Life Journeys: Living Folklore in Ireland Today

Title

Subject

Life history interviews from the inhabitants of Cork city's Northside.

Description

27 oral history interviews focusing on the life of Cork city's Northsiders. This interviews in this collection were used in the Cork Folklore Project's (then the Northside Folklore Project) first book; Life Journeys: Living Folklore in Ireland Today. The book, published in 1999, was compiled and edited by former Cork Folklore Project researcher Stephen Hunter.

Date

1996-2001

Identifier

CFP_SR00002_good_1996; CFP_SR00104_farmer & osullivan_1997; CFP_SR00127_mccarthy_1998; CFP_SR00134_noonan_1998; CFP_SR00140_murphy_1998; CFP_SR00154_dalton_1998; CFP_SR00176_debarra_1997; CFP_SR00177_long_1998; CFP_SR00181_farmer,mccarthy & donovan _1997:

Coverage

Cork, Ireland: 20th Century

Relation

Published Material:

Hunter, Stephen (1999), Life Journeys: Living Folklore in Ireland Today, Cork: The Northside Folklore Project.

Source

Cork Folklore Project Audio Archive

Rights

Cork Folklore Project

Language

English

Type

Audio

Format

.wav

Collection Items

Willy Good: Halloween, Fairies, Holy Wells,

Willy Good was born in the 1930s and brought up in Commons Road. His house was in the family for two centuries, and once had a thatched roof.

He recalls Halloween games; he called Halloween ‘Snap Apple Night’. Ghostly encounters associated with…

Margaret Farmer & Eileen O’Sullivan: Toys, Christmas, Nosey Keefe’s

Margaret Farmer was born in 1914 and talks very briefly about Christmas. and Nosey Keefe’s shop.
Eileen O’Sullivan also talks Christmas and about Woollams’ toy shop, and about Hadji Bey, an Armenian who sold Turkish Delight on McCurtain St.

Brenda McCarthy: Schooldays; Communion; Dating

Brenda (b. 1963), had 5 sisters and 6 brothers; she was the youngest child in her family. Her mother was from Boyce’s Street. Her father was from near Macroom, and his family was well-off. She always lived on the Northside.
She recalls her…

Tina Noonan: Blackpool; Sunbeam; Childhood Restricted Content

Tina’s father was from Blackpoool, and her mother was from Cove St. She has 8 siblings. She went to Blackpool School, which was since demolished; there they used to be given milk and buns.

Tina recalls some of a skipping rhyme she used to sing as…

Michael Murphy: Worklife; Murphy's Brewery; Childhood

Michael was born in 1941. He was born in Francis Street. He had 6 brothers and 5 sisters. His earliest memory is of his grandfather’s funeral, with a hearse pulled by two horses, in 1945. His mother’s pregnancies and the arrival of newborn children…

Sheila Dalton: Family Life; Marriage; Childhood

Sheila was born and raised on Gurranabraher Avenue. Her father was from the Fail hill area and her mother came from Whitechurch.
Sheila was second youngest in a family of 7 girls and 4 boys. Her father worked in a government building as the lift…

Eibhlís de Barra: Northside, Gender, Childhood Games

Eibhlís was born on the Southside of Cork. Her husband was from Blarney Street, on the Northside.
She recalls childhood games such as The Chaineys, and The Gobs, and Scaa, the latter two played with small stones. She quotes some of the skipping…

Denis P. Long: Working Life; Balckpool; Austrailia

Denis grew up in Blackpool. His father was a train driver.
He worked for the ESB (Electricity Supply Board) but wanted to earn better money and went to Australia in the 1950s. He tells a funny story about visiting a rocket range and meeting someone…

Margaret Farmer, Catherine McCarthy, Helen Donovan: The Emergency; The Black and Tans;

Margaret remembers that her father used to shout “Up the Mollies” when he had drink taken. [Note: These particular Mollies were agitators controlled by Joseph Devlin MP in opposition to William O’Brien]. She recalls the days of the Black and Tans; on…

Billy McCarthy: Quaker Road, Public Baths, Childhood

Billy was born in 1941. His mother, Mary Ann Cronin, was from Mayfield; her father, William Cronin served with the British army during the First World War, and later became a postman. His father’s family came from Dunmanway, West Cork. His father,…

Maria Lopez: Galica, Language, Superstitions

Maria was born in Galicia, in Spain, in 1958.

She talks about differences between Galicia and Madrid. Maria talks briefly about ghosts and superstitions of Galicia and about the Galician language. She sees similarities in Ireland and the Irish…

Nick Hennessy: Racism, Adoption, Childhood

Nick was born circa 1959. He spent his earliest days in an orphanage. His father was from Egypt and his mother was Irish, and their relationship was frowned upon by his mother’s family.
He was adopted and lived in Dublin and then in County Kerry. As…

John Connolly: Childhood Games; Corporal Punishment; Family Life

John Connolly describes growing up in Fairhill. He gives details of various childhood games, including Kick the Can and Cat and Dog. His mother died when he was about two years old and he and his two sisters were raised by their relatives while their…