LILY’S FINEGAN’S CENTRE OF COMMUNITY
THE WHITESTOWN PUB HAS A LONG HISTORY, A FAMOUS CLIENTELE AND HAS A BIG HEART
Where could an international rockstar casually walk into a pub, buy a few drinks for the regulars, sit and relax and enjoy a drink and not be hassled or even be recognized, for that matter?
Lily Finnegan’s in Whitestown! Yes this hugely popular pub located on the tip of the Cooley peninsula can boast this fact.
The year was 1985, Bruce Springsteen was about to play to 95,000 people at Slane in the following days and had rented a cottages just down the road from Lily’s in the run up to the gig. He had been seen walking on the strand earlier in the day and popped in for a few beers before heading back to his cottage and none of the elderly regulars had recognised him, the story was broken the following day and by that time Bruce had already departed for Co. Meath!
Lily Finnegan’s is somewhat of an icon in Cooley and has been for quite some time. The pub dates back to the late 1700s, and had its licence in 1845. Originally it served as both a pub and shop for the area and was remained in the Finnegan family for all of this time.
Lily took over the running of the pub along with family friend Jemmie McAllister in the 1960’s after her Father John passed away along with and ran it for over 20 years together. In the late 80’s Lily fell into ill health and the pub closed for a number of years before it was taken over by her nephew John Pratt who had also been living there too. Once he got his hands on it he started a transformation along with some of his friends, adding a toilet and generally cleaning the place up to make it more user friendly. He reopened the bar on March 16th 1993 as a trial run for St. Patrick’s Day and such was its success they never closed the door since.
Unfortunately Lily passed away exactly a year to the day and was waked upstairs above the bar (which remained open). It wasn’t too long later that Derek McGarrity joined the staff, a young fifteen year old and he and John worked hard to make it one of the best pubs of its kind in Cooley.
After working in the Whitestown pub for a number of years until 1997, John decided it was time to spread his wings and explore even more of the world and wanted to sign over the pub to Derek (aged 17) and his family, at that time a publican’s licence could only be attained by someone aged over 21.
In 2001 Derek took over the leasehold and licence himself and still holds it to this day. He immediately started to make changes to the
premises by working on the main bar, the snug and even included a pool room.
These renovations continued to 2001/02 when he decided that a mini festival was needed. He hired a marquee for a bank holiday acquired the services of such top bands like Staccato, Joe Murray and the Texas Wildcats and the Willing Fools and successfully ran the festival over three nights.
This was around the time just before Carlingford had made a name for itself as party central, so many flocked to the mini festival and such was its success that everyone who attended couldn’t wait for the next bank holiday to see what Derek had planned for them. It also boosted the numbers who were regularly going to the pub both during the week and at weekends where it was usually packed to capacity and provided plenty of live entertainment. Progression of renovation work continued all the way to 2006 and Derek regularly contacted Pelican Promotions to hire their marquees for festivals, fundraisers and any time they needed to increase the space for people who flocked there. He was in the process of buying his own tent, but all was put on the back burner when the 2008 crash happened.
It was back to survival mode like all their adversaries. The only difference was they had
built up a good regular trade which helped to keep the place buzzing.
It wasn’t until 2015 that he decided to add a large beer garden adja- cent to the premises and covered it with a manually removable roof and this played host to a huge amount of events, mostly in the summer months, but was never out of use with live bands every Sunday evening that also included a bar-b-que.
Lily Finnegan’s is also renowned for its great charity work and it all kicked off when the Whitestown Festival began in 1994 when they first fundraised For Crumlin Children’s hospital chiefly organised by the late Michael Hearty and Joe Keenan.
The July 12th weekend was selected and the place was completely transformed to help raise money for the worthy cause. Such was its success that the festival ran for the following four years.
A huge fundraiser also took place for Temple Street Children’s hospital arranged by family and friends of local girl Jody Traynor who received fabulous care with them. The group decided to host a night for the charity and managed to get The Revs, at that time the band were one of the biggest in Ireland and gave their services free of charge as one of its members was local boy John McIntyre (now married to Zoe Conway) and it was an immense success.
