tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37129608657942578562024-02-19T14:49:37.342+00:00Celtic Roots Craic!Raymond McCullough hosts and produces the popular, 'Celtic Roots Radio' show – downloaded by around 10,000 listeners, in more than 110 countries around the world.
The show features a wide range of Celtic and roots music – Celtic, folk, folk/rock, Appalachian, bluegrass, Scottish, Irish, Breton, Cajun, singer/songwriter – plus a regular helping of northern Irish craic from Raymond.
This blog makes available the scripts from that section of the show.Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.comBlogger70125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-82791546567516172712020-05-19T18:23:00.002+01:002020-05-19T18:31:11.091+01:00Celtic Roots Craic 72 – Lockdown, self-isolation and St. Patrick<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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Well suddenly the world has become a very strange place indeed! New phrases have entered our vocabulary to stay – like <i>‘lockdown’, ‘social distancing’</i> and <i>‘self isolation’</i>. Where will it end – and more importantly, when?</h3>
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At least after two months we’re beginning to see some light at the end of the tunnel here in Ireland. From next Monday we can go to garden centres again and recycle all those bottles I’ve been collecting up for months! </div>
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But can you imagine being in Ireland and not a single pub is open? Who could ever have predicted that? And not a single church is open – they’ve had to move to <i>YouTube</i> and <i>Facebook</i>. The saints of Ireland could never have imagined such a situation! </div>
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Mind you it’s not all bad – the church I belong to now has around 3 1/2 thousand people listening in – instead of a couple of hundred! And we’re even more in contact with our community – because we’re delivering medicines and food to people who are isolated, and getting a great response from local councils, the police, etc. </div>
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I was thinking about the old Irish saints – I’ve talked about Colombanus recently, for instance. Like most of them he knew all about <i>‘self-isolation’.</i> He used to make a habit of going off into the woods in France and spending days on his own in prayer. Mebbe we should take a leaf out of his book?</div>
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Patrick, Brigid, Columcille – all of these guys were known for the hours they would spend in prayer and isolation. When Patrick was forced to work as a slave herding on Mount Slemish in Antrim he claimed that, <i>‘in one day I would pray up to one hundred times, and at night perhaps the same’. </i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica";"><span style="font-size: 12px;">He described himself in his Confession as being, </span></span><i style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 12px;">‘like a stone lying deep in the mud. Then He who is powerful came and lifted me up and placed me on the very top of the wall.’</i><span style="font-family: "helvetica";"><span style="font-size: 12px;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> And later he said, </span><i><span style="font-family: "helvetica";"><span style="font-size: 12px;">‘Whatever comes about for me, good or bad, I ought to accept them equally and give thanks to God<span style="color: #1a1a1a;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(26, 26, 26);">'.</span></span></span></span></i><br />
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Maybe we could learn from Patrick. I know these are very difficult times for all of us. We are suffering from the effects of this lockdown, from being restricted and unable to interact normally with those we care about. Patrick learned that giving thanks changed things – in particular it changed him – so that the difficult times didn’t bring him down, instead he was ‘lifted up’. </div>
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You may not have the same confidence and trust as Patrick and the other saints, but I really recommend their way of looking at things – it certainly works for me!</div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-70967492609470684722020-05-19T18:19:00.003+01:002020-05-19T18:21:21.006+01:00Celtic Roots Craic 71 – The 'black stuff' – a traveller's tale!<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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The Bush Bar, Blacklion, Co. Sligo</h4>
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Well, life can be a wee bit unpredictable, wouldn’t ye say? The whole world seems to have gone totally crazy at the moment. I was in a local supermarket the other day and it reminded me of news stories of GUM stores in Moscow before Glasnost came along! Ah, well, sure at least ye can relax for a wee while and enjoy some music ’n’ craic.</h3>
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Normally we have a parade in Downpatrick at this time of year, but they’ve all been cancelled. The health people recommend that we keep drinking plenty – though I think they actually had water in mind – <i>uisce</i>, rather than <i>uisce beatha – </i>the<i> ‘water of life’! </i>However, the choice is up to yerself!</div>
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Anyway, I thought I’d tell yez a yarn, to cheer yez up. When I was about twenty one, or so, myself and a friend, Davy, decided to take a wee trip down south. This was still during the troubles, mind, and we were hitch-hiking – not too many people were inclined to risk giving lifts at the time, but we managed. We started at the access to the M2 Motorway in Belfast and managed to get a lift for forty miles or so, beyond the end of the motorway at that time.</div>
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That took to what was then known as <i>‘bandit country’</i> in Co. Tyrone – made all the more obvious by the local road signs being riddled with bullet holes! It took us ages to get through that part. Eventually we made it to the border – which at that point is between two villages – Belcoo, on the northern side, and Blacklion, on the southern side.</div>
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Traffic was scarce and lifts were even scarcer and we were seriously thinking of sending the night in a roadside workman’s hut when a car stopped for us. The occupant was a local pub owner, Vincent McGovern – known locally as <i>‘Vincie the Bush’,</i> because he owned four bars, which he inherited from his father – on either side of the border – each called, <i>‘The Bush Bar.’</i></div>
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Vincent was also a reformed alcoholic, and – after treating us at his local bar to tea and sandwiches – gave us a ride to Sligo, while entertaining us with stories of his travels all over Ireland to help fellow alcoholics.</div>
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After a night spent in Sligo, we headed south again and found ourselves once again marooned – this time in the remote west of Ireland, with not a vehicle in sight for miles. Eventually we got a lift on a farm trailer carrying milk churns and passed by another couple also hitchhiking, waving as we overtook them. Shortly after they waved to us as they passed in a car. And so it continued – we passed them, they passed us – going only a few miles each time.</div>
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While we were trudging through Ballyhaunis a single driver in a yellow Ford Cortina pulled up and told could take us all the way to Galway City. We got in and thanked him, and I mentioned how we had kept passing this same couple all day. Sure enough, we caught up with them again and our driver agreed to pick them up also. I chatted with the driver, but the others sat quietly in the back listening to his music and not talking.</div>
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When we arrived at Eyre Square in Galway, Davy and I got out on the passenger side and the other couple got out on the opposite side, so they were halfway across the Square when the car drove off. Even so, I tried what turned out to be the magic words, shouting,<i> ‘Buy you a pint?’</i> across the Square.</div>
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They responded and joined us in Richardson’s Pub in Eyre Square for the first of several pints that afternoon. They were husband and wife, Bernard and Nuala, from Sligo and we had a great conversation which led to a friendship which has continued now for many years – my wife and I visiting them every few years. Until that day I had only ever drunk Guinness shandy, but Bernard didn’t know that when it was his round <i>–</i> so that was how I developed a taste for Guinness!</div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-47291249161888491982020-05-19T18:15:00.002+01:002020-05-19T18:15:45.478+01:00Celtic Roots Craic 70 – Down at 'The Yard' – The Titanic Quarter<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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Filming the Titanic Quarter from the Goliath Crane (100m up)</h4>
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Now, I live down the road from Belfast – otherwise known as B’lfahst! – and Belfast’s main claim to fame is its history of shipbuilding. The Harland and Wolff company, who started shipbuilding there in 1861, was founded by local, Edward James Harland, and a German immigrant from Hamburg, Gustav Wilhelm Wolff. </h3>
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Harland had previously managed the existing Hickson’s Shipyard and bought this yard from his employer in 1858, making his assistant Wolff a partner in the new company. They built ships for the white Star line – the <i>Olympic, Titanic</i> and <i>Britannic</i> – between 1909 and 1914. Harland & Wolff also once owned shipyards in Glasgow, Liverpool, London and Southhampton.</div>
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In 1936 the company started an aircraft manufacturing facility with the Short brothers, known as <i>Short Brothers and Harland Ltd.</i> – known locally as <i>Shorts</i>.</div>
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In 1898 my great-grandfather died – he’d lived in Glasgow since the age of seventeen – and my grandfather and his older sister then moved back to Northern Ireland, where my great-grandfather was originally from. My grandfather began to work in the joinery workshop in Harland & Wolff’s shipyard – or<i> ’The Yard’ </i>as it was always known. </div>
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During the Second World War the shipyard employed about thirty five thousand people, constructing six aircraft carriers and repairing several thousand ships. The aircraft factory – Shorts – were also building Stirling Bombers. In 1941 the Luftwaffe bombed the shipyard heavily, causing a lot of damage to the yard, the city and completely destroying the aircraft factory.</div>
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The most famous ship built at Harland & Wolff was, of course, the RMS Titanic, which unfortunately sank on her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York, via Cherbourg in France and Cobh in the south of Ireland. More than 1,500 lives were lost, because the ship didn’t carry enough lifeboats for all the passengers.</div>
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I had a great uncle – a man called William George Given – who in 1912 had booked to emigrate to Canada on the Titanic. However, he was so anxious to make the trip that he decided not to wait and took another boat instead – which turned out to be a very good move!</div>
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A few years ago the Titanic Belfast visitor centre was opened in what is know known as the Titanic Quarter of the city. You can learn how the ship was built, the history of the shipyard and see what the luxury cabins and ballroom looked like, walk around the slipways, etc. You can also visit the sister ship – the <i>SS Nomadic</i> – which has been restored nearby.</div>
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The shipyard is still in operation, though it only employs a small fraction of the thousands who used to work there. Belfast’s skyline is dominated by the two huge yellow cranes – Goliath and Samson – which span 459 feet across the dry dock below and can lift up to 840 tonnes to a height of 230 feet. They were built by the German company <i>Krupp</i> in 1969 and 1974, respectively. Nowadays, instead of building ships the yard mostly repair oil rigs and manufacture wind generators.</div>
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In 2011, before the Titanic Centre was built I was asked to film some video from the top of one of the cranes for the new <i>Titanic Belfast</i> website. Four of us went up inside the tapered leg of the crane in a small lift. At the top there is a large room containing two huge diesel engines, which are used to propel the crane along rails. We were able to walk along the top of the gantry, which is over 300 feet above the ground, and film the harbour from it. </div>
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While we were filming the weather suddenly changed from beautiful spring sunshine to wind and snow blowing horizontally – so we had to make a hurried escape back to the lift area!</div>
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Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-79269049010502760632020-05-19T18:11:00.003+01:002020-05-19T18:11:32.906+01:00Celtic Roots Craic 69 – Balagan – 'What are ye like?'<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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Balagan – a travelling puppet show, or a mess!</h4>
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Here’s an interesting word for ye – <i>balagan</i>. It means a mess, but it could be the name of a town somewhere in Ireland, couldn’t it? Actually, it’s a Hebrew slang word that I first heard on a visit to Israel. It can refer to many situations – a traffic meltdown, the state of your kid’s room, Irish politics, Israeli politics, your complicated relationship with your boyfriend or girlfriend – and so forth.</h3>
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It has interesting origins, too. It seems to have come to Israel from Russia in the late nineteenth century. It meant the same thing in Russia, especially referring to the wagons used by travelling puppet shows. The word apparently originated in Persia – as <i>balakhaana</i> (from which comes our word,<i> balcony)</i> – and travelled via Turkey to Russia, Poland and Lithuania – and eventually, Israel.</div>
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When I first heard it in Israel and had the meaning explained to me, I thought,<i> ‘This really ought to have been an Irish word!’</i> What we might say instead is that something is a <i>‘Horlicks’ – as in, ‘Ye’ve made a right horlicks of that, haven’t ye?’ </i>We might also say,<i> ‘Yer makin’ a right pig’s lug a’ that.’ </i></div>
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If yer referring to someone mixing their food all up together ye might say, <i>‘Yer making a right stour of it.’</i> <i>Stour</i> is an Ulster Scots, or Scottish, word that can also apply to a cloud of dust – if you stir up a whole lot of dust yer <i>‘making a stour’.</i> <i>Stoor</i> might possibly have originated with the Vikings, because it is also a Scandinavian word for dust.</div>
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I spent a hour or two wandering around Krakow, in Poland, with a Polish couple who used to live here in Northern Ireland. Camilla, the wife, kept finding opportunities to repeat the Ulster phrase, <i>‘What are ye like?’ </i>– which usually means there’s something odd, or amiss, about the person referred to. We might also encourage this person to <i>‘Wise up!’ </i>or to <i>‘Catch yerself on’.</i></div>
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Of course, I’m sure everyone is familiar with the Irish word – <i>eedjit</i> – a different way of pronouncing, <i>idiot</i> – for instance, <i>‘Ye eedjit, ye – what did ye go and do that for?</i>’ or, <i>‘Yer man’s all right, like, but he can be a bit of an eedjit at times!’ </i></div>
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Another way of saying that would be,<i> ‘Yer man’s not the full shillin’, </i>or<i> ‘He’s a couple a stories short of a bungalow!’ </i>– calling into question someone’s mental capacity. You could also say, <i>‘Ye haven’t a titter of wit, have ye?’ </i></div>
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In this part of the world we tend to excel at this sort of derogatory banter – we call it <i>slaggin’.</i> Strangers can be a bit taken aback when apparent friends start to <i>‘slag each other off’ </i>– saying things like, <i>‘Ach, ye haven’t the wit ye were born with,’ </i>or,<i> ‘Aye, yer head’s a marley!’ </i>(referring to a marble); <i>‘Sure he’s as thick as champ,’</i> or,<i> ‘I think there’s air gettin in!’</i> or,<i> ‘Quit actin’ the maggot, you.’</i></div>
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If we want to make fun of someone’s lack of height we might say,<i> ‘Stand up, Jimmy – oh, ye are standin’ up!’ </i> The opposite would be,<i> ‘What’s the weather like up there?’ </i>Or we might say,<i> ‘If he was chocolate he’d be some eatin’!’</i></div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-17826465881581227632020-05-19T18:06:00.003+01:002020-05-19T18:07:49.232+01:00Celtic Roots Craic 68 – 'R'aper blades and the 'glass hammer'<h3>
