Dúchas.ie

This is a wonderful website for those of you with Irish family. As the blurb says: "dúchas.ie is a project to digitize the National Folklore Collection of Ireland, one of the largest folklore collections in the world. Material from thirteen counties in the Schools’ Collection is available here now." So far, the Schools' Collection consists of folklore compiled by schoolchildren in the 1930s. I found stories told to the schoolmaster (George McCahey, married to my 2nd cousin once removed) in Quigley's Point, in the far north of Co. Donegal. Several of the children are my relatives. One of them, Alex Doherty (my 3 cousin 1 removed), was particularly prolific. He has a story about fairies in the grounds of his home, Whitecastle House, where I've stayed many times, but somehow I missed the fairies. Unfortunately, the stories are neatly written up by the schoolmaster. It would have been nice to see the children's own writing.

 

What a delightful website, and the handwriting of the children beautiful. I located the Galway parish of my ancestors and showed my wife some of the children's stories written in the 1930's; their recall of folklore passed down to them and giving the meaning of Gaelic place names. She enthused at the lovely handwriting (she writes in similar style to this day) and said that she doubted many children could emulate this today. I had to agree, after all who writes, when you can text?

 

I'm so glad you liked the website, Bob. Actually, I looked for it initially with you in mind, because I wanted to cheer you up after your experience with the Catholic records! In this case, you were luckier than I was in that the children had written the stories themselves. In my family's school, the schoolmaster has clean-written them all. But the stories are wonderful, aren't they? And such a good example of the Irish gift of story telling.

 

Great, Adrienne. I'm so glad you've found a story told by a family member. Here's the story about fairies told by my 3 c 1 r. He'll be 90 this year. A bit further along there's a story about candle-making told by a 3rd cousin. She'll be 92.