Letterkenny’s Kieran Kelly sits down with Paul Bradley in this week’s edition of The Third Degree to talk about his many passions. From delving into the Cathedral Town’s fascinating history to editing the hugely popular Christmas annual, he is a busy man!
Hi Kieran, thanks for doing this interview. Could you tell us a little about yourself, please?
Hi Paul, thanks so much for asking me. I’m a primary school teacher in Scoil Bhríde in Convoy but I am a born and bred Letterkenny man! My father was from Glenswilly but my mother’s side of the family are from ‘the foot of the town’, or Lower Main Street. I was brought up in Beechwood Avenue, a hop, skip and a jump from going to school in Scoil Cholmcille and then St. Eunan’s College. After university in Dublin and then Maynooth, I moved to London for a few years but the draw of home brought me back and I’ve been living in Letterkenny again since 2006, where I live now with my wife Olivia and our two beautiful children, Joshua and Hannah.
You’re known not just for being an historian of Letterkenny, but for actually sharing your knowledge and research in books. What drew you to that subject?
I suppose the interest originally came from listening to stories about old Letterkenny from my grandmother, Cassie McDaid, my aunt, Mary Mansfield and of course, my mother. It’s a bit of a cliché, but listening to them reminisce about the Devlin Hall or the old railways naturally sparked an interest when I was younger. But the idea for the first book came about after I moved home from London. I was sub teaching at the time and the days that I wasn’t working, I didn’t want to lie around so I would go to the library, mainly to keep myself busy. It frustrated me a little that the information on Letterkenny was scattered about in different books – one book about the railways, one book about the Cathedral etc. – and I just thought, wouldn’t it be easier if the information was all in one book, easily accessible for all? So after 7 years of research, I put it out my first book in 2014, called Letterkenny: Where the Winding Swilly Flows.
What’s the most satisfying part for you, sourcing the photos or finding the information?
Hard to say. I really enjoy putting pieces of a puzzle together, and that can be a mixture of researching books or finding new photos. The great thing about photos though, is that they cannot lie. What I mean is, text in a book can sometimes be inaccurate, perhaps due to a false memory or something. But a photo is what it is, it shows you something that is irrefutable. I made a trip last summer to the National Photographic Archives in Dublin and they have many photos of the town that have not yet been digitised. Finding some of these was just fascinating, it was like having my own little time machine and going ‘back in time’ and viewing the town and its people in a new way.
Your book Then Again is very useful for its old and new Letterkenny comparisons. How many of your old photos come from the National Library or other archives, and how many from local individuals? Do you find an old photo and then take your own photos to match? Is the information about who lived/worked where and when based on memory or records (I imagine that’s harder to come by the further back you look.)
Very much a combination of both National Library and individuals kindly sharing their photos with me. Making comparisons of old and new is a great visual way of showing change over time. When I am taking the photos myself, I try to get as close to the original angle as possible for an ideal comparison. The great thing is though, is that in, say fifty years time, my modern photos will then be a bit of history themselves and people in the future can compare them all over again. God knows what the town will look like then? We might still be waiting on the Bonagee bridge!
As regards the information on who lived or worked where, that came from a lot of careful research of going through old Annuals and articles that appeared in the Donegal News in 2008 by Brid McDaid, which was based on the memories of older residents of the town. Niall McGinley’s book, Our Town, had something similar and other information came from interviews I undertook myself with various people. The further back you go, yes it gets harder, but therein lies the fun of cracking that puzzle! I recently found a document showing the names of residents in each house on the Main Street in 1839 and I can’t wait to share that with people.
Out of curiosity, many of the photos in Then Again are in colour – have they been colourised (quite well), or are we just lucky someone had colour film at the time?
Colourised by myself on the computer. Not everyone agrees with the colourisation of black and white photos and I see their point, but for me, it offers another way of looking at the past in a fresh perspective.
I presume it’s much the same set of skills you use with the Letterkenny Annual, whose 42nd edition you’ve just edited and launched? Does one feed into the other (your own work and the Annual work)?
Well the great thing about the Annual is that it is a team effort. There are so many people involved who help to bring it out, not least Liam O’Donnell in the Community Centre, who puts in a trojan amount of work. I just help by putting all the articles and photos together as best I can. I grew up with the Annual being a part of Christmas. It’s a part of our community and very much a part of Letterkenny. And with the sad passing of Jim Lynch last year, who was editor for 37 editions of the Annual from 1984, there was a very real danger that it would not happen. Jim would have been heartbroken if that had have happened so I stepped in very late and we managed to get it over the line.