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Tilley lamp (as sold in Redmond Jefferson's store)</h4>
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A wee bit a’ history here. When I was about 15, or 16, I used to work in the summer holidays in a hardware shop in the centre of Lisburn – called <b>Redmond Jefferson</b>. Redmond is from the same Teutonic root as Raymond – i.e. <i>Raedmund</i>, meaning <i>‘mighty and wise protector’</i> – but that’s just by the way!</h3>
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Actually, a year and a half ago I found myself in Poland – in a town called Mikolow – pronounced <i>Mikov</i> – not far from Krakow. We were involved in a small building project in a poor area of town, and some of the local men came out to help us. I was mostly cutting up wood with a circular saw and one of the locals joined me to help hold the wood steady. We had no common language – I’d learned only a couple of words of Polish and he knew no English. </div>
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After a few hours of repeating <i>‘dobre’</i>, meaning <i>good</i>, <i>‘dziekuje’</i> – <i>thank you</i>, and <i>‘tak’,</i> meaning <i>yes</i>, I got one of our Polish friends to translate for me and asked my helpful friend what his name was – it was <i>Rajmund</i> – spelled with a ‘j’ and a ‘u’ – then I told him my name was the same and he was delighted!</div>
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Anyway, I used to work for this firm called Redmond Jefferson. They supplied just about everything you could imagine in the building and agricultural line. A farmer would come in and ask for <i>‘r'aper blades’</i> – which were sharpened metal triangles which formed the teeth on a reaping machine. </div>
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<span style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 12px;">There was quite a dodgy store room on the second floor, where the floor was weak and sloped towards the middle and you had to walk carefully around the edges of it. This was where they kept rare items such as glass globes for Tilley lamps, carefully wrapped up in newspaper dated 1931! No it wasn’t the most up-to-date hardware store!</span><br />
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In the hardware shop I learned all about plumbing fittings such as male or female 1/2” bends, or tees, or a half-round <i>‘bastard’</i> file – that’s what it’s called! I even learned to cut glass, when the normal glass-cutter was on holiday. You had to lean a large sheet of glass on the edge of the bench, then let it drop flat onto the bench, which worked because the air underneath created a cushion and the glass didn’t break.</div>
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One of the jobs I hated most was being asked to go for a stone of lime – this had to be scooped into a paper bag by leaning into a metal bin and you ended up breathing in the lime dust – not pleasant. </div>
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On one occasion a customer asked for an 8ft by 4ft sheet of steel, which was leaning against the wall in the yard. I carefully pulled it upright and leaned it against my back, before carrying it to the customer’s trailer a few yards away. When I went into the office to find out the price of this metal sheet I discovered it weighed 2-3 hundredweight (that’s about 150 kgs!). After that I didn’t volunteer to carry any more sheets of steel on my own!</div>
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The other employees were quite adept at disappearing for long periods – skivin’ off, it’s called – and I would often end up trying to serve two customers at once at opposite ends of the shop. Of course, when you were the new lad the older hands had to try to <i>‘take a hand out of you’</i> by sending you off to another hardware store to borrow such non-existent items as a <i>‘glass hammer’,</i> or for the <i>‘long weight’</i>. I never actually fell for any of these fool’s errands, but it never stopped them from trying. </div>
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One of the regular questions they’d ask was, <i>‘Is yer da an Orangeman?’ </i>As my father was not a member of any Orange Lodge, I said,<i> ‘No.’</i> What they really meant was, <i>‘Are you a Protestant?’ – </i>so, of course they then assumed I was Roman Catholic. Took me a while to work that one out!</div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-80904486380029231722020-05-19T18:01:00.002+01:002020-05-19T18:01:36.133+01:00Celtic Roots Craic 67 – 1798, a bridge and 'the priest's grave'<h3>
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<b>Kilmore Parish Church re-built in Ulster Folk Museum, Cultra, Co. Down</b></h4>
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<b>Well, we’ve looked at some further away parts of the Celtic world recently – so I thought I’d update you on my own part of the world. My wife, Gerry, and I are sort of in transition at the moment. Yes, I’ve finally got the underfloor heating working properly in our converted stone barn, which we hope to move into permanently later this year. In the meantime, we stay there about one night per week. It’s about fifteen minutes from Downpatrick, Co. Down – just outside Crossgar. </b></h3>
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Crossgar is a bit unusual for Irish towns – because before the year 1800 it didn’t exist. There was a big house nearby called Crossgar House, which has since become the Passionist monastery of Tobar Mhuire, meaning ‘Mary’s Well’, after a holy well in the grounds. An Cross Ghearr in Irish means ‘the short cross’, so possibly there had once been a Celtic Cross there which was broken? There is no trace of it now, though.</div>
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There was also a pub close to the Glaswater River – glas, in Irish, means ‘grey’, by the way – where apparently, ne’er-do-wells used to hang out. The people of the much older – 800 AD – village of Kilmore about a mile away, used to refer to, ‘those drunkards down at the bridge’.</div>
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Now the bridge is the secret to the existence of the village of Crossgar. The local landowner, Price, in what is now called Saintfield, four miles to the north, planned out the village of Tamhnach Naomh – Irish for ‘Field of Saints.’ </div>
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Saintfield had taken a major part in the 1798 rebellion of the United Irishmen against the English. A force, led by local Presbyterians, ambushed a British force in a wood, killing around 100 men in total. The British retaliated by pretty much destroying the village. The name change to Saintfield, in English, took place around the same time.</div>
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Now after re-building and improving the damaged village of Saintfield, this same local landowner then turned his attention to what was to become Crossgar. You see, there were only two roads at that time from Belfast to Downpatrick – one was the route for passenger coaches, via Killleagh and Comber, to the east; and the other, which passed through our little hamlet of Listooder, was the route of the mail coach, which also passed through the village of Saintfield.</div>
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Price decided to build a new bridge – at Crossgar – with a new coach road running from Saintfield, over the bridge, and on to the County Town of Downpatrick. Now, both mail and passenger coaches changed to the new route and a new village grew up beside the bridge, named Crossgar after the nearby demesne house. Of course, this road also brought prosperity to Saintfield – half-way between Belfast and Downpatrick – which, of course, was Price’s plan.</div>
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As a result, both Kilmore – which means ‘large church’, and Listooder – meaning ‘Fort of the Tanner’, after the Celtic fort on the hill nearby, became backwaters, served only by minor roads – boreens, really. The original church outside Kilmore was later numbered stone by stone, and transferred to the Ulster Folk Museum at Cultra, in north Down, and a new Church of Ireland church built closer to the village.</div>
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The area was once known as the seven chapels, dating back to around 400 AD – six of which can still be identified because of the remains of old graveyards. Just north of our hamlet of Listooder, there is one of these – Killygartan – known locally as ‘the priest’s grave’. There is also a ‘mass rock’ , from Penal Times, in a field nearby. The priest in question was one Fr. McCartan, who also gave his name to the Killygartan River, which flows past our front door. </div>
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Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-63330334733382190532020-01-15T00:09:00.000+00:002020-01-15T00:10:19.455+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 66 – Columbanus – how the Irish saved civilisation!<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">St. Columbanus in stained glass window</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">At the moment I still live in Conlig – between Bangor and Newtownards, though we’ll soon be moving to our new/old cottage near Downpatrick. Bangor is not from the Irish – it’s from the Latin, <i>Beann Chor</i>, meaning good choir. That’s because the town of Bangor grew up around the ancient Irish monastery that was established there around 555 AD by a man called Comgall.</span> </h3>
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It is reported that St. Patrick had once rested there and saw a valley filled with angels. All that remains there now is <i>‘St. Malachy’s Wall’</i> – most of the stone being re-used to build a later Abbey Church nearby – and a sundial, which is now placed in front of the Town Hall.</div>
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Comgall was born between 510 and 520 in Magheramorne, Co. Antrim, and educated at Movilla, in Newtownards, Glasnevin, in Dublin and Clonmacnoise, on the River Shannon, in Co. Offaly. He held to a very strict rule, with a lot of prayer and fasting, but also music and singing – the <i>Bangor Antiphonary</i> being the hymnbook which remains from those times. </div>
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Almost 3,000 monks worked, studied and prayed there. They also held a 24-hour prayer watch – prayer, scripture reading and worship – that continued for more then 100 years and probably explains why Bangor has become known as <i>‘The Light of the World’ – </i>sending missionaries out to Europe during what was known as the <i>‘Dark Ages.’</i></div>
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The two best-known of those missionaries were Colombanus – or Columban – and Gall, or Gallus. Columbanus – meaning <i>‘white dove’ </i>– was born of a rich family in the province of Meath in 540 AD, but came to Bangor to study under Comgall. At the age of forty he was given permission to travel to Europe and took twelve younger men with him, including Gall.<i></i></div>
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They landed in Brittany, near St. Malo, in 585 AD, leaving a village of Saint Coulomb there, before moving on to Annegray, where they founded a monastery in an abandoned Roman fortress. In 590 he founded a second monastery in a nearby castle, at Luxeuil-les-Bains, and then a third called Ad-Fontanas – modern day Fontaine-lés-Luxeuil.</div>
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When the king of Burgundy died – who had been a strong supporter of Columbanus – his sons were still minors and Columbanus fell foul of their grandmother, Brunhilda, and eventually he and his Irish companions were forced to leave Burgundy. Their ship, however, was driven back to shore by a storm and the captain refused to take them any further. Columbanus and his friends travelled across France to Switzerland and Bregenz, in Austria, where they established another monastery. </div>
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Colombanus moved on after a year, crossing the Alps into Italy, but Gallus remained and later founded another monastery nearby, which was named after him, St. Gallen – now the town of St. Gallen. </div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 12px;">Columbanus arrived in Milan in 612 and was welcomed by the king and queen of Lombardy, who gave him land at Bobbio, including a ruined church, so he could establish a monastery there, which he did in 614 AD. Columbanus died at Bobbio a year later, having meanwhile been invited to return by the new king of Burgundy. He and his followers are credited with saving the civilisation of Europe.</span>Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-37378249735222415162020-01-14T23:49:00.001+00:002020-01-15T00:06:40.254+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 65 – 'Ye cannae take our freedom!<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Scottish highland bagpipes</span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I got into a whole history of Galicia last time – which <i>I</i> found interesting, I don’t know about yous? – anyway, it occurred to me I haven’t talked about our close neighbours across the North Channel – the Scots. </span></h3>
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My grandfather was actually born in Glasgow – or <i>Glasgae</i>, as they might put it! – although my great-grandfather had actually come there from here in Northern Ireland, then married a Scots lady called Mary ?? and the rest of that sad story I’ve told before. </div>
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A lot of people in Northern Ireland have Scots connections – many of them dating back to the time of the <i>Highland Clearances</i> – back in the early 1700s – when many Scots came to the north of Ireland, as well as emigrating to North America. </div>
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Scots from the Highlands and islands were forcibly evicted from their crofts, so the landlords could develop huge sheep farms – making money came first, once again! These evictions pretty much destroyed the traditional Scottish clan-based society, that had existed up until then – and the emigration has continued – just as it has done in Ireland – ever since. The Scottish Celtic band, <i>Runrig,</i> released a great song about it, called <i>‘Oran Ailein/Leaving Strathconon.’ </i></div>
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We Irish – especially in the the north – share quite a lot with our Caledonian neighbours. In the 6th and 7th centuries there used to be a Gaelic kingdom called, <i>Dalriada</i> – or<i> Dál Riata, </i>in Gaelic – which spanned the<i> North Channel, </i>with part of the kingdom stretching to Argyll, in Scotland – the coast of the Gaels – and the other part in County Antrim – which would explain the Scots accent in <i>‘Co. Antrim, hey!’</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;">They still speak Gaelic in western parts of Scotland – only they call it </span><i style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica";">gáidhlig</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica";">! </span><span style="font-family: "helvetica";"> </span></i><i><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Gáidhlig</span> </span></i><span style="font-family: "helvetica";"><span style="font-family: "arial";"><span style="font-size: 12px;">and the Ulster </span></span></span><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"><i>gaeilge</i></span><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> have many similarities, but there are differences, too – you can easily get caught out!</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> </span></div>
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By the way, do you know where the word, <i>Scot,</i> originated? It comes from the Latin word, <i>scotus</i>, meaning an Irishman – so all them Scots over there are really just Ireland, east!</div>
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Of course not all people from Scotland are really Scots – that is of Irish descent – the tribe that lived in the eastern part of Scotland were the Picts. As far as I know they had no connection with Ireland, and they had a few battles with the Scots of Dál Riata. The first king of Dál Riata was Fergus Mór – Fergus the Great, from which, of course, you get the Scots name, Ferguson – plenty of those about in Ireland! Eventually, in the 9th century the Scots and Picts united into the new kingdom of Alba, or Albannach.</div>
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Did you ever hear the story of how the Scottish bagpipes were invented? No? Well, a certain Scots chieftain came over to the north of Ireland for a wee visit and they laid on a banquet with food, drink and entertainment. He was very impressed when he heard the wild sound of the Irish <i>uilleann</i> pipes and asked if he could possibly get a set to take back to Scotland.</div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;">Well, the local chieftain called in his pipe maker and he agreed to do his best to make him a set of pipes before the visiting chieftain went home. When it came time to leave the pipe maker presented the Scottish chieftain with a newly made set of pipes, and explained that he hadn’t had the time to make the bellows, which are used to fill the </span><i style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 12px;">uilleann</i><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> pipes with air, but had put in a little pipe that the player could blow into in the meantime. And ye know what? The Scots haven’t caught on to this day!</span><br />
