then the streets were in ruts, the homes were falling, the best streets were interspersed with thatched houses ….. now we have a flourishing town ….. the houses and establishments second to none to any inland town in Ireland.’ Twenty years later an editorial in the Leinster Express under the heading ‘The water supply of Athy’ noted ‘we are now paying for our past neglect and for the carelessness of former generations ….. the water we have been consuming all our lives turns out to be polluted ….. our dwellings have been constructed without any regard to the health of the inhabitants ….. the sanitary conditions of the town are very bad.’ The editorial noted that a special meeting of the sanitary committee had been convened for that day to consider whether a pure water supply could be brought from a distance into the town by means of pipes. Thirty years were to elapse before a piped water supply was provided for the people of Athy. By comparison fifty-five years have passed since Athy’s outer relief road was first suggested in a consultants report presented to Athy U.D.C.

'The Black and Tans 1920/'21' and 'The World War 1 Dead of Co. Kildare'

Two important books arrived on my desk in the last week, both of them with listings of men who served our neighbouring country at a time when Ireland was an unwilling part of the British empire. The first book was Jim Herlihy’s latest publication, ‘The Black and Tans 1920 – 1921’, which added to his impressive list of previously published works makes him the outstanding author of policing before and during Ireland’s War of Independence. Subtitled ‘A complete Alphabetical List, Short History and Genealogical Guide’, the book is a complete listing of the 7,684 men who enlisted in the Royal Irish Constabulary Special Reserve, or as they were better known the Black and Tans. The Black and Tans were recruited to compensate for the shortfall in R.I.C. members, resulting from the IRA campaign against the police which forced so many policemen to resign. Between 6th January 1920 and 7th July the following year 7,684 men were recruited in Britain and brought to Ireland to join the R.I.C. Special Reserve. Amongst their numbers were 381 native Irishmen, including 9 from County Kildare, 6 from County Laois and 5 from County Carlow. The Black and Tans, so called because they dressed in black trousers and tan tunics, were initially trained in the R.I.C. Depot at Phoenix Park, but later in the Hare Park Camp on the Curragh before ending up in September of 1920 in Gormanstown Camp, Co. Meath. On completion of their one month training the R.I.C. Special Reserve were transferred to R.I.C. Barracks around the country. Athy, while not regarded as an active rebel town, had a small number of Black and Tans stationed in the old Cavalry Barracks at Woodstock Street. While recruiting for the Special Reserves stopped on 7th July 1921 the members of that force only began to leave Ireland in January of the following year. At least one member of the Black and Tans who was based in Athy remained in the town or later returned, which I do not know, for he married a local girl. The story of the Black and Tans is one which we Irish remember as one of killings and atrocities by men who were a law unto themselves. Jim Herlihy’s book is a comprehensive listing of the men who during the 18 months they were in Ireland suffered 143 casualties. During their time in Ireland they earned the outrage of Irish men and women who regarded them as terrorists. The second book published by the County Kildare Decade of Commemoration Committee is titled ‘Remembrance: The World War 1 Dead of Co. Kildare’. Compiled by Karel Kiely, James Durney and Mario Corrigan it lists the 753 men and 1 woman from the County of Kildare who served and died during World War I. The research for this book has uncovered 9 Athy men not previously identified who died during the war. Three of them were from Offaly Street, two brothers James and Thomas Connell and Joseph Breen. As a young lad growing up in Offaly Street I remember the brothers Mick and Johnny Connell lived in Crampton House opposite what is now the Credit Union in Offaly Street, while another brother Lar lived in Stanhope Street. They were the brothers of the two World War 1 soldiers, James who died on 17th April 1915 and Thomas who died on 9th September 1916. Further up Offaly Street during my youth lived Tom Breen and his family, whose daughter Nan died within the last year or two while she was still living in the family home. Tom’s brother Joseph, a soldier in the Royal Army Service Corps, died aged 32 years, less than two weeks before the end of the war. He was born in Janeville and his younger brother Tom at the time of his brother’s death was living with his grandmother Julia Bradley in Offaly Street. Two other soldiers of whom I was not previously aware are identified as William Dooley of Castlemitchell and his namesake whose brother James Dooley lived at Rathstewart Cottage, Athy. Other Athy soldiers who died in the war but whom I was unaware of until they were included in the new book were 22-year-old Christopher Doran of St. John’s Lane, 33-year-old Michael Davis of Kelly’s Lane and later Chapel Hill, Patrick O’Mara of Chapel Hill, and the Vigors brothers, Arthur and Charles, whose father Charles Vigors was a shopkeeper in Market Square in the 1890s and later. The book lists the deaths of 120 men born in Athy, by far the highest number of any town in the county, the next highest being the Curragh with 67 and Naas with 64. An additional 19 names must be added to Athy’s World War I casualty list, representing men not born in the town but who lived there either when they enlisted or sometime earlier. For many years it was believed that they were on the wrong side of history, that is until Kevin Myers, John MacKenna and later Clem Roche and others wrote of Athy’s men’s sacrifices with pride and gratitude. Here in Athy we arranged the first Armistice Day Sunday Service nearly 30 years ago as part of a weekend of remembrance which featured a seminar in the Town Hall, with lectures by Con Costello, Pat Casey, Kevin Myers, Josephine Cashman and Jane Leonard, followed by a performance of ‘The Fallen’, a voice play of the Great War by John MacKenna. This was the first awakening of an important part of our town’s story and one which now finds another retelling of part of that story in the new book ‘Remembrance: The World War I Dead of Co. Kildare’. Congratulations to Karel Kiely and her colleagues James Durney and Mario Corrigan for a magnificent new publication on Kildare’s World War I dead.

