Colm Revolutionised Sports Broadcasting

It was a testimony to his decade long stint with RTE that led to Colm Murray being headhunted for a newly created Sportscaster job in 1989.  His beginnings in the new television Sports Department that year was not as a result of the American style positive declaration, “You’re Hired,”.  Instead Colm heard some colourful orders which changed his professional life, and then he heard - “You’ll Do,”

Colm died early today, Tuesday, July 30^th after a three year battle with Motor Neuron disease.
The Westmeath man had since the early 1980’s, been one of the main newscasters on the national broadcaster, but following the setting up of the Six One News, there was a hunt for ‘Sportscasters’.  So Colm found himself sent for by head of news, Rory O’Connor, who told him that they were hoping to put sport on the news in a larger format than had been done in previous times.  Ironically Rory also died just a few weeks ago.  At the time, in 1989, he asked Colm to consider taking the job, but the Moate man believed that he knew very little about sport.
But the bossman said to him: “You play golf, you back horses, you go to an odd gaelic football match and you enjoy it, don’t you?”
Colm had to agree with him on everything, but still he was doubtful.
But then the bossman shouted at him in a blue fashion, followed by the welcome words, “You’ll do!”
Colm was in stitches of laughter when he remembered that incident, when this writer interviewed him in 2005.
“That’s how I got the job that I’m in today and that’s what I was told, whether I liked it or not,” laughed Colm, eight years ago.
Colm Murray was the first man who had to set the plan for the presentation of television sport on RTE in ’89, and had to do it fast!  On his first day he had three or four minutes of television to fill and hadn’t a clue what to put on.  He needed pictures for his broadcast, and he found an interesting, albeit humorous sports story.
“The battle for me was to get pictures and I got pictures from Shelbourne Park of a great greyhound of the time called Randy,” laughed Colm.  “So the first picture I put on was Randy the Greyhound, running around for sixty or seventy seconds.”
Although it was a battle, it was also a dream job for the Moate born and bred horse racing lover. 
It wasn’t a road he had envisaged he’d travel when he was growing up in the family home, which was situated over their grocery shop in Church St., Moate.  His main hobby at the time was drama, but he inherited his sports passion for horse racing from his late father, Michael.  His first meeting was in Kilbeggan and he was enthralled by the carnival atmosphere at Westmeath’s popular race course.  He loved the scene of the bookies out on the course, and looking at the horses, and seeing the colours of the jockeys’ silks.
“When I got older I used to study the form and when I could get my hands on a half crown I’d place it on an outsider, hoping to win it, those are my earlier memories of Kilbeggan, and Roscommon Race Course, and of course Galway,” said Colm.
Moate was a great town to grow up in the 1960’s, Colm said, and he was proud of it being the near the centre of Ireland.
Finding himself too tall to be a jockey, Colm decided to go the more conventional route of employment, by studying at UCG and Maynooth College, eventually ending up as a secondary school teacher.  Before his RTE days he taught at the Athlone Vocational School and then in Tullamore Vocational School. 
It was at the Co. Offaly school that Colm met and fell in love with another teacher, Ann, who became his future wife, Ann.  The couple had two daughters Patricia and Kate.
Ar Dheis De Go Raibh Anam Dilis

Athlone Folk Doing Charity Skydive

(as published in Westmeath Examiner)

 

A group of volunteer health professionals from Westmeath came together in 2009 and formed ‘Immunisation 4 Life’ to organise immunisation programmes and child health clinics for under 5s in the poorer countries of the world and to provide support to existing charities in emergency situations.

 The group consists of experienced Public Health Nurses and Doctors with Dr Kevin Connolly (former Consultant Paediatrician, Portiuncula Hospital Ballinasloe) as Medical Director. In addition to Dr. Connolly, founder members include Lucy Brady (nee Ledwith) originally from “Harristown” Ballymore and now living at Corr,  Walderstown, Athlone and Maura Moran, (nee Galvin) from Moate.

 

In 2011, ‘Immunisation 4 Life’ created a partnership with a well-established charity in Zambia, called the NERI Clinics, ( www.nericlinics.org ) which has a busy Primary Health Care clinic in the Linda Province on the outskirts of the capital Lusaka. The NERI Clinics are managed by two Irish GPs and run by qualified health professionals from Zambia. To date Immunisation 4 Life has undertaken six trips to the NERI Clinics involving 30 volunteers. The average trip lasts for 10 days and the volunteers travel on their own time, taking holidays from work and paying for the trip themselves.