But one of their biggest fundraising drives commenced in 2014 when the Garth Brooks concerts were famously cancelled and Derek, Budgie Boyle and a number of other volunteers put together a festival on the weekend those concerts were due to take place in less than seven days!
The Festival has since become an annual event for Children’s charity Aoibheann’s Pink Tie which was formed in memory of Aoibheann Norman from Drumcondra. The lads managed to acquire a trailer and field from Hanlon Transport, signed up local artists to perform such as The Long Riders, Henry Mac, Philip McCloskey and Gerry Larkin to name but a few, and every year since attracts all of the top local acts and bands to perform. Everyone donated their services free including those providing food ice creams and various rides so that all the money would go to the charity. It was free into the entire weekend, all that was asked was that a donation to the cause was made and by the time weekend was over they had managed to collect well over €12,000 and that figure has steadily risen each
year since.
One man who has made the pub his regular whenever he is in the area is country star Nathan Carter and he liked the setting that much he recorded a music video there along with the band Cherish The Ladies.
One of the pub’s most important visitors came in June 2016 when American Vice President Joe Biden came to Whitestown trying to trace his family roots (Cill Mhuire Cemetery), there had been rumours that he was going to call on his journey, but according to Derek that’s all they were, rumours. He and Cllr. Peter Savage were interviewed in the pub by the Sean O’Rourke radio show on RTE1. Even when he received a call from the American Embassy on a Sunday evening, he thought it was some of his mates giving him a prank call. After he had finished talking to some lady, he googled the American Embassy phone number, rang it back and the lady reassured him that Joe was on his way! After this the pub became a very busy place indeed. Background checks were run on everyone there, and plenty more besides. In the three days prior to his arrival, the pub was searched three times by the Gardai and the American secret service, checking in every nook and cranny, even going so far as dismantling the jukebox to make sure nothing explosive had managed to make its way in there.
On the afternoon of his arrival a 30 vehicle motorcade made its way to the pub and was covered by a SWAT team who were set up just away from the pub and the fields around were dotted with secret service men and sharp shooters. There were around 200 specially invited locals who were spread around outside the pub and when he got there, he went around and shook everyones hand and chatted to as many of them as he could for the best part of an hour. It was a huge feather in Lily Finnegan’s cap and Joe enjoyed it that much that he returned in 2017 (now not Vice President) along with his son, brother and some staff. This time he met up with more invited locals and had a better time now that he wasn’t on the meter!
Another strange arrival at the pub took place one Sunday afternoon. Lily’s was a pub that The Corrs dad Gerry used to frequent on a Sunday afternoon for the odd pint or two. On one of the occasions he asked would it be okay if son Jim landed his helicopter in an adjacent field and when Derek said he was alright with it, about 20 minutes later Jim and entourage arrived to enjoy the weather, ambience and location too.
But two of their most famous regular visitors have to rugby legends Rob and Dave Kearney who live just up the road from the pub and often call in when they are home visiting their parents. The walls in the pub are testament to their visits with a framed Lions Jersey from Rob and the Ireland Jersey Dave wore against Italy in the World Cup proudly hanging there. Derek knows he needs to constantly look for opportunities to move the business forward in order to make it profitable and survive, and this has hit home more than ever since the lockdown. The heart of Lily Finnegan’s is its weekend business and its customers - including the very valued locals, holiday makers and day trippers, but in addition to this planning is in progress to make Lily’s a destination venue for authentic traditional Irish Pub Weddings / Parties / Corporate Bookings by opening up the pub for exclusive bookings throughout the week as well.
Well, when the pandemic kicked in, Lily Finnegan’s also had to close its doors, but Derek has been extremely busy painting, cleaning and renovating for the future. What that holds, is anyone’s guess, but you can rest assured that Derek, his staff and legions of Facebook friends will be ready to pick up where they left off and return to making Finnegan’s into one of the best pubs in Louth.