Welcome to a special edition of SHSS Alumnae Link!

This week, in honour of Sacred Heart’s 80th anniversary, we connected with Mrs Noreen Minihan who graduated in 1949.

Name and position:

Mrs Noreen Minihan (née Lenehan), retired Principal of St Joseph’s Infant Boys’ School, President of Tidy Towns, founding member of the Clonakilty Convent of Mercy Past Pupils’ Union, and philanthropist.

Lives:

Clonakilty.

Tell us about yourself:

I was born on Pearse Street in Clonakilty, upstairs over where Betty Brosnan’s café is now. My mother’s name was Betty Brosnan. My father died when I was 4 months old. He was one of the first guards to come to Clonakilty in 1923, just after Irish Independence. The barracks that time was where Crowley’s chemist shop is now, because the main barracks had been destroyed in the Troubles. When I was seven, my mother married again. I went on to have two sisters and three brothers. One sister died as a baby, and the other married a man in the Royal Navy and was stationed in Hong Kong. She came back to Clonakilty when she was pregnant with her second child, but died the day after it was born. I took the eldest - the little girl who was a year and nine months - and I thought I’d have her for a long time, but when the father remarried, he took her back. I found that very hard. We’re close now though.

I have six of my own: three boys and three girls. They’re lovely. As the saying goes, they’re very fond of you!

Leonora, the eldest, is teaching in Paris. Patrick lives outside Clonakilty. He was in the bank, then he retired and he does consultancy now. John did IT. Karen practised law for ten years and then changed course and moved to Schull. She’s now involved in writing and drama.

Miriam is an ophthalmologist in London and Michael did IT.

I have sixteen grandchildren and we’re very close. The whole lot of us have gone on holidays together. One time, we went to a huge house in Provence with a swimming pool. The whole lot came: my children and grandchildren. It was gorgeous. I loved it. Another year we went to Carcassonne.

My husband, Michael, got sick in 2008. We had just come back from Paris. He went in to look at a match on the television while I was ironing. Then, he went up to bed, and when I went up to put things in the hot press, he called me and said he had a ferocious pain in his head. It turned out to be an aneurysm. He lived for just over two years afterwards in the hospital here. They were more than fantastic. I used to go up twice a day and I’d help to feed him: in the morning and the evening. I value that time now. It was great to be with him. We celebrated our 50th anniversary party in 2009. It was amazing. I said we weren’t having any 50th anniversary because I would hate photographs with that dull look in his eye. Then, one evening I was babysitting for my son, John. I had been above that day in the hospital, and found Michael looking great. So, I got out the phone and I rang all over the place. I called Abacus Catering, and the following Saturday we had Mass and a lovely party above in the hospital. Crowds of friends came and we got lovely photographs, and his eyes were as clear as could be.

Tell us about your schooldays:

I attended the Convent of Mercy Primary School. We used to finish in mid-July for the summer. Classes ended at the end of June, but we would stay on for two weeks learning algebra and geometry with the nuns. I entered first year at SHSS in 1945 and graduated in 1949. Some of the nuns there at the time were Sr Benedicta, Mother Brendan, Sr Genevieve, Sr Conleth, and Sr Eugenius. There were also lay teachers: Ms Door and Ms Gould, and Ms Purcell. Ms Gould and Ms Purcell became nuns afterwards. They were well into their forties when they entered.

Sr Benedicta was very dominant - a real disciplinarian, but had the children’s interest at heart.

When I was at school, there was Sister Lorenza and she used to run the Children of Mary. When we were about sixteen or seventeen, we were made Children of the Angels and we got a green ribbon. Then in our final year of school, we were made Children of Mary. Every Sunday, after 10am Mass, there was a meeting here at the convent and we’d have prayers and instruction. Great friendships were made.

During the month of May, the whole school would start where the primary school is now and go down to the gate, then go up and around the convent grounds for the May Procession.We’d say the Rosary, sing hymns, and stop above at the graveyard and pray for the dead. All the hymns were to Our Lady.

I did step-dancing when I was young and I kept it up when I was a teenager. So, if there was a concert I’d be invited to step-dance. There would be small concerts, all the way from Ballinascarthy to Kenmare. There was a Father McCarthy here in Clon. One time, he was running a concert in Kenmare, and he wanted people from Clonakilty to go. I went down along with Denis Twomey, a brilliant pianist from Skibbereen, and a singer called Michael. I can’t recall his surname. Anyway, Michael had the most gorgeous voice and Denis would play the piano. When Michael sang ‘Sparkling Eyes’ and Denis played the piano, nothing else mattered only to listen to them!

Best memory of school:

I enjoyed being at school. I loved the kindness of the nuns, particularly Sister Brendan.

