Aughaboura Creamery of the 1930s

On the railway side of Aughaboura bridge and separated from the ‘plots’ by the railway track leading to Ballylinan was a building which in the 1950s was used as a garage. Despite that, it was still known as ‘The Creamery’, while the ‘plots’ were allotments rented out by the Railway Company to locals wishing to grow their own vegetables. My father had one of those plots, the one nearest to the railway station, which was still quite a distance away and almost directly opposite ‘The Creamery’. It was around that building that my Offaly Street pals and I were to be found playing on many occasions. Always on weekends when the garage was closed. I had often wondered why it was called ‘The Creamery’ or more precisely the ‘Aughaboura Creamery’. The story was told in numerous local newspaper reports of the late 1920s and the early 1930s where I came across references to Kildare and Laois Co-op Creameries Limited. Apparently the co-operative company was agreed to be formed following the holding of a public meeting in Athy’s Town Hall in August 1929. The farmers who attended that meeting decided to establish a creamery in Athy and arrangements were made to canvass other farmers in the locality to get their support and agreement to supply the new creamery with milk. Apparently to make the creamery viable the milk of at least 600 cows was required to be guaranteed. By March 1930 the call on the requisite number of shares in the company having been paid up arrangements were made for the registration of the Creamery Society. Plans for the necessary alterations of the previous Railway Company premises were prepared and once completed work on installing the creamery equipment was to proceed. In May 1930 it was agreed to register creameries at Athy and Stradbally as a single society under the name ‘Kildare and Laois Co-op Creameries’. That same month work started on the reconstruction and fitting out of the Athy creamery. The Leinster Express reported that the Athy Creamery opened for milk reception in May 1931. The Athy plant which was called a central creamery was initially only in position to separate milk and send it to Castlecomer for churning. It was planned to engage in butter making at a later date. Difficulties in sourcing sufficient milk supplies proved problematic for the creamery. Of the 500 shareholders only 160 supplied milk to the creamery and many of those only provided a portion of the milk they originally promised. With many shareholders holding back on supplying the creamery with milk several court cases were taken by the society against farmers/shareholders who subscribed for shares in the society but did not pay the first moiety or subsequent calls for funding. Despite initially opening in May 1931 the creamery appears to have closed for periods due to insufficient milk supplies. The Athy Creamery was listed as a scheduled creamery in the 1932 Dairy Produce (Price Stabilisation) Act which meant it was identified as a marginal operation. This was due to a combination of falling milk prices and high reconstruction and fitting out costs. The creamery reopened on 1st June 1933 but closed the following year. The Nationalist and Leinster Times carried an advertisement for the sale of the Athy creamery in June 1935. The creamery building reverted back to the Railway Company and with the founding of Córas Iompair Éireann in 1945 it was used as a C.I.E. garage under the management of Andrew Conlon. The garage closed some time in the 1960s and Andrew, who was for so long associated with the Aughaboura garage, bought Paddy McEvoy’s shop in Leinster Street which his daughter Mary managed for many years. Andrew Conlon is pictured in the accompanying photograph.