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Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-82917132307486045512020-01-14T23:40:00.003+00:002020-01-14T23:46:13.809+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 64 – Galicia – the Cinderella of Celtic nations<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUj6v2ni2EfEIw0YvEQlTFkQmltnhb9uB6pne_KGeQgV8qtGk3DvE3U_cpHzCzUV94qX0S00h4YtWbLfngILBPddHBcvvdMvFJmCo3YkYXyQ-RWkUcJECJaT0mBv4VbQnBRTFmNBohradz/s1600/Galician+flag.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="130" data-original-width="184" height="226" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUj6v2ni2EfEIw0YvEQlTFkQmltnhb9uB6pne_KGeQgV8qtGk3DvE3U_cpHzCzUV94qX0S00h4YtWbLfngILBPddHBcvvdMvFJmCo3YkYXyQ-RWkUcJECJaT0mBv4VbQnBRTFmNBohradz/s320/Galician+flag.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">You might have noticed we’ve been playing a lot more Breizh music – from Brittany – on recent shows? That’s because several Breton musicians and bands have contacted me from France – usually through <i>Facebook</i>. And I’m also hoping to get hold of some authentic Galician tunes in the near future, from a similar contact. </span></h3>
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Galicia is the north western province of Spain – with towns like A Corunya, Vigo, Santiago de Compostela – where the famous pilgrimage across the north of Spain terminates. Another inland town is Lugo, which is named after the ancient pagan Celtic God, Lugh – like the village Conlig, close to where I live at the moment – which gives ye a bit of a clue to the Celtic heritage of Galicia.</div>
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Unlike Catalonia, which has been having a big row with the Spanish government over independence, the Galicians seem to be happy enough with their lot. They’ve had their own autonomous parliament since 1978 – Franco took away their autonomy while he was in power. The Galicians were originally called <i>Gallaeci</i> by the Greeks and Romans – similar to the <i>Galli</i> – in Gaul, and the <i>Gallati</i> – the Galatians, another Celtic tribe who lived in part of what is now Turkey – St Paul wrote a letter to them, remember? In those days Galicia extended into what is now northern Portugal. They lived in fortified villages called <i>castros</i> – hill forts.</div>
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The Roman historians regarded them as a bunch of barbarians – occupying themselves in fighting by day and eating, drinking and dancing at night – sounds like they were true Celts all right! When Rome collapsed the Kingdom of Galicia survived independently for more than 170 years. Like Brittany, the northern part of Galicia had an influx of fellow Celtic Britons, who had been squeezed out by the anglo-Saxon invasion of what then became England. The Britons brought Christianity with them and established their own diocese of Britonia. In 718 Ad the Islamic Moors took over most of Iberia – modern Spain and Portugal, but they never really conquered Galicia – just sent some soldiers to collect taxes from them. </div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica";">Unfortunately, the Galicians no longer speak a Celtic language – modern Galician is a Romance language, based on Latin and close to Portuguese, which – although containing lots of Celtic words – disqualifies them, in the opinion of some, from being a truly Celtic nation. At a meeting of the </span><i style="font-family: Helvetica;">Celtic League</i><span style="font-family: "helvetica";"> in 1986, Galicia officially joined the other six Celtic nations – Brittany, Cornwall, Ireland, Isle of Man, Scotland and Wales. Unfortunately for Galicia, this decision caused an uproar in the </span><i style="font-family: Helvetica;">Celtic League</i><span style="font-family: "helvetica";"> and – mainly because they no longer have a living Celtic language – Galicia’s membership was revoked again a year later.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Despite this rejection, regular Celtic Festivals are held there – the <i>International Festival of the Celtic World</i> in Ortigueira being one of the largest and best known in Europe, with sometimes over 100,000 visitors. Last year the Galician Parliament recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of self rule with bagpipes and folk songs. Yeah, the place is apparently coming down with bagpipers – which they call <i>gaitas</i>, similar to words used for the pipes in eastern Europe. There are hundreds of pipers – <i>gaiteras</i> – registered in Galicia! Some of the most popular tunes are called munieras – which are very similar to Irish jigs – I’ve played some on past shows.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Galicia has something else in common with the other Celtic nations in that it is remote, hilly and not industrialised. The coastline is made up of rias – flooded river estuaries, similar to those found in Brittany – with plenty of beaches. The climate is generally wetter than other parts of Spain – so us Scots and Irish should feel right at home. And there’s Finisterre – Land’s End in Galician – the second most westerly point in mainland Europe.<br /><br />And, while it may not be particularly Celtic, the <i>Camino de Santiago</i> pilgrimage ending in Santiago de Compostella, nearby, attracts millions of pilgrims, who walk the <i>Camino Trail </i>and stay overnight in special hostels provided for the pilgrims. The saints bones were rediscovered after the Romans departed and are claimed to be those of the apostle James, who was the first disciple martyred in Jerusalem, then – apparently – secretly transported the length of the Mediterranean by his disciples. Some believe the bones were actually those of the fourth-century, <i>Priscillian</i>, bishop of Avila, who was executed by the emperor as a heretic and whose followers brought his body back to Spain from Trier, in Germany.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">A former colleague of mine when I was a lecturer – from here in Northern Ireland – went on the pilgrimage and then wrote a book about it – it’s called</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 14px;"> </span><i style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 14px;">‘<a href="https://www.amazon.com/RESTLESS-HEARTS-Walking-Santiago-Frances-ebook/dp/B01FWD9E7E" target="_blank">Restless Hearts</a>'.</i>Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-61566348089331382172020-01-14T17:49:00.005+00:002020-01-14T23:17:21.293+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 63 – Roast potatoes, chips 'n' mash!<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDJwVbiNfk9-g2G8UlyhG8NlEmCDd-3_Se092jZFD8cNXYNla_sqOZGctDAKcCdBTqZkt0w80ImVPEUIEOWOfw-5C0ZJkhkom54NtTP4FA0yfUMsmKfUs03nWvCXkBRAkiunHW9Md93rsc/s1600/TatieBread.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDJwVbiNfk9-g2G8UlyhG8NlEmCDd-3_Se092jZFD8cNXYNla_sqOZGctDAKcCdBTqZkt0w80ImVPEUIEOWOfw-5C0ZJkhkom54NtTP4FA0yfUMsmKfUs03nWvCXkBRAkiunHW9Md93rsc/s320/TatieBread.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There is one thing that people always associate with Ireland, although they actually originated in the Americas. The Inca Indians in Peru were the first to cultivate potatoes back around 5,000 B.C. </span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /><br /> Then, in 1536, the Spanish Conquistadors conquered Peru, discovered the potato, and brought it to Europe. Sir Walter Raleigh brought potatoes to Ireland in 1589, on his 40,000 acre estate near Cork. And the rest, as they say, is history.<br /><br />But why is the potato associated so much with Ireland? Well, the main reason is that during Penal times most of the Irish were poor tenant farmers. They grew wheat, barley and oats on their smallholdings, but it took the sale of most of that to pay the high rents. <br /><br />So, they cultivated a small area of their land in potatoes and mostly they lived on that – which is why the Irish Famine in 1845 and subsequent years had such a devastating affect. The potato blight that destroyed the crops affected Britain and Europe, also, but the people there were not so dependent on the potato for survival – they had bread and meat to live on. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Did you know that all through the famine years, Ireland continued to export cattle, sheep, pigs, wheat and barley in great quantities. Profits came first, unfortunately, and the poor people found their only means of sustenance turned into a rotting mush. Many of them tried to survive on grass and often whole families were found dead with grass stains on their mouths. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /><br />Capitalism and a lack of concern – <i>‘sure they were only Irish Catholics, weren’t they?’ </i>– caused the deaths of about a million people! Actually, though, quite a few Protestants – mainly Presbyterians – died also. There was no international famine aid, or emotional TV appeals in those days!<br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, you’d think we’d have gone right off potatoes by now, wouldn’t ye? Not a bit of it! We were up in Donegal a few years ago and decided to have a meal in Buncrana, in the old railway station, there, which has become a restaurant and pub. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">While we were waiting for a table there was a local boy making a mobile phone call home to his wife. He’d obviously stopped in for a pint, and – by the look of him, he intended to have a few more – but was reassuring his wife, <i>‘I’ll be home for the spuds, now, so I will. Oh, aye, I’ll be home for the spuds!’ </i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /><br />When he actually arrived home <i>‘for the spuds’ </i>is anybody’s guess and whether they were still fit to eat, or stone cold, or burnt, or maybe eaten by the dog – we’ll never know. Perhaps not the recipe for domestic harmony, eh?<br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Speaking of recipes, I said we were down in Dublin recently – for the first time in a few years. We had a meal in <i>Gallagher’s Boxty House</i> in Templebar and, of course, we both had boxty. It’s a sort of pancake made with potato and then filled with chicken, beef, or whatever, in a sauce – very tasty! You can get it in Belfast, too, on the <i>Belfast Barge</i> – a floating restaurant on the River Lagan. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In nearly any Irish restaurant you can get a <i>‘feed a’ champ’,</i> which is mashed potato with scallions mixed in (spring onions, if you’re English). By the way, did you know that the word, scallion, came from the town of Ashquelon, in Israel? Another variation on champ is something called colcannon, which is mashed potato mixed with cabbage. That’s very tasty as well.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But something you’re unlikely to find south of the border is potato bread. That’s an Ulster thing – a vital component of the Ulster Fry, in fact. If ye’ve never had an Ulster Fry, then ye’d better get yerself over here and try one – but maybe not if yer suffering from heart disease already! They also do potato bread in Scotland.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When I was a wee nipper my mother used to make soda bread, wheaten, treacle bread and potato bread – all baked on the griddle set on top of a gas stove. You take a wean a’ cooked potatoes and mash them up, add a wee taste a’ flour and a teaspoonful of salt and spread the mix out on a flour-covered board, or baking sheet. Then you roll the mix out thin and place it on the griddle, with some flour sprinkled on it, cut it into four pieces and cook it dry. You can always fry it up in the pan with oil, or butther, later.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My mother also made a variation on this called potato apple – potato bread with chopped apple mixed in – mmm, delicious! It’s very hard to find anywhere that sells potato apple these days, but ye can easily make it yerself.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The other potato thing we love is potato crisps – or potato chips, if yer American! They were supposedly invented by a black American chef, in Saratoga, New York – one George Crum, I kid you not! – but actually, they first appeared in an English cook book by William Kitchiner in 1817. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of course, an Irishman got in on the act – Joe Murphy – who else? known as <i>‘Spud Murphy’</i> – who started up the <i>Tayto</i> company in Ireland and is credited with inventing <i>Cheese ’n’ Onion </i>flavoured crisps – my favourite! The <i>Tayto</i> factory in Northern Ireland is inside a big stone castle, down in Tandragee, Co. Armagh. I actually once drove a lorry – a truck – right inside the castle to make a delivery. Oh, and by the way, not far from Dublin we have the <i>Tayto Theme Park!</i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, we Irish do love our spuds – purties, praties – whatever! You’ve heard of the Irish mixed grill, haven’t you? – roast potatoes, chips and mash?</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
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Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-70880387627194119702020-01-14T17:02:00.002+00:002020-01-14T17:36:08.572+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 62 – Huguenots, 'Millies' and the ‘wee blue blossom’.<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-WuA5Hx6RpjoShWHOQooIfIQlatJrk2BL08OMhM3Y1uypWA70PMBTEEXYRPz5LAmWiQBNncdVGJg4oI4VLglWeIm0hgiju6LQtWjXJ9B_92Z04akpx0rGmJINfst5M1wW4vx5b1glVDtX/s1600/blue+blossom.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-WuA5Hx6RpjoShWHOQooIfIQlatJrk2BL08OMhM3Y1uypWA70PMBTEEXYRPz5LAmWiQBNncdVGJg4oI4VLglWeIm0hgiju6LQtWjXJ9B_92Z04akpx0rGmJINfst5M1wW4vx5b1glVDtX/s400/blue+blossom.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">A field of flax in blossom</span></b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;">I think it’s time for a wee bit a’ history. There are a few things that Ireland is well known for – music, fighting, our accents, Irish whiskey, being scattered all over the world ..</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> </span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;">Apparently Ireland ranks second in the </span><i style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Good Country Index</i><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> – after Finland, would you believe? But there are a couple of exports that are particularly related to the north, here – Ulster. You’ve heard of Irish linen?</span><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> </span><br />
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When the Industrial Revolution came to Ireland it mostly affected the north. Of course, the famine in 1845 contributed greatly to poor people leaving the countryside and heading for towns and cities – and the Irish ports, railways and canals were built to bring produce to those ports, to supply the market in England. Cotton and linen mills were established in towns and villages all over Ulster – but not much south of what since became the border.</div>
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The Irish Linen industry developed here because of a group of people called the Huguenots, who emigrated here from France in the mid nineteenth century. King Henry IV, of France, issued the <i>Edict of Nantes</i> in1598 – which gave religious freedom to the Protestant Huguenots. That, unfortunately, was later revoked by king Louis XIV, who issued the Edict of Fontainebleau in 1685. The Huguenots were stripped of their freedom and ordered to renounce their faith. </div>
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So, thousands of these persecuted Protestants decided to call it a day and emigrate from France and, for some of them, the north of Ireland seemed the right kind of place to head for – as they were pretty much Presbyterians. They brought with them their particular skills in weaving and finishing linen.</div>
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Linen is made from flax, and Ireland had a particularly suitable climate and topography both for growing and, after harvesting, for <i>retting</i> the flax. <i>Retting</i> was basically rotting away the outside to leave the strong fibres inside the plant. This was done in a flaxhole – which was a dug out pond, or ditch, where the flax was placed under water for a time. </div>
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Flax has been grown in Ireland from at least the eleventh century, and was referred to as the<i> ‘wee blue blossom’</i>, from the pale blue flowers the plant produced. In the sixteenth century Irish nobles wore tunics – or <i>leines</i> – made from linen which had been dyed yellow, using saffron obtained from the crocus flower. Yellow, apparently, was a status symbol at the time.</div>
