Marvellous Margaret celebrates her 100th

Margaret Conroy has a mischievous look in her eyes. These are eyes that have seen the passing of 100 years of history, but retain the glint of youth.

The Kilbeggan centenarian recently received her personal letter from President Michael D Higgins. In that letter Uachtarán na hÉireann, spoke of the remarkable changes to our lives in that time.

At the time of Margaret’s birth, the Shannon Power Scheme are coordinating the building of a giant hydroelectric dam at Ardnacrusha for £5.2 million. George Bernard Shaw is awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature and in a few months time, and 100 miles up the road, Charles James Haughey will be born in Castlebar.

Since then we’ve had the Great Depression, World War II, the emergence of mass media, space travel, the rise and fall of the Berlin Wall, the internet and all the while Margaret has grown up, met her husband and raised her three sons; Tom, Ben and Gerald.

In his letter, President Higgins thanked Margaret for her contribution, adding his best wishes for the big day saying: “I hope you will be surrounded by the warmth of happy memories and secure in the knowledge that you continue to make this world a better place for all who love you.”

The big day was a family occasion, and Margaret’s three children and 12 grandchildren were on hand to celebrate wit her.

“My granny lived to be 94, so the gene is in there,” Margaret’s son, Tom Conroy, told the Examiner about the family’s longevity.

“It came and went,” Margaret described the fleeting nature of the last century, “but being 100 isn’t that much of change. I’ve had a good life. I think life is what you make it.”

Growing up in Ballydaly, Tullamore, she was one of eight children: “I was reared on a farm. I had to work. I went to school in Kilbeggan and after that I got a job for myself.

“Because there was a good few of us in the family, I was told ‘get yourself a little job’, and so I did. There were plenty of ups and downs.”

Among the ups for Margaret were the dances of her youth: “I enjoyed going to dances. There were lots of them back then. I knew my husband for a while before we married, but we met up at a dance.”

The couple first came to each other’s attention at the St James’s Hall, on the old Dublin Road, Kilbeggan. Built in 1944, during ‘The Emergency’, St James’s Hall still retains many original features and represents a period of history when little was being built in rural Ireland.

“It’s gas, that’s where I met Catherine, my wife, as well,” Tom says of the community centre.

During the courtship the couple attended more dances in the area as their romance blossomed. “Before I married and became a farmer’s wife I was working,” Margaret said of taking up the role of a clerk with John Kelly’s in Tullamore. The job required her to know shorthand and typing.

She worked there from the age of 17: “Unfortunately, it’s gone now. It was a very popular place back in the day. It was a hardware shop, a pub, a shop, you name it – it had everything. It was a one-stop shop.”

Margaret worked in Kelly’s for 12 years up to when she got married: “I was very happy. Life was not like it is now. We had less, but we were content with less.”

Margaret and Bernard moved to the island in Ballycumber, where they rented a house. Then they bought their home Kilbeggan: “The neighbours were very nice when we moved here. It wasn’t like I was moving a great distance.”

Tom described how his mother maintained her own vegetable garden, producing food to feed the family in an era before supermarket abundance. Her hens yielded eggs that she sold to supplement the family income.

The Emergency of the ‘40s was not something that had a significant impact on rural Westmeath: “It didn’t worry me in the slightest. It was one day at a time. Like everything else, it came and went. There were a lot of changes over the years, but we just lived through it, no matter what was happening.”

Times were tight, but the Conroys made the most of what they had. The couple had their first holiday when they went to Kerry for their 25th wedding anniversary. Within five years of that holiday, Bernard was diagnosed with cancer.

The Kilbeggan centenarian says the simpler times made it easier to be happy: “My idea of people that are out now is that they are not happy. I think they want too much, and when they get that, they want more.

“I had to work for everything that I got. There was nothing for nothing. My husband died young, but I had to take that as it comes. You have to take those things as they come.”

The grandmother of 12 enjoys the visits from her children’s children: “They are very good to me. I like all my grandchildren. They visit me and keep me company.”

Margaret said being from a family of eight siblings was a good start in life: “If you come from a big family, it’s a bit different. There is something about it. I think big families like each other better. I’m strong at the moment, whatever the future may bring.”

The tests of the last century have not taken any of the spirit or humour away from Margaret Conroy, she remains a remarkable woman.