St. Vincent de Paul Society and Athy Lions Club Presidents Everest challenges

During twelve months of lockdown we have witnessed a catastrophic change in the commercial life of our town and district. Local businesses have suffered badly, and business owners and workers alike have felt the financial repercussions of a local economy which is closed down. Families which have always managed to face up to life’s trials now find themselves facing an ever more uncertain future. There is an increasing number of families and individuals experiencing financial difficulties who, for perhaps the first time, have to rely on the charity of others. In Athy we are very fortunate to have an active branch of the St Vincent de Paul Society which, for more than 100 years, has been helping local families and individuals in need. Historically that help was availed of by those whose poverty was the result of long-term unemployment. Today, the Vincent de Paul Society is called upon to help those no longer able to cope financially as a result of the Covid lockdown. Reliance on the Vincent de Paul Society is a new experience for many. Their needs are all the greater as the psychological impact of the national lockdown is felt by parents and children alike. The local branch of the St Vincent de Paul Society is made up of a small number of men and women who quietly and discreetly help local people in need. The demands on their time and on the resources of the local branch are in normal times quite high. However, with the ongoing Covid lockdown demands for help have increased enormously. More money than ever before is required to meet the urgent needs of those in want. Athy Lions Club, recognising the crisis facing many people in Athy and district, have decided to organise a fundraising event to help the St Vincent de Paul Society. Called the Everest Challenge, it will feature an attempt by the Lions Club president, 45-year old Brian Dooley, to ascend 39,340 steps representing the height of Mount Everest. The world’s highest mountain is located on the crest of the great Himalayas of Southern Asia, between Nepal and Tibet. It was believed to be 29,028 feet high when first climbed by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953. However, a recent American survey found that it is 29,035 feet high. The extra seven feet will mean a little extra work for Athy Lions president, who will not only walk up 39,340 steps but also descend the same number of steps. He will get no credit for steps descended, but will find a little relief going down before facing into another upward advance. The challenge will start on Saturday, 1st May and continue the next day and into a third day, if necessary, until the target is reached. As I write this Eye, Brian Dooley is practising his stairclimbing techniques to ensure the fitness levels necessary to keep climbing for eight hours on the opening day, and on each day thereafter. It will all take place on the Athy Rugby Club fire escape, which is a sturdy metal stairs, ten feet four inches high, with fourteen steps. The Lions Club president is undertaking this challenge in return for donations which will be divided between Athy St Vincent de Paul Society and Pieta House, which provides counselling to people who are in suicidal distress. Donations can be made online at www.idonate.ie/athylionsclubeverestchallenge or at the Everest Challenge site on any of the days the intrepid Brian Dooley is “stepping it out”. I would hazard a guess that there is not another Lions Club president in Ireland who could match our Lions president’s vision and stamina. If and when Brian successfully makes the 39,340 upward steps, and reaches the summit of the virtual Everest, it will mark an extraordinary personal effort by him. We will all wish him well on the day, or days, of the climb beginning on the 1st of May. In the meantime, remember the two charities which will benefit: St Vincent de Paul Society, Athy and Pieta House. Your donations, no matter how small, will help both organisations continue to offer assistance to all those in need during these difficult times.

Shackleton Autumn School 2023 (Part 2)

