by Joe O'Toole
When I got to know Granny O’Toole she was lively, but had mobility problems, suffering greatly from arthritis of the hip. She relied for support on a stick with a crook on it. Although she could not walk without the stick, she seemed constantly busy and on the go. I was always in awe of her and knew that behind her kindly face was a toughness. It is a pity that she never told me her story herself. Maybe I was too young, or more likely she was too forward-looking to be indulging in the past. But it raises the question: how well did I know Granny O’Toole? I would have said very well, only to find, when I began looking under stones and putting the pieces together, that I never knew the woman at all. The same must apply to many of life’s relationships.
How many stories lie undiscovered behind the faces and front doors of those we think we know very well?
A KERRY–GALWAY MATCH
My father’s third-level experience was brief – he went to University College Galway for a week. But, unquestionably, they were an eventful seven days during which he managed to cram in some interesting diversions, including driving a car over the docks and into the harbour! Fortunately, all survived and it would appear that it was his cool-headedness that saved them from fatalities. However, the consensus was that he needed a more disciplined regime than college life.
His mother made enquiries and he was immediately accepted into the Garda Depot in Phoenix Park, which, as well as being Garda Headquarters, was also the training school for new policemen, and from which he eventually emerged as a fully-fledged garda.
My father’s name is Michael O’Toole, or to give him the full moniker by which he grandly introduced himself to my mother – Michael Francis O’Boyle O’Toole, born and reared in Lettermore, County Galway. But he is known to everyone as Myko, probably an anglicised phonic corruption of the Irish Maidhc Ó.
Myko was a bit inclined towards mischief. He was a twin and one of a family of five. After the death of his father, in 1925, his mother had her hands full with the family’s general store and farm and in true Gaelic tradition, Myko was sent to his grandmother in Kilmaine to be reared for a time. He was enrolled in Kilmaine National School and then spent his early secondary school years at the CBS in Ballinrobe. He finished his post-primary education in St Mary’s in Galway.
After completing his garda training, Myko was based in Dublin and billeted in the depot in the Phoenix Park. Myko enjoyed life in Dublin. Among other activities, the young garda took up acting and was reasonably successful. Strong friendships developed over the course of rehearsals and performances and late nights were an essential part of the fun. An O’Casey play was one of the group’s most successful offerings and it got a good run at the Peacock. A major party was planned for the closing night of the play, but as can happen at such times, the celebrations became overenthusiastic and the partying got more than a little out of hand. They were drinking in the Plough bar near the Abbey Theatre, and sure they were only building up an appetite for more when last orders were called. The only hope for more drink was to travel outside the city limits to what was known as a ‘bona fide’ pub, where opening hours were much longer, on the grounds that the customers would be bona fide travellers. Without doubt, this must have been the most abused piece of legislation in the history of the State.
But how would they get there? As luck would have it, there was another garda drinking in the pub who just happened to be the official driver for the then Minister for Education, Tom Derrig. The poor man had been an IRA gunman in a previous time and was one of many who, as part of a fairly progressive initiative, were rehabilitated into positions in the police force or the army at the end of the ‘Troubles’. (Haven’t we the mighty tendency towards the euphemistic in Ireland? While we were killing and maiming each other in what every other country would call a civil war, we refer to that period as the ‘Troubles’.)
Our heroes, Myko and his mates, organised a few generous measures of drink for the already inebriated driver. Drunk and innocent, the unfortunate man was soon persuaded to hand over the keys of the State car to his new friends, two gardaí and a teacher, Séamus Ó Dúda. The official driver was ensconced in the back seat and the unofficial garda driver took over. Off the lads headed, down the Liffey quays, out past Chapelizod and Palmerstown to The Dead Man’s Inn in Lucan. There they stayed and continued the spree, indulging themselves mightily until they were shown the door at a time which was nearer to early morning than late night.
Having made their way homeward, only God knows how, they left the State car in the north city centre, with the key in the ignition and the driver, the former IRA man, sleeping it off in the back seat. Rather than split up, the bosom buddies decided that Ó Dúda should also come back to the barracks. By the time they finally found their way through the Park gates and reached the Garda Depot they were well after the curfew time. You have to remember that this was during the ‘Emergency’, which, because of our neutrality, was the official Irish euphemism for the Second World War, and gardaí were subject to military-style regulations while in the depot. Needless to say, the merry thespians did not have the required late pass.
No problem; it was Ireland, regulations were flexible, the barracks was small and the sentry recognised them, so he was prepared to look the other way. But these boys were in no humour to do the sensible thing and slip quietly into their billets. No sir! High on alcohol, they were ready for more devilment. They demanded that the sentry fire a volley of revolver shots in the air to celebrate closing night and their safe return. Of course he refused, whereupon they proceeded to relieve him of his revolver and emptied the magazine through the roof of the sentry box, finishing the night with a grand finale.
The teacher, Ó Dúda, who was not known to the sentry, was smart enough to make a run for it. But the other two boyos were in serious trouble. There was the inevitable enquiry, followed by disciplinary proceedings. Amazingly, they escaped expulsion from the force, but within days one of them was transferred to Donegal and Myko was on his way to beautiful Kerry. That was how he came to be stationed in Teresa’s county.
