From Rockfield in Turlough to New York City

ROCKFIELD, Turlough, native Joe Doherty contributed a nostalgic article for the Parke & Turlough magazine ‘Yesterday & Today 1911-2011’ in which he recalled his first day at Turlough school when he got into a fight, writes Tom Gillespie.

Joe wrote: It came about because I spent some time before going to school in my grandmother’s house, the Naughtons from Clooncundra.

On my first day in school the teacher took one look at me and said: ‘Ah you, what is your name?' I said my name is Josie Naughton. She looked at me and said ‘Who?' I said Josie Naughton. This buck at the back jumped up and said he is not Josie Naughton, he’s Josie Doherty - so that was my first fight.

As the years went by there were a lot of highlights.

With headmaster Quinn, we learned a lot about football, even though we had no football, and no pitch to play on. It was always a big regret. If only we did have a pitch to play on we could have ended up in Croke Park.

There was a great crowd of lads going to Turlough school who were highly motivated towards football.

I recall a final year when I was 13 or 14. The last game we had was on a Sunday afternoon. My father was gone for the day so I invited the boys up to the field and we started this game.

This time we had a second-hand football. We called our teams and started the game. My side was winning about two-thirds of the way into the second half when the ball burst and we didn’t have a second one. As my side was slightly ahead I tried to claim victory. They were having none of it.

I think it was my very good friend, Ted Jordan, or Frank Davitt and a few of the boys who promised that we would finish it some other day. But to this day the game was never finished.

I always hated the land so after Turlough school my parents sent me to the Tech in Castlebar - Davitt College today. I learned a lot there. It was a great three years of my life. I learned from carpentry to mechanic, mechanical drawing, and so on.

Of course, I had my problems there; they almost threw me out a few times for getting up to devilment. One such funny incident was when the teacher picked a few of the ‘country lads’ to reach the ‘town lads’ how to weed vegetables. I was put with a ‘town lad’ ( I won’t name him) who had never seen the country in his life.

We were put on a drill of carrots, which was covered in weeds. I told him to pull the red things (weeds) and leave the green things (carrots).

He was halfway up the drill when the teacher came out and all hell broke loose. He grabbed the ‘town lad’ by the throat - 'What have you done? You have pulled all the carrots and left the weeds.' 'It was Doherty who told me to do it.' Then I got a few clips across the ears.

My first job was as a ‘helper’, as we call them here in the US in a gas (petrol) station, fixing cars in Teddy Bourke’s garage at Market Square, Castlebar. I lasted about eight months. One day I had a car on a lift checking the back axle for oil. I forgot to secure the wheel with a piece of wood. As I loosened the nut I noticed that it had slipped and was coming towards me. I just escaped as it crashed to the ground. My career ended there when I picked up my last pay slip that day and I was down the road again.

It did not bother me because at 10 shillings a week (€0.63 equivalent today) I was broke after I got paid never mind before I got paid.

After that it was up to Josie Bourke’s garage on Ellison Street where I lasted only four months. I was getting £2 a week (€2.52 today). I got an offer of a job in the hat factory on the Newport Road through a connection I had. I loved the hat factory.

After almost a year I decided to make another move. There was nothing left for me around Castlebar so I said I would try England.

At the age of 19 I left for London. It broke my heart to leave Castlebar but there was no other choice.

My first stop was in Pompey (Portsmouth) in the south of England and what broke my heart further was the accent. I could not understand one thing down there. The accent in London was one thing but down in Portsmouth I could not understand one thing they were saying. I lasted three months and then it was back to London.

That was a new experience for me. We stayed up on the fifth floor of a flat where we had to seal the windows with newspaper to keep out the wind and rain.

We had to come down to the ground floor for the bathroom and there was no such thing as a lift.

However, I got a nice job as a toolmaker. I finally moved out to the west side of London and spent a few years there working in mechanics for EEC and Wimpy and got to love London and made a lot of friends there.

* Part Two will be published online tomorrow

* Read Tom Gillespie's County Town column in our print edition every Tuesday