Out of the Blue - A Little Book of Inspiration

Work and Play

I remember in early summers, my Father would cut the turf with a slane and we’d help to spread and then foot it, and we’d later build it into stacks on the bog. The milk and butter would be placed in the water to keep them cool; I loved our tea – breaks. The bog can be a hungry place you know. We’d later bring the turf home in baskets on the donkeys back. There’d be three or four of us travelling up and down in convoy on the donkeys for about a week.

We also had to help at hay time, turning and tossing the hay for day’s before it was saved. I looked forward to my mother’s cooking – and I’ve never tasted nicer tea and homemade brown bread and butter than I did in the hayfield.

How simple and easygoing life was back then. We’d play for hours as a family, or with the neighbouring children and we had plenty of scope to do so – up to St. Patricks rock, Cloosh Hill (Cuchan) as we called it, Seanaree, Bunnigappaun and surrounding areas.

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This page was added on 26/06/2012.

Comments about this page

  • I’m intrigued about the placename “Seanaree” that appears in this section. It was added in June 2012. Exactly a century before that date, my father’s 17-year old first cousin Margaret (Maggie) Connor sailed from Queenstown and landed in Boston.
    Her last address was entered as, “Shanaree, Cloosh, Oughterard” and her closest relative there as her father, Pat Connor. She was headed to Roxbury, to join her sister, Delia, at their uncle, my grandfather, John O’Connor’s home.
    Could whoever lovingly recounted those childhood memories of life in the area be willing to expand on the meaning and location of “Seanaree”?
    Was it a young girl’s idyllic name for the rugged countryside where the family lived, or was it somehow connected to Shannaghree, the large lake to the west of Lough Tawny in Upper Cloosh?
    Thanks for any info you can provide. Love the website.

    By Bob O'Connor (04/05/2018)

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