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Carlow County - Ireland Genealogical Projects (IGP TM)

The changing face of Carlow town


Source: CARLOVIANA 2017 Edition No. 65 Page 56

The changing face of Carlow town

by Margaret O’Rourke

Remembering Carlow from the time of my childhood - up to the present - is like painting a picture, one of those complex ones by modern artists. Memories come in spurts, forgotten things re-surface in the mind.

For many people 'the old days' were the best of times and all things modern destroyed the quality of life.' But while that is partially true, it is not the whole story.

There were many wonderful things about the simplicity of life back then but there was also a lot of hardship. One area that has improved greatly is that of housing. Today so many people have homes to be proud of - it was not always so. Most people back then lived in houses owned by private landlords - low rents and no maintenance!

Of course, there were others who owned their own homes with beautiful gardens and bathrooms. The latter was something that most people didn't enjoy until the 5Os and 6Os, thanks to local authority housing. Before that some houses were little more than hovels and yet fine families were reared in them.

Sadly, this great housing initiative slowed down and today, Carlow, like the rest of the country, has very many people in need of affordable accommodation. Back then, faith in God was an intrinsic part of all our lives and people thought little about the future. Enough for today was the motto.

Because the town was smaller, everyone knew everyone else and good neighbours abounded. People shared their troubles and were not too proud to borrow a cup of sugar! Today's world has less to offer in that direction. Then as now, the well to-do and the poor lived in different worlds but it wasn't as simple as that.

The less well-off came in many shades and were determine to keep their foothold in where they stood in the community. When it came to marrying, it was very important to stay at your own level or move up a rung. White collar workers were looked on with respect as not having to get their hands dirty and wearing the good suit every day was seen as a sign of success!

I hasten to add that most of this had changed before I was a young thing, going to the Ritz Ballroom three times a week and open for romance without too much checking on the fellows' occupations.

By that time, the criteria were largely good manners, a nice voice, clean fingernails and the ability to do the Tango! Remembering Carlow from that time, the mind swings to the centre of the town itself - Tullow St., Dublin St., and all the interesting side streets that opened off them. What a lovely, vibrant memory of fine, elegant shops, with the families who owned them all living above the business premises.

These were living streets where people shopped and chatted during the days and walked for pleasure in the evenings. Everything you could possibly want was available in the town centre plus the irreplaceable bonus of friendly service from familiar faces. So what happened? Because this, as anyone who walks these streets knows, is no longer the case.

So many fine, long-established shops are no more, very many boarded up – the final indignity. And what of the people who served us with such friendliness and efficiency? The simple answer is that large, anonymous supermarkets took their place. The effect on the town has been devastating.

Let's take a look at the Shamrock Square and ask, as I do, how Doyle's fine, well stocked shops were replaced by The Plaza, a structure totally unsuited to a country town? Across the road stand two burned out very old buildings that were once a sub-post office and a grocery. These derelict buildings have been allowed to dominate the top of our town for a great number of years and are, I believe, under a preservation order. Just what is being done to preserve them?

Walk down a little further and look with the greatest nostalgia at Mary Teresa Kelly's shop, now boarded up. Mary never let any child go out without a handful of sweets and she had a kitchen chair in one corner of the shop where your mother could sit down and take a rest while you gazed at all the glass cases with delight I could go on but it is too depressing - gone The Coliseum cinema, the Nationalist office, a historic building and one that belonged in the main street, the Ritz cinema and dance hall and all the families that once lived over their shops.

Dublin St., lost a treasure when the venerable and beautiful Royal Hotel was knocked down to make way for a car park (despite, I believe, a preservation order being in place) and what of the old Technical School, a gift to the town from George Bernard Shaw? Enough of that, let the reader fill in the many gaps. But surely, somebody should have shouted 'stop'. All of this deterioration didn't happen overnight - it took years to bring these fine streets to their present stagnant state.

The Courthouse, a magnificent building of which we are all proud, is on the way to being another casualty as the fine, unique railings that surround it are being allowed to be eaten away by rust. One day soon they will have to be taken down 'for safety reasons' just as the fine trees that surrounded it were chopped down before an opinion was sought from Coillte as to whether they could be saved or not. Yes, a destructive spirit prevailed where Carlow's town centre was concerned and we must live with the results -or live in hope for the promised renewal.

Our Cathedral was saved from being denuded of some of its finest features by the people of Carlow taking to the streets in protest. The plan was to remove the main altar, the two side altars, the marble communion rails and the gloriously carved pulpit.