Lucy Brady is one of the driving forces behind the group. She said, “We have such abundance here and it takes very little to make a huge difference in other people’s lives. Maura Moran, who I know from my schooldays, is a Public Health Nurse working in County Galway and through her we were able to make contacts with many health professionals and together we started this charity.

“In addition to looking at immunisation we are also very interested in providing support to address the problem of malnutrition which isn’t just a case of lack of food but rather lack of appropriate food. On one of our early trips to Zambia we surveyed the nutritional status of children under 5 years in the Linda Province and found that 2% were severely malnourished and 17% had moderate malnutrition. This has serious short and long term implications for the health and wellbeing of these children and in order to address the problem we developed a nutritional programme which involved recruiting and training the Community Health Workers to screen for malnutrition and then to assist in running a weekly nutrition and under 5s clinic where moderately malnourished children attend for extra feeding or supplementary feeding. Up to 150 children attend this weekly clinic at any one time where they are monitored for progress until they have achieved ideal weight for height, and maintain it for 4 weeks.

“Without this clinic many of the children with severe malnutrition would be referred to the University Teaching Hospital in Lusaka where they would be admitted for at least 8 weeks. A family member, usually the mother has to stay with the child which is disruptive to family life and could compromise the wellbeing of other children at home. And also unfortunately the mortality rates are very high at 30%. It is too soon to gather data on the success of the nutrition clinics we have developed but we know that we are able to provide the necessary care to these children in their community without the disruption that a hospital stay would cause.

 “We are also committed to providing a rapid response to provide vaccination programmes in emergency situations such as refugee camps, conflict situations and natural disasters. As a dynamic, flexible and motivated group of professionals, our priority is to implement a successful vaccination programme which will benefit thousands of children.  We have a special interest in the measles vaccination but are willing to participate in any vaccination programme that will help save lives.

“We are just at the start of a long journey but already we have seen the difference we can make which spurs us forward. We have recruited volunteers who are highly qualified with relevant medical and nursing experience and we have developed our clinical and administration guidelines. We can offer expertise in immunisation and child health to NGOs and Governments and we support the Millennium Development Goals through education, participation and collaboration with local agencies and relevant groups.

“We are very grateful to all the support that we have received. All the volunteers with Immunisation 4 Life pay for their own flights to Zambia and this means that all funds raised go directly to running the clinics.

“We are always looking at innovative ways to raise funds and I have been recruited to do a parachute jump on Aug 9^th 2013. I am very grateful for the support of friends and family and my fellow parachute-jumpers Conor Brady and Patrick Munnelly.

 

 

 

 

Athlone Castle – 800 Years of Irish History

 

It is more than 800 years since Lord John de Grey, Bishop of Norwich, erected a stone tower, on the site of the present Athlone Castle.   The castle has the distinction of being the oldest building in the town of Athlone.  It was purpose build by King John of England to defend the ancient ford - Athluain - in which Athlone town takes its name.  The castle is situated overlooking the River Shannon on the edge of the Connaught side of the town, albeit in the towncentre.

