Lifestyle

Until recent times in Ireland, it was the community midwives who were entrusted as the ‘baby-catchers’, their hands welcoming almost everyone into the world.

IN December 1974, Feakle jumped onto the front line of world news when it was used as the venue for secret talks between a group of clergymen from Northern Ireland and senior members of the IRA. Present were Dr Arthur Butler, Dr Jack Weir, Rev Ralph Baxter and Rev William Arlow. It is suggested that Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, Daithí O’Connell, Máire Drumm, Seamus Loughran, Billy McKee, Seamus Toomey, Kevin Mallon and JB O’Hagan were in attendance.

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By John Rainsford AS the Government debates the proposed extension of Limerick City into Clare, an amazing story of early 20th century emigration reveals that the spirit of adventure has no boundaries. Christina Madden (née McMahon) departed for New York on board the SS Teutonic, which she boarded at Queenstown (Cobh) on April 28, 1910. She was just 19 years old and registered as being from Rhebouge (Rhebogue) in County Clare when she set first foot on American soil, bypassing Ellis Island, on May 5, 1910. A cursory examination of the Townlands Index (1851) published by Her Majesty’s (HM) Stationary Office in 1861, however, reveals that Reboge, as it was then called, lay clearly within the confines of Limerick. The location is confirmed in the Census of 1911, when it is referred to as Rebogue and in the 1923 Census, where it is called Rhebogue. Indeed, Christina was joined later by her future husband, John J Madden, who had stayed …

THIS Thursday night will mark 21 years of Mike Gardiner’s County Corner – the ever-popular country music programme on Clare FM that started the week the radio station first broadcast to the people of Clare.It’s a big celebration for the show’s presenter, Ennis man Mike Gardiner, who has grown and developed the show since 1989. “I started in Clare FM the weekend after the station started and I’ve been there ever since. The show was originally called County, Irish and Oldies. I had worked for some time in a pirate radio station in County Limerick called Galtee Radio, with a country and folk show, so that was the kind of show I was taken on by Clare FM to present. It was seen at the beginning as a temporary filler but 21 years on I’m still here. The name changed many years ago to Country Corner and it’s purely country music that I play – Irish country, American country, country …

PATRICK Kavanagh was a self-educated man who became one of our great poets of the last century. His father was a small farmer and cobbler and Kavanagh left national school at 13 years of age. He was apprenticed to a shoemaker but he abandoned the trade after one year when he himself claimed that he had not even succeeded in making one wearable pair of shoes. As one person wrote, he was more destined to toil in the stony grey soil of Monaghan than to write about it. He spent the next 20 years working on the family farm.In his spare time he wrote some poetry. He had left school with an interest in literature and wrote about the scenery, land and everyday life of his native Iniskeen. His early poetry was published in his local newspaper in the 1930s. The London publishers Macmillans published his first book of poetry Ploughman and Other Poems in 1936 and they encouraged him …

COAL and turf are two forms of traditional solid fuels but as is widely known now, fossil fuels damage the environment. In addition, of course, they are not renewable. The alternative, environmentally friendly options for solid fuels are made from trees and plants and are called biofuels. When these fuels burn, they give off carbon dioxide and this would at first seem like it is bad for the environment (burning fossil fuels, like oil, coal and turf, give off carbon dioxide damaging our environment).The difference for these solid fuels, is that they can be regrown and replanted. As the new plants reduce the carbon dioxide again, biofuels are seen as being carbon neutral. It is important to use an efficient way of burning the fuel to avoid a huge percentage of the energy produced being wasted. Efficient boilers and stoves are far better at not wasting this heat and energy, so using a well-designed boiler and insisting on a quality …

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