How big a responsibility is the Annual – not just in terms of doing people and places justice, but in its actual workload: is there nothing for 9 months, then a rush of work?
We wanted to get the Annual out earlier this year to meet the Christmas post deadlines so September and October were very much the busy months of things coming in and then putting it all together. But yes, the end justifies all the hard work. It’s great that we have it out this year in plenty of time.
You also write plays, generally based on local history, like the recent Drumboe. Is that work primarily imaginative (within the confines of what’s well known), or is it also fed, maybe even inspired, by your general historical research? Does a play scratch a different kind of itch for you than say, a photographic book, or do you see them all as being part of a reconstruction of the past?
I guess it depends on the play. Drumboe and Beneath an Irish Sky (I play I wrote about the shooting of an RIC constable in Letterkenny in 1921) were both inspired by research. But I’ve also written a couple of comedy dramas that have no link to history, such as Dramateurs and Jimmy’s Winnin’ Matches. However, the joy I get in researching a topic certainly helps with the writing of an historical play. It is very much a different style of writing though. What I’ve learned over the years is history is history and drama is drama. For a drama, you have to take certain liberties in the name of entertainment. The audience didn’t come for a lecture; they want to be entertained. And so you have to create and imagine scenes that never actually happened but without straying from the actual history. That’s the challenge. For example, with Drumboe, I created a fictional character to interact with the historical characters of Joe Sweeney and Charlie Daly. The audience needed that fictional character to understand what was going on. Without him, it would have been just two men shouting at each other! And that’s not entertaining…unless you’re in the pub!
You also work as a teacher. Can I ask you…where do you get the energy, time, and drive for everything?
Ha, God only knows! All I can say is, I have a very understanding and supportive wife! Being a teacher, I am blessed with having two months off each summer. That helps a lot as that’s generally when I get my writing done each year. I’m the kind of person who hates to be idle. I find it strange when I have nothing to do so I generally have a few things in the pipeline. I’m directing a play in the Spring with Letterkenny Music & Drama Group and I have a new book coming out early next year about the history of pubs and hotels in Letterkenny going back two hundred years to 1824. That was what I primarily worked on last summer. Finding the energy, time and drive to do something is easy when you enjoy doing it, I guess.
What about pre-photography Donegal? Does that interest you as well – could we see a drama about the Siege of Donegal or the Battle of Scariffhollis in the future?
I have a play in development at the minute about the Derryveagh Evictions actually. It’s a courtroom drama based around the trial of Francis Bradley and, again taking a little historical liberties, I put John George Adair in the dock. I’m very excited about it and hopefully we’ll be able to stage it soon. I have a personal connection to the story as my great, great, great grandfather, James Sweeney, and his family were evicted from their homes and I can’t help but draw comparisons to modern landlordism and evictions that are still taking place.
Is there anything else at all, any local issue, you’d like to raise or remind people of?
If anyone has any local historical topic they wish to talk to me about, please email me at letterkennyhistory@gmail.com and I will help in any way I can.
Quick fire:
Favourite book?
Couldn’t honestly choose one. I love to read a wide variety of books – plays, history, thrillers. But let’s go with my current favourite – “One For the Road: A History of the Pubs and Hotels of Letterkenny 1824-2024”…out next year!
Film?
JFK, The Godfather, Life of Brian, Back to the Future, Superman…depends on the mood
The perfect night?
A glass or two of red in front of the fire, eating popcorn with Maltesers, watching a movie with Olivia.
Artist?
Kevin Bridges, Billy Connolly
Music?
The Beatles – I shook hands with Paul McCartney once…I cried with joy afterwards!
Your nickname at school?
A few close friends from college still call me Angry K…don’t ask!
What motivates you?
To be a better person than I was yesterday
What do you look for most in a friend?
Honesty
What angers or disappoints you?
Dishonesty
How do you relax?
Researching and writing!
Do you have a motto or philosophy you try to live by?
And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make (The Beatles)
If anyone else would like to take part in this interview, to raise a profile or an issue, or just for fun, please contact Paul at Dnthirddegree@gmail.com
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