A wooden form of the building had been built by Turlough O’Connor, King of Connaught in the summer of the year 1129, and after the Normans arrived in Athlone around 1199, a raised motte and bailey castle was constructed.  The earth on which the tower was built was probably too fresh causing it to collapse.  It was soon re-built, and laid the foundation of the great castle that exists in Athlone town today.
The outer walls enclose a solid platform of earth about twenty-five feet above the level of the present roadway; this platform probably represents the motte of Norman times. 
In the Williamite (protestant) and Jacobite (catholic) War, the Castle played a key role in the defence of Athlone, and perhaps the most dramatic events in the life of the Castle occurred during two sieges in 1690 and in 1691. 
In June 1691 Athlone Castle came under fire by King William’s army, and it was estimated that almost 25,000 men arrived in Athlone under the command of the Dutch General, Gordard de Ginkel. 
General de Ginkel attacked the bastion in the town, and with a minimum resistance from the Jacobite Army, the Leinster side of town soon fell.  When King James’s Jacobite army were retreating back over the bridge, they broke down arches to hinder and prevent the progress of the advancing General de Ginkel and his army.  For the next ten days, the Williamite army held the Connaught side of Athlone by firing an estimated 12,000 plus cannonballs.
As a result of the siege, the castle was virtually reduced to rubble.  Eventually the Williamites moved across the Shannon in a surprise attack on the Jacobites and forced them out and took over the town.  The advance guard quickly set about repairing the arches of the bridge, setting a pontoon bridge in place to enable a sudden attack by the Williamites into the Connaught side of town.
The scene was of total massacre and up to 500 Jacobites were killed in the final assault and these bodies were added to over 1,000 who were killed in the long week bombardment.  After the siege the castle was rebuilt by the Williamites.
For many decades the English flag had been hoisted over Athlone Castle as the British military had declared an Army post at the Castle. However, obviously that changed in 1922 with the signing of the Treaty. 
Throughout the centuries Athlone Castle has withstood many and various attacks, but as recent as 1967, the most unbelievable assault came not from outsiders, but from the town’s own fathers.
Athlone Urban District council called for the castle to be knocked so that a Civic Centre consisting of a town hall, library and conference centre, could be built on the castle grounds.
This is when the Old Athlone historical society instantly set a campaign in train, to protect the castle.
The Westmeath Independent newspaper, also supported, and advocated the preservation of the Castle as a museum or tourist centre.  Bord Failte, Inland Waterways, and Roscommon County Council joined forces with the Old Athlone Society in the campaign.  Five hundred post-primary students from Athlone held a procession of protest in the town.
The eyes of the world were on Athlone, and the council’s proposal to demolish the town’s castle.  However despite the council’s vote to go ahead with the destruction, the voices of the people was heard loud and clear and the council eventually reversed their motion of demolishing the castle.
A Festival of Athlone was planned for the summer of 1967, and the Department of Defence granted permission to the Old Athlone Society to use the central keep of the castle as a temporary museum for the duration of the festival.  The museum was staffed by volunteers, and remained open throughout the summer, after the festival had ended. 
‘The museum was a resounding success with 1500 visitors during its first week of opening,” said historian, Gearoid O’Brien in the Westmeath Independent, 1996.  “Many hundreds of thousands of visitors have visited the castle museum and many have returned to view the various exhibits there.”
The castle is really the centrepoint of the town, and even today, with all the large commercial buildings and shopping centres in the town, the castle still stands out among them all.  It is the true centre of the town, because of its strategic position on the edge of the town bridge and overlooking the River Shannon. 
Athlone Castle has been the first port of call to tens of thousands of tourists from all over the world when they visit the Irish midlands.
The castle came into the twenty-first century, aided by new technology and media, and now the tourist can view in interactive fashion, the story of the Siege of Athlone, and many other different aspects of the castle, before the Siege, and up to the present day.

 

 

 

 

 

Syd Shine Keeps Right On.........

Syd Shine today (pic by Ann Hennessy)

 

He is one of the last surviving bandleaders of Ireland’s Big Band Era, and during his lifetime of 93 years, he also became one of the country’s biggest known showband legends.

Syd was born in July 1920, and the year before that, his father Martin built Hillside House in Bower View, Athlone which became the family home. 

Syd had three brothers and one sister, and all are dead except one brother.  His eldest brother was Frank who was a businessman, and second brother was Billy who was a doctor in Lancashire.  His youngest brother Noel is still alive and retired in Florida.  He was a Chemical Engineer with Gulf Oil (now Chevron).  Syd’s late beloved sister, Clare, was married to Leo Faller from Athlone, Ireland.

Syd, who was an accomplished pianist, in Athlone, was a leading tenor in St. Peter’s and Paul’s Church Choir from when the church opened in 1937 and for many years afterwards. 

In 1934, Martin Shine built the Crescent shop, in Athlone and extended it out bit by bit, until it became a very prestigious ballroom.  The Crescent Ballroom in Athlone was legendary throughout the forties, fifties and sixties, as one of Ireland’s best-loved dance spots.

“First my father built the shop, and then he built the first part of the ballroom, then the stairs and then the supper room,” said Syd.

Syd Shine himself was the bandleader of the resident Crescent Big Band, either with a quintet or a sextet or the thirteen piece.  Syd and his family continued to run the Crescent shop in the daytime and the ballroom at night.

“We put the best of everything into the Crescent, because we knew it was the people of the town’s ballroom and I’m glad we didn’t spare expense,” said Syd.

Syd started his own band the ‘Crescent Swingtet’ in the late 1930’s. In the years that followed, Syd, who was bandleader in all his various groups, also played at many countrywide venues, as well as at the Crescent.

One of the many highlights of those years was the Trinity College Ball.  Syd’s Orchestra played the college’s first ball in the 1950’s and then went on to play four more for the college in the Edmund Bourke Hall, over the next four years.  This gained the orchestra many accolades throughout the length and breath of Ireland.

“We were very lucky as a group because in Athlone there was a constant supply of sax, trombone and other brass players.  They came mostly from the Army Band, who were top class musicians, with tremendous experience,” said Syd.