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Most of the Huguenots arrived here in the nineteenth century – around 5,000 of them – and, by this time, Presbyterians were no longer discriminated against in Ireland. They came to places like Dublin, Cork, Kilkenny, Waterford and Portarlington – and some came to the north and settled around the town of Lisburn. </div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica";">They brought Huguenot names, such as Fyfe – I had a friend called Tony Fyfe; Boucher (or Bow cher) – there’s still a Boucher Road in Belfast today; </span><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">Cloquet (or Clokey), De Vagnes (which became Devanny or Devenny), René (which became Rainey), etc. A lot of these names are still in use today. </span></div>
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Linen production is mentioned in the ancient Brehon Laws. The Irish trade in wool was too competitive with England and William of Orange encouraged the Irish Parliament to pass a law restricting wool export and in 1699 it was prohibited altogether. So the Irish had to concentrate on the linen industry instead and, by the end of the eighteenth century linen accounted for about half of Ireland’s exports. </div>
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A Huguenot called Louis Crommelin came here from Cambrai in the north of France – actually, we still have a Cambrai Street in Belfast – only Belfast people pronounce it with four syllables, instead of two – Cam-ber-ai-yah Street! Crommelin set up a weaving factory in Lisburn – the town where I went to school. He is regarded as the founder of the Irish linen industry. </div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">In 1825, hand spinning and weaving were replaced by machines and the large Belfast mills came into being. Encouraged by the famine, many people moved from the country to Belfast. Most of the employees were poor, uneducated and female and became known as <i>‘millies’</i>, or more often,<i> ‘wee millies!’</i> </span></div>
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Some of my own family were a part of this story. My great uncle, George Given, moved from owning a grocer’s shop in Dunkineely, Donegal, to Lisburn in 1877. His sons worked as<i> ‘hackle-setters’</i> in one or other of the two flax mills, he himself drove a cart between the mills. My own father worked in the surviving<i> Linen Thread Company</i> mill for most of his life – though he was an electrician. I actually worked there for one summer myself.</div>
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There’s a sad Belfast tale about a man from the Shankill Road who cuts his wife’s throat with a razor and then, in fear of the law, hangs himself with a linen bed sheet twisted into a rope. The story finishes, <i>‘He went to hell, but his wife got well, and she’s still alive and sinnin’, for the razor blade was German made, but the rope was Belfast linen!’</i></div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-77157049169495062412019-12-11T15:54:00.002+00:002020-01-14T17:12:15.941+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 61 – Irish export – good and not so good!<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<b><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Sunset in northern Manitoba</span></b></h4>
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You’re most likely listening to this because you love Celtic music and culture. There’s a bit of a sad story behind why that’s so popular around the world – we’ve exported Irish and Scottish culture and music because so many people from this part of the world felt they had to leave here and go somewhere where they felt free from oppression. </h4>
The<i> ‘Highland Clearances’ </i>in Scotland resulted in mass emigration to the New World. The English ruled in Ireland for centuries and anyone who didn’t worship in the English way was persecuted – in other words Presbyterians and Roman Catholics. </div>
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During Penal times, Catholic priests were forced into hiding and would come out to a mass rock in remote country to serve their people communion. If they were caught, those who weren’t executed were imprisoned on an island in the west. Presbyterians, likewise, were forced to hold their<i> ‘hedgerow schools’ </i>out in the wilds and the English mocked them and called them <i>‘blackmouths’</i>, because the children would have stained mouths from eating wild blackberries. For a time both Catholic priests and Presbyterian preachers had a bounty on their heads.</div>
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In Oliver Cromwell’s time many Irish people were forcibly transported to the Caribbean as indentured labour in the sugar and tobacco plantations. These Irish labourers were the first European settlers on the volcanic island of Montserrat in 1632, and it’s had an Irish culture ever since – an Irish scholar in 1831 reported that the Irish language was still spoken by both black and white inhabitants. Unfortunately, the Irish later became owners of imported black African slaves and didn’t treat them any better than they had been treated.</div>
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The same<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;"> sort of</span> thing happened in the US and Canada. Many Scots and Irish went there to find religious freedom, and in the early days, some Highland trappers married native women and became full natives themselves – so that today there are native tribes in Manitoba and Saskatchewan with Scottish names like McGregor, Spence, Tait, Macdonald, Calder … Some became what were known as Anglo-Metis, even developing their own<i> ‘Bungee Creole’</i> language – which was a mixture of Scots Gaelic, Cree and Ojibwe that is still spoken today in certain parts of Manitoba. </div>
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By the way, we passed on to native Americans a form of music and dance, now known as<i> ‘Jiggin’.’ </i></div>
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But most Irish and Scottish settlers interpreted the native traditions they observed as<i> ‘pagan’</i> and eventually laws were introduced to<i> ‘civilise’</i> these people – the <i>‘Indian Acts’.</i> In Canada the churches were brought in to manage these<i> ‘Residential Schools’</i> in an attempt to drive the native out of these children – that’s where the term <i>‘Final Solution’</i> first came into use! </div>
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Physical and sexual abuse were rife and nearly 50% of the children didn’t survive their Residential School experience. Those that did had been divorced from their traditions, their language and normal family relationships and that often led directly to alcohol, drug and other<i> ‘substance’ </i>dependence of many native people. When I first travelled to a Manitoba reserve in 2004 I apologised on the local radio station for what people from here had done in our name – I got a very positive response. If you want to know more about this check out my<i> ‘Broken Treaties’ </i>podcast on <i>PreciousOil.com</i></div>
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So, nearly anywhere you go in the world you’ll find Irish people – 50 million of them in the US! As like as not they’re involved in building something – and likely spending the proceeds on quenching their thirst and loosening their vocal chords for a wee bit of a <i>’session!’</i> But the reason they originally left here to travel to these far off places was maybe not so pleasant. </div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-55600329381022713122019-12-11T15:50:00.002+00:002020-01-14T17:11:47.535+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 60 – Belfast, bil-fahst and Canada, eh?<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
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<b>Belfast Harbour at night</b></h4>
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Well, yez all seem to like learnin’ how things are said and done in this part of the world. I’ve said it before, but it bears repeatin’ – there’s no such thing as <i>an</i> Irish accent, there’s a whole host of different accents! </span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;">We were at a Thanksgiving feed the other night – about a hundred of us – and there were some Americans there, obviously; some Canadians, too – and opposite me was a friend from Cork – or as they would say, </span><i style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 12px;">Cark!</i><span style="font-family: "helvetica"; font-size: 12px;"> And a couple of weeks ago we were down in Dublin – for the first time in quite a while. If ye’ve ever had to drive through Dublin, ye’ll appreciate the reasons for avoiding it, unless you’re actually going there. </span><br />
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Anyway, we were at an<i> International Crime Writers Festival</i>, called, <i>’Murder One’</i> – my wife, Gerry, had been asked to read at it. It was in Templebar and we stayed two nights at a hotel in Templebar – a very noisy place at night, with live music in a pub just opposite, but a great place to eat out. We had Greek food one night and Irish boxty another night, with a Russian waiter serving us. </div>
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So, at the Thanksgiving meal we were discussing the fact that both Belfast and Dublin have not one, but two, accents – there’s the <i>'real Dub'</i> accent of the inner city and then there’s the polite – sometimes called, <i>‘West Brit’ – </i>accent of the suburbs.</div>
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Belfast is the same, only different – if yer from the Newtownards Road ye would probably say, <i>‘East Belfaast,’</i> and in the west they’ll say, <i>‘West Belfaast’</i>, Same with the Shore Road, they’ll say ‘<i>North Belfaast.' </i>But people from more polite parts – like the Malone Road – would say they’re from<i> ’South Belfast!’</i> </div>
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If yer from Belfast nearly every sentence will end with, <i>now</i> – only it’s pronounced, <i>‘Nye!’</i> but if yer from county Antrim, it’ll end with,<i> ‘hey’</i> –<i> ‘I’m from Ballymena, hey!’ </i>And if you live in <i>Derry, hey</i> – no that’s just Derry/Londonderry, with a<i> ‘hey’</i> stuck on the end, so you can stop Googling where <i>Derryhay</i> is, you won’t find it! – they have their own variation – they’ll say something like, <i>‘I’m from Derry, hey, mugger!’ </i></div>
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Actually, we’re not the only ones to end sentences with a particular word. Canadians are famous for putting, ‘<i>eh?’</i> at the end of a sentence – y’ know, <i>‘How do you spell ‘Canada’ – it’s C, eh? N, eh? D eh?’ </i>and not to be outdone, the New Yorkers have their own variation,<i> ‘Huh?’ </i></div>
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Many years ago – while I was still single – I shared<i> </i>a house just outside Belfast with a friend, John Garrett, from Alabama. We discovered many differences in the languages we both spoke – so that I eventually coined the phrase,<i> ‘The two languages are very similar, aren’t they?’ ‘What’s that?’ ‘Y’know, English and American!’ </i></div>
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In Ireland a car has a bonnet at the front – the phrase, <i>‘Pop the hood,’</i> means something entirely different over here! – you could be eliminating somebody from a rival gang. And cars don’t have <i>fenders</i>, they have <i>wings</i>. We walk on the <i>footpath</i> – not the <i>pavement</i>, and certainly not on the <i>sidewalk!</i></div>
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One thing I will say, though, is Americans and Canadians are usually quite easy to transcribe. I’m compiling a book from radio interviews I did some time ago and the peopl from North America – especially the deep south – they speak steadily and reasonably, whereas the Irish, and the Scots, speak in little bursts. So, that word that you can’t quite make out turns out to be maybe six words all run together. At the moment I’m transcribing an interview with a lady from <i>In-dee-ah</i> – same problem, they speak English – but they pronounce words verrry differently.</div>
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So, there ye are, where are ye? Ever since the trouble at the Tower of Babel, communication has become just a wee bit tricky!</div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-6321623552863404532019-12-11T15:44:00.001+00:002019-12-11T15:56:27.859+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 59 – Patrick's Day, Purim and Molly Bloom's<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
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Murphy's Irish Festival, Tel Aviv</h4>
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Well, it just so happens that two celebrations are happening back to back this weekend – the Jewish festival of Purim finishes on the 14th of Adar – which is Sunday 16th – and, of course, St. Patricks Day is on the 17th! But y’all knew that last bit, didn’t ye? Anyway, <i>chag Purim sameach</i> to all our Jewish and Israeli listeners. Apparently, there are several day long parties happening at several pubs across Israel. </div>
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At Purim the Jews celebrate the story of Queen Esther, who delivered the whole Jewish race from extinction by the wicked Haman. She fasted and prayed, then went in to the Persian king, her husband, without being summoned, which could have resulted in her own death. Thankfully, the king looked kindly on her and heard her request on behalf of her people. In the end, it was the wicked Haman who was executed, along with his whole family.</div>
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To celebrate the deliverance from death of Purim, the Jews give each other presents of food and drink, recite the complete story of Esther, from the bible, donate to charity, eat a lot of food, dress up in fancy dress and masks, drink a lot of alcohol and celebrate in the streets, with dancing and so forth. So, there’s not a whole lot of difference between Purim and St. Paddy’s Day, is there?</div>
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Now, you may not be aware of this, but the Israelis are mad keen on Irish music and there are Irish pubs all over Israel. I can’t claim to have visited every one of them – even with my five trips to Israel, so far – but I did get to an Irish festival in Tel Aviv in 2006, which led to me meeting a Jewish brother and sister, originally from here in Ireland – well, he WAS carrying a bodhran! They told about the best Irish pub in Tel Aviv and, of course, I decided to investigate.</div>
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The pub is called <i>‘Molly Bloom’s’</i> (she was the wife of Leopold Bloom, who was the hero of James Joyce’s book, <i>‘Ulysses’</i>) and the pub is at the end of Mendele Street, in Tel Aviv, beside the beach. Apparently, on St. Patrick’s Day the street is so packed that the police come and close it off to traffic. </div>
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Anyway, I found it easily enough, and went in to find a packed Irish pub, great food, draught Guinness, and about twenty Irish musicians playin’ their hearts out. One girl had the most beautiful clear Irish voice, singing an unaccompanied song – but it turned out, to my great surprise, that there wasn’t an Irish person among them! They were all native Israelis and brilliant musicians. Needless to say, I’ve been back there since – both for the music, the Guinness <i>and</i> for the great food (the seafood pie, or the venison sausages? Hmm!)</div>
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Strange to say, I’ve not officially performed in any of these pubs – though I have busked in Jerusalem at the end of Shabbat – but maybe one day in the future I’ll put that right! </div>
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St. Patrick’s Day is also celebrated all over Moscow and in other strange and far-flung places. So, wherever ye happen to be,<i> ‘Paddys lá sona’</i> or <i>‘Lá fhéile Phádraig shona duit.’</i> – have a great St. Patrick’s Day!</div>
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Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-81909262118248295912019-12-11T15:15:00.005+00:002019-12-11T15:58:23.423+00:00 Celtic Roots Craic 58 – 'To Finaghy and beyond'<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
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Captain Courier van – <i>'To Finaghy and beyond!'</i></h4>
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The other day I came across it again, a wee courier service in the Belfast area humorously named,<i> 'To Finaghy and Beyond!'</i> Finaghy, in case ye didn't know, is a village just to the west of Belfast, towards Lisburn – where I originally come from. Finaghy actually means <i>'white field'</i>, <i>fionn</i> being the Irish word for white. Most place names in this part of the world are from Irish, for instance Belfast comes from <i>Bel Fierste</i>, which means <i>'mouth of the sandbanks'</i>. </div>
