Pages Past: Bishop compliments students building boats at night school

Westmeath Examiner April 9 2016

Crime figures fall

The number of burglaries in Westmeath and the number of incidents of damage to property and the environment fell substantially between 2014 and 2015, figures released by the Central Statistics Office had shown.

Up, “substantially”, however, were controlled drug offences, which registered at 356 in 2014 but 451 in 2015.

The figures showed that the number of burglary and related offences in Westmeath in 2014 had come to 578, while the figure for 2015 was down to 339. The figures also showed that under the heading of damage to property and the environment, there were 560 offences recorded in 2014 and 466 in 2015.

Public order offences were largely static (632 in 2015 and 644 in 2014).

Westmeath Examiner April 8 2006

Flash glasses!

Celebrities such as Prince Albert of Monaco, singer Enrico Iglesias and FI names Eddie Jordan and David Coulthard were all wearers of sunglasses made in Mullingar, our issue of April 8 2006 reported.

Oakley Optical Ireland Ltd, was the manufacturer of prescription lenses for frames in the Oakley range – which had just taken a major leap forward with the introduction of the RAZRwire selection, which had an embedded Motorola mobile phone Bluetooth wireless headset included.

John Russell, managing director of Oakley Optical Ireland Ltd, revealed that while just 27 people were employed at the Mullingar facility, in the last year alone, they had handled 36,000 jobs.

A photo accompanying the article showed some of the staff lined up outside the company’s premises at Clonmore – each wearing sunglasses. The staff were Sinead Charles, Seamus Byrne, Enda Begley, Jurate Aleksejunaite, Marie Mulligan, Louise Grimes, Orla Killian, Margaret Mallen-O’Connell, Eimear O’Brien, Siobhán Courtney, Aidan O’Rourke, Krzusztof Duda, Maciek Rak, Krzusztof Lachowski, Alan Rooney, Tom Conway, Niall Henry and John Russell.

Westmeath Examiner April 13 1996

The £100,000 house

“The phenomenon of the £100,000 house is fast disappearing” was the subhead to the front page lead story in which Westmeath auctioneers were stating that in terms of property sales, it was currently a sellers’ market.

“More new houses were built in Westmeath during 1995 than at any other time in the last five years, according to the Department of the Environment, which has issued statistics showing that a total of 742 houses – 400 local authority and 342 private – were completed in the county last year,” stated the intro, describing this as a pointer to the fact that the property market was thriving.

Auctioneers interviewed for the item stated that both new and secondhand houses were selling better than ever, prices were skyrocketing, and even the cost of agricultural land was on the way up.

The article indicated that houses were now beginning to sell for more than £100,000, and auctioneer Jimmy Murtagh said that two or three years previously, there were few houses, even in the town of Mullingar, that would sell for £100,000.

Westmeath Independent April 11 1986

O’Byrne Cup progress

There was much delight in sporting circles after Westmeath defeated Longford 1-11 to 0-7 to qualify for the final of the O’Byrne Cup.

The Westmeath side, described as “very young and determined”, included nine players who were under 21 years of age, and the journalist who covered the match against Longford said that the margin was fully deserved and would give the Westmeath squad a new-found confidence after their dismal National League Division 3 campaign, when they failed to register a single point.

“Now the midlanders will meet Wicklow in the final and if Westmeath play as well as they did last Sunday, they are in with a great chance of lifting their first major trophy for quite some time,” stated the writer.

The Westmeath team were: S McGuire, P Murtagh, T Darcy, G Walker, M Kelly, A Collins, M Fagan (0-3), T Ormsby, T McCormack, B McCabe (0-1), S Murphy (0-2), P McWade, P Walsh (1-1), S Hynes (0-2) and L Giles (0-2). Subs: P Murray for Walker; C Flanagan for McWade and N Lynch for Murtagh.

Westmeath Examiner April 10 1976

Multyfarnham Community Games

Multyfarnham Community Games Committee held their annual general meeting and the chairman, Michael Donohoe, in his address thanked everyone for help given during the year, before going on to pay tribute to Very Rev Fr McManus, PP, Multyfarnham for the use of the school; to the Franciscan Friary for the use of the field for training and for sports day and for the use of the handball alley; the teachers for their co-operation throughout the year and the local GAA Club who gave so much of their time in training the juvenile football teams.

