You've reached the
Website of
Mrs R Carr,
please
read on......
(If you wish to read more about me, and mine, read on , to return to the main page, click Home....)
These are the McIntyre Family arms.
The motto is "Per Ardua" which means "Through Hardship"
This is a picture by my granddaughter Eilis-Marie b.1998
|
My earliest memories date from around 1942, some time after the birth of Jim, the youngest of my |
My father was an excellent story teller, a great asset to him in his teaching career and a
His mother died when he was only three, but he did have acouple of early memories of the
The work included making stiilss with deats made of woven coloured string and it was watching my son Brendan make the same sort of stool for his little son, Emile, that brought the memory back.
Daddy also taught the boys basketry. I often wished I could do it, as I watched my dad weaving canes, keeping them damp all the time, as they would crack if they became too dry.
All sorts of objects, for example bags, waste paper baskets etc, could be made using raffie and milk bottle tops. These tops were not foil, as modern ones are, but cardboard. The bottle necks were a bit wider and the cardboard tops were circular to fit inside the opening. They had a circle in the centre which sould be pressed out (perhaps to make it easier to remove the top). Once collected and cleaned the raffie was woven round and round the bottle tops until they were covered. They were then joined together to make useful articles. When my brother John was in the second top class, groups of boys worked on two tapestry type pictures - one of American Indian themes and one Egyptian.
Mary and her husband Charlie had married in America, but by this time (the 40s) were living in
More about my father, his family and anecdotes from his life
source of delight to his children. It is unfortunate that we did not make some record of his
stories, and have to rely on increasingly fragile memories.
days before the family left Glasgow, to live with their grandparents in Fanad Co Donegal.
One was of sitting on a step, crying loudly and being picked up and comforted, presumably
by his mother.
He also remembered a park with a pond where he sailed a little boat. However, most of his
childhood memories are from his days in Doaghbeg. He, his brothers and his one sister were
the first of three sets of orphan cousins to be brought up on the McAteer farm.
His schooling began in the Doaghbeg School which was situated at the bottom of the slope
below the building we all called the New House, although it had been built many years
before we stayed there on holiday in 1946.
From an early age, my father was an avid reader and often recalled how at the end of each
summer term, the would be given their readers for the following year. He would take it with
him when he was sent to herd the cows, and this resulted in him having read it from cover to
cover long before the summer holidays were over.
He instilled in his children the same love of reading, which has stood us in good stead over
the years both as a source of pleasure and a means of extending our knowledge.
I loved to listen to his stories about his childhood. One I remember was about himself and
his brother, Ignatius. They were up during the night to watch a cow which was about to
calve. This was a task often given to youngsters so that the adults could have some rest until
they were needed.
Nothing was happenning and the two boys began to feel hungry. So they decided to make a
pancake. They had often watched Big Ma making one of the griddle, and we sure they could
do it. They mixed the ingredients, hung the gridle over the fire, and poured the batter
on. They forgot to rub fat on the griddle surface so when they tried to turn the
pancake they found it had stuck fast to the gridle
Last Sunday, we were listening to Ireland's Eye on Radio Berkshire, when they played a song that
took me back to my childhood days. The song was called " Kelly the Boy from Killane" and it was a
great favourite of my father. We heard him sing it so often that we knew it off by heart, from
beginning to end ( I still do). My father had good reason to consider it one of his favourites. When
he was in his teens he was at a social gathering in Portsalon Hotel. Somebody persuaded him to
entertain the company with a song. He chose to perform 'Kelly'. Afterwards a man came up to him and
gave him half a crown - a huge sum of money for a youngster in those days. A friend told him, later
on that the stranger was in fact ' on the run' ! back to main page
When my father was first assistant in All Saints School in Coatdyke, Lanarkshire (which lies between Airdrie and Coatbridge in the central lowlands of Scotland) he taught handiworks to the 11 and 12 year olds in the top class.
Peterborough. They had three daughters, Rosemary(Roma), Brenda and Ann(e). Naturally, I was much
better acquainted with my single aunts and uncles, because we visited our grandparents every second
Sunday, as a rule. I looked forward to these visits, especially the trips to Tollcross Park on sunny days
in Summer. I remember visiting a little museum in the park with my Grandpa, where there was a glass
with some stuffed birds and animals, depicting the rhyme "Who Killed Cock Robin?" It fascinated me,
but I don't remember going there again. My Grandma's lovely dinners may have been part of the
attraction to 16, Denbrae Street. My mother was also able to make interesting and nourishing meals
out of the meagre rations available, and always contributed a cooked joint of beef to the meals at
Grandma's. as she knew that her mother invariably had other guests to cater for, as well as us. Aunt
Susan, the eldest of the family, was a very outgoing person. I was rather in awe of her (still, I was in
awe of nearly all adults, and a good few of my peers, at that time!) At the very lively after-dinner
discussions that took place during those long-ago visits, Susan was never loth to voice her opinions
always with a touch of humour