Ellen was a proud mother and farmer

ELLEN O’Connor (nee Collins), who has died aged 96, was born to parents Jack and Johanna Collins in Counguilla, Scartaglin, on 20th May 1920.

Ellen, the sixth in a family of seven, was named after her sister Ellen who had died from burns received in a festive bonfire accident in Scartaglin village on the previous Halloween. She is predeceased by brothers Mike, John, Dan, Denis, and sisters Ellen and Mary.

She attended Scartaglin National School, euphemistically known as Scartaglin High School due to its position on top of the cliff when approached from Counguilla.

Ellen became one of the many who joined the unpaid labour ranks in the home and farm at that time. Moving through her teens she acquired all the skills of baking, cooking, sewing and darning.

At night she, along with neighbours and friends, would gather at the crossroads, rambling houses or ‘American wakes’ to share, enhance or add to the music, song and dance of Sliabh Luachra. Here the polka set, walls of Limerick or siege of Ennis would have been her joy during one of which, at seventeen, she met husband-to-be Tommy O’Connor of Ranaleen.

On her marriage to Tommy in 1943, Ellen enjoyed her new surroundings in Ranaleen, where she was made very welcome by her neighbours. She was a good and popular lady, her front door always open and everybody was made to feel welcome. That however did not pay the bills of a growing family so pigs and poultry added to the farm produce. This was labour intensive but was a great way for growing children to learn how money was earned.

Who could forget the aromas she could get out of that old Stanley No. 9 range before it was aided by an equally renowned Calor Gas cooker! As the late, great seanachaí Eamon Kelly would say — her cooking and baking would have the teeth swimming around inside in your mouth! Some remarked that she could make a dinner out of practically nothing, but they didn’t notice her well-tended kitchen garden with a selection of vegetables that would fortify a plate all year round.

At the age of forty-five she passed her driving test. This did not come easy but she stuck at those driving lessons around the front field and then out around the roads. By the time she came to take her test she was ready, a proud mother of ten with her document to show she had passed.

After twenty-five years of married life in Ranaleen the family moved to Caherbreagh, Tralee, where Tommy died 41 years ago. Ellen continued farming there late into her seventies. She would head off into Lee Strand with the bulk tank in tow. One day she arrived home without the bulk tank having had lost it somewhere on the way home, so her creamery outings were curtailed somewhat after that.

Yes, she certainly has left her mark in the rich legacy of her ninety-six years on this earth.

She is survived by sons Tommy Frank and John Joe; daughters Margaret; Joan; Helen; Mary; Kay; Ann, Bernie and Monica, daughters-in-law; sons-in-law; grandchildren, great-grandchildren and many friends. She is remembered in her faith, including her whisperings of the daily rosary; in the skills she passed on through the love of her crafts and way of life and in the old songs she sang with a gleam in her eye.

Her motto might well have been: “Go with care, life has no spare.”