Gerry Coleman is one of those local heritage treasures, somebody who recalls and can tell well stories of people and events which have left most local memory.In a working life which has taken him through the pub business, horses and Kildare County Council, he is a trove of recollections of people such as the Barker brothers, Bill and Henry, who had a cobblers’ shop on the Chapel Road in the 1940s.
Or Bill Martin, who had a fish shop down the Main Street, where there is now coincidentally a fish & chip emporium. And there were, of course, the two sisters who operated Lawlors sweet shop, beside where the Kilcullen Family Practice is today. Also Mary Hayes, who ran a similar shop further up the hill, in a property now owned by Nolans Butchers.
Also part of today’s Nolans was the Post Office, operated in Gerry’s memory by this writer’s great-aunt Maggie Byrne, before it was taken over by the Misses Gordon from Dunlavin, and subsequently by the late Miss Buckley.
He can tell you the intricate family linkages of the ‘old’ Kilcullen, and unravel kinked chains of generations succession. And also the small stories that are key ingredients in the recipe of a rich local past.
If you meet him—he likes a drink of a Thursday in The Spout pub—ask about, for instance, Sean Shortt and the ball of malt. Or the donkey derby in 1943 in Dr Dan O’Connell’s field, where Gerry was the ‘trainer’ of Flood’s Ass, which was ‘robbed’ of a win with Gerry’s brother Peter Paul up.
About himself? Well, Gerry originally wanted to work with horses, but his mother persuaded local publican Joe McTernan to give her 15-year-old a job in the bar after a neighbour saw him fall off a horse while working at New Abbey Stud. “She was sure I’d be killed if I stayed with them,” he grins.
Four years later, when famous Red Cow owner Tommy Vaughan wanted a barman to replace Ned O’Rourke, who had moved to O’Connells Bar in Kilcullen, Joe McTernan put Gerry in for the job ‘whether I liked it or not, that’s where I ended up’.
But the Red Cow was a good stand, most popular with country people heading south back out of Dublin to Waterford, Carlow, Portlaoise and other key points. Included in them was the regular Friday night Kilcullen contingent from the Boxing Club, who would ‘erupt’ into the pub at about a quarter to eleven, after a night at the National Stadium.
“I was also well known by all the lorry drivers, so I never had any difficulty in getting a lift home after my shifts were over.”
After 15 years at the Red Cow, Gerry came back down to work in Co Kildare and spent the next decade in the Derby House Hotel, at a time when it was growing rapidly. “They were making a fortune at weekends in the ballroom, at 6 shillings a head entry,” he remembers.
After taking a year off, and disliking being on the dole even though it was giving him more money than his barman’s wages, he answered an ad in the paper for a job with horses at Sallymount Stud, then owned by the late Bert Firestone. A recommendation from Andy Connors, then head man at neighbouring Gilltown Stud, got him the position. But two years later he secured a sewerage system caretaker’s job with Kildare County Council, where he stayed until he retired.
Browsing back through memories, Gerry also recalled the An Tostal Dan Donnelly Pageant in the early 50s. “I especially remember the big crowds who came, and Mallick’s Bar being open then just up the road.”
At his 80th party in Fallons Cafe Bar last year there were several generations of family present, among them his wife Mary—a Burke from Naas whom he married 45 years ago—and their children Niall, John, Elaine and Colette.
“It was a great night, and I’ve had a great life,” he said to this writer, extracting a promise that we’d have another pint together soon.
And pull out some more memories for the collection.