Needless to say, I did not hear about this episode from Myko. By pure coincidence, and I suppose because of the nature of my job, three decades later I met that same teacher, Séamus Ó Dúda. He hailed from West Kerry, was as wild as they come and great company. It was he who told me the story of my father’s enforced exile to Kerry, a tale that Myko only grudgingly admitted the truth of over the years.
Teresa Moriarty and Michael O’Toole were married on 17 September 1946 in St Peter and Paul’s Church, Arran Quay, Dublin. You might ask, why Dublin? Well, with one of them from Connemara and the other from West Kerry it could be said that the Dublin venue was convenient to both the Dingle and Lettermore contingents, but possibly the truth would be that it was a neutral spot. And the Dingle crowd were not at all unhappy with the trip to Dublin – it was All Ireland Final week and they would be travelling anyway.
The Dingle party was based in the Four Courts Hotel, just down the quays from the church. Teresa says that herself and Myko had a bit of a tiff on the night before the wedding and that she was on the point of calling the whole thing off. According to herself, she threatened to dump the wedding flowers over the Liffey wall into the river and not get married at all. Obviously, she thought better of it, so she didn’t and they did.
Whatever about the mood of the bride, people generally were in bad humour and Dublin was no place to be that week. It was wet and dismal; the city had been hit by floods and strikes; last-minute wedding shopping was uncomfortable and difficult.
Coincidentally, considering that it would be me who would be leading and managing similar campaigns on its behalf thirty years later, the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO) was in the news, as the political and Church establishments sought to bring to an end its six-month-long teachers’ strike in Dublin. Notices of meetings organised by the INTO to inform the general public of the issues involved decorated the lamp-posts. Placarded picketers patrolled each pr
imary school. The media was praising the INTO for indicating a readiness to accept Archbishop McQuaid’s offer to act as mediator between the union and the government. De Valera and the government were coming in for criticism from parents’ groups and the media for not exhibiting the same willingness. It became the most significant industrial action in the organisation’s 150-year history. It politicised the INTO, to the extent that it immersed itself in the next general election, with the union activists aligning themselves with the newly founded Clann na Poblachta Party against the reigning Fianna Fáil government, which had been in power for more than fifteen years. Fianna Fáil was defeated and Clann na Poblachta went into power as part of Ireland’s first coalition government.
But that all came to pass over the following couple of years. Back to the wedding and the news of the week, and indeed of the month. That September saw the ‘Battle of the Harvest’. The diabolical weather had produced the wettest summer for years, and the harvest was seriously threatened. Much had already been irretrievably lost, and lay rotting in sodden fields. This was at a time in post-war Ireland when food was still being rationed, and people became seriously concerned about food stores for the looming winter. The situation developed into a national crisis. It was a disquieting coincidence that it was exactly one hundred years since the Great Famine, which was still fresh in the folk memory. Everyone was urged to help the farmers. Lorries, cars and buses were organised to transport thousands of city workers out to the farms to bring in the harvest. Predictably enough, they were christened ‘the collar-and-tie brigade’.
Some of the Dingle wedding guests were planning to stay on in Dublin to go to the Roscommon–Kerry All Ireland Final at the weekend. Local heroes Gega Connor and Paddy Bawn Brosnan were playing, and more than a few of the guests had stand tickets. The happy couple were also planning to attend. But, true to form, the GAA was not going to be found wanting at a time of real, patriotic, national endeavour. So they put their shoulders to the national effort by postponing the All Ireland for a fortnight so that the country would not be distracted from the essential business of the harvest. For maximum impact, they allowed the public debate of ‘Will they? Won’t they?’ to foment all week before making the announcement on the Friday. Well done, lads!
Never ones to be left out of the ‘Big Story’, the four Catholic archbishops called for a National Triduum of Prayer as a general act of supplication to the Lord God, seeking a respite from the atrocious weather. The triduum was scheduled to start on Friday, 20 September. Every Catholic was urged to attend. All over Ireland people trooped to the churches and wore out their knees praying. The Litany of Loreto was followed by the Rosary, then Benediction and the Litany of the Saints. The same again on Saturday and Sunday. On Monday, universal thanks was given for the huge support and massive turnout for the triduum.
But in a perfectly mischievous display of precision, irony, or pathetic fallacy, the Good Lord responded the following day with the worst floods of the year. Dublin recorded 2.4 inches of rain, which fell in a fourteen-hour non-stop downpour.
People had to be evacuated from their homes and given temporary accommodation in halls, institutions and colleges, including St Patrick’s Teacher Training College in Drumcondra. In a minor media coup, the INTO opened a Teachers’ Harvest Bureau in their strike headquarters at the Teachers’ Club, Parnell Square. The bureau provided the names of striking teachers who were volunteering to help the farmers with the harvesting. School pickets were reduced in order to provide more helpers and the newspapers carried photographs of the strikers lining up to board lorries to the farms.
