FROM THE MEMORIES ACRHIVES
One front page of
TheAvondhu 21 years ago carried the news that careless parking was endangering lives in Fermoy, as people were using the area around the new fire station for parking. This activity could hinder vehicles leaving the station responding to an emergency and was described as a ‘disturbing development’.
In Mitchelstown, there was a harmonious conclusion as the McDonagh family, members of the Travelling community who were living at the advance factory site on the north side of the town, moved to an alternative site at Cloonlough. A new tenant had yet to be found for the advance factory, however.
Conna’s Nicole Maguire was pictured with Margaret Scannell, proprietor of The Final Furlong, after she won the ‘Voice of North Cork’ competition in Coolagown. Elsewhere, Rathcormac’s Jacinta Hogan was throwing her hat in the ring to represent Cork in the Rose of Tralee that year. Ms Hogan noted that she was almost 25 and so would be reaching the cut-off point for the competition soon.
There were plenty of new beginnings on the retail side of things as it was ‘ white gold week’ at Barber’s Jewellers in Fermoy and a children’s clothing shop, ‘New Image’, opened in Knocklong. Meanwhile, the gardening expert Charlie Wilkins was due to visit the Co-op store in Mitchelstown and the first tenants, the Cork County Childcare Company, moved into the newly refurbished mill in Castletownroche. In Watergrasshill, meanwhile, The Fir Tree set a date for their reopening that May and in Fermoy Leisure Centre, a new sauna with Scandinavian spruce benching was to replace one of the steam cabins.
Conversely, 23 regional branches of Dairygold were to close at the end of April 2003 and Jim Woulfe, the general manager of the co-op’s trading division, blamed the closure on overhead costs and the fact that farmers were getting feed and fertiliser delivered directly to their farms. He didn’t say if the cutbacks would mean better prices for suppliers. In Clogheen, PJ English was fighting tooth and nail to keep the branch open, blaming the closures on the past decisions of Denis Lucey, while Mary Twomey Casey in Glanworth said the branch’s profits were up 50 percent in the first three months.
A plaque to Mitchelstown’s most famous writer, William Trevor, was planned to honour the Man Booker Prize winner’s 75th birthday. While a bronze plaque to remember the departed Presentation nuns of Mitchelstown was to be unveiled on Convent Hill in April 2003.
Animal welfare concerns were raised regarding sheep on Department of Defence land in Kilworth. Accounts of sheep in a distressed state had circulated with a number of weeks, with dead sheep and a large number of bones and skeletal remains littering the area.
‘Mel’s Plaice’ in Ballylanders offered a full menu with fresh cod and chips available all Good Friday, while every pub was of course closed. However, Murphy’s Pub and the Elbow Inn lounge in Fermoy would be hosting sumo wrestling from 9pm when the pub reopened on Saturday. Looking ahead to the summer, concert trips to Dublin were advertised for gigs by Bruce Springsteen in the RDS, Paul McCartney in the RDS and Robbie Williams in The Phoenix Park.
In Fermoy the An Taisce ‘Spring Clean’ was launched at the courthouse with TD Michael Ahern and Tom Murray of the Special Olympics performing the honours. Meanwhile, Shinnick Plant Hire abandoned their plans for a waste disposal site in Killavullen, saying it was ‘too much hassle’. They did not concede that the public’s concerns had any weight, however.
In Araglin, the fisheries board confirmed pollution in the Moconoch river, but did not say more as court proceedings were possible. The river had apparently changed colour ‘dramatically’ and was reported by a member of the public. Elsewhere, gardaí approved of a plan to introduce bye-laws prohibiting drinking alcohol in public in Fermoy and were also investigating a hit-and-run in Kilbehenny where a parked blue Ford van was hit by a vehicle. An ‘ unhelpful’ note was left under the wiper, apparently to ‘fool witnesses’.
The pupils of Castlelyons NS launched a book of essays with Cork hurling star Seán Óg Ó hAilpín, while the market traders in Mitchelstown made a presentation of €100 to the Aid Cancer Treatment charity.
Finally, the Lord Mayor of Coventry, Fermoy’s Nick Nolan, had decided to ‘call it a day’ and return home to Ireland; he had gone to the English town originally to attend a wedding but stayed a little longer than intended! He was hoping to move into the old schoolhouse near Mount Melleray Abbey.