The demise of the Big Band era happened in the early 60’s with the coming of the Showbands, so in 1963 Syd set up a five piece group called Syd and the Saints. The group was recorded by Peter Sullivan, the man who turned down ‘The Beatles’.

‘The Saints Showband’ in 1967 recorded a song written by Mary Flynn, entitled ‘The Broken Hearted Farmer’, a song which gained the band international media publicity when the song was denounced by the powers of the time, leading to its banning by RTE Radio. The song told of the Irish farmers fight against the government of the day and highlighted their campaign of marching, sitting on the steps of government buildings and blocking roads.

The British tabloids followed the story with interest and it helped build up the Saints following in England. During the Saints visit to the US in 1967, ‘The Broken Hearted Farmer’ got numerous airplays on the famous ‘Dorothy Hayden Radio Show’ in New York.

"It’s sad that they wouldn’t play us in Ireland, yet we were on every night for months on American radio," says Syd today about the ‘Broken Hearted Farmer’ story. 

Later Syd changed the format of his group to an eight piece band entitled - ‘The Saints Showband’. The original line up for this group were: Syd Shine on organ, Joe Flynn on vocals and bass, Frank Somers on drums, Pete Keighery on lead guitar and vocals, Finbar O’Keefe on rhythm guitar and vocals, Liam Meade on trombone, Frankie McDonald on trumpet and Brian Sullivan on lead vocals and tenor saxophone.

Syd and ‘The Saints Showband’ were very successful and played in dancehalls all over Ireland. The showband also had a following in Scotland, England and Wales, where they travelled regularly over their five year period. They travelled to America in May 1967, to such success, that they were asked back later that same year.  They played in New York venues such as The Red Mill in the Bronx, the Jaegar House on Lexington Avenue and the Ambassador in Flushing. 

Syd successfully circumnavigated the other aspect of his life around his music, and that of course was his love of the River Shannon.

It was in 1957; (while he was still leading his Big Band Orchestra) that Syd bought ‘The Fox’ barge.  However the Fox wasn’t his first home on the water, because in 1942, Syd bought his first barge which like the Fox was also a 60 ft. boat.

It was known as the ‘Chang-Sha’ – a Chinese name, meaning ‘River House’.

Syd has made many national television and radio appearances over the years including a popular appearance on the top-rated ‘Showband Show’ in 1965, and over the past two decades he made appearances on ‘Live at 3’ and ‘Open House’.  He also has the distinction of having performed three times on ‘The Late Late Show’.

Although Syd is modest about his life and his career, he is a most popular and well-received man in Athlone town. 

“I have to say when I go up the town, about 20 people would come up to me to talk, and sure it’s great, and lovely to hear them talk about the old days of the Crescent,” says Syd.

“I enjoyed the Showband Era very much, but my favourite time was the Big Band era of the 40’s and 50’s.”

Syd foresaw the demise of the Showband era at the end of the 1960’s, so he bought the land near Brick Island in 1968, and built a harbour, and the Jolly Mariner nitespot, and ran the venue for about five years.

In July 2001, Syd gained a special honour at Aras an Uactarain from President Mary McAleese for his contribution to the Irish showband scene in the1960’s.

He will always be known as the Syd of the Crescent Orchestra and of Athlone’s own showband – Syd and the Saints! 

Buttons and Bells of the Kiosks

I always remind my neighbour from the housing estate I grew up on, that one time the people of the terrace had to share the telephone at the end of the road.  Nowadays practically all of those people have phones in their pockets.