Sr Brendan knew how busy my mother was in the shop so she suggested, in my Leaving Certificate year, to bring a second lunch. Then, when the other girls went home at 4pm, I stayed on. Sr Malachy from the kitchen made me a cup of tea, I had my second lunch and I studied until 6pm. She knew that Mammy would be looking for me, to do messages or to go to the creamery for butter. I’d be called on to help in the shop. The nuns wanted me to have an education. They were determined that their girls would have a job. They never stopped. They had lots of contacts, maybe in other convents, and the three jobs they always wanted were teaching, nursing and the civil service. Some of the girls left after the Junior Cert, some went to England to do nursing.

I would hope that each girl in the school finds the job that they like best. It’s a long life and it’s great to have a job that you like and look forward to.

Tell us about your career progression to date:

I went to Mary Immaculate Training College in Limerick in 1949 to become a primary teacher. At that time of course not everybody had a phone at home so my grandmother went down to the local shop and used the phone to ring me to say that there was a job going out the country: in Knockskeagh. That time you were eighteen going on thirteen, so I said, ‘What do you think, Nana?’ and she said, ‘I’d take it.’

So, when I finished my training, I started my teaching career in Knockskeagh. I spent four and a half years there, cycling to school each morning. I spent the next forty years teaching in the boys’ school: Scoil na mBuachailli. At that time it was an old school, and I had 56 boys in the class - Senior and Junior Infants together. I had seating for 38 and the rest sat on the floor, and they alternated. They all got on very well. Then we moved over to the present school and in 1996, the senior boys joined on to the back of our school. It’s all one now.

For almost forty years, I prepared the boys for First Holy Communion. It was a great privilege and I loved it.

I actually taught for 45 years. When I retired from teaching, I was asked by the diocese to go around visiting schools as a ‘Diocesan Visitor’. We called ourselves ‘The God Squad’. My daughter is married over in Paris and one year, Michael and I were over in Charles de Gaulle airport, showing our passports, and there was a moving stairs with a big line of people and next thing I heard, out of the blue, ‘Mam, Mam! Look at the holy lady!’. You can’t go anywhere!

I loved my job. I retired in 1996. I cried every week that last year, but I wasn’t long retired when a local priest asked me to sub in Kilmeen school, and I taught all the time until 2008 when my husband got sick. It was great to be a sub because if a child came in and said that there was a milk carton down the toilet, I’d say: Tell the Master! It wasn’t my problem. That’s why I loved it so much.

What does Sacred Heart mean to you?

I was always involved with the convent in general. In 1968, Mrs McCarthy decided that we start a Past Pupils’ Union. Bunty O’ Regan was the first President and I was the Vice President.

From then on we organised dances and various activities and lectures, as it was a very energetic Past Pupils’ Union. For instance, the present Flower Club started with flower demonstrations. We brought people out from Bandon and they showed us how to arrange flowers. Sheila Gilbert was very involved. We brought a lady called Cliona Clayton down from Cork and did house furnishings. We ran fashion shows. We gave all the funds to the school or else we bought something for the school. We did a lot of fundraising that time.

We also started the Past Pupils’ Union in Cork. They’re stronger than us now and they have a meeting every year. We go up to it. Ms Brosnan goes up to it and she reports on what’s happening. Sr Benedicta, up to the time she got ill, never missed it.

We also ran the Debs dances. They started around 1968/1969. The Debutantes were dressed all in white and it was beautiful. Michael Minihane and Jack Power would arrive from Skibbereen to take photos.

What does Clonakilty mean to you?

Clonakilty is like one big family, it’s so easy to love it. It’s easy to get involved in things and I feel bad when I say no. I’m President of Tidy Towns. I help to run a Bingo on Monday nights for funds for the Community Hall. I’m one of the founding members of the PPU. I also run a lottery for the hospital for funds. I’m busy all the time really. Church Gate collections. The upkeep of the Grotto. Cork Simon Community. In 2013, the Clonakilty Convent of Mercy Past Pupils’ Union organised a very successful gathering at the new Convent of Mercy for the ‘Clonakilty 400’ celebrations. Every year, I write a long Christmas letter to my friends and relations all around the world. It’s handwritten, about 25 pages in length, with news of the family and of Clonakilty. I photocopy it and send it. Now, it has a huge readership.

Advice you’d give to students today:

Do your evening study, every single night. Then you’ll enjoy your exams because you’ll know the answers. I would really and truly say that.
When you’re at school, look at the Leaving Cert students the day they get their results. See the joy and the sorrow, and remember that that will be you one day.

Favourite motto:

If I can help somebody as I pass this way then my living will not be in vain.

Thank you to Mrs Minihan for taking the time to answer our questions. It was truly a pleasure to feature such an inspirational lady.

See you soon for the next instalment of SHSS Alumnae Link.