East Clare

The inaugural Mountshannon traditional music weekend kicks off next Friday to Sunday September 24-26 in conjunction with the Mountshannon Hotel and is organised by Cliodhna Donnellan.

SCARIFF native Fr Martin Bugler left Ireland’s shores for New Zealand on November 4, 1958, the day of Pope John XXIII’s papal inauguration but he returned home to coincide with a number of other historical and memorable occasions. Fr Bugler has been based in Helensville/Haupai in northern New Zealand, close to Auckland, since 1958 but is currently in Scariff, where he is visiting. The Scariff priest had three special events happening in Ireland that led him home, the first being the international reunion at the former seminary at St Patrick’s College in Thurles. The second “highlight” as he refers to it, was that of the golden jubilee of his sister as a Sister of Mercy, while an added bonus to his visit was attending the ordination of the new Bishop of Killaloe, Kieran O’Reilly. Speaking to The Clare Champion, he recounted leaving Scariff for his new home, a six-week long voyage away. “Growing up here, in Scariff, one must remember …

EAST Clare resident, entrepreneur, author, farmer, fire fighter, there are many titles that could be used to describe Emelyn Heaps but three words, which form the title of his autobiography set it all out – Heaps of Trouble.

AN East Clare man, Ruairí Costello has won the first official World Fly Casting Championship, held in Norway recently.

Scariff native Margaret Kelly nee McNamara recently celebrated her 108th birthday in the USA. Born in June 1902, Margaret currently resides at the Pines Nursing Home in Glens Falls, New York, about 50 miles north of Albany, having emigrated to the United States in 1918, when she was just 16 years of age. Following receipt of her eighth commemorative coin and ninth signed letter from President Mary McAleese, Margaret gave an interview to the Irish Voice publication in New York where she regaled them with tales from her youth in County Clare and taking the boat to a brave new world. Margaret has a number of relatives still living in Ireland and her nephew Noel McNamara continues to hold the family farm in Clonusker, Scariff. Noel and his sister Eileen visited Margaret and her older sister Nellie in New York 12 years ago just after Nellie celebrated her 103rd birthday. Eileen, who now lives in Dublin, but whose daughter returned …

THE parish priest in Tulla received some interesting post last week after it was thought he had a secret line to the person or persons occupying Tulla graveyard.An ESB bill addressed to “The Occupant, Tulla Graveyard, Tulla” made its way to Fr Martin O’Brien last Thursday after the local postman was confused as to which occupant in the cemetery he was supposed to deliver it to.  Fr O’Brien said, “the local postman obviously amused and amidst considerable local amusement wondered who was the occupant and in the fun decided to deliver it to me. I suspect he thought I had a line to the occupants”.While the letter to the unknown occupant of the graveyard caused a local stir and spurred plenty of jokes around Tulla there was a serious side to the matter and the community remembered the late Brian Culloo who spearheaded the committee that lead to the graveyard being so nicely lit.A number of years ago the local …

The community of Whitegate has rallied around the parents of four-year-old Andrew Burke, who suffers from a rare condition known as neuphratic syndrome, and in doing so raised almost €5,000 for the Temple Street Renal Play Fund.

Upgrade work is expected to begin in the next couple of weeks on the Connaught Road and in the Connaught Road Estate, which has been described locally as “long overdue”.