The Shackleton Autumn School is just two days away as I began to write this week’s Eye on the Past. It has been a particularly busy week, with a huge amount of work finalising arrangements for the arrival of lecturers and visitors from overseas. This year the Autumn School celebrates 23 years in existence, during which time it has grown from strength to strength. The first Autumn School was planned and arranged with the help of Bob Headland who was then working in the Scots Polar Institute in Cambridge. The Polar Institute, based in the university city of Cambridge, was established to further understanding of the polar regions through research and publications and Bob was the Curator of the Institute when I contacted him in 1999. He generously guided my first faltering steps in organising the first Autumn School, named after the Kilkea-born explorer, Ernest Shackleton. Bob has attended every one of the Autumn Schools since then, apart from the Covid period schools which were held on Zoom. Alexandra Shackleton, granddaughter of Ernest Shackleton, attended the second Autumn School in 2001 and has been present every year since then. The success of the Shackleton Autumn School at international level is something that is perhaps not readily appreciated. In truth, the provincial town in the south of the county of Kildare has been established as the location of one of the most popular annual polar events held anywhere in the world. The continued success of the Autumn School which operates as an ‘offspring’ of the Shackleton Museum, is due to the work of a small committee comprising Kevin Kenny of Naas, Mark McClean of Wexford and Seamus Taaffe of Athy. They took on the task of organising the annual school some years ago and with the assistance of the museum staff have improved on the original Autumn School model, making it one of the great events in the Kildare County tourism calendar. At the opening of the Autumn School on the Friday evening of 20th October I will have the great honour of announcing that funding for the redevelopment of the Shackleton Museum is in place and that work on the redevelopment of the museum will commence shortly. That work will on completion give the town a first-class museum designed to attract a lot of visitors from overseas. It is a major coup for Athy and one which I could not have envisaged when founding the Athy Museum Society in 1983. The purpose of the society was to open a local museum highlighting the town’s story, its people and its history. My discovery of Shackleton’s birthplace in nearby Kilkea prompted the telling of his story with a panel or two in that local museum devoted to Shackleton. The Autumn School followed much later and the success of the school prompted the thought of a museum dedicated to the polar explorer given the tourism possibilities that could create. Kildare County Council through it’s then executive Peter Carey, recognising the cultural and tourism opportunities involved, played a major part in securing the Shackleton statue and the cabin in which the polar explorer died. The drive for a dedicated Shackleton Museum would not have been possible without the County Council’s backing and Kildare County Council has now agreed to take over the financing and management of the Shackleton Museum when it reopens. This will ensure the financial stability which the museum will require for the future. The volunteers who have been part of the museum project stretching back over forty years have helped to create a wonderful cultural asset, with the possibility of adding to the commercial well-being of the town through tourism and visitors generally. Shortly the present Board of Directors of the Shackleton Museum will gather for the last time and resign as directors in order to allow Kildare County Council to appoint a new Board. I will be vacating my position as chairman of the Board, happy in the belief and knowledge that the dream I had forty years ago of a museum in Athy will be in good hands when Kildare County Council take over. If I had dreams in the past, I also had nightmares and that of the loss of Whites Castle is my recurring nightmare. The development of Whites Castle as a town/Fitzgerald Museum is my next dream. What better way to make Athy a tourist destination rather than a stopover on the way to Kilkenny or elsewhere than having two museums of different interests, one telling the Shackleton story, the other outlining the story of a historic town with a rich past. I am afraid I don’t have forty years left in me to fulfil that dream. It must however come for Whites Castle can never be allowed to fall into dereliction. The Castle and Crom a Boo bridge are the acknowledged symbols of Athy and must be protected, preserved and eventually used for the benefit of the people of Athy.

Shackleton Autumn School 2023 (Part 1)

As summer greens turn to winter browns it is only natural that our thoughts turn to the festive season in December. However, there has been one fixture on the town’s calendar for the last twenty-three years and that is the Shackleton Autumn School which returns on the weekend of the 20th – 22nd October. With the Museum at the Town Hall closed for renovations for the next 18 months the Autumn School has found itself a new home in the Abbey, formerly the Convent of Mercy, Athy. It’s an exciting departure for the Shackleton Autum School as it has a greater range of facilities and spaces available to the attendees and lecturers than in the old Town Hall. After piloting the Autumn School through two years of online events during Covid the Autumn School returned with its best ever attendance last year and the committee hopes that the attendance at this year’s Autumn School will surpass those record numbers in 2022. The committee have worked hard to put in place a programme for the local primary and secondary schools and students will participate in a number of workshops on Friday, 20th October involving the sculptor Mark Richards who created the superb Shackleton statue in the back square. Mike Robinson, the Chief Executive Officer of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society will lead a workshop on climate change. Primary school students will be immersed in the polar world with presentations and workshops involving representatives of the U.K Antarctic Heritage Trust who will share with the students a virtual reality experience giving the students the opportunity to experience an Antarctic base 80 years ago. Donald Lamont of the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust will address the students on the recent discovery of Shackleton’s ship ‘Endurance’. Finally Hugh Turner, the grand-nephew of the explorer Apsley Cherry Garrard, author of the polar classic – The Worst Journey in the World - will speak to students about what it is like to be a polar explorer. The Autumn school itself will be launched at 7.30p.m. in The Abbey on Friday, 20th October and all our welcome to attend. As ever we can expect attendees from all over the world including the United States, Britain, Germany, France, Spain, Australia and even Singapore. Attendees will be treated to a variety of lectures which include the Scottish pilot Doug Cochrane who will speak about his time flying in the Antarctic followed by the Norwegian archaeologist Synnove Strosvag who will talk about explorers and how they break down barriers in life. The distinguished Antarctic historian Dr. Michael Rosove who will speak of the hundred years that have passed since the first biography of Shackleton was published. Nick Cox, a 30 year veteran of both the Arctic and the Antarctic, will talk about the development of polar clothing and equipment, while the Autum School is delighted to welcome back Mensun Bound, one of the discoverers of The Endurance who will talk about the history of Shackleton’s most famous ship. Other lectures will include Caitlin Brandon on Dr Alexander Macklin who as well as participating on two of Shackleton’s expeditions attended upon Shackleton on his death bed. There are a number of side events which the committee have been able to develop this year given the additional space available in the Abbey including a polar market hall which will host a variety of sellers of polar books, arts and crafts. Everyone is welcome to attend the polar market hall to see the interesting items for sale. The most important part of the weekend for many of the participants and local people is the social side of the Autumn School and as ever O’Brien’s pub in Emily Square will be an important focal point for those attending. The Autumn School is pleased to be associated with the Athy Lions Club hosting of ‘South, Always South’ in St. Michael’s Parish Church Athy at 7.30pm on Sunday 22nd October. This is the story in music, words and pictures of Ernest Shackleton’s life, his Endurance expedition and his extraordinary legacy. It is composed and performed by Brian Hughes (Uilleann piper and whistle) with the County Kildare Orchestra, scripted and narrated by John MacKenna and conducted by Lorcan Daly. All proceeds of the performance will be going to Athy Lions Club and it will be a wonderful opportunity to enjoy local artists in a local setting and tickets can be brought from Winkles newsagents or any Lions Club member or from the offices of Taaffe & Co. Solicitors.

