It Says in The Bridge: October 05
On probably the saddest front page ever in the history of The Bridge, the smiling face of Pat Dunlea as we all remember him marks the mourning of Kilcullen on his untimely death. The magazine promises a comprehensive recall of his life and work in a future issue, but for the moment reprints the piece I wrote in the Diary on the morning after Pat died.
Beyond that, the life of the town he loved so well continues to be chronicled in the usual comprehensive Bridge way, with the work of the magazine's newest writer, Pat Behan, making an even greater contribution both in news and features.
His pieces include -- in the first in a promised series from Kilcullen as 'A Town of Babel' -- profiles of Andre Garcia from Cuba, who now lives in Calverstown and has a mobile windscreen repair business, and of Tallaght-born Martin Myles who has taken over management of The Hideout. That last, many readers will know, has resonances for this writer, and I wish him well.
Pat Behan, who may well set some records in the near future in an attempt to become the Bridge's most prolific writer since Sean Landers, also reviews the first book from a new local imprint, Browne Publishing of Calverstown. Ireland's Mammals by Juanita Browne is, according to the piece, 'an interesting and informative presentation of Irish mammalian fauna, supplemented with remarkable photography'.
A new feature, under the byline of Sgt Eddie Relihan, is Kilcullen Garda Notes and documents both an armed robbery at the Gala Supermarket and suspicious behaviour by a number of people 'calling door to door' in Nicholastown.
Environment News in this issue extends over five pages, with reports on the coming facelift for the bridge, Heritage Week, and a full detail of the judges' comments in the recent Tidy Towns adjudications for both Kilcullen and Brannockstown.
Photographically there is full coverage of the Cross & Passion Debuntates' Ball 2005, and of the Heritage Day seminar and field trip on Dun Ailline (Knockaulin), all courtesy of Pat Foley. More individual coverage includes the 50th anniversary of Paddy and Molly McMahon of Yellow Bog, the respective 80th and 70th birthdays of Fr Matt Kelly and his brother Pat, the 70th birthday of Kitty Clarke and the 89th birthday of Alice Coleman.
(Fr Matt, who was one of my teachers in Newbridge College, looks fabulously well in the Bridge photograph. I'm glad.)
In Paul Aspell's Over The Bridge there are musings on what he calls the 'trucking disgrace' of today's Kilcullen, because of the lack of a northern access link to the motorway (which was one of the few things that the late Pat Dunlea fought for and failed to get), the continuing contraction of the English language because of the new communication of texting, and his concerns about the results of the number of hospital dramas on TV. He wonders what kind of trauma they cause to patients waiting for operations?
In his Letter from Taiwan, Sean Landers (home at the time of writing) fills out his space with some responses to his last piece about the 'Ghost Month' of August. He says they are unedited. I suggest, as an editor of several decades, that they should have been.
Sean's other favourite pastime, looking at the history of families with even small connections to Kilcullen, is this time the first of two articles on 'The Clare Connection' with Castlemartin, involving inter alia Sir Maurice Eustace and one Thomas Keightley. Fascinating but too complicated to sub to a few lines here.
Billy Redmond in his inimitable Off The Cuff muses on millionaires and their money and what they might do with it, in his own preference part of it might be used to educate deserving teenagers 'who might not otherwise be able to afford it'. Indeed and so.
Other stuff -- there are the usual schools pages, including a report of a visit to Berney's Saddlery by Scoil Bhride pupils and some details of the 'busy days' at St Joseph's NS in Halverstown.
But I have to go back to a contribution by 9-year-old Emma Birchall from 4th Class in Scoil Bhride for the piece de resistance of everything in these pages: the results of her interview with her grandfather Tom (with whom I was a schoolmate) on the history of her school's building. Read it if you read nothing else in this issue.
Sport coverage includes congratulations to Kilcullen GAA Minors on qualifying for their first ever final in the Kildare B Minor Championship, a comprehensive lookback on the successful summer of St Bridget's Pitch & Putt Club, and the continuing progress of Kilcullen AFC.
And finally, not least because it is the back page advertorial, a recent visit of a group of journalists and officials from the Dutch Food Board to Nolan Victuallers chronicles the third visit this year by delegations via An Bord Bia to the famous Kilcullen business.
On holiday for the last ten days in France I have eaten good steak many times, but none of it matched what the Dutch and the others will have taken home with them from Kilcullen.
Brian Byrne.