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A lot of place names have common features – the most likely is Bally, from the Irish<i> 'Boile'</i>, meaning <i>'place of' </i>– so we get places like Ballynahinch,<i> 'place of the island' </i>– <i>'inch',</i> or <i>'inish' </i>meaning island. Ballymore would mean <i>'the big place',</i> whereas Ballybeg means <i>'the lttle place'.</i> The same with places called Dromore and Drumbeg – both in Co. Down, meaning <i>'big hill' </i>and <i>'little hill', </i>respectively. Bunmore and Bunbeg are again <i>'big river mouth' </i>and <i>'little river mouth',</i> respectively. Derry comes from the Irish <i>'doire',</i> meaning<i> 'an oakwood'</i> – so again you'll find Derrybeg and Derrymore, or sometimes Deramore, all over the place. In Co. Down we have a small place known as Derryboye, <i>'boy'</i> meaning yellow.</div>
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The Irish word for a rock is <i>'carraig'</i>, (from which we get the name <i>Craig</i>), or sometimes<i> 'carrick'</i>, for example Carrickfergus, a port town in Co. Antrim, meaning<i> 'the rock of Fergus'.</i> You'll also find plenty of places called Ballincarrig, or Ballycarry –<i> 'place of the rock',</i> and similar. The word for black is 'dubh', as in Dublin, which comes from the Irish <i>Dubh Ling</i>, meaning <i>'black pool'</i>. So Carrigdubh, or more likely Carryduff, simply means <i>Black Rock</i>. </div>
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Another common place name is<i> 'maghera'</i>, which means<i> 'a plain',</i> so you get Magherafelt in Co. Derry, Maynooth in Co. Kildare, and Moycullen, in Co. Galway. A great one in Co. Down is the townland of Magheraconluce, which means<i> 'plain of the meadow of the fort'.</i> Another example is the area known as The Maze, near Lisburn, famous for The Maze Racecourse.</div>
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A lot of Irish place names have some religious significance. The Irish word<i> 'kill', </i>meaning a cell, or church, is found all over the country, from Kill, in Co. Kildare, outside Dublin, to Shankill, meaning<i> 'old church' </i>– found near Bray, Co Wicklow, Lurgan, Co. Armagh and also, of course, in north Belfast – the famous, or infamous, <i>Shankill Road</i>. There are lots of Killbegs and Killmores, Killdrums, Killoughs and so forth. The word<i> 'temple',</i> from the Irish<i> 'teampaill',</i> also meaning church, is often found, for example, Templepatrick, Co. Antrim, or Templemore, in Co. Tipperary.</div>
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A more unusual word for church though is Donagh, which literally means<i> 'Lord'</i>, but is usually short for<i> 'the Lord's house' </i>– Donaghadee, in Co. Down, for example, means<i> 'the Lord's house of St. Dee'.</i> Donaghmore in Co. Tyrone just means <i>'big church'. 'Tobair' </i>is an Irish word meaning<i> 'a well', </i>so you get places like Tobermore<i>, 'big well', </i>in Co. Derry,<i> </i>and the monastery of Tobair Mhuire,<i> or 'Mary's Well'</i>, in Crossgar, Co. Down. There's a Ballintober,<i> 'place of the well'</i> in Co. Roscommon, and another Ballintubber, in Co. Mayo.</div>
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Then there are lots of variations on the word <i>'fort'. 'Dun'</i> is a an example, usually meaning a fortified house, or stronghold, so we get Co. Down = <i>'An dun',</i> Downpatrick, Dunmurry, near Belfast, (next to Finaghy, actually!), Dunfanaghy in Co. Donegal, and lots of Dundrums, Dunbegs, Dunmores, etc.<i> 'Lis'</i> is another word for a fort, usually a Celtic ring fort. I've mentioned Listooder before, which is '<i>fort of the tanner'.</i> Lisnagarvey, Co. Antrim, was the old name for Lisburn,<i> 'Garvey's fort', </i>or<i> 'fort of the gamblers',</i> until the fire there in the 1600s, when it was renamed, <i>Lisburn</i>. </div>
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Yet another name for a fort is <i>'rath',</i> which refers to the earthen bank enclosing a fort, whereas <i>'lis' </i>refers to the open space inside. There are quite a few places with <i>'rath' </i>in their name, Rathlin Island, off the north coast of Co. Antrim, being an obvious one. In Dublin you have Rathfarnham, with its castle, and just outside Belfast there is the Rathcoole Estate, along with a few Rathmores, and a village simply called Rath, in Co. Tipperary. <i> 'Rath' </i>is often abbreviated to<i> 'ra',</i> for example, Rathmelton, in Co. Donegal, which is spelt<i> 'Rath melton',</i> and the townland of Rademon in Co. Down, which comes from<i> 'rath, </i>(or fort,) <i>of the demons</i>'. A stone fort is usually referred to as a <i>'caiseal',</i> from which the word<i> 'castle' </i>obviously comes, so most names have become castle, e.g. Newcastle, which can be found in several places in Ireland. The famous one is of course the Rock of Cashel, from which Cashel town gets its name.</div>
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And before we leave the subject, there's also <i>'droichead',</i> which means <i>'bridge',</i> from which we get Drogheda, the town in Co. Louth, and <i>Droiched Nua</i>, or Newbridge, in Co. Kildare.</div>
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Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-43883741258271565872019-12-11T15:07:00.001+00:002019-12-11T16:00:42.559+00:00Celtic Roots Craic 57 – 'Uisce beatha' or a pint a' 'double'<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>'Warrior Maid'</i> moored in Groomsport Harbour</span></h4>
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The sad news is that my boat, <i>Warrior Maid</i>, has sustained a fair bit of damage to the keel over the winter. In fact, it actually sank just before Christmas – though I managed to pump it out later the same day and get it floating again. I had to spend most of the following night during high tide travelling up and down to the harbour and pumping it out every hour and a half, as the water was coming in steadily. Next day when the tide came up again I pumped her out again and we moved her up the slipway, where she can't possibly sink again. In the wintertime the slip isn't too busy but, even so, I need to get the boat lifted out onto dry ground ASAP. Now that I've got my boat trailer back from a friend, I'll be able to get the crane down to lift her out. </div>
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So, I've been working out in the cold quite a bit – making adjustments to the trailer, cutting, welding, angle-grinding, de-rusting and painting – while I have the chance. Once the boat is on the trailer, I can forget about it for a wee while and start to get some work done on converting my stone barn into a home. The other day, the sun was shining in a clear blue sky, with very little wind, and I worked until it set – by which time it was getting pretty cold. On the way home I was driving west with the remains of a beautiful sunset lighting up the sky in front of me and a huge orange full moon rising behind me. Spectacular!</div>
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Well, it's getting close to St. Patrick's Day again, and lovers of Celtic and Irish music and culture all over the world will be wantin' to celebrate the fact. It's amazin' that they don't do this with St. David's Day, St. Andrew's Day, St. George's Day or any other saints day that I know of. What is it about an Irish saint that has made him so popular? St. Patrick's Day is celebrated enthusiastically in north America, Russia and Israel – as well as many other places where there are Irish immigrants.</div>
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I've been to Israel a few times and one of the best Irish pubs I've been to is called Molly Bloom's – right beside the beach in Tel Aviv. The food is great and the music and the atmosphere is even better. The first time I was there was a few weeks before St. Patrick's Day and even on Friday evening (not always the best time for entertainment in Israel) there were around twenty musicians playing in a session there. There is music Monday, Wednesday and Friday – it just starts earlier on Friday. There were guitars, banjos, bodhrans and fiddles galore – and a girl singer with a beautiful 'Irish' lilt … But there wasn't an Irish person among them! Every single one was an Israeli. And all over Israel you can find other bars that play Irish music on a regular basis – even in Arad, down in the Negev.</div>
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Apparently, Irish culture – and recently especially the northern Irish accent, etc. – is the most popular around the world. No wonder then that when I go abroad – even though, being from Northern Ireland, my passport says 'British' – I don't claim to be British, but Irish.</div>
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<span style="font-family: helvetica; font-size: 12px; text-align: start;">Locke's Distillery, Kilbeggan, Co. Westmeath</span></h4>
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As well as welcoming Irish culture and music around the world, people internationally seem also to have got more and more of a taste for our national spirit – Irish whiskey. Or <i>'uisce beatha' </i>as it's said in Irish. <i>'Uisce beatha' </i>is simply a direct translation of the Latin,<i> 'aqua vitae' </i>– <i>'water of life' </i>in English – and it used to be brewed by monks in monasteries around Ireland. Today there are really only four major distilleries of Irish whiskey in Ireland – so nearly all the different brands of Irish whiskey come from one of these four. One is based way down in Co. Cork, in Midleton; another is just across the border in Co. Louth, on the Cooley Peninsula, and they also now own the third, originally Locke's Distillery in Kilbeggan, Co. Westmeath. The fourth distillery is in Co. Antrim, at Bushmills on the River Bush. </div>
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I've been on a tour around this distillery – famous for it's Black Bush and Coleraine whiskeys. At the end of the tour you get a free sample of one of the products. That reminds me of the Irishman who once drowned in a vat of whiskey – apparently, he got out three different times to go to the bathroom! That didn't happen to me, thankfully, as – believe it or not – I'm not really a whiskey drinker. I do like the odd pint of the <i>beor dhu</i> mind you – the black stuff, Guinness, that is.</div>
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There is a story told – whether true or not, I wouldn't know – of Arthur Guinness witnessing the extreme drunkenness of many Dubliners one Sunday morning, due to their consumption of Irish whiskey the night before. According to this story, Arthur decided that he would produce a much less alcoholic drink that would be much more difficult to get drunk on – hence the birth of Guinness. Arthur actually started by brewing ales, following in his father's footsteps. His father, as land steward for the Archbishop of Cashel, was responsible for brewing beer for the workers on the estate. After he'd been going for a while, a black beer, called porter, brewed in London, became popular in Dublin. Arthur decided to brew this porter himself and soon he was exporting porter to London. After 40 years of brewing he decided to focus his attention on porter, or stout, only.</div>
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Many years ago you could go into a pub and order either XXX stout, which was much stronger, or XX, but Guinness withdrew the XXX variety. Even today, you can go into most pubs in Ireland – excepte maybe the trendy ones – and order a pint of <i>'double.' </i> With no further explanation required, a pint of Guinness should soon appear. In fact, in most country pubs, just ordering a pint will produce a Guinness, unless you specifiy some other beer. Although porter, or stout, was a relatively new invention, there is mention of vats of black beer in ancient Irish legends such as <i>The Tain </i>– so maybe Guinness is just the latest edition of something which is really as old as the hills. </div>
Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-14290649295851616072013-02-14T22:50:00.001+00:002019-12-11T17:04:51.114+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 56 – 'The Cock Corner' & Co. Down Railway<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Downpatrick – BCDR Railway Station</span></h4>
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We've been having untypical snow here in Ireland, recently, which, thankfully, has now disappeared. We're not used to extreme weather here, so it always throws us into chaos – not like my friends in Canada, etc., who are always ready for extremes. And the great news is that our little cottage project has finally got official Planning Approval so, as soon as the weather gets a little warmer, I'll be able to start turning what looks like a glorified garage into a proper home. That should be fun.<br />
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The stone building was probably erected around the late 1850s, and I've been intrigued to find out more about its history. It sat on its own, beside a couple of thatched cottages with some farm outbuildings, another farm on the other side and one across the road. Apart from the church across the road, which dates back to the 1700s and earlier, and a hall just up the hill from us, these are the surviving original buildings of Listooder, Co. Down. There are also the remains of the stable for donkeys and the minister's horse. Other cottages were unfortunately demolished by the landlord many years ago, when the tenants had the cheek to ask for some improvements to their properties. Instead, about a dozen families were all summarily evicted. The school was demolished around then, as well.<br />
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The hamlet has always been a mixture of Roman Catholic and Protestant right back to the 17th century. We are right on the crossroads of two country lanes and across from us is a large field, with these two roads and the main road nearby making a rectangle cut off from other fields. It's called Leggycurry Field, with the main road crossing the small Killygartan River via Leggycurry Bridge, just a quarter of a mile from us. In that field are two small disused stone quarries, which may have been used to provide stone for the church and houses in the past, but I have another idea.<br />
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Travel about a mile north or south from Listooder and you will come to the remains of two railway bridges from the old <i>Belfast and Co. Down Railway</i>, which took passengers and goods to the city from both Ballynahinch and Downpatrick/Newcastle (and on to Castlewellan and Banbridge). The two lines separated just a mile and a half north of us at a place called Ballynahinch Junction. The Ballynahinch Line was opened in 1858, while the Downpatrick Line was completed a year later. The old line used to cross both roads near us on an embankment, which required local stone to be quarried for its construction – perhaps from those selfsame quarries in the field next to us. Which in turn could mean that our building might have originally been built to house carts and tools connected with the quarry?<br />
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The Downpatrick–Newcastle and Ballynahinch lines were closed back in the 1950s. Incidentally, the other branch of the now defunct line went just behind our present house on its way from Newtownards to Donaghadee. The only BCDR line still functioning travels from Belfast to Bangor – two miles away from our current home. When we first moved here we explored the old cutting behind our house and recovered four ends of the original bench seats from a BCDR carriage – the seats themselves having been burnt. Some day I hope to make these into a couple of outdoor benches for our new place. <br />
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By the way, a couple of miles of the <i>BCDR</i> track has been restored in Downpatrick, so in the summer you can take a steam engine trip on the old Co. Down Railway from Downpatrick Station out to Ballydugan Mill and lake – mebbe have meal there? – and to the ruins of Inch Abbey in the other direction. Newcastle Station still exists, but no longer a station, but the Queen's Quay terminus in Belfast is long gone.<br />
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While researching the history of our proposed new home I learned that, although Listooder is the name of the townland it belongs to, that was not the original name of the hamlet. The farm building next door had a shop-cum-pub at the end next to us, known as <i>The Cock </i>– what is known in Ireland still as a <i>'spirit grocers'.</i> In other words, it sold hardware and groceries to local farmers and kept beer and spirits in the back for those who required them. <br />
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Stories are told of the local minister having to give stern sermons on the evils of drink, after his parishioners had consumed a<i> 'liquid lunch' </i> between morning and evening services! While excavating inside the building and to the rear I found quite a collection of very old beer, whiskey and medicine bottles – several still intact – complete with several glass stoppers. Less than a mile away was another little <i>'spirit grocer',</i> known as <i>The Hen</i> – now completely gone. So our hamlet was previously known as <i>The Cock Corner,</i> and is shown as such on old maps of the area. <br />
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Belfast's new <i>Titanic Quarter</i> is now the home of a brand new building for the Public Records Office (PRONI) and here I discovered old Rates Records for our property dating back to 1936, when it was shown as a house and shop until 1957. After that, John McCullough – who could conceivably be a distant relation – presumably got too old to run the shop and just lived out his days in a room at the rear. He had no electricity and had to go to the farm next door for water and to use the toilet – even though there was a perfectly good well behind his house. <br />