Closure of business premises in Offaly Street, Sylvesters, Kitty Websters, Kehoe's pub and Moore's

Treasured memories of the past were recalled as I drove down Offaly Street on the way to my office early last week. As I passed what in my young days was John W. Kehoe’s pub I saw across the entrance to Butler’s Row workers had started to remove the shop windows of Kitty Websters. Kitty’s was the local sweet and ice cream shop for the youngsters who, like myself, lived in Offaly Street over seventy years ago. It was the place where I can vividly remember spending my one penny pocket money in return for a toffee slab. Kitty with her sister Patty operated the shop, but it was called Kitty Websters, and it was Kitty who as we grew into our early teens was more than willing to break open a packet of Woodbine cigarettes to sell one cigarette to any of the local youngsters. I don’t know what age I was when I first ventured to smoke a cigarette in the People’s Park, far from the prying eyes of parents and other adults. We youngsters knew it simply as the Park, and it was there that the young fellows from Offaly Street spent many hours of the day, especially during school holiday periods. Smoking a cigarette was the sign of an independent minded youngster, aping the habits of an adult. So it was that Kitty’s was my Woodbine supplier until the day, I can still recall, when too much pulling on the noxious weed made me very sick. That was my last ever cigarette. Kitty Websters and Kitty herself were an important part of my youthful background. I can’t remember when Kitty’s closed but my own young children were still crossing the road from their grandmother’s house in Offaly Street in the late seventies to purchase sweets and other delights from Kitty’s. The removal of the windows to be replaced by small windows signalled the change from sweet shop to dwelling house or apartment status. It was as if history had moved in the same way, that many years previously when the communal oven in Kitty’s back yard available for local women to bake bread fell out of use. The once bustling public house owned by the G.A.A. stalworth, John W. Kehoe, just across the laneway from Kitty’s has been shuttered and closed for a number of years. Mona Sylvester’s shop next door to what was Moore’s grocery shop at the corner of the back square has also been converted for use as an apartment. Moore’s grocery shop, presided over by the brothers Michael and Eddie Moore, is now a travel agency. Moore’s honey, harvested by Michael Moore, was one of the many delightful items available in that corner shop. The present owners have had the plaster removed from the exterior walls to reveal the cut stone and window surrounds of brick. It presents a very attractive appearance displaying the workmanship of masons of an earlier age. It was at the one end of a street enlivened by young families who lived there, while the other end near to St. Michael’s Church of Ireland was the Savoy cinema managed by Bob Webster. That cinema in Offaly Street was once a hive of activity every night of the week. The once lively street awaits a regeneration but when it comes Kitty’s of fond memory will have passed into history. Writing of history I’m reminded of a number of queries which have been received during the past week. Can anyone help me to trace Patrick Moore who in 1977 lived in Geraldine when his mother Mary died. His father was Francis Moore who fought in World War I as a Dublin Fusilier and won a D.C.M. military honour, second only to the Victoria Cross. If you can help please contact me. Another query relates to the Miss Mylods who had a boarding house in the old Fever Hospital in the 1960s. Sisters Sarah and Bridget, I believe, came from Shercock, Co. Cavan. Can anyone give me any information as to their background and time in Athy. Athy Lions Club will be promoting a concert in St. Michael’s Parish Church on Sunday 22nd October featuring the Kildare Orchestra with Brian Hughes and John MacKenna in a musical work composed by Brian and scripted by John. Tickets at €25 each can be bought from any Lions Club member, Winkles shop and Eventbrite. Tickets can also be purchased in my office. All proceeds of the concert will go to the Lions Club local charities. It is a good cause and promises to be a great event which incidentally has been arranged as part of this year’s Shackleton Autumn School. The photo exhibition, Identifying the Past’, continues in Athy’s Art Centre in Woodstock Street from 2-5 each day but must finish on Friday, 13th October. It’s a unique exhibition of photos of Athy people taken in the town’s street taken over 70 years ago. Do visit the exhibition to see if you can identify the men, women and children who were part of the local community so many years ago. A final question – can anyone tell me where was Couse Hill, said in 1752 to have been about 1½ miles from Athy? Nearby was, I understand, a mill and the house of a John La Couse, a French Huguenot who fought on the side of King William at the battle of the Boyne.

