Aidan Montague's memories of Ballyknock

My earliest memories of Ballyknock were waking up on Christmas morning to find my new toys spread across the big settee by the open fire. My parents always made Christmas day a magical experience.

We would troupe off to midnight Mass on Christmas eve in the old Kilwarlin church and when Mass was finished we would emerge into the crispy frost, or sometimes snow and head home to the freshly cut Christmas tree surrounded by presents.

My mother would have baked the Christmas cake many weeks before and the family washed it down with copious amounts of ginger wine - what it lacked in alcohol it made up for in bucket loads of sugar.

Time had passed us by in Ballyknock. We had no electrictity or mains water supply. We read our books by the light of oil lamps and drank water from the little well across what was pronounced - "The Shuck". No idea where the word "Shuck" originated but it referred to the little stream along the roadside.

In the corner, we had my grandfather's (Henry McKeown) old gramophone which had long ago passed it's use by date. The box of needles and all the old 78s were still intact but, try as I may, I could never get so much as a squeak out of it.

Being an only child for the first eight years of my life I found my entertainment amongst the old "uncles" who lived in various out-buildings or "appendages" to the main house. They were actually my mother's uncles, the Mckeowns - Henry's brothers.

The eldest was "William John", the grumpiest man on Earth. William John was a major source of entertainment to, not only me, but also to his brothers. He was in his eighties when I knew him and regarded me (quite rightly) as some sort of nuisance that he didn't deserve at this advanced stage of his life.

The poor man endured everything from me covering his chimney with hesion bags, to smoke him out, to dropping a broken brick on his head (fortunately adorned with a little Irish cap) as he sat on a bank reading the Sunday paper. In even later years he started to tolerate me which was more to his credit than mine.

The old uncles used to congregate around the open fire on winter nights and I found great joy in parking my tricyle (with a boot full of snow) alonside the fire and letting it melt around their feet. They just muttered under their breath and sent me on my way.

I went to the old school at "Rileys Trench" which consisted of the grand total of two teachers and twelve pupils ranging in age from about sixteen to six (I was one of three six year olds). I spent my first morning at school crouched below the desk - I was terrified. The two young teachers eventually coaxed me out with "sweeties" and thus my schooling began. Soon I was having lunchtime sword fights around the headstones and over the graves in the old graveyard adjoining the school. We made our own catapults, slingshots, bows and arrows and attacked everything that moved.

My mother used to take me to school perched on a little seat on the back of her bicycle. It was a few miles to Riley's Trench school and invariably we would end up in the ditch as my mother lost control of the bike on the icey roads. We never seemed to get anything more than a few scratches and of course bike helmets were a thing of the distant future.

During the summer holidays I would spend my time with the Dillons, the Megarrys and other neighbouring farmers. When I was about eleven, one farmer, Billy Megarry decided that it was time to put me to work. I hung tightlly to the mudguard of his tractor as he drove me to the potatoe field. I started off earning nine shillings per day and eventually, at the age of sixteen, I was able to work twelve hour days and raked in the princely sum of fifteen shillings per day, working a six day week. Billy was a good man and he paid me well. Fifteen shillings per day was actually very good money and my parents were grateful for the extra income. By that time I had four little sisters and my father's wage barely stretched.

We used to have fun hurling potatoes at the occasional car or tractor that would pass by on the little winding road. I used to admire an older cousin who was able to hurl potatoes prodigious distances with great accuracy. He was bigger and stronger than the rest of us and set a great example for the younger kids to follow.

My father dug a well in our back garden, complete with a winding handle and bucket to raise the water so my mother could do the washing. It worked great for few years until I decided to clear the partially full paint tins out of the shed and empty the contents of numerous tins into the well. Of, course the oil based paint floated on top of the water and made a great concoction.

What else could I do? I couldn't resist - I threw a match in and watched the well explode into flames. I can vividly remember my mother yelling to my father - "He's set fire to the bloody well." The whole winding contraption caught alight and that was the the end of that particular source of water.

Perhaps the best family friends in Ballyknock were the Dillon family of Fort William - up the hill from our home in Ballyknock.

On most evenings, the father, Johnny Dillon would come down past our place to feed the pigs. Johnny loved a chat with my parents and he would always make time to drop by for a yarn by the fireside. I can always remember the smell of fresh pig manure wafting through the house as Johnny warmed his feet (boots and all) by the open fire. No one seemed to mind. Johnny always presented a cheery face on a winters evening and the smell of pig dung was a small price to pay for such good conversation.