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Before he opened his shop the building was the original home of <i>Listooder Mission Hall,</i> which still survives in a wooden building just down the street. After John became ill and moved to his brother's farm on Listooder Hill, the building was inherited by a relative, who kept horses at the rear while her two brothers ran both a car repair and a landscape gardening business from the building. We bought it from this lady in 2007. Quite an interesting little history, eh?Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-2793231847233113232013-02-14T22:48:00.000+00:002019-12-11T17:09:28.544+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 55 – Irish language- north and south<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEybRTvWhZ5BEFOnqmAMo4f_CZ8plRRPN6Cb9tJaRJVAJrfi-qgpiTEk3XuTy0OJmJs4A9F0bUf056OFOU0rWsmIgY4Pfx7CrqiGphnLF4xBiDFKV0NSt8jbZ5V2VyBnQdiyGn5gKcmJv-/s1600/Drumballyroney+School.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEybRTvWhZ5BEFOnqmAMo4f_CZ8plRRPN6Cb9tJaRJVAJrfi-qgpiTEk3XuTy0OJmJs4A9F0bUf056OFOU0rWsmIgY4Pfx7CrqiGphnLF4xBiDFKV0NSt8jbZ5V2VyBnQdiyGn5gKcmJv-/s400/Drumballyroney+School.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Drumballyroney School, Co. Down</span></h4>
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I just learned something the other day that took me a bit by surprise. Apparently, quite a number of people in east Belfast – usually referred to as <i>'Loyalist east Belfast!'</i> – are taking a course in the Irish language! Now, to those of you who live in far off places that may not seem such a strange thing – after all, it IS our own language, is it not? But if you have ever spent any length of time in this part of the world, you would soon learn that such a thing has been unheard of for decades.<br />
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Part of the reason for that was that Protestants swallowed the propaganda that claimed the Irish language for the Republican Movement. Obviously, then, it was something that Loyalists should avoid like the plague. So, it's a great sign of <i>'normalisation' </i>that ordinary people from east Belfast should not only be learning Irish, but that no one is voicing any objection to this. The truth, of course, is that for many years the Irish language was kept alive mainly by Presbyterians and other Protestant intellectuals – clergymen, mostly. The first book in any Gaelic language was published in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1564 – a translation of John Knox's book,<i> 'Liturgy'.</i> The first book in Irish to be printed in Ireland was a Protestant catechism, using Gaelic script. <br />
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Irish was spoken by the majority, even in the north of Ireland, up until 1800, or so. When Queen Victoria came to visit Belfast (after Cork and Dublin) in August 1849 (during the Irish Famine), one of the things she noted in her diary was that most of the banners she saw contained the Irish motto, <i>'Cead mile failte'</i> (a hundred thousand welcomes). Though Belfast was a completely Unionist governed town at that time, nobody felt they were not also Irish.<br />
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The British Government prohibited the teaching of Irish in schools. And, strangely enough, the Roman Catholic Church discouraged the learning of Irish in their National Schools until about 1890, seeing it as backward and learning English as the way to better yourself – especially in the British Empire and in America. Even the reformer Daniel O'Connell and other Irish political leaders saw Irish as a backward language.<br />
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The Famine itself had removed many native Irish speakers – either by death or emigration – and it was left to Protestant clergymen to instigate moves to preserve and restore the language. Douglas Hyde, the son of a Church of Ireland rector, founded the Gaelic League in 1893, to preserve the Irish language. A branch was formed in Belfast in 1895. Speaking in New York in 1905, he said,<i> 'The Irish language, thank God, is neither Protestant nor Catholic, it is neither a Unionist nor a Separatist.'</i><br />
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At that time there was also a revival of interest in Gaelic sports and the Abbey Theatre was launched in Dublin, which performed plays about Ireland, though still written in English. Well known writers such as W.B. Yeats, J.M. Synge, Sean O'Casey and Lady Gregory were involved in this. Their writing utilised Hiberno-English – the version of English spoken in Ireland – which used many idioms from the Irish language.<br />
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Many of those who came to govern the new Free State after independence from England, were influenced by the Gaelic League. Unfortunately, it was infiltrated by members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood and developed radical nationalist aims, with the result that, in 1915, Douglas Hyde resigned as president in protest. From then on the Irish Language became more and more a symbol of the Republican Movement and Presbyterians took less interest in the language because of this.<br />
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The new Irish Government continued to use English for all official business, although Government employees had to have a qualification in Irish to apply for a position – though they never had to speak it after they were employed. Irish was made a compulsory subject in schools. To become a teacher you had to have an Irish qualification, though again, all teaching was done in English. <br />
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In Northern Ireland the Unionist government discouraged the learning of Irish and the number of Irish speakers declined greatly. The last native Irish speaker here, from Rathlin Island in Co. Antrim, died in 1983. Since the Good Friday Agreement was signed in 1998 Irish was given official recognition and many of the new integrated schools teach the language. Six families established a Gaeltacht in west Belfast back in the 60s, and now there are many Irish language Primary Schools in Northern Ireland and at least four Secondary Schools. The enthusiasm for learning Irish among working class Protestants in east Belfast is a very new departure and it'll be interesting to see how that develops! Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-56599596358225069962013-02-14T22:46:00.000+00:002019-12-11T17:13:38.992+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 54 – 'Scraws, thatch and 'the back streets''<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1-hE4D7T-j6G4olbD6hgbu0572c5vm-VT-1AQlAG4syL40RkaemJDBDPAPMuzkdeGsdOOIlmSzDiXdOkYtLlkNwrgeEjtKLc7toLaKafLQLrNWrEr8Pm60LL7_Ax5Nbdhh6ZHMvETik_J/s1600/Warrior+Maid+and+Cockle+Row+cottages.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1-hE4D7T-j6G4olbD6hgbu0572c5vm-VT-1AQlAG4syL40RkaemJDBDPAPMuzkdeGsdOOIlmSzDiXdOkYtLlkNwrgeEjtKLc7toLaKafLQLrNWrEr8Pm60LL7_Ax5Nbdhh6ZHMvETik_J/s400/Warrior+Maid+and+Cockle+Row+cottages.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Groomsport Harbour and village with thatched cottage behind</span></h4>
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I was helping my daughter and son-in-law to move house recently and we had a Brazilian helping us, whose name was Clauder – Claude with an<i> 'r' </i>on the end. I was able to remember his name quite easily because it reminded me of some-one throwing lumps of turf – clods. We call this pastime <i>'cloddin''. </i>That reminded me of another local word for turf – scraw. Scraws were used in thatching, which is making a bit of a comeback after nearly dying out as an art. The rafters and battens of a roof to be thatched were first covered in scraws – grass sods complete with the roots, but with the soil mostly removed. This provided a base for the hazel rods that were used to pin down the bundles of thatch on the roof. Nowadays I believe steel spikes are used as well to secure the bundles of reed thatch.<br />
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There are not too many thatched cottages any more in Ireland – north or south. Most of those you would find now would be of fairly recent construction and often used as tourist accommodation. The original thatched cottages of the Irish countryside have mostly rotted and tumbled into ruin by now, while modern tiled or slated dwellings have replaced them. <br />
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At Groomsport village – where my boat, <i>Warrior Maid</i>, is moored – there are still two of the original fisherman's cottages preserved by the local council as a visitor's centre for tourists, known as <i>Cockle Row</i>. In the summer months they hold classical concerts outside at weekends, while inside you might be fortunate enough to be given a piece of soda farl, freshly baked on a griddle over a traditional turf fire. If you are even more fortunate you might get butther on it!<br />
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These cottages are also the landmark I use to line up my boat with the end of the pier. Beyond this line the water is deep enough for my boat at any stage of the tide, but inside that line I can only approach my mooring at more than half-tide. The cottages are also lit up at night, which makes a pretty backdrop to the harbour.<br />
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Ye'll not find too many thatched houses in Belfast, now. The original workers houses in Belfast were built during the Industrial Revolution, when a lot of people moved from the country to the city to work in the Linen mills. These brick built, slate-roofed houses were the bare minimum that Mill owners could provide for their workers. Whole areas of Belfast were laid out in matching rows of these terraces, known locally as the <i>'back streets'.</i> The houses are known as <i>'kitchen houses'</i>, or<i> 'two up, two down' </i>– meaning two bedrooms upstairs, a <i>'living room' </i>– or <i>'parlour'</i> downstairs, with what was known as a <i>'scullery' </i>behind – probably with a <i>'Belfast'</i> sink – leading to a tiny paved yard, with an outside toilet – or<i> 'outhouse' – </i>off it.<br />
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Years ago, at the height of the troubles, I ran my own construction business, rehabbing these old houses under a local authority grant scheme. One of these jobs was a house that had been bricked up during the troubles, because it was in an interface area and rioting between the two sides had put whole streets of houses out of use on either side of the<i> 'Peace Line'.</i> When I began this job I could only access the house by means of a ladder, climbing in through the first floor (upstairs) window, because all the downstairs windows and doors were bricked up.<br />
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These houses would need repaired, a bathroom added and an extension out back with a proper kitchen. Some of the work involved removing the roof slates, re-pointing the chimney and replacing the original slates on new felt and laths. Every morning I would climb the ladder, then take a good long look around in every direction, before beginning work. One morning I spotted two other men on a roof just across the Peace Line from me – but it turned out they were doing the same as me – rehabbing a house on that side, so no problem!<br />
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There were occasions, though, when bullets would be fired across the fence, hitting the street outside. Or a hunger striker would die, and all the women from the <i>'orr side' </i>would be out banging dustbin lids in protest. On those days you found some work needing done inside! <br />
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When the roof was nearly finished the prospective new owner of the house arrived to see the progress and, seeing as I needed a couple of extra slates, I took him for a wee tour of the empty streets beyond his – next to the Peace Line. There were no people, the houses occupied only by pigeons – <i>'road pickers'</i> as they're called locally. It was a very eerie experience and he was nearly a nervous wreck after that trip – though I did manage to find the slates I needed!Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-23898005089718168762012-08-09T02:24:00.002+01:002012-08-09T02:24:27.363+01:00Celtic Roots Craic 53 – 'Up ta yer uxters in glar!'<h3>
<b>8th August, 2012</b></h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Barbour Threads</i> (formerly <i>The Linen Thread Company</i>), Hilden, Lisburn</td></tr>
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So what have I been up to recently – well, designing book covers and publishing paperback editions of a couple a' books, sorting out my accounts for the past year and, oh yes, cleaning out a well. That involved climbin' down a 20 ft ladder (after pumping all the water out) and then filling buckets, either with very dirty water, stones, or thick glar – then climbin' the ladder again and hauling the buckets up on a rope to empty them. 'Glar' is a great Ulster-Scots word ye might not have come across before. It refers to somethin', usually black and sticky, with the consistency of thick porridge. It can apply to sticky clay, but in this case it means rotted vegetation, mixed with bits of stick and stones that have fallen down the well for many years.<br /><br />There have been cottages here since the mid 1600s, so this well was probably dug nearly 300 years ago. It's solid rock all the way down and nice and cool to work in when it's warm and humid up above. When ye've spent a day up and down the ladder ye really do end up 'up to yer uxters in glar', I'm tellin' ye! <br /><br />When i finally got it emptied, the well was three feet deeper than when I started! One of the items removed was a large piece of timber which, on closer examination by my neighbour, turned out to be one of the shafts of a cart. He being pretty much of a horse expert would know. Though why anyone would want to throw this down a well, I have no idea! Other items found were the remains of several buckets and three large stones, weighing several hundredweight, which I just about managed to haul up on a rope – with a few hours gap between stones! Those stones were probably covering the well at one time and then got knocked in.<br /><br />Thankfully, all the glar, stones and other items have all been removed now – the only thing still to come out is the old pipework, which is a heavy 2" iron pipe, with large flanged joints. The pipe will have to be cut up into about five separate pieces before they can be hauled out by rope. Meanwhile, the new pump is installed in the well and now connected underground to the building, with some lime in the bottom to sweeten the water a bit. When I've finished and it has had a few weeks to settle properly, then we'll test the water to see if it is fit for drinking, needs filtered, or maybe only used for washing and flushing. We'll see.<br />
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Well, I expect a lot of you watched the opening ceremony for the London Olympics – some spectacle, eh? And a wee short clip of the Giant's Causeway in Co. Antrim near the start. I was really impressed with the motte, the grassy mound with the tree on top – just like you find in Celtic forts all over Ireland. In the performance the tree was pulled up and all the industrial workers came out, turning an agricultural scene into the Industrial Revolution. <br /><br />In Ireland that happened mainly in the north. All over Northern Ireland you'll find mills, or the remains of mills – especially in Belfast. In the heart of Co. Down, where we hope to be living in the near future, there were no less than seven mills along the nearby Ballynahinch River. Some of these were corn mills, where the local farmers got their oats and barley milled. Some were flax mills, were flax was taken from the flax holes – or lint holes – and spun into yarn, then woven into the famous Irish Linen.<br /><br />The farmer pulled the flax plant up by the roots and placed the damp bundles into the lint hole, weighed down with stones. Nowadays they use tanks and chemicals instead. The next stage after removing the retted flax and drying it was called scutching, which was done in a scutch mill, passing the flax between rollers to break up the woody material and remove it. This process produced a lot of dust. After scutching the linen fibres were spun into yarn, giving rise to many spinning mills. And finally, the spun yarn was was woven into Irish Linen, which then had to be bleached – originally in the sun on a bleaching green. <br /><br />Flax was grown particularly in Co. Down and Co. Antrim and you can still find the remains of old flax holes across the country. Some of the skill in linen making came to Northern Ireland with the Huguenots – 10,000 French Protestant refugees in the 18th century, who brought their linen-making expertise with them from France. The Huguenots didn't just come to the north of Ireland, there is a Huguenot graveyard in Merrion Row, Dublin, near the Shelbourne Hotel, with over 200 surnames from the La Rochelle area of France. Most of these names are no longer to be found, but D'Olier Street in Dublin's city centre is an example. Other small groups went to Waterford, Youghal, Cork, Portarlington and Lisburn, in Co. Antrim. <br /><br />When we were young my father worked for the Linen Thread Company in Hilden, near Lisburn, and flax was still being spun there. We used to play with the wooden bobbins and used the combing needles, or hackle pins, to start a screw hole, etc. The whole industry changed over to making synthetic thread – nylon, etc. – contributing to the decline of the linen industry. I worked there myself one summer, I had a contract to replace windows on the third floor of one of the mill buildings, while the German machinery – and the music-while-you-work – rattled loudly in my ears. It was impossible to have a conversation.<br /><br />Linen mills are found all over Belfast, Lisburn and many other towns in Northern Ireland, though few of them produce linen today. The pale blue flowers of the flax plant are becoming a thing of the past, too.Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-80089980186140113762012-05-31T21:55:00.001+01:002013-02-14T22:57:47.370+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 52 – 'On the wings of an eagle'<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4sh_kpzhAVq7RBi-V3rUMSH70dZEsF9R8tWyz7WeHvcvMx0C8XuOTMg8tPr6BYfvMPTrAojclFBpusZHycoFnLCizqfnyZutYLoIz8KifamftJfS_o_jmqSfefu4k-PbVZoPTFhh5J0VO/s1600/Eagle+Wing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4sh_kpzhAVq7RBi-V3rUMSH70dZEsF9R8tWyz7WeHvcvMx0C8XuOTMg8tPr6BYfvMPTrAojclFBpusZHycoFnLCizqfnyZutYLoIz8KifamftJfS_o_jmqSfefu4k-PbVZoPTFhh5J0VO/s400/Eagle+Wing.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eagle Wing at sea</td></tr>