Culture Night in Athy 2023

Culture Night has come and gone. There were twelve events held in Athy giving us all the opportunity to learn how a diverse range of cultural activities can expand our understanding and appreciation of the arts. Last year I questioned why all the events local, regional and national had to occur on the one night rather than being spread over an entire week. It was again very difficult to attend all the local events and impossible to reach on events held outside the town. A culture week would make more sense and encourage greater public involvement in the various arts. I was sorry to miss local artist Cathy Callan’s painting event in the Irish Wheelchair Association premises at St. Vincent’s Hospital. Cathy is a very talented artist whose work I have admired for some time. My first visit on Culture Night was to Clancy’s bar in Leinster Street to view John Coffey’s photographs of renowned Irish folk musicians. It was wonderful to see that he had captured on film a fine portrait of the late Liam O’Flynn, Ireland’s greatest uilleann piper. It was significant that both of Athy’s current master pipers, Brian Hughes and Joe Byrne, also featured amongst the renowned Irish folk musicians of today. Memories were stirred as I looked at the photograph of the late Anthony O’Byrne, the Donegal man who was one of the founders of the weekly Clancy traditional music sessions and after whom the Tony O’Byrne GAA Park in Ballyadams is named. The town library was the venue for the unique, “The Prado on the Barrow” exhibition featuring the work of some members of Athy’s photographic club. The club borrowed an idea from the main Spanish National Art Museum in Madrid which during the covid lockdown encouraged Spanish families to recreate in real life some of the classic paintings in their collection and to share photographs of their recreations on the internet. The Athy club members were asked to repeat that exercise and twelve of their photographs were chosen for the exhibition. The paintings recreated included works by El Greco, William Leech, Leonardo de Vinci, Van Gogh and several other great masters. “The Prado on the Barrow” was a fascinating exhibition combining fine photography, exceptional costume arrangement and design. Unfortunately, it was limited in terms of exhibition time as it was followed at 6 o’clock by the celebration in song and story of the Johnny Cash visit to Athy sixty years ago. The Arts Centre which has taken on an exciting life post covid was my next port of call. Two events were based in the Arts Centre, the earliest being the exhibition of Athy photographs by the travelling photographer Frank Goggin. He captured on film over 800 local persons on the streets of Athy in 1948 and 1949. The photographs are of a time and a people long past but present family members of those photographed can revisit long forgotten memories as they view friends, family and relations whose images were captured over 70 years ago. The exhibition had been opened in the town Library on the day before Culture Night and transferred to the Arts Centre where it will remain open each day except Sunday from 2.00 – 5.00pm for two weeks. The Arts Centre was also the venue for a production centred on the songs of Burt Bacharach. “Anyone who had a Heart” was a joyful musical tribute to the legendary American songwriter who gave us such timeless songs as “What the World needs now” and “Raindrops keeping falling on my head” amongst many many more. The Arts Centre in Woodstock Street is an excellent music venue and Athy Musical and Dramatic Society with David Walsh as Director and Carmel Day as Musical Director gave the audience on Culture Night, and three other nights as well, a first class show. I could not get around to the six other events but the large number of cultural events on the one night in Athy was a wonderful indication of a culture awareness which augurs well for the future. As Horace the Roman poet once wrote “no one is so far unreclaimed that he cannot become civilised, if only he will lend a patient ear to culture”.

