Excellent documentary featuring young and old Offaly people screened in local village

AN excellent documentary featuring a number of local people was shown in the community centre in Shannon Harbour last Wednesday.

It was organised by Offaly Local Development Company and involved school children interviewing mature residents from Clara, Edenderry and Shannon Harbour. Their brief was to ask about life growing up in Offaly, changes they have seen, improvements or not!, young people today and how they could improve their prospects.

Both generations really impressed me. The younger generation with their respect and the mature with their memories of the past. The wit was fulsome. The technical set up and ambience of the recording was very professional.

Having to leave school at the age of 10 or 12 and no secondary education was often mentioned, as was going to England at a very young age to work as families were poor and large. There was malnutrition during the war years and even in the 1950’s there was no fruit or sugar with the rationing books.

Sport was hurling and football. Children had to help in the mornings before school, delivering milk or paper rounds. In the 1950s houses had tilly lamps to read by, before electricity arrived in the area.

Maggie Kent recalled that they were the only family with a television in Shannon Harbour and everybody used to pile into the house to watch county matches. Sandwiches and tea would be consumed with gusto. Emily Scanlon was from a large family in Clara. Three of her family won All Ireland football medals, but don’t mention the Lowry or Darby names in Kerry! John Hogan from Raheen spent 17 days in Mountjoy for protesting against the government policy to deny farmers their rights.

In terms of society, it was very close knit and people knew everybody else and helped each other. Michael Galvin remembered cycling to dances and Emily Scanlon used to sing in a dance band with three lads. They were paid £7, she didn’t drink but the money had gone by the time they packed up the van!!!

Patsy Gunning said there were no phones or social media. He regretted that fewer children knew about nature, birds, nests and trees. Mind you Shannon harbour is one of the best bird watching areas in Europe according to an expert, so the material is there. Martin Rourke from Banagher recalled the railway station and the hotels. One person was growing cabbages and hung up balloons to ward off hungry pigeons. Finn Reynolds went to work in England at 14 along with a lot of youngsters from Ireland.

Most advised youngsters to get as much education as they could, academic, trade or technical, to assist them for employment. Maggie Kent, a senior nurse and administrator by profession worked, volunteered and organised medics and charity workers in Lebanon and Syria. She refurbished the family home and doesn’t really have many regrets about life, which most mature people concurred with.

Thanks to Shirley and Dermot McIntyre for organising the event and providing food and refreshments in McIntyre's pub.

Thanks to all the participants for an enlightening and memorable documentary.

The full list of participants in the intergenerational documentary were as follows:

Shannonharbour Students: Darren Nevin, Lauren Bowe, Áine Reilly, Cameron O'Sullivan, Liam Harrington, Darragh Staunton, Sean Lyons.

Interviewees: Kieran Turley, Martin Rourke, Maggie Kent

Clara Students: Chloe Russell, Arthur Sochaki, Codi Connell.

Interviewees: Owen Clyne, Emily Scanlon, John Hogan.

Daingean Students: Harry O'Meara, Finn Reynolds, Marcus Daly.

Interviewees: John Canton, Patsy Gunning, Kathleen Reynolds, Michael Galvin.

The project was co-ordinated by members of Offaly Local Development Company’s Social Inclusion Team, Louise Larkin, Declan Costello and Hazel Daly. Hello Camera were the production company and these screenings are one of OFFLine Film Festival’s outreach initiatives. The whole project is funded through the Social Inclusion and Community Activation Programme, which is co-funded by the Government of Ireland and the European Union.