Community Magazine March 2015 No. 333 EDITORIAL It reduces the environment to slum standards, is very expensive to clean off and With the days getting longer and the weather puts an extra load on the shoulders of those generally improving, we are entering a new who are already over-worked. Worst of all - year of community activity and endeavour. it gives very bad example to young children. We have just had Clane Musical and Dra- matic Society’s annual production of “Sing CALENDAR into Spring”, which was held in the West- grove on February 27th and for which they Monday 2nd March must be congratulated once again. The Soci- Clane Juvenile Hurling awards night will be ety’s next production will be “The Cripple held at 7pm in Clane GAA club. See P. 10 of Inishmaan” by Martin McDonagh which Wednesday 4th March will be staged in The Abbey in Clane from Clane Toastmasters are holding an Open the 8th to the 11th April. Again this is some- Night in Clane G.A.A. Club at 7.45pm. All thing to look forward to. are welcome. See p. 9. In the meantime we have the St. Pat- [Friday 13th-Friday 20th March rick’s Day Parade and Festival coming up See special Festival Calendar on page 8.] fast; now the 11th performance by the Pa- Wednesday 18th March rade Committee, under the chairmanship of Clane Local History Group present: "Irish Mary Dunne. From day one this has been an Victorian Mountaineering", a talk by Declan explosive social and community event and is O'Keeffe in the Clane GAA Club, Prosper- a great tribute to the organizers. ous Road, Clane at 8pm. All are welcome and admission is free. See p. 6 Community Games kicked off with Monday 30th March Swimming on Saturday 28th and the results Monthly meeting of Clane Community are included. The Field and Track events are Council in the Evergreen Room at the Ab- being arranged for May. More details later. bey Community Centre at 8.30pm. Tidy Towns judging extends from June 1st Wednesday 8th-Saturday 11th April to August 31st. We will give more details of Clane Musical & Dramatic Society present Tuesday evening volunteering in our next “The Cripple of Inishmaan” by Martin issue. Graffiti is still a huge issue and in this McDonagh, which will be staged in The regard we repeat a paragraph from January Abbey in Clane. See p. 7 Sunday 26th April “It is extraordinary that, despite the Fleadh Cheoil Chill Dara takes place in extent of community development and the Scoil Dara, Kilcock on Sunday 26th April provision of facilities by numerous sporting 2015 at 10 a.m. See p. 5 groups, that we have such an antisocial problem with graffiti. Vast areas of the walls of the Heatth Centre and SuperValu as well EDITOR’S DEADLINE as the Village Centre, the roof of the Girls’ The deadline for receipt of material for the Old School, lamp posts, brickwork pillars April issue of Le Chéile is have being daubed and desecrated. All the evidence is that very few individuals are Monday 23th March involved. Although 4 or 5 signatures are To 142 Loughbollard please. being used there are indications that as few Tel. 045-868474. as possibly only one or two individual are involved. We must all be on the watch out E-mail: [email protected] for any evidence of this type of activity and be prepared to pass on the information” Get Le Chéile on www.clanecommunity.ie 2 THE GIRLS’ OLD SCHOOL IN dation, but Mother Mary Aikenhead, after a THE MAIN STREET few visits to Clane, declined and refused to send the Sisters here. In our April 2014 edition of Le Chéile, which can be accessed in the web site The Bishop, Dr. Nolan, died in 1837 clanecommunity.ie, we published an article and this suspended the foundation for longer. on the Boys’ Old School, now the KARE His successor, Dr. Francis Haly, was ap- Centre on the Dublin Road. This was to coin- pointed in 1838, and immediately asked the cide with its renovation at the time, with the Presentation Sisters, whose main work as assistance of TÚS, and the reinstatement of laid out by their founder Nano Nagle was to the old name plaque by Matt Hayes. instruct the poor, to come to Clane. In this issue we carry an article on the On 25th April 1839, (the Feast of St. Girls’ Old School in the Main Street which is Mark), the Presentation Convent was found- of course immediately beside the Church. It ed by Rev. Mother Teresa Brennan from became disused as a school in 1982 when the Portlaoise. She brought two Sisters from Car- new Schools of Naomh Phádhraig and Na- low, two from Portlaoise (Maryboro) and one omh Bhríde