Telephone and Phonebooth
at Derryglad Museum, Curraghboy, Co. Roscommon
 

The first time I used the telephone kiosk at the end of Assumption Road in Athlone was sometime in the late 70's.  My now deceased mother had asked me to ring the television repair people.  In those days most people were renting televisions, and there always seemed to be loads of breakdowns.
She told me the details on how to make a phonecall from a callbox.  She explained that I had to lift the receiver, put in ten pence (I think that's how much it was then), dial the number on the circular dial, wait for a response, and when that is received, then press a button with the letter A on it.  It was important she said, not to push button A until the person I was calling responded.  If they didn't respond, then and only then, should I push a button with B on it, which would cause the money to drop back to me into a slot.
There was a queue of about four or five people outside the box before I went in, and while I was inside another queue gathered up.  The callbox serviced almost a dozen housing estates, so queues were inevitable.
I could just about reach up to dial the numbers on the telephone dial.
I was proud as punch when I made my first call, and everything went well.  I did as my mother told me, with the tenpence and Button A, and had no reason to bother with Button B.  It was so exciting to be talking to another person on the telephone, and it was like something I’d only seen on television to that point.  It was a voice on a machine, yet it was a human voice.  To a child of that time, that was amazing.
I was so excited when I went back to the house, that I asked my mother was there any other call I could make for her.  But sadly for me, there wasn’t.
In those days, it was pretty rare to see a phone kiosk empty, and a queue of at least one person outside.  Most people didn’t have phones in their houses up to the early 1990’s, and mobile phones were totally non-existent when I was a child.  So therefore the main means of communicating to people who were quite a distance away was by the public telephone.
Almost every housing estate had a phone kiosk with a telephone book, but the trouble was, bleeps would be played on the phone before the customer had used up their three minute allocation of time talking.  After that, the customer had to search frantically for coins to be put back in the slot, to prevent the call line from being cut off.
Sadly at times, many of the phones were vandalised, which was more than a pity, because many times these phones made a difference in whether a doctor or ambulance would arrive at a patients home in time to save them from illness or death.
Friendships were made outside the phone box, and there was more than a few arguments about who belonged where in the queue.  Also many people gave the phone number of the phone box on their application forms when they were looking for a job.  People in England and the USA who had family members on our road, would also have the phone’s number and would use it to contact their family.  Their family members would wait inside the phone box if they were lucky, and if it wasn’t in use, to receive the calls.  If they were unlucky it could be a cold wait outside waiting for the person inside to finish their call. 
Booking a taxi couldn’t be easier at that time thanks to the phone boxes, but if you made an appointment with another person you had to turn up on time.  There was no luxury of sending texts on mobile phones excusing yourself for being late, and telling the other person you’d be there soon. 
In the short few years since that time, it’s amazing how much has changed.  Certainly mobile phones are in the possession of almost every person in the land.  The remaining kiosks lie empty throughout the land, and one by one they are disappearing.
But I’ll never forget the excitement of talking for the first time to a human being from that machine at the end of the housing estate.

 

 

 

 

Sun Returns Rocks To Hodson Bay Island

The sun shone today in the Irish midlands, and brought back the group of rocks which exist in front of Hodson Bay Island in South Roscommon.

The rocks had disappeared sometime in the long wet spring and summer of 2012 and had not being seen since.  However a freezing cold, but dry March 2013 have brought back the rocks from the depth of Lough Ree.

Is this an omen of a hot Irish summer in the midlands this year?

Ireland’s Count McCormack Honoured in Liverpool Museum

McCormack Record in Liverpool Museum

 

It seems like a good deed is never forgotten, at least in the case of Athlone’s World Famous tenor, John 'Count' McCormack – who is proudly remembered in Liverpool for helping to build the city’s majestic catholic cathedral.

During WW1, McCormack, who was born in the Bawn in Athlone, and who spent his childhood and early adulthood in the town, began a tour of UK provincial cities, starting with Liverpool, in aid of the Red Cross.

However it was in May 1932, one month before he sang at the High Mass at the Eucharistic Congress in Phoenix Park, Dublin, that John McCormack gave a great gift to Liverpool by singing and recording ‘Hymn to Christ the King’.  The record was issued as a single-sided disc to be sold in aid of the building fund of Liverpool’s Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King.  On one side of the disc was, side by side, pictures of the Archbishop of Liverpool, and McCormack’s favourite portrait of himself. 

The old 78 speed record, with pictorial jacket, is on display at the Museum of Liverpool Life, which is in Albert Dock in the city.  The disc is viewed by the thousands of tourists who visit the famous museum every year.

In September 1932, McCormack gave a concert in the Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool in aid of the building of the cathedral.  It was an immense success, and had an audience of more than 2,500 people.

The Athlone tenor sang two arias and four songs before the interval.  It was the first occasion that he would give a public performance of ‘Hymn to Christ the King’.  McCormack was accompanied on the organ by the composer, Vincent O’Brien.

Raymond Foxhall, writing about the concert in his 1963 biography of McCormack, paints a little known picture of the tenor:

‘He detected the sound of people beating time with their feet.  He stopped singing and said angrily: “Stop padding your feet.  I really cannot sing with that noise.”

He completed the song and left the platform for a short rest.  The hall was filled to capacity, but a further 200 people had been allowed to sit on the platform to hear him.  When he returned he showed his displeasure for the feet-stamping by turning his back on the main audience and singing the next song to those on the platform.

On another occasion a woman in the gallery was always a few moments ahead of everyone else with her ‘Bravo’ and when he was singing Eric Coates ‘Bird Songs at Eventide’ she got his last two lines drowned by applause.  He glared up at the gallery and there was no further interruption of his songs’.