Bernard Casey: Cathedral Road, Childhood, Cork Jazz Festival
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Description
He recalls air raid shelters in Cork during the 1940s. He talks about his routine as an altar boy. The first housing developments of Cathedral Road. The countryside was close by and farmers brought milk door to door. In the Autumn, children would go picking blackberries first, then slogging apples.
Date
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Coverage
Relation
CFP_SR00387_sheehan_2010; CFP_SR00388_sheehan_2010; CFP_SR00389_healy_2010; CFP_SR00390_kelleher_2010; CFP_SR00391_crean_2010; CFP_SR00392_mckeon_2010; CFP_SR00393_twomey_2010; CFP_SR00394_stleger_2010; CFP_SR00395_speight_2010; CFP_SR00396_lane_2010; CFP_SR00397_obrienoleary_2010; CFP_SR00398_jones_2010; CFP_SR00399_saville_2010; CFP_SR00400_magnier_2010; CFP_SR00401_marshall_2010; CFP_SR00402_marshall_2010; CFP_SR00403_murphy_2010; CFP_SR00404_prout_2011; CFP_SR00405_walsh_2011; CFP_SR00406_prout_2011; CFP_SR00407_newman_2010; CFP_SR00408_newman_2010; CFP_SR00409_leahy_2011; CFP_SR00411_newman_2010; CFP_SR00412_newman_2010; CFP_SR00413_finn_2011; CFP_SR00414_ohorgain_2011; CFP_SR00415_oconnell_2011; CFP_SR00416_sheehy_2011; CFP_SR00417_mcloughlin_2012; CFP_SR00418_gerety_2012; CFP_SR00419_kelleher_2012; CFP_SR00420_byrne_2012; CFP_SR00421_cronin_2012; CFP_SR00422_ohuigin_2012; CFP_SR00423_meacle_2012; CFP_SR00424_horgan_2012; CFP_SR00425_lyons_2012; CFP_SR00427_goulding_2011;
CFP_SR00491_fitzgerald_2013.
Heritage Week 2011: CFP_SR00430_tomas_2011; CFP_SR00431_newman_2011; CFP_SR00432_stillwell_2011; CFP_SR00433_oconnell_2011; CFP_SR00434_lane_2011; CFP_SR00435_montgomery-mcconville_2011; CFP_SR00436_ocallaghan_2011; CFP_SR00437_corcoran_2011; CFP_SR00438_jones_2011; CFP_SR00439_ohuigin_2011; CFP_SR00440_mccarthy_2011; CFP_SR00441_crowley_2011; CFP_SR00442_obrien_2011; CFP_SR00443_jones_2011; CFP_SR00444_mcgillicuddy_2011; CFP_SR00445_delay_2011; CFP_SR00446_murphy_2011;
Video Interview: CFP_VR00486_speight_2014
Published Material:
O’Carroll, Clíona (2011) ‘The Cork Memory Map’, Béascna 7: 184-188.
O’Carroll, Clíona (2012) ‘Cork Memory Map: an update on CFP’s Online Project’, The Archive 16: 14. https://www.ucc.ie/en/media/research/corkfolkloreproject/archivepdfs/archive16.PDF
Dee, Stephen and O’Carroll, Clíona (2012) ‘Sound Excerpts: Interviews from Heritage Week’, The Archive 16: 15-17. https://www.ucc.ie/en/media/research/corkfolkloreproject/archivepdfs/archive16.PDF
O'Carrol, Clíona (2014) 'The children's perspectives: Place-centred interviewing and multiple diversified livelihood strategies in Cork city, 1935-1960'. Béaloideas - The Journal of Folklore of Ireland Society, 82: 45-65.
The Curious Ear/Documentary on One (Cork City Memory Map) http://www.rte.ie/radio1/doconone/2011/0816/646858-curious-ear-doconone-cork-city-memory-map/
To view the Cork Memory Map Click Here
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Transcription
C OC We might chat away for a little while. You might introduce yourself and say who you are.
BC My name is Bernard Casey. I’m chairman of the Cork Jazz Festival based here in Civic House in Pope’s Quay. Many years ago I actually played on Pope’s Quay. That happened when I was an altarboy in St Mary’s Dominican Church which is just adjacent to the Civic Trust House.
C OC Could you describe the scene for me that would have been there now when you would have been out there playing out on the road?
BC Well, part of the that I seem to remember in my distant past, this would probably be around ’45 or ’46, the huge air raid shelters that were on the quay here. They were huge concrete edifices, the most ugliest things you ever saw in your life. But, they were part of the, they were built possibly 1940, 1941. There were two here outside Civic House and further up the quay there were another two. I remember those. I wasn’t an altar boy then but I remember always been associated with St Mary’s. My elder brother was an altar boy here so obviously we’d be in and out, the family would have been in and out. So, they were knocked then and I remember they being knocked with this huge ball. That’s how they knocked the concrete edifices. I became an altar boy then, and happy days for seven or eight years. About thirty altar boys there at the time.