He thanked Rev Bro Hugh for training the handball teams, Tommy Hatchet, the trainer of the soccer team and all who supplied transport for evening games and on the day of the sports.

The secretary, Michael Leavy, complimented the parents who had taken an interest in the games and he urged more parents to help out this year as he felt that Multyfarnham could participate in other games if the committee had more help.

The following committee were elected for the coming year: President, Very Rev Fr McManus; Vice-President, Rev Ulick Troy, OFM, Chairman, Michael Downes; Vice-Chairman, Patrick Wallace; Secretary, Michael Leavy; Assistant Secretary, Mrs R Gaffney, Treasurer, Tommy Keogh; PRO, Jimmy Nally; Delegates to County Board, Mrs. Tierney, Patrick Wallace, Patrick Leavy and Jimmy Nally.

Westmeath Examiner April 9, 1966

Ambassador ordered boat

A short item in the issue of April 9, 1966, revealed that the American ambassador to Ireland, Mr HJ Guest, had placed an order with the rehabilitation section of St Loman’s Hospital, Mullingar, for a boat. His order followed the section’s success in a recent Esso boat-building competition in Dublin, which had been recounted in the previous week’s issue of the Westmeath Examiner.

That earlier report noted that members of the mental health board, at their monthly meeting, paid tribute to the hospital staff. Mr J Sweeney, MCC, chairman, said he wished to congratulate Peter Caffrey and the patients on winning a prize in the Esso competition, describing it as a remarkable achievement.

At the same meeting, members also congratulated the players and staff involved in the St Loman’s pantomime, and extended special praise to its driving force, the chaplain, Rev W Cleary.

Westmeath Independent April 14, 1956

Night students complimented on boats

Boats were also in the news 10 years earlier with an account in the Westmeath Independent of how the Bishop of Meath, Most Reverend Dr Kyne, had blessed 10 boats which had been built by night students of Mullingar Vocational School. A blessing ceremony had taken place at Cleary’s Auction House, Mullingar, on Thursday evening of the previous week.

The report stated that the boats, which were completed in about six months, were a credit to all concerned and the workmanship won high praise from the many notable guests present at the ceremony. His Lordship was assisted by Very Reverend W Quinn, Administrator, St Mary’s Athlone, Chairman of the Vocational Committee and Reverend J Dermody, CC Mullingar. The boats cost the students approximately £25 each to make.

After the blessing, Fr Quinn thanked the Bishop for performing the ceremony. He paid tribute to the instructor, Harry Waters Athlone, and to the students, many of whom had no previous experience even of carpentry work.

This boat-building class, he stated, was the greatest venture the Vocational Education Committee had ever undertaken. Athlone, a town with a boat-building tradition, was “only in the ha’penny place” compared with Mullingar.

Mr T Grennan, Senior Inspector, representing the Department of Education, described the boats made in the Mullingar class as being among the best he had seen turned out at any class.

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Anyone recognise any of these young boatbuilders?

Irish Independent April 9, 1946

The remaking of a myth

An item in the Irish Independent described how, at a BBC competition for children the previous week, one question asked was: from what tree does an Irishman cut his shillelagh?

The children made no response.

The questioner then ventured a supplementary query as to whether they knew what a shillelagh was. Again there was silence, whereupon the quizmaster volunteered that it was a cudgel or stick, “not always used for peaceful purposes”.

The writer remarked that the children in the competition must not have seen their grandparents’ albums of English picture postcards; otherwise, they might have recognised the stereotypical Irishman, complete with pipe in his hat, turning a pig out of the drawing room at the point of a shillelagh.

No doubt, the writer continued, if Irish children had been asked the same question, they might have shown similar ignorance, but for a different reason. They would never have encountered this supposedly warlike weapon, which, he contended, existed only in English comic papers and in the Oxford Dictionary.

Whatever may be said of the BBC, there was, he added, some excuse for the New Zealand visitors who, on recently seeing Dublin youngsters hurling on a piece of waste ground, begged permission to handle one of the “shillelaghs”.