Barbara Sheridan, Retired Editor of Kildare Nationalist

Barbara Sheridan, the Editor of the Kildare Nationalist when that paper first appeared following the separation of the Nationalist and Leinster Times into Carlow, Laois and Kildare editions, retired last week. I first became aware of Barbara, then a young local journalist when I returned to Athy 41 years ago. I wrote a few historical articles which made their appearance in both the Leinster Leader and the Nationalist and Leinster Times. With my election to Athy Urban District Council in 1985 my appearances in the local press became much more frequent. These appearances owed nothing to my penmanship but to Barbara’s acute reporting on Council meetings in the local Council chamber. At those meetings I always sat in the same seat facing the press reporters who overlooked the sunken chamber where the elected representatives and Council officials sat. My choice of seating was determined not by any anxiety on my part to help the press catch my every word but rather by my decision to sit directly opposite Council Paddy Wright. The Sinn Fein Councillor’s words and actions were always likely to create controversy in the Council chamber. I must admit I often ignited the flames of controversy while persistently attacking some might say goading the Sinn Feinner. Reporting on the monthly rows between Paddy and myself gave Barbara the reporter many a good headline. “Orgies held at derelict Athy site said Councillor” was one of many claims made by Paddy who said that the building was owned by the Council chairman, Frank Taaffe. The building according to Paddy was used for “cider parties, orgies and everything”. The pity was I never got invited and never found out what “everything” was. The Council years reported by Barbara Sheridan gave the Nationalist and Leinster Times readers front page headlines such as “Athy UDC row erupts in violence” and “Athy UDC clash ends in walkout”. The offending parties came back for more every month and surprising despite all the rows much good was done during our time on the Council. I stepped down from the Council in 1999 to lead the opposition to the inner relief road and to fight for the outer relief road. The Kildare Nationalist had emerged in 1992 and shortly afterwards Barbara approached me about the possibility of writing a weekly article for the new paper. My first article appeared in September 1992 and that short piece ended with the line “Eye on the past will each week deal with a topic of interest from the history of South Kildare when we will delve into the rich vein of local history which remains to be discovered and related in future articles”. Barbara who started me on the columnist’s journey, which still continues, did me the honour of launching Eye on Athy’s Past Volume III in 2007. She wrote in the foreword of that book how she invited me to contribute a regular column to the Nationalist. The brief she claimed was broad – it was to be something on local history – nothing too serious – and it had to be readable. I thank you Barbara for the opportunity you gave me to tell the story of a town steeped in history and of a people rightly proud of the place we call our own. I call myself a Kilkenny man exiled in Kildare despite having spent the vast majority of my years in the shortgrass county. My early working life was in Naas where I knew Barbara’s father, Brinsley Sheridan as one of the stalwarts of the Moat Club. My first and only appearance on stage was in a play put on by a newly formed county council drama group. The play was performed in Naas and Caragh sometime in the early 1960’s and Brinsley Sheridan was the stage manager and set designer for that play. His daughter, Barbara continues the family connection with the Moat Club in Naas this time as a director. Congratulations and best wishes to Barbara on her retirement. This auld fella will continue on the road Barbara opened up for him for another while.

The Campaign for the Outer Relief Road

The outer relief road, or bypass road, is nearing completion. When opened it should make a huge difference in relieving town centre traffic congestion. Almost half a century has passed since the then Athy Urban District Council considered proposals to lessen anticipated traffic congestion in the town. Traffic was anticipated to increase over the following years and quite rightly the local authority officials in the mid-1970s set about planning for the future. Looking back to a time when the value of the built heritage of our town was largely unappreciated and ignored, it was no surprise that the Council’s consulting engineers engaged to plan for the town’s traffic future proposed an inner relief road as an immediate relief measure. An outer relief road was also recommended as a long-term solution. The inner relief road was planned to run parallel to Leinster Street on the south side, exiting at Meeting Lane and across the back square, bypassing the rear of the Courthouse. The road which was planned to have six-foot-high walls on either side would also require an elevated road from the square to the new bridge a short distance south of Crom a Boo bridge. That inner relief road as planned was the desired development favoured by the County Council officials and it gained the unanimous support of the elected members of Athy Urban District Council in the mid-1970s. It is difficult to imagine nowadays how anyone could have approved the traffic plan, the effect of which was the partial destruction of the finest public space in the county of Kildare. It was the election of a new Council in the mid-1980s which prompted a close look at the inner relief road proposal adopted by a previous Council. It is hard to believe that any town planner or engineer would suggest the construction of a new road just a few yards from the town centre, with walls on both side of the new road. It was that part of the extraordinary incompetent road plan which was first dropped. As a sweetener for the supporters of the inner relief road the Council’s consultants indicated that shopping development along the length of the new roadway would be encouraged, but not so as to infringe on the existing businesses on Duke Street and Leinster Street. How this was to be developed was never explained. Indeed as I look today at the number of vacant shop premises on the town’s main streets I dread to think what might have happened if an inner relief road gave rise to the emergence of further business premises. The inner relief road was opposed by what I believe was the majority of the local townspeople, but despite this the local Councillors by a slim majority supported the County Council officials in their drive for that road. It was not to be as the Planning Appeal Board for the very first time in its history refused permission for a local authority road plan. The Board’s notice of refusal cited the more appropriate development as the outer relief road which is what we are to get later this year or early next year. The townspeople of Athy who campaigned for the outer relief road and opposed the inner relief road got it right. The County Council officials and the public representatives who chose the inner relief road got it wrong. It is well to note that none of the present-day Council officials or public representatives were involved in the outer relief road versus the inner relief road struggle. It was a struggle which went on for several years and involved the call for a plebiscite which was rejected, the holding of public meetings in Emily Square and a door to door canvas for support for the outer relief road. The campaign ended with the six-day public hearing held in the Stand House Hotel on the Curragh, which months later gave the result which the local people had championed. What the campaign taught the local people is that public officials, while claiming to listen to the voice of the people, for the most part ignored the people they serve. Official opinions, I acknowledge, are more often than not in line with those of the general public, but too often we come across instances where the differences between the general public and the officials cannot be merged. The anti-inner relief road campaign is a case in point where the Council officials by various devious means over a long period of time sought to thwart the will of the people. Most notable was the persistent failure of the Council officials to acknowledge the correct count of HGV vehicles passing through the town centre. The true figure which was much larger than that previously stated on numerous occasions by the officials was only finally revealed at the public enquiry. The campaign for the outer relief road and rejection of the inner relief road uncovered institutional arrogance which should have had no part in 20th century local government. Institutional arrogance was the hallmark of the landlord dominated local authorities of the 19th century. The passing of the Local Government Act in 1898 extended the right to vote in local elections and put local government on a truly representative basis which led to the virtual disappearance of the landlord class from local administration. Subsequent changes in local government law saw the emergence of the county manager with executive powers, while the elected members of the councils exercised reserve functions. The initial unhappiness of elected members with the new managerial system led to some changes in the managerial role, but were never completely resolved. However, the lack of autonomy and the weakened power of county councils resulting from departmental control is a continuing issue which makes local government less local than it should be. Despite these shortcomings our long-awaited outer relief road is nearing completion, despite decades of frustration on the part of the local people and many examples of institutional arrogance by former Kildare County Council executives.