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Last show I talked a bit about Belfast's new Titanic Quarter and the <i>Titanic Belfast</i> centre. Last Saturday we had a bit of a wander down there in the sun and checked out the facilities on offer. There's no free parking and you have to be prepared to do a bit of walking to get anywhere.<br />
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The <i>SS Nomadic</i> – sister ship to <i>Titanic</i>, <i>Britannic</i> and <i>Olympic</i>, and the only ship remaining of the <i>White Star Line</i> – is currently in the dry dock at Abercorn Basin being re-furbished. <i>Nomadic</i> was used to carry 1st and 2nd class passengers from Cherbourg out to the <i>Titanic</i> and <i>Olympic</i>.<br />
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At the moment there is also a small Belfast Harbour Marina, with temporary facilities, in Abercorn Basin at the back of the Odyssey building. Eventually, as the Titanic Quarter is developed this marina will move to the dock below the famous <i>Harland and Wolff</i> cranes, <i>Goliath</i> and <i>Samson</i>.<br />
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The <i>Titanic</i> wasn't the only ship to leave Ireland for the USA and not to arrive. In fact, the very first ship to leave here for America was the <i>Eagle Wing</i>, which set off as early as 1636! The ship was named from verses in Exodus and Isaiah, referring to the children of Israel being <i>"carried on eagles' wings"</i> and <i>"soaring on wings like eagles"</i>. This ship was built at Groomsport Harbour, on the southern shore of Belfast Lough, from 1631 on. In 1636, 140 Presbyterian men, women and children – including four ministers – set sail for the New World in order to escape the limitations on their religious freedom, being imposed upon them by the Church of England and the English government.<br />
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Although the province of Ulster had been planted largely with Scots Presbyterians in the early 1600s, the province had subsequently been divided up into Anglican parishes, with some Presbyterian and Puritan ministers being allowed to minister in a few parishes. Four Scots Presbyterian ministers – Blair, Welch, Livingston, and Dunbar – twice excluded from ministering in their churches, began to make plans to travel to the New World. They made contact with Cotton Mather in New England and were assured that they would be free to practise their own unique form of Christianity there. They sent over an agent who selected a tract of land near the mouth of the Merrimack River, on the border between Massachussetts and New Hampshire, <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Groomsport Harbour and village, Co. Down</td></tr>
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The 150 ton ship set sail from Lockfergus (present day Carrickfergus) on the north shore of Belfast Lough – with Blair, Livingston and two other preachers, Hamilton and McClelland, aboard. They immediately had some trouble with unfavourable winds off the coast of Scotland, and grounded the ship to look for leaks in the keel. Setting off again, they managed to cover more than half of the journey, but then encountered very stormy seas, high winds and heavy rain, resulting in a broken rudder – mended by the captain, Andrew Agnew – torn sails and other serious damage to the ship, which also sprung a leak. Even when several passengers became sick and two died – a child and an old person – they remained 'cheerful and confident'. One child was born during the journey and was baptised by Mr. Livingston, who named it, <i>Seaborn</i>.<br />
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The captain and crew told the ship's company that it was impossible to hold out any longer, with more storms to be expected before they could reach their goal. Eventually, after much prayer and discussion, the passengers agreed to give in to their urging. The <i>Eagle Wing</i> turned back for Ireland and entered the harbour at Lockfergus again on 3rd of November, after an absence of about eight weeks.<br />
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The company of the <i>Eagle Wing</i>, having sold all their possessions to buy goods to trade in America, and with people they had hired to help them to fish and to build houses there demanding their wages, were a good deal worse off than before they set sail. The four ministers, still not accepted in Ireland by the ruling authorities, returned to Scotland the following year, where they had more success. They were welcomed by the people there and became instrumental in the subsequent overturn of the episcopal form in Scotland, which has been largely Presbyterian ever since.<br />
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Eventually, more settlers from Ulster did make it to Boston and Portland in 1718, the passengers immediately inquiring about the piece of land on the Merrimack River – very likely Londonderry, New Hampshire – where they then settled. More and more ships brought Ulster Scots settlers to America, in turn becoming pioneers and frontiersmen. As they established each new settlement, they would first build a fort for protection from the natives and then they would build a church and a school. <br />
<br />
The Rev. Francis Makemie came from Ulster to America in 1683 and organised the first Presbyterian Church in America, becoming the <i>"Father of American Presbyterianism"</i>, and in the years that followed, Ulstermen played a tremendous part in the spread of Presbyterianism in America. Ulster Scots settlers founded schools all over the country. One of the most notable being William Tennent's <i>Log College</i>, founded at Neshaminy in Pennsylvania, which became the forerunner of <i>Princeton University</i>.<br />
<br />
They were also involved in politics and were instrumental in the <i>Declaration of Independence</i>, at least eight of the signatories being of Ulster Scots background. The document was originally handwritten by Charles Thompson, from Maghera, Co. Londonderry, and it was printed by John Dunlap, an Ulster Scot from Strabane. At least fourteen US presidents have had Ulster Scots origins, with several others having maternal links. From 1881-1904 the US had a continuous 23 year run of Ulster Scots presidents! Hopefully, we've made a positive contribution, rather than otherwise!Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-69900590040131331992012-04-10T22:19:00.001+01:002013-02-14T23:01:19.083+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 51 – Goliath, Samson and 'Titanic Belfast'<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://assets.podomatic.net/mymedia/thumb/1042994/460%3E_6147344.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://assets.podomatic.net/mymedia/thumb/1042994/460%3E_6147344.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Titanic Belfast</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<h3>
<b>10th April, 2012</b></h3>
A new phenomenon in Belfast in recent years has been the development of <i>'quarters.'</i> First we had what is now known as the <i>Cathedral Quarter</i> which, strangely enough, is near St. Anne's Cathedral to the north of the city centre. Like Dublin's <i>Temple Bar</i> area, this is an area of narrow cobbled streets, restaurants, old pubs and new pubs in old buildings, with music and other entertainment. Just opposite the cathedral is <i>Writer's Square</i>, with the names of local writers inlaid in the pavement, where music and arts events are held.<br />
<br />
On the other side of the city centre, bordering the Lower Ormeau area are a group of streets we've always referred to as the Holy Land – because it includes Jerusalem Street, Palestine Street, Damascus Street, Carmel Street and Cairo Street. This used to be a mixed residential area of small two and three story terraced houses, but it has changed dramatically over the last few years. Most of the original inhabitants have gone. A small number of immigrant families still live there, but the area has been invaded by several thousand students – from both <i>Queen's University</i> and the <i>University of Ulster</i> – as developers have converted and extended the small houses into student housing, leaving only the original facades unchanged.<br />
<br />
The area is now officially part of what's known as <i>Queen's Quarter</i>, an area encompassing the buildings of <i>Queen's University</i>, a proposed new site for the <i>University of Ulster</i>, (which is currently outside the city), student accommodation and lots of bars, clubs and nightspots.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi25JlbDa2VRXANyS7tWr8El9Flttd2h1T6u9q3VOXxSigCw_xdF-79MEYIhFFf-XKT39yFpxVYYgVnn-ITRNtNpSDQeW-UxgckyM3tsHOqbJWxTsMKFlOjdyd-pzIr7VM6WxHai2AKW3ky/s1600/Titannic_White_Star.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi25JlbDa2VRXANyS7tWr8El9Flttd2h1T6u9q3VOXxSigCw_xdF-79MEYIhFFf-XKT39yFpxVYYgVnn-ITRNtNpSDQeW-UxgckyM3tsHOqbJWxTsMKFlOjdyd-pzIr7VM6WxHai2AKW3ky/s1600/Titannic_White_Star.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">White Star Line poster of Titannic</td></tr>
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The most recent quarter is in east Belfast and it's been gettin' kinda busy recently – because we're about to celebrate the 100th anniversary of a great tragic event – the sinking of the <i>RMS Titanic</i>. In the docks area, near the former <i>Harland & Wolff</i> shipyard, we now have a spectacular new building – the <i>Titanic Belfast</i> centre. The building cost £77M to build and has four wings, each looking like the prow of the ship itself, joined by a central glass tower. Inside you can learn everything there is to know about the <i>Titanic</i> – how it was built, the shipyard it was built in, fitting out the ship, her maiden voyage, the sinking. You can even visit and explore the wreck underwater.<br />
<br />
The <i>Titanic</i> was built in the <i>Harland & Wolff</i> shipyard in east Belfast – at that time the largest shipyard in the world. In 1910 Belfast was a boom town, a strong leader in engineering and linen manufacture as well as shipbuilding. At that time the <i>Titanic</i> was the largest and most luxurious liner in the world. The shipyard employed over 35,000 people in the early 1900s – including my grandfather!<br />
<br />
The yard was founded in 1862 and has the world's largest dry dock and later the two huge yellow cranes, which dominate the Belfast skyline, manufactured by the German company, <i>Kruup</i> – <i>Goliath</i> (315 ft high) was the first, in 1969, followed by <i>Sampson</i>, in 1974 (348 ft high). Each crane spans 259 feet, can lift a load of 840 tons, and run on rails, driven by their own huge diesel engines inside the top of the main leg of each crane – two engines in each, one for backup. <br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcP00RCjjbUjZZRx_8I2yyAQW4aOdJBbisVygrHHLMFS8Mc_cuqXQTCr-nvJCe6ECHLGa7jDzj3g8FLBIK8MBVKlmtR0I-DfjW4ghXKKoB7LM_DeKvCviZ7HAWCExvhwfWVFmG5qqbBHPX/s1600/Filming_Titannic_Quarter.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="202" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcP00RCjjbUjZZRx_8I2yyAQW4aOdJBbisVygrHHLMFS8Mc_cuqXQTCr-nvJCe6ECHLGa7jDzj3g8FLBIK8MBVKlmtR0I-DfjW4ghXKKoB7LM_DeKvCviZ7HAWCExvhwfWVFmG5qqbBHPX/s320/Filming_Titannic_Quarter.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Filming the Titanic Quarter from 300ft up on top of Goliath crane</td></tr>
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When the <i>Titanic Quarter</i> was first being planned a few years ago I was asked to film the site for their new website, from the top of the <i>Goliath</i> crane. We had to get special permission to film from there and were taken up in the tiny lift inside the leg of the crane, to the engine platform at the top. The lift tends to bounce up and down rather alarmingly as it travels! At the top is the gantry, which looks like a large red shed, that travels on rails from one side of the crane to the other and houses the lifting gear. The driver is suspended from this in a little downward projecting cabin, so that he can have all round vision.<br />
<br />
Seeing we had a once-in-a-lifetime chance to film from the top of the crane, we took guitars up with us and filmed each other performing on top of <i>Goliath</i>. At first it was beautiful sunny spring weather and I got some great footage of ships moving and a plane landing at the nearby <i>George Best City Airport</i>. <br />
<br />
Unfortunately, when I was being filmed performing, not only did my guitar strap come adrift, but a sudden wintry squall came in around us, with strong winds and snow hitting us horizontally. We had to grab camera, tripod and guitars and scramble quickly for safety down the stairs to the engine platform at the top of the leg of the crane!<br />
<br />
In 2007 the <i>Goliath</i> crane crashed into one of the smaller cranes – at 95 tonnes! – knocking it over in what could have been a lethal accident. (Check it out on <i>YouTube</i> under <i>Harland & Wolff Crane Accident</i>).<br />
<br />
The <i>Titanic</i> was built in this dock, although smaller cranes were used in her construction, along with sister <i>White Star Line</i> ships, <i>Olympic</i> and <i>Britannic</i>; the Royal Navy cruiser, <i>HMS Belfast</i>; P&O's <i>SS Canberra</i> and dozens of other ships. Nowadays the yard deals more with refurbishing oil rigs and drilling ships and building wind farm components. <br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFn6kJUVG28Oi4GwzSSb5xhwbD0n8fcb9YkMF9YK4GkHc57XpeWu5GO-99p08x0gs4a7XteFVs4bNyqxp0ue651k0KwoYRpklc0Ytp_Jd3Ti5dHtpSfhTlqb5_3p5RYkJmauK6IiSEWj60/s1600/Titannic.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFn6kJUVG28Oi4GwzSSb5xhwbD0n8fcb9YkMF9YK4GkHc57XpeWu5GO-99p08x0gs4a7XteFVs4bNyqxp0ue651k0KwoYRpklc0Ytp_Jd3Ti5dHtpSfhTlqb5_3p5RYkJmauK6IiSEWj60/s200/Titannic.jpg" width="200" /></a><i>Titannic</i> left Belfast on the evening of 2nd April, 1912; calling at Southampton in England; Cherbourg, France; and finally Cobh, near Cork City, in the Republic of Ireland; before setting off across the Atlantic for Manhattan, New York City. She struck an iceberg at almost full speed on April 14th and sank two hours and forty minutes later, with the loss of more than 1,500 lives.<br />
<br />
My great uncle, George Given, was booked to travel on the <i>Titannic</i>, but he was so eager to get to Canada that he travelled on an earlier ship instead. What a providential move that turned out to be, eh?Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-44417353232378950972012-03-17T01:09:00.001+00:002012-03-21T01:48:16.467+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 50 – 'How's she cuttin' now, byes?'<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXKYe27m1cFpA47ZjIn-AQSGkLX47UikkM9xYMJl7kOhUocN5eiSQEWAlfWuyFtXSYqN4bz03zFjFr-lnEr7nO3JyzlTphBey-xBuXdlX5K8Kzku5bcPSVUsk-D5kyGAgwzhb_iJ-zyAm2/s1600/HPIM1978_2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXKYe27m1cFpA47ZjIn-AQSGkLX47UikkM9xYMJl7kOhUocN5eiSQEWAlfWuyFtXSYqN4bz03zFjFr-lnEr7nO3JyzlTphBey-xBuXdlX5K8Kzku5bcPSVUsk-D5kyGAgwzhb_iJ-zyAm2/s320/HPIM1978_2.JPG" width="276" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Celtic brooch sculpture, outside St. Patrick's Centre, Downpatrick</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-size: large;"><b>16th March, 2012</b></span><br />
<br />
Well, it's the time of year for a wee bit a' celebratin' of all things Irish. I've had a very busy week, so I'm just getting to record this show at the last minute. We've covered a fair bit of history and culture in the last couple of shows, so maybe I should vary the theme a bit the day? It often occurs to me how incomprehensible our way of talkin' must sound to most outsiders. Maybe if you have some Irish background then at least some phrases might be familiar to you?<br />
<br />