C OC What kind of routine would you have for the week as an altar boy there?
BC Well, you’d be on for the week really. If you were on Mass, you’d be on from Monday to Saturday and you could be on the seven o’clock mass which nobody wanted [laughs], half seven, eight, half eight. These were the times. There were four masses plus eleven o’clock. Sunday then you were on all day practically from early morning mass and then you’d have Complan in the afternoon and you’d have Confraternites [sounds like], in the evenings. So, it was practically a full time job.
C OC And, how many of you would be on at the same time?
BC Well, for mass, just two. Then you’d be marked present or absent and if you were absent more than one or two in the week, you got a dressing down.
C OC And, did you have to look after your own [vestments]?
BC Pure white, yeah. They were laundered every week. You’d have to have them laundered. They were laundered by the Good Shepherd and they were all beautifully crisp and starched with Soutane and Surplus. The surplus would have as much lace as you could find. They were different times. Easter was very important of course. Easter’s when you’d be up at half five in the morning because the ceremonies on Thursday and Friday and Saturday morning would be, they’d start early like, at that time. We’d be out playing ball out there at six in the morning. So, happy times. Different times altogether.
C OC You went to the North Mon. Can you tell me a bit about the choir there?
BC Well they always had choirs really. Still have I think. There would be three or four choirs going on at the time really, until obviously voices started to break at a certain stage. They always would put on shows every year, maybe twice a year like. It was a good tradition there like. The music would be sorted, and you’d be learning it by the Tonic Sulfa, the doh, ray, me, fah, so, lah, tee, doh, written on the board by the Brother. It was, I felt, it certainly was a great advantage in developing your ear, and your aural sense. It was certainly an advantage to me when I took up music let’s say for want of a better word. It was certainly no hindrance.
C OC Thinking back now to when you were small. Can you describe the street that you grew up on
BC From immediately after the war there were quite a lot of tenements up around the North side. Pockets of them that still hadn’t been cleaned up and cleared up like. Then you could see, although there wasn’t much money in Ireland at the time, that efforts were being made. Just around that period was when the whole of Cathedral Road began to be built. It started there at the Cathedral, with those houses that are still there on either side of Cathedral Road, and I remember on my way to school seeing the men actually making the concrete blocks for them. This little hand machine. Make them actually for each house, they’d take them out of this little press and put them to one side, they would dry there for a week, two weeks whatever it takes, before they were used in the actual building then like. Gurranabraher then just grew out of that then, just year by year by year to what it is today.
C OC When you were smaller did you feel any links with the countryside.
BC The countryside was very near. If you were up beyond the Cathedral in Cathedral Road, you were nearly in the country. Beyond that I remember there were some fields with streams that you would visit. There was also small farms around, and these are the farmers that would bring their donkey and cart around with the milk in the churn, and would visit each house like and you’d get the measure of milk plus a drop for the cat. Where the Orthopaedic Hospital is now at the moment, there’d be a farm there, a small farm there with a few cows and that like. And then there’d be the North Mon playing fields. Sure its’ completely built up now.
C OC I’ve a couple of last questions for you. It’s something we’re asking everybody. Do you remember in the autumn time doing anything with apples.
BC You mean slogging apples? [laughs]. I remember going out with a few other friends like, and first of all you’d be picking blacks. That would be September. You’d go out early in the morning, Saturday morning or a Sunday morning. You would come back, you’d go out with a pail, and you’d come back absolutely torn asunder from the brambles. Your hands and mouth covered in Blackberry juice which was very difficult to get off. Which probably still is like. And slogging then, you’d go to Odam [sounds like], if any farmer has an orchard or an apple tree. I suppose you’d try your hand at that. They were harmless things like really like you know.
C OC And how about. My last question for you is about Bonfire Night. Do you have any memories of Bonfire Night.
BC Every area would have its own bonfire. Usually very controlled really. The adults would make sure there was control. But for weeks beforehand you’d be going out the countryside looking for Furze bushes, and you’d have to travel out a few miles all right, cut them and then drag them all the way in to where the bonfire was to be held and they’d dry up then for a week or two, because they wouldn’t burn very well unless they were dry. This was well before I remember tyres being used on the fire. If you have an old tyre, that was a luxury I think.
C OC Is there anything else that comes to mind. Any kind of images or memories?
BC Not really. Looking back everything seemed to have been very rosy but of course it wasn’t.
C OC What kind of challenges would people say of your parent’s generation?
BC Well the biggest challenge for any house was to have somebody working. A lot of emigration. Especially to America at the time. Anybody who did go always did well like you know. Thankfully. A lot of unemployment. I think it wasn’t until the mid ‘50s that the country started picking itself up slowly. Things began to improve. We were a young country. Takes time and good leaders too. But, we’ve come full circle haven’t we? [laughs]
C OC Well, that much is very true. Well, listen, thanks very much.
End of transcript.