The smell of summer is still the same as it always was.
It was a Thursday morning out walking along an old road in Letterkenny. The footpath may be all new and a new one way traffic system is now in place. But the trees that overhang the old roadway with old stone walls on each side still capture the fresh smell the young leaves give off when they fully form and give off that vibrant colour of green as the warmer days of summer arrive.
This week, I was given an old school photo that needed its glass replacing. Along with it were four photos of three schools that housed the Boys School over the last century. These four photos were the last few to be included in the history of the school in photographic form which will go up on the walls of the newly extended complex. Scoil Cholmcille will be officially opened in the coming days. The boys school and the girls’ schools are now integrated ( both take boys and girls).
The photos that I cut a new piece of glass for were of a group of boys at the Old Boys School, called St Columba’s or Scoil Cholmcille. It would have been taken in 1968. The photographer was the Late Tony O’Shea who had his studio just off the High Road. He signed his name ‘A O’Shea’ on the photograph for the long version of his name, Anthony. His wife was also a photographer and her name was Anne, so A O’ Shea covered both of them.
Looking at the photo, my mind went off on a journey and I had a go at trying to see how many of these boys from Letterkenny I know. Even though they were all a few years older than me, I still knew an older version of their faces as they grew up in our home town. Letterkenny was a much smaller place in those days that this photo of the Boys School Choir was taken. They were the winners of the Bianconi Cup three years in a row – 1966, ’67 and ’68.
So, starting at the front I recognise Declan Nee from Nee Drapers, Main Street, where A Wear is now located. Liam Collins from The Burma (Ard O’Donnell), Micheal Foley from Wolfe Tone Place, and the two Keeney’s – Kevin and Malachy from New Line Road.
In the second row I recognised Micheal Mellett, College Row, and Eunan McGlynn of Ballymacool. John Stevenson, Lr Main Street, Paddy McGlinchey Back Road, Gerard Kelly, Kellys Mills, Micky Ponsonby, Burma, John McGeehan, New Line Rd and Willie Murray and Patsy Ferry from Wolfe Tone Place.
In the third row I could see Dermott Donohoe, Church Lane, Paul McGeehan, New Line Rd, one of the McCarron’s from the Burma and Leo Keeney. Back row are Joe Glenfield of Gallagher’s Hotel, Karl Kelly of Sprackburn House, Brian McArt, Iona, Vincent Mc Glynn and Hugh Coyle Wolfe Tone Place, Pat Price, Burma, and Johnny Regan from New Line Rd.
The year this photo was taken I had just started the school and, as it was in those years, the first two years the boys went to the Girls School for Junior Infants and Senior Infants – better known as ‘Baby’ and ‘High Infants’. I went to the Boy School in 1970 and some of these boys were still there in the 5th and 6th class. They were soon to move on to the nearby St Eunan’s College or the Tech which was then located over at the Burma.
As it happens, the day I was delivering this photo that included 44 boys all decked out in the days before school uniforms for their group photo, I was also asked to take their two 6th class groups of the present day school before they depart this summer and head off on the many journeys that their lives may take them.
Gone are the days of the manual typewriters that punched the ink onto this paper that carries the captions below the photo. The picture had faded over the 55 years from when it was taken as the sun would shine in the very tall window in the old boys school. The photo, because of its square shape, would have taken on the old medium format camera. It would have been developed by the O‘Shea’s at their studio.
The print hasn’t faded a bit over all these years. A simple soft pencil, maybe 2B, was used both to sign the photo and to make a small border around the picture on the mount board.
Last Friday Morning in the brand new hall, the Sixth Class got ready for their photos – four rows high, just like the old photos from years ago. Now the photos are still taken with cameras of the day but it is a digital image with no heating up of developer fixer and and was not getting the negative out of the spool in complete darkness and loading it on to a developing spool. Now, the darkroom is your computer and the photos are transmitted down the phone line to a photo lab that digitally prints the image. In another 50 years, someone will be looking at both photos of the school children sitting beside each other and will be trying to put names to the faces familiar in Letterkenny in their day, just as we did this week.
Included belwo is the caption for the old photo from years ago, have a look and see who you can spot from all those years ago. Sadly some of them school children have gone to their eternal rest over the years.
The names of the boys in the photo.
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