As 2024 draws to a close, Castleisland District Heritage looks back at what the year has given and, sadly, taken away. The year got off to a good start when the project was granted funds by the Heritage Council for a new (and soon to be launched) website, and assistance with the transcription of the Roll Books from the Castleisland convent schools. The transcription and scanning work has been helped by Transition Year students from St Patrick’s School and also by a French student from Paris Cité University working under the CTL project.
This year, the project entered its tenth year since foundation which was celebrated in August during National Heritage Week with an Exhibition in St Brigid’s Hall and Castleisland Library. The family of the late Michael O’Donohoe (on whose research the project is founded) assisted greatly in the production of an article, Profile of Michael O’Donohoe, Castleisland Historian with Co Clare Roots.
Visitors to the Office
Our Visitors Book is testimony to the great number of visitors we have welcomed in the course of the year from America, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and of course Ireland and the UK. Many come seeking help with their genealogy, some utilizing DNA technology to seek out ancestors. It is notable that the visitors find accommodation locally and might be described as a new generation of heritage tourists. Articles on our website – more than thirty published this year – show that the ‘heritage tourists’ are happy to contribute stories about their family researches to us.
Ongoing Projects
Volumes II (2022) and III (2023) of the Catalogue of Castleisland District Heritage have been printed and bound. Volume IV (2024) is now complete and Vol V is underway. Our ongoing projects include the poetry of Moss Tommy Reidy, which was promoted in local schools earlier this year, and the writings of the late Con Houlihan, about whom a number of articles were posted on our website including ‘Spotlight on Reineen: An Outline of Con Houlihan’s Ancestry.’ The Presentation Convent archive is now underway with the transcription of the school Roll Books. The unmarked headstone of Castleisland historian T M Donovan, whose Popular History of East Kerry was the subject of a recent radio broadcast in America, is a project also to be tackled if funding can be sourced.
Donations
A great number of books, photographs, documents and manuscripts have found place in our archive this year. A recent contribution from Maurice Walsh includes a 1950s play by the late Timothy ‘Mutt’ Murphy, Adrift in the Night. Chris McMorran, brother of the late historian Russell McMorran, travelled to Ireland and contributed additional material by his late brother and a number of copies of the valuable Pictorial History of Tralee.
Local Publications
John Roche launched his book, Terryfaha, in early 2024 and it has proved to be invaluable in directing enquirers who seek to learn the context of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in the locality. It has been highly praised by scholars including Professor of History Dr Bill Storey of Mississippi who plans to visit the town again in early 2025. Tom Dowling launched a book, Just Go, in early 2024 and his mother, Kathleen, has done likewise in late 2024 with Holy Water by Helicopter, a selection of the homilies of her late brother, Fr Ben. Castleisland District Heritage contributed an article about Poff and Barrett to The Kerry Magazine and our second calendar about local achievers designed by project illustrator Noel Nash went on sale this month.
Poff and Barrett
Castleisland District Heritage also produced a small booklet, Poff and Barrett: A Nineteenth Century Tragedy in anticipation of the favourable outcome of our application for the Posthumous Pardons of Sylvester Poff and James Barrett. The announcement came in April, and on 30 October 2024, the two condemned men were finally exonerated of the crime of murder by President Michael D Higgins at Áras an Uachtaráin – to the sheer delight of descendants of both families who gathered for the occasion. Since then the committee has met to discuss the erection of a memorial plaque in the grounds of the former prison in Tralee where the remains of the two men lie in unmarked graves. The two Pardons, together with the Pardon of John Twiss in 2021, have been framed and are now on display in the office.
Obituaries
It was with great sadness we learned of the death of Sheila Roche, beloved wife of John Roche, Chairman of Castleisland District Heritage, who passed away after a short illness on 25 May 2024 after sixty-five years together. We were further saddened to learn from Professor Bill Storey, a friend of Castleisland District Heritage, of the death of his 20-year-old son, Graham Wilson Storey, on 30 July 2024. The news of the death of Maurice O’Keeffe, Tralee, on 26 August 2024 reached us with sorrow; Maurice had a passion for local history and was a friend of Castleisland District Heritage.
