Kathleen Bolger and Maureen Cullen - Folklore, Customs and Memories from North Wexford

This recording is from a larger collection which was recorded and produced by artist/folklorist Michael Fortune in November 2018 with Kathleen Bolger and Maureen Cullen from Coolgreany, Gorey, Co. Wexford entitled “A Ramble Through Time... Vol. 4 + 5 "
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Chapter Marks/List of Contents:

00:00 - Christmas and Hallowe’en
06:00 - Colcannon - different recipes
08:01 - Cooking on the open fire
08:31 - Playing in river as children. Also chatting about children in old tea-chests.
09:23 - Moved from rural houses into ‘new’ houses in Coolgreany. Chatting about how running water and cooker were valued by their mothers.
10:32 - Chatting about the kitchen dresser and everyone had them. More of a decoration now. Chatting about cup hooks.
12:10 - Christmas trees and holly and ivy at Christmas
13:54 - Putting up Christmas holly and ivy.
14:18 - Take down Christmas Decorations and Little Christmas
14:43 - Their mothers always made another dinner on Little Christmas. Family day. Roast beef eaten. The women never had a day off on that day.
15:51 - Holly kept for Pancake Tuesday. Straw kept from the crib. Also put into their purse or pocket.
17:03 - Midnight mass. Up to to Ballyfad for midnight mass about one and a half miles. M Drunk men ’singing’ at the back of chapel at midnight mass.
18:58 - Christmas Eve. Giving mothers a hand on Christmas Eve. House had to tidy for Santy to come. Christmas Pudding made months in advance. Always called him Santy.
19:58 - Remembering looking at toys, especially dolls, in local shop windows. They recalled how money was scarce and how some neighbours and relations got stuff and they didn’t.
21:12 - St. Stephens Day. No wren boys in Coolgreany but they remember the Wren Boys in Gorey in the 1990s. May have been Travellers. Always a fox hunt on St. Stephen’s Day. Doesn’t happen anymore.
22:32 - Went to visit the crib on Christmas Day. Visiting the graves at Christmas. Wasn’t that popular.
23:42 - Buy a big red candle for Christmas Eve and the youngest in the house would light it. It was left in the window. The first light at Christmas. Put in a jar with soil or sand. This was to show Mary the way while they also had it that it was the first light for Jesus. It would be let burn all night.
25:09 - Sweeping the chimney before Christmas. They though it was done for Santy. Letters put up the chimney for Santy. Doors left open.
26:26 - Collect holly and give out to older people who couldn’t get out to the fields to get their own. They really like having holly in the house at Christmas.
27:53 - The birds swept the berries off the holly on them. Holly only put up three days before Christmas.
28:38 - Nothing much done on New Years Eve. Always a dance on Christmas Night in the hall in Johnstown and Inch. Unusual. No alcohol at it. Live band. Rock and Roll and waltzes. Even the Priest was at it.
31:33 - Wedding Blowers at the weddings. Tormenting a couple. Used a broken bottle to blow. They would be in the fields around the house of the people to be married. One of their brothers did it. They called it ‘Blowing’.
34:24 - Wedding Breakfast and Honeymoons. Strawmen, Blackmen and Chimney Sweep.
35:35 - Jumping over the broom at weddings.
35:53 - No dances in Lent. Lenten fast. Patrick’s Daywas a new thing.
36:55 - Guggy Eggs
37:34 - Easter. Salt and candles blessed. St. Blaise’s Day.
38:32 - Planting spuds by the 17th of March. Planting on Good Friday.
39:35 - Calling spuds pratai. Ingins for onions. Fluur for floor. Duar for door. Tay for tea. Old pronunciations. General chat words and sayings.
42.56 - Some fieldnames and placenames they remember.
45:04 - Blackdogs and ghosts. Some great local stories.
47:10 - Strange Lights. Local stories. Ghosts and spirits. Someones ‘fetch’.
48:26 - A ghost of a dead person.
49:17 - Horse sensing danger and a local story
50:02 - Aughapoulantalamh - local placename and story
51:28 - Dogs turned on the owners. Ghost story.
52:21 - People getting lost in fields. Classic story. Funny ending.
53:41- Raheen stories.
54:16 - Jack the Lantern and Willie the Wisp and Flying Saucer Story
56:03 - Building on a Mass Path. Knocking on the windows and hearing people talking.
57:08 - The Bow/Banshee. Her grandmother died. Also story of the banshees comb. Heard at the Ball Alley in Coolgreany. Spotted in Arklow by a bridge.
1:01:09 - Great ghost story.
1:02:59 - Story of robin and the sign of a death. Banshee story.
1:03:59 - When Kathleen’s grandfather died. Smell of the pipe father died.
1:04:42 - The May Bush. Parades. Bonfires. GAA Bonfires. When they ended.
1:09:25 - Herring season. The Pea, the Melt and the Swim.
1:10:25 - Asking about st. Martin’s Eve and then hearing about St. Patrick landing near Castletown and the local threw stones at him.Patrick’s Well mentioned.
1:12:30 - Kathleen’s father was born with a Cawl.

Видео Kathleen Bolger and Maureen Cullen - Folklore, Customs and Memories from North Wexford канала Michael Fortune (Folklore.ie)