TONE AVENUES - First inhabitants in 1957: House No. 1: OSullivan; 2: Folan; 3. Ryan; 4. OLeary; 5. Lynam; 6: Flanagan; 11: Blake; 12: Reeve/OSullivan; 13: Cullen; 14: Reynolds (who moved out in those early years - the Dad worked in Logues shoe shop in town). The Dillon family moved in later. 15: Gallagher; 16: Higgins; 17: Briand; 18: Ryan; 19: Murray; 20: ? (Later Lally). There were two Ryans - Tony and Mary who are still there and the other were an elderly couple with one daughter called Martina. Two OSullivan families - Pat on the first bungalow and Mrs Reeve married secondly Paddy OSullivan. This OSullivan family had a chip van up until Paddy died and Murrays at the top of the street, had a sandwich/tea/soup van (both often seen at the Galway Races). Not many cars on the street in those early years apart from Gerry OLeary and Frank Gallagher and of course the chip and tea vans. Around the corner from Flanagans was another Higgins family, then Hickey, then Rabbitte while on the other side from the Barry Avenue side up were Finnegan, Flaherty and Hoey. The first to break down the front wall in Tone Avenue was Paddy Murray to get the van in close to the front door. Pat OSullivan sunk a few holes in his garden and we had our own pitch and putt course and had many hours of enjoyment. Colie Folan (a native of Connemara) would get a trailer load of turf every year and we would cart ever sod in bags in through the house. It was like working a conveyor belt, every kid on the street wanted to help. Talk about ants! Robert Blakes uncle had an old cine-camera and would hang a sheet on the wall in the front sitting room and we would all watch whatever movie he had at the time - Roy Rogers, etc. If you were lucky you would get a half crown from Paddy Murray if he needed his van cleaned or chopping the spuds into chips at the back or Robert Reeves house. Every boy on the street had a bicycle wheel and a stick and we would belt the wheels up and down the street and up and down every other street also, till we were exhausted. No car was safe coming along Barry Avenue when we let those wheels go. The ones with tyres were the best as they would bounce back off Donal Killeens wall and if you were skilled enough you could belt it back up the street again on the rebound. Aidan Finnegans garden was the biggest and we would play rugby there. Aidan was one of the first of our younger generation to die, sadly in England after he finished his training in hotel management. A lot of people from Tone Avenue have since departed this life but left many great memories on the street. From that original bunch who moved in in 1957, Tony and Mary Ryan and Sally Gallagher are great ambassadors of all those past. Every street has a tale to tell and a face to remember. People were very happy all those years ago and although families had their fair share of personal tragedies and very little money, life was very simple in the late 50s and 60s when we were young and needed very little to occupy our minds. If you had a black and white TV in those days you would have a few friends call on you at night. Tone Avenue is still there - as are all the other streets - very quiet now compared to the thousands of children let loose on Mervue in the 1950s (and there were some BIG families. Mervue - what a great place to grow up in!
Posted on: Thu, 27 Nov 2014 14:46:18 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015