Throwback Thursday: Summer childhood in our beloved Courtmacsherry

MARY Holly was much moved by those memories of simpler times and less sophisticated holidays featured in last week’s Throwback Thursday.

“Ah Jo, what memories you brought back! We didn’t go to Crosser or Youghal either, and I think that some of my classmates thought I was quite deprived. No, we went to Courtmacsherry, a place most had never heard of,” said Mary.

“Courtmac was a quiet village and my family had holidayed there since 1926!. How did that happen? Well, my mother’s eldest sister had a work colleague who came from Courtmac and she used to tell such stories about the village she came from that my maternal grandparents decided to take a house in the village for a month in that summer. They travelled down by train and, as I say to people who ask, ‘we never went home’. 

My parents continued the tradition and as we didn’t have a car, my uncle drove us down and deposited us for the month of July. Courtmac is still our haven.

“Your mention of the author Mary Burchill reminded me of the little library that was housed in Johnny O’Donovan’s shop in Courtmacsherry. Mr. O’Donovan had bought the old stock of the Winthrop Library in Cork, and had a bookshelf of volumes opposite the counter. Each year Mum would go to borrow reading material, and Mr. O’Donovan’s recommendations were always the same, Mary Burchill for the ladies and Zane Grey for the men. As we would leave the shop, Mum would reflect that she probably had read the borrowed books the previous years, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. No Kindles in the 1950s!

“The tennis court wall in the centre of the village was the meeting place for teenagers. It was the first place we checked on arrival, to see who was about. When it was raining there was a big tree across the road on The Terrace to provide shelter. Last year, alas, after much soul searching, the tree had to be cut down as it was dying and dangerous.

“The same families returned year after year. We were the ‘July crowd’ and then there were, of course the ‘August crowd’. One year we discovered a house was vacant for August, so our family combined with our cousins and we stayed on for another glorious month. That meant we were there for Regatta day, something we had always wanted! We discovered the huckster’s stalls, went to the station to see who had come on the train excursion, and acted as collectors for the Lifeboat when we got a bit older. One of my older cousins remarked that Courtmac was the only place where the Regatta took place in the village itself - the children’s races on the street were a big highlight of the day - but to be fair there were swimming races, greasy pole, pillow fight, yawl and sailing boat races too.

“There were several shops in the village and they supplied our basic needs except for milk and potatoes. Milk was delivered by bike, a summer job for a local teenager employed by Michael John O’Donovan. The one and two pint cans were looped on the handlebars of the bike as he made his rounds of the village. When Mum went to Michael John’s shop at the end of the month to pay the bill, there was always a present of sweets or biscuits to thank us for the custom.

“The potatoes? Ah yes, that was definitely unique to Courtmac. Robbie Love would trundle down the village each weekday morning with his wooden wheelbarrow. He went to his bit of ground outside the village and dug those delicious floury potatoes that still live in the memory. He would load the potatoes into the empty one and two gallon paint cans he had in his wheelbarrow and set off down the village. Robbie would knock at each door and call ‘Want some potatoes?’. That’s how you bought them, a gallon or two gallons of potatoes!

“I type here in my house outside the village, with electric light, running water, an en-suite bedroom for myself, television, and of course internet, and marvel at how our mothers coped without such mod-cons. 

Great times, great memories. Thanks Mum and Dad!

And thank you, Mary. That really is a wonderful evocation of past times. And what a continuing family tradition! Thank you also for sharing those great family photographs of yesteryear.

Mícheál Kenefick (he of the Whitegate periwinkles juvenile industry!) was also moved by our descriptions of times past to write of the road where he was born - The Middle Road, as it was always known.

“I was born in a thatched house in the Middle Road which meant, even though I was very young, I had the privilege of knowing the Thatcher. He was a gentle man and a gentleman, a great talker, storyteller and sage. Getting the Thatcher would trigger a whole series of wonderful adventures. Firstly he had to be located and booked. Bear in mind that this was an eon before telephones which young people will find it hard to imagine, so I would cycle with my dad, Jack, to Guileen as there were many thatched houses there and therefore a good chance we would meet the Thatcher.