A journey to Monaghan and Kells while visiting Derry / Remembering Eileen Tuohy

I was on a journey of remembrance last week as I travelled to and from Derry where I spent a few days within the walls of that ancient city. On the way northwards I stopped over in Monaghan town where I spent a few happy years more than fifty years ago. I went to Monaghan in November 1967 as the new Town Clerk on promotion from a similar position in Kells, Co. Meath. I was newly married and lived in a second storey flat overlooking the Diamond in Monaghan town. My two sons were born in the Beech Hill Nursing Home which has since closed and is now the site of a secondary school. It was in Monaghan that, with the help of a County Council loan, I bought my first house for the princely sum of £750. A three bedroomed end of terrace house, number 4 Dr. MacKenna Terrace was the Taaffe home for two years or more. Great memories were recalled as Breege and myself revisited sites and scenes of young lives spent amongst the wonderfully friendly Monaghan people. The town’s streetscape has not changed much even if new business names showed how the passage of time reveals the almost inevitable generational changes we have come to expect. Monaghan has a strong commercial heart evidenced by the lack of too many charity shops. It’s success is re-enforced when you find Dunnes Stores and an Easons book shop in the town. These two businesses follow success and help to ensure its continuity. The commercial strength of Monaghan town owes much to the local authority’s decision to provide parking throughout the town at very reasonable rates. Monaghan’s car parking rates of one euro for two hours is an encouragement to local shoppers and visitors alike to do business in the town centre. Other towns I have visited recently in County Cork allowed parking for two hours free of charge which is a parking regime first successfully trialled in Steyning West Sussex many years ago. The Monaghan parking rates I found were similarly imposed in Omagh and Strabane and confirmed the savvy northerners acceptance of the wisdom of not discouraging town centre shopping by imposing revenue gathering charges. The local council here in Athy informed us when parking charges were first introduced that they were intended to better regulate parking in the town and were not intended as a revenue collection exercise. Soon after they were implemented, the fee paying parking areas were extended widely throughout the town. This has damaged Athy’s commercial life. Monaghan has several easily accessible car parks in and around the centre of the town including all day parking for one euro in designated areas. Clearly, the town fathers recognised that encouraging footfall in the town’s centre was far more important than creating an income generating scheme to bolster local rates. As I travelled northwards from Monaghan, I found the rural villages of Bready, Magheramason and New Buildings all within a short distance of each other and near to Derry City flying Union Jacks and Ulster flags on every available electricity pole. The message was clear and for a visitor from the South somewhat discomforting. Derry itself was flag free insofar as I could see and the people there were very friendly and reassuring. I spent a few hours on a guided tour of the Bogside led by Paul Doherty whose father Pat was one of the thirteen men shot dead by members of the Parachute Regiment on Bloody Sunday, 3rd January 1972. The Bogside is festooned with murals which remind us of the difficulties faced by the locals during the Troubles. Listening to the guide, it was clear that decades of discrimination and gerrymandering which effectively disenfranchised the majority still shapes the minds and hearts of the local people. The following day I visited the much publicised Derry Girls Exhibition in the Tower Museum as my son Francis, one of the Monaghan youngster’s, was the Art Director on the T.V. series. In the same building was an extensive exhibition telling the story of Derry City. It was one of the best Exhibitions of its kind I have ever seen and is well worth a visit if you are ever in Derry. On our return journey we called to Kells, where in May 1967 I took up duty as a Town Clerk and where after marrying we lived for two months at the end of a one and a half year term in the job. The Town Hall where I had my office is now an Auctioneers but otherwise like Monaghan the streetscape shows few changes. Kells held many memories for me. It was there that a small group of us living in digs played football almost every evening in St. Colmcille’s Park. Amongst those were the legendary footballers Des Ferguson and Greg Hughes who were living in Kells at that time. They appeared once or twice a week while the rest of us haunted the playing pitch every evening. I recalled those whose company I enjoyed while working in Kells and also in Monaghan and as I walked the once familiar streets of both towns, the fading memories of 50 years or more ago returned. The friends and acquaintances have in many cases passed on but they are still remembered with fondness. During the week, a one time resident of Offaly Street passed away. Eileen Tuohy lived in No. 22 Offaly Street with her parents Michael and Annie and with her older brother Tommy and younger sister Mary. Michael was an old IRA man from East Clare who served as a Garda in Athy for many years. He died in 1972 and his wife Annie whom he married while he was stationed in Tullow, died four years later. Mary, the youngest of the family died in London in 2015 and six years later. her brother Tommy, a Marist priest, died. Eileen who was born in 1936 was the last of the Tuohy family which formed part of the strong family based community which existed in Offaly Street in the 1940’s and beyond. The street is no longer home to any of the families who lived there during my young days. Sadly, the local shops Kitty Websters and Sylvesters as well as Moore’s on Emily Square corner are no more while even the local pub and Bobs Cinema are long closed. Friendships and acquaintances forged in younger days are constantly being lost as old age gathers more and more of us in its grip. My journey of remembrance which started in Monaghan followed by a visit to Kells ended this week with a funeral to St. Michael’s cemetery to bid farewell to an old neighbour.

