There is an anti-Irish feeling so predominant among the English members [of parliament] as to render them totally unfit to legislate for Ireland – Daniel O’Connell to William Trant Fagan, 26 October 1833 Michael O’Donohoe’s innocuous note on Dromultan Estate opens up volumes in Irish history. The name associates with Thomas Browne,…… Continue Reading
Hotels in and about Castleisland
Michael O’Donohoe plotted the development of hotels in the town of Castleisland from the late eighteenth century. Among the earliest inns documented are Bailey’s Hotel and Meredith’s Hotel. Others named include Brandon Arms Hotel, Chute Arms Hotel, Castle View Hotel (or Scannell’s/Hartnett’s Hotel), Coffey’s Commercial Hotel, Brosnan’s Temperance Hotel, Fitzgerald’s Imperial Hotel, McCrehan’s Star…… Continue Reading
Castleisland Fever Hospital & Dispensaries
A fever hospital operated in Castleisland during the Famine. At a meeting of the Tralee Union in December 1847, Captain Fairfield of Mount Eagle raised concerns about its management.1 Research material in the collection relates to the fever hospital at a later period, 1878 (in which year a temporary hospital was erected) to 1894,…… Continue Reading
Creamery Lane, Castleisland
A number of pithy essays by Michael O’Donohoe sit among the vast quantity of papers in the collection. Topics covered are wide in variety, for example, the GAA, Lord Headley, the Moonlighters, the House of Progress, Sir Richard Griffith and Creamery Lane.1 Creamery Lane, transcribed below, is an affectionate reminder of times…… Continue Reading
Dooneen Water Supply
The great public protest of recent years over Uisce Éireann would have been water off a duck’s back to Michael O’Donohoe. His archive included a study of the supply of water to Castleisland. As far back as 1874, the public was far from content with the idea of paying for the utility. At…… Continue Reading
Directory of Castleisland
Michael O’Donohoe created his own nineteenth century directory of Castleisland to form an image of the town in commercial and residential context.1 His 27-pg handwritten directory, which covers the period 1846 to 1917, was formed from existing sources including Slater’s, Guy’s, Kelly’s and Macdonald’s Irish Directory and Gazetteer of 1917. Michael arranged the…… Continue Reading
Church of St Stephen and St John, Castleisland
The Michael O’Donohoe archive contains a study of Castleisland parish church, Church of St Stephen and St John. In 1878, Most Rev Dr M’Carthy, Bishop of Kerry, spoke of the ‘great want’ of a parochial church in Castleisland during a visitation there.1 The church that then existed was described as ‘very seedy looking’…… Continue Reading
Castleisland Schools: Presentation Convent Girls
‘They shall shine like stars for all eternity in the Kingdom of His saints’ – Very Rev Monsignor Tobias Kirby, Rector of the Irish College, Rome, congratulating the Presentation nuns on founding a convent at Lixnaw in 1877 A 102-pg registration book for Castleisland Convent School Girls dating from the 1860s to 1947 forms…… Continue Reading
Patrick O’Keeffe
The approaching annual autumnal Patrick O’Keeffe Festival in Castleisland provides opportunity to present material on this subject from the collection. The foundation of the festival, now in its 23rd year, was sketched by John Reidy: Noted piper, Peter Browne arrived in Castleisland late in 1992 and began researching the life and times of O’Keeffe for RTE…… Continue Reading
Irish National Land League
Castle Island … a village which has attained the unenviable notoriety of being considered about the worst in the country1 During the Land War, a reporter for the Illustrated London News stated there were ‘four roads going out of Castle Island, on every one of which a man has been shot within the last four…… Continue Reading