Through the public outcry, the altars were saved and portions of the communion rails but the pulpit was sent to the museum. However, the end result is quite beautiful and we can still be proud of our Cathedral. Yet nothing will ever convince me that a space could not have been found for the pulpit, one of the finest in Europe.

Another good development was the siting of the County Library and Carlow Museum in the Presentation School when a fine new school was built on the outskirts of Carlow. Possibly more than anything else, the library now gives a focus to Tullow St, particularly today when a host of interesting activities take place there. And, amazingly, the fine statue of Our Lady has been left in place outside the building, together with a plaque marking the bi-centenary of the arrival of the Presentation Sisters. The museum is also a wonderful asset to the town.

But now, perhaps, it's time to think of things that have definitely improved since the old days. What immediately springs to mind is the difference in local health services since the introduction of the choice of doctor scheme.

Before that, the poor and the sick were served by Carlow dispensary on Church St., a grim building that I ever only glanced into as a child. But a glance was enough.

Stone floor, rows of wooden benches on which the sick waited for the arrival of the doctor. To say it looked a place of cold comfort would be an understatement. To go there, you had to have a Green Card, something my mother never even tried to acquire. However tight the resources, we paid for our visits to the doctor but, let me add, we didn't go for any trifling illness. No, instead, my mother had a goodly assortment of home remedies, including Beecham’s Pills, Aspro, Sloan’s Liniment, Bread soda (for indigestion), hot onions for application when ear ache struck, iodine, Mrs. Cullen's Powders, cough bottles and many more. And, to tell the truth, they worked well!

Later the dispensary moved to a new building on the Green Road but the regime was the same. Ironically this was supposed to be the first leg of Carlow's new hospital, which, of course, was never built. So, all that was accomplished was that people from the farthest corners of the town had to trudge a long journey, often pushing prams with one or two occupants, to avail of the new facility. I don't have to comment on how different things are today when those with medical cards see their own GP in his surgery, by appointment.

And how can one write about Carlow in the old days without mention of the Sugar Factory? It dominated our lives just as its massive chimney dominated the skyline. There was work aplenty particularly during the three or four months of 'the Campaign' when lorries, filled with beet, trundled through our streets, and the air was permeated with the sweet smell of pulp.

Here again one must mention the shopkeepers of the time who gave credit, particularly on foodstuffs, until the money started rolling in.  Without them many families would have gone hungry but the Campaign was coming and the good traders were prepared to wait.

Living on the Dublin Road, the railway station played a big part in our lives - the street coming alive as the trains came in. Hackney cars buzzed up looking for business and horse drawn floats brought heavy goods for dispatch. Streams of passengers passed our doors giving rise to many doorstep chats. The station was also a wonderful place for children to play.

I could not end this random collection of memories without mentioning the transformation that came over St. Dympna's Hospital which began in the late 5Os, due largely to the arrival of RMS Dr. Bertram Blake.

At that time there were over 2OO long term (sometimes lifetime) patients in the hospital. Suddenly all began to change. The enormously high walls came down, the male and female patients were integrated for meal times, tables set for four or six.

One of my first assignments as a very junior reporter was to attend the meetings of the Carlow/Kildare Mental Health Board, so I saw the changes as they happened. The biggest one, perhaps, was the day Dr. Blake announced to the Board that he wanted the farm on the Dublin Road sold. This was met with dismay and strong opposition as all the produce of the farm, which was worked by the patients, went to provide food for the hospital.

But Dr. Blake was determined. This type of work, he said, was not good for the mentally ill, too isolated. For those who wanted outdoor work there was plenty of it around the hospital itself, keeping the grounds in order. He got his way and that stopped the daily truckloads of patients being brought from the hospital to the farm where many spent their time just looking into the hedges. And then there was the matter of the big hall in St. Dympna's, a prime venue for dances featuring all the big bands.

Clubs hired the premises but now there was an added proviso. The organisers were told that they could have the hall but only on the understanding that a list, which Dr. Blake would make out, of patients that were fit to go dancing, would be admitted. This was done.

No doubt many more changes went on inside the hospital, many due to some new drugs which happily had come on the market, but one thing is certain St. Dympna's was never the same again.

Perhaps there's a plaque somewhere to Dr. Blake's contribution, if not, there should be.

But then so many fine characters helped shape our town, many whose names are forgotten. Even as I end this article other spurts of memory are flooding my mind.

Time, perhaps, to turn off the tap - for now!

My thanks to John Shortall and the County Library for their help.

Source: CARLOVIANA 2017 Edition No. 65 Page 56


Source: Carloviana Vol. 2. No. 28. Year 1980. Page 56.

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