“After the day was set, the next operation would be to cut the scallops in John Williams’ acre and split them, and finally collect the straw in the donkey and butt. John Holl from over the road would be required to tend to the Thatcher when the day came, handing up the sheaves, and sharing the odd bottle of stout as it was thirsty work.

“The Thatcher would have a story for us every morning before we went to school, and when he was finished his craftwork, the roof would be gleaming and as golden as a Whitegate sunset.

“The Middle Road had four paths. There was the school path or Ellie’s path which we used to go to school, and where the Middle Road mothers brought us cocoa in the winter months. This path went through the girls’ yard and while that was a no-go area for the boys, Master Herlihy and Mrs O’Halloran would turn a ‘blind eye’ on the cocoa mornings. One other exception was that when Jack wouldn’t have the pigs fed before he went to the Fort, I was allowed go through the girls’ yard to the Middle Road to feed them.

“The second path across from our house called the Buildings was the one we used go to play in the glen, and importantly to go to the bus for first Mass on Sundays, as the road with the triple name was the only tarred one. Strangely over the years it has been known as The New Road, The School Road and The New Line. 

The Hill Road would not be tarred for several years nor indeed would the Middle Road. 

"At the top of the Buildings path was the tap which was a regular meeting place for the neighbours as none or few of us had running water.

“The third path went in the opposite direction and we used it to go and play with Martin Edwardes, as it ran by his back door. We might even have called it Edwardes’ path.

“The fourth path was a short one by our back yard which was Shea’s path and took us to the Black Gates on the Hill Road.

“I did the messages for two of my neighbours. Dykes who had only one leg, lost in the Great War, was our next door neighbour and I spent many a happy hour with him when I was a child. He would send me to the village, which was a big deal then, for a plug of tobacco. Dykes wasn’t his name but to this day few, if any, knew his name and so we never called him anything else. On my way to the village I would have to the house of another Great War survivor who was also wounded which affected his mental health. If Bob happened to be lecturing loudly to the planets I would be afraid to so I would wait behind Lizzie Lewis’ gable end and report back to poor Dykes that ‘they hadn’t it.’ He knew the score I think.

“Mrs. McGuinness who lived a few doors away, in the only other thatched house on the road as it happened, would send me for coconut creams, and yes I did have a few for myself on the way up the hill. By the same token she always knew I had a few but didn’t complain too much until one day after I went a bit too far!

“Grannie Williams was our next door neighbour on the other side and one time, having pulled an iron gate on top of myself trying to climb it I broke my collar bone and I would have to go to her every morning to put the sling (a tea towel) on it until it mended. Believe it or not I it well.

“Kathleen, my godmother, was a few doors away and helped to rear me. Of all the houses in Middle Road I loved Kathleen’s best of all and when our mother would go to Midleton which was no more than once or twice a year Kathleen would be put in charge and I would get the dinner there and always a treat afterwards.

“While boys and girls often played together and I particularly rounders with Nora Mary. Marie and Joan, I was closest in both age and devilment to Jimmy Power. We did some ‘accidental’ destruction to a ditch when we were quite young but Jack, with the able assistance of Bob Hogan, got the fire under control quickly. Bob was a regular and welcome visitor to the Middle Road and the supplier of the lino that most houses had then. He would give us a spin in the pony and trap when we would run to the cross to meet him.

“So we had thatch on the roof, lino on the floor, a safe in the back yard to keep the milk and the butter cool, fattened a few pigs, kept a couple of hens and Jack kept us in spuds and vegetables from the garden. 

It is still, for Middle Roaders at least, the best road in the world and I’m lonely for it and for those days..

“Jimmy Power and I are now grandparents to adults but three quarters of a century later we are still best friends.”

Oh Mícheál, what great recollection you have! The thatcher! Those delectable coconut creams (didn’t we call them Sphring Sphrongs at one time?) Cocoa delivered to the school! And best of all, the firm friendships formed in those endless days of childhood.

Come on the rest of you. Let’s have your memories! Email [email protected]. Or leave a comment on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/echolivecork.