Growing up in Marian Row
By Tom Gillespie
MARIAN Row in Castlebar was completed in 1954, which coincided with the Catholic Church’s Marian Year. The estate consisted of 24 houses and it was all young families who were accommodated there by Castlebar Urban Council.
A similar number of houses made up St. Bridget’s Crescent, across the river.
The Gillespie family resided at number nine and it was where I grew up, except for my first five years when we lived at Spencer Street.
The houses in the estates were constructed by McCormack Brothers Builders. Both rows of houses differed in design. The Marian Row houses had a sitting-room downstairs to the front and a kitchen and scullery at the back and three bedrooms and a toilet upstairs. In contrast, St. Bridget’s Crescent had a large kitchen downstairs running from the front to the back of the house. There was a small room off the front hallway which in most houses was used as a bedroom, with three bedrooms and a toilet upstairs.
In the early years most of the rear gardens were tilled and produced vast amount of vegetables and potatoes.
While our garden was well planted our next door neighbour, Frank Brennan, who worked in the hat factory, had a model plot, only to be outdone by Jack McHale in number 12.
The houses in the middle of Marian Row had gardens with a slight hill which suited the potato ridges which were always on the slops to help with drainage.
On the flat portion at the top of the garden my father erected a makeshift greenhouse which produced fine tomatoes. Alongside it I built a hut with a tunnel for access.
Over the garden wall there was a field that separated us from the old vocational school. Hay was saved in the field and one evening I was enjoying jumping on hay cocks when whoever had the hay caught me.
He commenced to march me home. We had to climb over a gate next to the top of the garden at number one. I hesitated and let him get over the gate first and then I made a dash for it, scaled the garden wall and scurried through four or five plots until I found a safe hiding place until the ‘danger’ had passed.
As we got older we progressed to playing in Baynes’ Field, and doing the ‘hogies' in the river. These were invented by Patsy Heraty from number six in St. Bridget’s Crescent.
Two concrete sloped banks enclosed the river. A series of cement block were placed at equal distances in the middle of the shallow river and we would run down the slopes onto the block and up the other side and on to the next block, and so on.
It was possible to go from number nine to 24 without touching the water. As we got more proficient the distance between the blocks were increased and we enjoyed the challenge.
On the Marian Row side of the river there was a tiny walkway inside the river wall. At Halloween this provided us with a hiding place where we would sneak up to one of the front doors, tie a fishing line to the knocker, retreat behind the wall and pull the line to knock on the door.
Timing was vital as you had to release a bit of line as the front door was opened. Once the occupant answered the door, saw no one there, they closed it again.
The unlit back road in Marian Row was our playground, as was the green across the road.
However, one of our many pranks backfired. With my friend, Ger Heverin, from number 24, we came a cropper one night.
I had acquired a frightening looking rubber mask. We borrowed my father’s long, heavy coat.
We went in to Kennedy’s yard. I put on the mask, climber on Ger’s shoulders, tightened the coat around the two us and knocked on the back door.
When Mrs. Kennedy answered Ger made a run for it but we had ignored the clothesline that crossed the yard. It caught me on the chest and both of us toppled to he ground in a heap to be given a proper going over by Mrs. Kennedy.