Myko and Teresa stuck with their plans and stayed on in Dublin until the weekend, despite the fact that the hard-won All Ireland tickets were now useless. On the Sunday, when they should have been attending the match, they drove west to Mayo. The newly-weds spent the next ten days in the magnificence of Ashford Castle, situated between Loch Corrib and Loch Mask in the beautiful village of Cong, County Mayo. That was considered fairly posh even in those days. The pair enjoyed themselves. Biological and chronological evidence would indicate that I came back from the honeymoon with them. So there it is, a Mayo conception!
A KICKSTART FROM THE POPE
It is more than possible that I was the worst footballer ever to come out of West Kerry, but then my relationship with the footballing world started out very badly.
‘Jesus, we’re going to be late for the match. What in the name of Christ is keeping Hanlon?’
It was the day of the semi-final and the Dingle fans were anxiously awaiting the arrival of local hackney driver, Mr Hanlon. Dingle was enjoying its best-ever decade in Kerry football. We had contested eight and won five county finals in the last ten years, but had not been in the final for the last two years. The blood was up. A good result today and we could be back in the county final, playing John Mitchell’s. Dingle against Tralee! The old enemy. And we had a good chance.
The match was taking place thirty miles away, and the transport options were pretty slim in the years immediately after the war. What few private cars there were all had three in the back and two more on the long bench seat in front beside the driver. Moran’s, Cleary’s and Hanlon’s hackney cars had been booked well in advance by the diehard supporters from Sráid Eoin and The Quay, the two Dingle clubs. Most of them had spent the previous few hours in Neligan’s, or Foxy John’s, or some other pub, illegally fortifying themselves with alcohol for the big event. Now they were gathered on the small bridge at the junction of Main Street and the Mall, waiting for the hackney cars. It was going to be one great day; they had been to Mass, some of them might have a meat sandwich, made from the crusty heel of the loaf, protected in a brown sweet bag and stuffed in a pocket. The talk was of football, and it was confident talk! They did not know it yet, but for some of them their day was about to unravel.
It was Sunday, 20 July 1947 and in a house less than fifty yards away from the bridge, an event that would bring much invective down on the innocent Mr Hanlon had just begun. He was about to get an emergency double-booking. Teresa Moriarty, now O’Toole, already a few weeks overdue on her first baby, went into labour and got into difficulty. She had to be brought to Tralee, and fast.
Myko rushed across the Mall and up the Barrack Height where he hoped to find a hackney, either in Jack Moran’s garage or in Hanlon’s house. Mr Hanlon was the first he met and he didn’t have to ask a second time. Hanlon’s big Plymouth hackney car was at the door as soon as Myko. Aunty Phyl helped Teresa to the door and into the car, then she went around the other side and sat in the back with her. Myko was in the passenger seat. They were on their way in minutes. Teresa was uncomfortable and well into labour. Myko asked the driver to slow down going over the bumps on the bridge near Baileristeenig. They picked up speed again through Lispole, Annascaul and up Gleann na nGealt. By the time they reached Camp, and still with ten miles to go, Teresa was sure they would not make it. Poor old Myko was speechless with worry, silently willing the car onward. They got to Tralee and rushed into the Bons Secours Nursing Home. Teresa’s midwife was a sister of Ned O’Loughlin, her neighbour in the Mall. More importantly, the gynaecologist, Dr Coffey, had a reputation far and wide as being the best in his field. He had good connections too, in fact, his hands had been blessed by the Pope himself.
It was a long labour and a difficult birth. Teresa, at the best of times not a physically strong woman, was drained and sedated after the ordeal. She would recover, however, and eventually survive four more difficult births, counting down the arrival of my four sisters.
So there I was, Sunday’s child. Delivered into the world by good Catholic hands that had been blessed by the Pope. That was Pope Pius XII, who, pictured or sculpted, was almost as ubiquitous as God himself in the homes of Ireland, gracing hallways, mantelpieces and parlours nationwide and easily recognised by his cadaverous expression, Roman nose and gimlet glasses. The Roman nose was unfortunate, because if the little busts fell, the prominent facial feature inv
ariably smashed. Around 1960, the Pope was joined on display by that other great international Catholic icon of the time, John F Kennedy. The both of them, Pope and President, were very big in Dingle. Role models for the 1960s.
After following their separate courses for generations, the two gene streams had finally converged. One from its source at the edge of Cill Chiaráin Bay in Eanach Mheáin through five generations of O’Tooles in Connemara, and the other from the top of the Cam between Glens and Mullach Mhial through five generations of Moriartys in Corca Dhuibhne.
And there I was, leading off the fifth generation since Daddy Tom. Irreverent and iconoclastic as he was, he would hardly have been overly impressed by my kickstart from the Pope.
Apart from the misfortunates who missed half the match because of me, my birth also brought no luck whatever to the Dingle team. In fact, I flattered to deceive; even though they won the semi they were beaten in the Final. Having started out on the wrong foot, so to speak, with the footballing world, it must be admitted that time brought no great improvement. I loved the game, but I was awkward, clumsy and uncoordinated. I played it for as long as it took me to realise that, while my own ineptitude frustrated me, I really enjoyed watching other people play, and I’m still at that.