For instance, a week ago a friend mentioned having had some Swedish people over visiting, when his wife came out with, <i>"Throw yer eye along that there and see if it's straight!"</i> Apparently, the Swedes looked at one another with no idea of what she was saying. To be honest, I find it fairly amazing that strangers can understand us at all! It's not as if we're being deliberately difficult – in fact, most Irishmen probably have a built in need to communicate, to want you to understand them. Though we'll be likely to phrase it, <i>"Do yez undtherstann' me now, like?"</i> – which probably doesn' help!<br />
<br />
Take <i>"Wud ye howl yer whissht?"</i> for example, literally meaning <i>'hold your breath'</i>, or <i>"Would you be quiet?"</i> Now ye could possibly have known that one from the song, <i>'There was an aul' woman from Wexford Town'.</i> If yer behavin' like a bit of an eedjit, now, someone might tell ye to, <i>"Have a wee titther a' wit, now!"</i> And if that doesn't do it, ye might be towl' to <i>"Catch yerself on!"</i> If somebody asks ye, <i>"How's she cuttin' now, byes?"</i> wud ye undtherstann' them? Mebbe ye would if they said, <i>"How are yez doin' there, lads?"</i><br />
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The answers could possibly be a mite hard to grasp, too: <i>"Ach, I'm bravely, like."</i> Or, <i>"I'm doin' rightly, so I am."</i> More than likely we'd answer, <i>"Ach, I'm dead on, ye know?"</i> If ye were referring to someone who'd recently been ill ye might be heard to say, <i>"Ach, 'e's powerful failed, altogether, so he is."</i> If ye were talkin' about yerself and ye'd been badly, ye might say, <i>"I'm as w'ake as watther, so I am,"</i> <i>"I'm not worth tuppence at the moment,"</i> Or, <i>"I'm not worth three ha'pence,"</i> – which is even worse, obviously! If ye were short of a bob or two – especially if somebody's askin ye to sub them (to lend them a poun' or two) – ye might say, <i>"Listen, I haven't three ha'pence meself to rub together, so I haven'."</i><br />
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A great deal of our time is spent in <i>"havin' a wee bit a' craic."</i> It's a way a' <i>"puttin' yer day in," </i>isn't it? If ye're later home than expected from the pub, or some other event, ye can always report, <i>"Ach, sure the craic was grann'"</i> or even, <i>"The craic was ninety, so it wuz."</i> If it was crowded ye would say, <i>"Thon place was hivin' the night."</i> Or, <i>"It was packed to the gills."</i> If yer <i>"Rarin' ta go"</i> it means ye're anxious to be off somewhere. And if a woman is dressed up to go out for the night she might be <i>"all dolled up to the nines."</i> <br />
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On the other hand, someone who never makes any effort to tidy themselves up could be described as, <i>"As througho'rr as they come,"</i> or <i>"As rough as purty oaten,"</i> – which is actually a mixture of potatoes and oatmeal. If he's rude as well, he might be described as <i>"an ignorant sort of a ganch."</i> An' if he's mean with his money, <i>"He wouldn' give ye daylight, so he wouldn't!"</i> Or, <i>"That fella wouldn' give ye the time a' day."</i> If someone is a bit greedy, or an awkward person to deal with, ye might say, <i>"I'd rather have that body a week, as a fortnight!"</i> If he's a big fella, ye could say, <i>"If he was chocolate, he'd be some 'atin'!"</i> <br />
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Many years ago I spent a few weeks doing some building work on a friend's farm near Belfast. Every day his mother would feed ye up to the gills with spuds an' stuff at lunchtime. Then when you went back to work the dad would come over to see how ye were gettin' on and he'd say the same thing every time, <i>"You know, a full sack doesn't bend!" </i> <br />
<br />
If you are listening to a conversation that ye know is in the Irish language, which you don't understand, you could always say, <i>"Ni higim."</i> – <i>"I don't understand."</i> If it's in English, but ye genuinely can't follow what they're sayin', ye could say, <i>"I have no idea what yer bletherin' on about."</i> If you want to be a little bit more forceful – not to mention, risky! – you could say, <i>"Are you talkin' ta me, or chewin' a brick?"</i> Not that I recommend that one, ye undtherstand!Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-53530051401522896962012-02-28T18:08:00.002+00:002019-12-11T17:19:26.748+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 48 – 'Up the Lagan in a bubble?'<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://assets.podomatic.net/mymedia/thumb/1042994/460%3E_5856505.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://assets.podomatic.net/mymedia/thumb/1042994/460%3E_5856505.jpg" height="265" width="400"></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><h4>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Lagan Canal and Island Arts Centre, Lisburn, Co. Antrim</span></h4>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>26 February, 2012</b></span><br />
<br />
On the last show I was describing how, many years ago, my father had sowed grass seed with a device called an<i> 'Aero'</i> fiddle. Just the other night I was with some friends in a small pub called<i> 'Paddy's Barn',</i> in Saul, Co. Down – and there, hanging up from the ceiling rafters was a perfect example of one of these devices – which I haven't seen in over 50 years. It's a small world, eh?<br />
<br />
That got me to thinking of another event from way back, which my father had told me about. I'll tell you about it in a minute. First a wee bit a' background. I was brought up in Co. Down, as I've said before, but I went to school in Lisburn, which is mainly in Co. Antrim.<br />
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The two counties are separated by the River Lagan, which flows from Slieve Croob – a hill in Co. Down near Ballynahinch – firstly west through Dromore, then north east to Lisburn and through Belfast, into Belfast lough – dividing East Belfast off from the rest of the city. There is a beautiful Irish song, <i>'My Lagan Love'</i> – the air made famous by Horslips as <i>'Fantasia' </i>– and the ballad itself has been covered by <i>The Corrs, Celtic Women, Phil Coulter </i>and a whole lot of others.<br />
<br />
The south eastern part of the city of Lisburn is across the Union Bridge over the Lagan and is usually referred to by locals as<i> 'over in the County Down'. </i> Just downstream from the bridge is what's known as <i>The Island</i> – a bend in the river below a weir, which was cut off by a section of canal and a lock. This was once completely occupied by the old <i>Island Spinning Mill</i>, which eventually became derelict. It's now the site of the new <i>Island Arts Centre</i> – a venue for concerts, art exhibitions and all sorts of events.<br />
<br />
The <i>Lagan Navigation</i>, as it was called, was begun in 1756, to connect Belfast Lough with Lough Neagh, the large inland lake which borders five of the six northern counties. When my father was an apprentice in what was later <i>Barbour Threads</i> – formerly <i>The Linen Thread Company</i> – he can remember the horse-drawn canal barges, known as lighters, delivering coal from the docks in Belfast to power the machinery in the Mill. The lighters also carried sand and bricks from Lough Neagh back down to Belfast.<br />
<br />
The canal has been in disuse since 1958, with the M1 Motorway being built along eight miles of the canal basin in the mid 1960s. The tidal section of the Lagan through the city of Belfast became navigable again in 1994, when the new Lagan Weir was completed. This keeps the water level upstream at a fairly constant level by raising and lowering five gates which can also protect from floods during extremely high tides.<br />
<br />
You can enter the enclosed basin for an hour or two either side of high tide, so we have taken our boat, <i>'Warrior Maid',</i> up through Belfast Harbour and into the basin – mooring it overnight at Donegal Quay, right next to the city centre, and also upstream at Stranmillis – at '<i>Cutter's Wharf'</i> pub – which is as far as you can go upriver at the moment. There are plans, though, to re-open the whole navigation in the near future.<br />
<br />
We've taken three trips in all from Groomsport, where our boat is moored, round to Belfast, also staying at the new concrete pontoon in a basin behind the <i>Odyssey Complex</i> and taking friends and family for short trips around the Harbour and up and down the river. On one of these trips the personnel on the Weir had forgotten to inform me when we went through the night before that the outgoing Gate 4 was not going to be in use next day, and so we ended up bumping our keel on the top of the partially closed gate! Needless to say, the weir staff weren't very pleased about this.<br />
<br />
In 2001, when the <i>Island Arts Centre</i> was opened in Lisburn, that section of the canal was also restored, and the local branch of the <i>Inland Waterways Association</i> were invited to bring small boats along to celebrate the opening. We also own a 14 ft. wooden dinghy, so I borrowed a boat trailer and arrived on opening day with my 79-year-old dad, my three-year-old grandson, my wife, Gerry, and another young friend. We launched the dinghy from a slipway, collected the rest of our crew at the canal basin and, after negotiating the lock and accepting the loan of a small outboard motor, headed downstream for a mile to the next weir and lock, which was still closed.<br />
<br />
On the way I happened to remark to my Dad that I bet he'd never been down the middle of the Lagan before. He agreed that he'd never done it in a boat. When I asked what he meant he replied that he HAD travelled down the centre of the river before, but on a pushbike! We were a bit puzzled until he explained that one winter when he was young, the river had frozen over completely and he and friends had cycled along the centre of the frozen river.<br />
<br />
It was as we were happily discussing this interesting anecdote, that my little grandson mentioned that his feet were getting wet. We all looked down and sure enough the water was nearly over his shoes. On further investigation I discovered that the bung was missing at the stern of the boat and water was flowing in like a tap turned on full! We were in danger of sinking! My young friend started bailing out the water and we headed upstream as fast as our 2 HP outboard could take us – yelling ahead to our friends as we approached the lock, to keep the gate open for us. As my friend kept on bailing, and we rose slowly in the lock, we managed to get my father, wife and grandson up the ladder to solid ground.<br />
<br />
As soon as the lock gates opened my young friend and I headed across to the slipway, still bailing out as we went. That concluded our trip on the Lagan – though we did have a nice meal in the new centre afterwards. We have an expression here in case anyone thinks we might be stupid, or gullible –<i> 'Do you think I came up the Lagan in a bubble?</i>'Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3712960865794257856.post-86573735729119395852012-02-10T17:52:00.002+00:002012-02-28T18:27:42.409+00:00Celtic Roots Craic! 47 – Sowin' wi' a fiddle!<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://assets.podomatic.net/mymedia/thumb/1042994/460%3E_5766916.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://assets.podomatic.net/mymedia/thumb/1042994/460%3E_5766916.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The 'Aero' fiddle seed dispenser</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-size: large;"><b>February 10, 2012</b></span><br />
<br />
Last week I talked about drivin', our latest Belfast sculpture and about the things we used to do when we were kids. I mentioned how flax used to be grown a lot and how it was retted in a Flax Hole. I never actually witnessed that process because, although my Dad used to work for what was then called, <i>The Linen Thread Company</i>, by the time I was around man-made fibres had taken over and very little linen was being made. <br />
<br />
I DO remember when the neighbour's field behind our house was used to grow corn. Now corn, means different things in different parts of the world. In the USA it normally means maize, which we used to call 'Indian corn,' here in Ireland – it was first introduced here when America first sent us some as famine relief in the nineteenth century. In England corn means wheat, but in Ireland corn always referred to oats – the cereal that looks most like grass, in my opinion. We don't grow much oats any more, because it mainly used to be grown to feed horses – in the days when horses where used for agriculture. <br />
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Then tractors began to appear on the scene and horses became a thing of the past. The first tractors we saw were mostly old <i>Ferguson 35</i>s, before it became <i>Massey Ferguson</i>. These started on petrol and then ran on something called TVO – Tractor Vehicle Oil. Diesel tractors came a little bit later. In fact, out in the country we improvised our own tractthers, usually by chopping the body off an old car and adding a sort of trailer body – more like an early pickup truck than anything – but you could use one to go around a field, spreading manure, or picking up hay at haytime. Yep, it was right out of the <i>Beverley Hillbillies! </i><br />
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I drove one of these – belonging to my uncle Wullie, who lived just up the road – when I was only about six, or so. When I say <i>'drove',</i> I just steered it in a straight line, while it crawled along in first gear, while my father and cousin forked peat litter (from the hens we kept), off the back of it. When we got near the hedge my Dad would jump down and steer it back towards the other end of the field, then go back to work.<br />
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When our neighbour's corn (oats, I mean) was ripe in the field behind us, they brought in an old <i>Ferguson 35</i> tractor, towing what we in Co. Down called a <i>'r'aper' </i>– in other words a former horse-drawn reaper, trailed behind the tractor – to cut the corn. The sheaves were then bound by hand and stooked together to dry – the whole family taking part. After a few days drying the big event took place – the thresher arrived! This was an old – originally horse-drawn – thresher, made mostly of wood painted with orange lead paint, that had faded to a sort of pink colour. It was trailed into the field behind a tractor and then belt driven from the tractor to thresh the corn. No such thing as a combine harvester in those days!<br />
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Back then, practically everything was done by hand. When our hay was ready to cut in June a neighbour would come and cut it with a r'aper, then, in the evening, the whole family would rake the hay into rows, with huge wooden handrakes. Even with my mother and uncles and cousins helping it took hours to row eight acres – and the next day they'd have to be spread out in the sun again! We didn't have such a thing as a baler, either, so when the hay was ready it was loaded by hand with a pitchfork onto a trailer, or one of those pick-ups, and hauled in to the yard, where it would be pitchforked again into the shed.<br />
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Our neighbour on the other side had about twenty acres, which he farmed full-time. He would stack his hay in fairly small stacks and then later collect it with a buckrake, a large pronged implement on the back of the tractor, which reversed under the stack and lifted it up. What usually happened, though, was that the front of the small tractor would lift up instead – so my neighbour's sons and daughter would have to sit on the front of the tractor – just like <i>Ellie-May Clampett! </i>– to balance the load, and they would proceed across the field see-sawing up and down – great entertainment for my brother and I.<br />
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We had one very steep field, with maybe a 40 degree slope! It's known as the <i>Dam Bank,</i> because it's opposite the river, which used to have a dam back then, so that it could feed water to power a couple of watermills. My father decided to re-sow this field one year and a neighbour ploughed it for us one-way – in other words, down the slope. There was some room to line up at the top – though it must have seemed like jumping off a cliff – but very little room to turn at the bottom – a very hair-raising and dangerous enterprise, which nobody would dream of attempting nowadays. <br />
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After it was ploughed and harrowed my father sowed the field – again by hand, using a piece of equipment which was common enough in those days. It was called a fiddle, because you held it in you left hand like a fiddle, with a small a mount of seed in a bag attached over your shoulder, and you played back and forwards with a bow in your right hand, whose string went around a cogged wheel. This wheel flung the seed out in each direction as you played and all the sower had to do was walk back and forth across the length of the field, re-filling the bag and sowing as he went. I helped by bringing him by marking the soil already sown and bringing fresh seed – but by the time we had that field sown my Dad and I were both pretty well sunburned!Raymond McCulloughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05226520716082378887noreply@blogger.com0