were officially opened on the from Drogheda. The Sisters were personally Prosperous Road. It is now almost 33 years collected by coach from Portlaoise and later and, as fortune has it, coincides with the brought to Clane by Mrs. Sweetman and official opening of the new extension to the Miss Browne. Girls’ School. “The School-House (Built by the Pa- How the Presentation Sisters came to Clane. trician Society in 1918) was in a most ne- glected state when we arrived here”. (Annals Around 1828 there was deep concern Pres.) So the Sisters, with the aid of the Rec- among at least two wealthy Catholic families tor in Clongowes and the local curate, made of Clane for the wretched state of the poor in a collection to get the School floored, ceiled, the village area. The Sweetman Family of windows repaired, desks and other requisites Longtown and Miss Judith Browne formerly supplied, and the School House was in order of Castlebrown Estate, were fully aware of in a few weeks. This School House had been this and they set about relieving this chronic built in 1818 for £300, and was an exact copy situation. Mrs. Sweetman, herself, went out of the Kildare Place School (behind the Shel- amongst the people, instructed, clothed, and bourne Hotel) This in turn had been built as employed the women in spinning for their an exact copy of the School Street School livelihood. She was still helpless about the (behind Guinness's). Both were demolished education of the poor children. Miss Browne by 1960. For this reason the Girls Old School wrote a letter to Dr. Kenny, S.J. (Provincial in Clane is a living link with an important of the Jesuits) requesting him to assist them, episode in Irish Educational History. with the Bishop’s permission, to get a Reli- gious Order to come to Clane to instruct the It was used to teach fifty orphan boys poor female children. from 1819 onwards and began to decline after 1830. The school went under the De- Mr. Sweetman contributed £700 and partment of Education in 1834/35. The De- Miss Browne £350 towards the building of a partment paid two thirds of the £200 which Convent on the grounds of the Patrician Or- the Patrician Society requested on their de- phan Society School House in the Main parture from Clane. The Sisters were ap- Street, which had been built in 1818 but was pointed to the school, under the Department in rapid decline at this time. The building of in May 1839. Mr. John Sweetman was one of the Convent started in 1836. The Sisters of the Trustees. {Note: the wall plaque states Charity were first selected to start this foun- misleadingly that the school was “built” in 3 1839.] See account below titled “Clane Free the assistance of the late Peter McCreery. School (James Byrne)” The people of Clane scarcely realize what There were 185 girls on rolls, in one they owe to the Presentation Sisters. schoolroom measuring 50’x22’. Many nov- ices offered themselves to join the Presenta- Clane Free School (James Byrne) tion Community in Clane and help the poor This is what was up until 1982 the children, so that by 1850 eight postulants in Girls School in front of the Convent, origi- all had joined the Order in Clane. The school nally built in 1818 by the Patrician Orphan was extended in 1906 when the “Infants’ Society for the education of orphaned boys Room” was built at the Southern end. A pre- and where the Presentation Sisters were to vious addition had been made at the rear in open the Girls’ School 21 years later in 1860, which connected the school and Con- 1839. It might well be one of the oldest in vent. The original large single room was the country. divided by folding doors in 1929, and the front porch was added. Railings replaced a The Kildare Place School was the high wall in 1950 and the building was re- model adopted by the Kildare Place Society, roofed. The previous ceiling was a fine ex- which was a Protestant educational society ample in stucco work built by a Jesuit Broth- that pioneered national primary education in er for the nuns on their arrival in 1839. Ireland. Their teacher training course was a 6 week course and the trained teacher was The Convent Gate was designed by expected to teach 100 pupils, of all ages, in Mother Brigid about 1932, taking its design one large room, with the assistance of a from the gates separating the Nuns’ Choir at monitor (a competent senior pupil aspiring the right side of the Main Altar. The granite to do the formal training course). That such arch was built at the same time.