Duthie's Jewellers Athy

After 105 years the name W.T. Duthie may soon disappear from the local streetscape as the sale of the jeweller shop has been completed and new owners take possession. The Duthie family, like so many others, in decades past, lived over the shop in Athy’s Main Street. Were they I wonder the last family to do so? I called to 30 Leinster Street a few days ago after Heather Duthie phoned me to say that with her brother Alistair, she was clearing the premises of Duthie family items and shop records and equipment. I was interested in preserving as much as possible the artefacts identifiable with the Duthie family business which was first established by Willoughby O’Connor sometime in the 19th Century. Albert Duthie’s father William Thomas Duthie worked for O’Connor in the Leinster Street business and succeeded him when he died in 1903. The name W.T. Duthie was retained as the business name even after W.T. died in 1949 to be succeeded by his son Albert who had joined his father a few years previously after a five year apprenticeship in Dublin. I have previously written of Albert Duthie who passed away at a young age in 1979, describing him as a passionate promoter of Athy Town. I first got to know him well when I was living in Dublin in the 1970’s. I called on Albert on a few occasions while visiting Athy seeking help with various Athy related questions. He was always very helpful and extremely knowledgeable in relation to local matters. I know he promoted the town as much as he possibly could and to this end he had the Athy crest embossed on cups and other items sold in his shop. Older generations will remember with fondness the Santa Claus which appeared in the Duthie Shop window in the weeks before Christmas. The nodding Santa Claus was the acknowledged forerunner of the festive season and was cherished by the youngsters in the town. Following Albert’s death, his wife Anna, a native of Ballybay in County Monaghan continued in the business until finally the shop closed for the last time on the 31st July 2013. Heather Duthie and her brother Alistair have kindly donated many items from the iconic jewellers shop to the local Heritage Centre. Included amongst those items were account books kept by Albert in which he recorded watch and jewellery items left in for repair. Looking through some of those earlier books, I came across names once very familiar in Athy. Names such as Miss Dallon and Mr. Hickey of Emily Square, Miss Breen of Offaly Street and Miss Stynes of Leinster Street prompted reminders of persons we knew over half a century ago. Another interesting item donated was a watch rack hanging with watches which had been left in for repairs over the years but never collected. An unusual item I received on behalf of the Heritage Centre was a trout caught by Albert in the River Barrow which he had preserved and mounted for display in the shop. That fish was recognised by the Irish Specimen Fish Committee as a specimen river trout having weighed 5lbs ½ oz and was recorded in the Associations returns for 1963 as having been caught by A. A. Duthie on the 27th May 1963. An interesting note which Albert prepared as a member of Athy’s Angling Club during 1964 gave the following details of fish caught by club members. Tommy Gray of Kilmoroney caught a Pike weighing 10lbs while Patrick Brennan of Belview captured a Bream weighing 3lbs, 7oz. A trout of 3lbs, 1oz was caught by Patrick Conway of Ballyroe and George Chatfield of St. Joseph’s Terrace caught the largest perch weighed 1lb, 7oz. The final entry referred to the 1lb rudd which was caught by Nicholas Cahill of Pairc Bhride. Albert Duthie was a dedicated member of the Angling Club and acted as Secretary of the Club for many years. In one of the watch repair books, I found a postcard advertising “St. John’s Reliance Lever Watch” printed on behalf of C.H. St. John of 3 Duke Street who was described as a Watchmaker, Jeweller and Optician. The 1913 Irish Directory lists the local watchmakers and jewellers as W.T. Duthie, W.P. St. John and E. Higginson, the last two located in Duke Street. As Charles Henry St. John of Duke Street died in 1947 aged 73 years, I wonder if the Directory reference to Higginson is correct. The items generously donated by the Duthie family to the Heritage Centre will be retained for future use/display while the business records will be forwarded to the Kildare County Archives. The photograph shows W.T. Duthie, Albert’s father who put his name over the shop door after he took over from W. O’Connor in 1905.