First, may I wish you all a very happy and successful 2009, agus go merimid beo ag an am seo aris [that we may be alive this time (next year) again]. As we haven't been getting many emails on Beara-L recently, I will start 2009 by going back to what my then Village, Ardgroom Village, was like "when I was young". Up at the top of the Village, beside the bridge, was a house that was built by Tade Kelly of Bawers and the "Holly Bar" for his wife Johanna who was teaching in the local Primary School. It was a Departmental rule that no teacher was allowed to live in a pub. So Tade had to build a second house. Later on, Mrs. O'Shea, who had been married in Butte, Montana, lived there. The next house down was Johnny Morley's. Morley came from Morley's Bridge, Co. Kerry. He was married to Katie O'Sullivan(Coorneenagh) whose brother Johnny was Secretary to the Mayor of Butte. Morley and Katie had a dog "Topsy" who was known to all and sundry as "Topsy Morley". Patie (Denny) Harrington came to live here when he became Principal Teacher in Kilmacowen Primary School (now closed). A son of his, Padraig, is a Bishop in Kenya, Africa. The house two doors down was originally the first Post Office, owned by Jackessy Crowley whose daughter Brigid was the Postmistress. She married Patsy McCarthy, and the Post Office was moved across the road to Patsy's house. I remember Jim (the Post) Harrington coming from Eyeries to Ardgroom on a bicycle loaded with letters and parcels. The worse the weather was, the louder you would hear Jim singing ---- I suppose to keep himself warm. Around Christmas time, when the mail would be heavier, he would bring the pony and trap. Next door was Bridie Healy's shop. When I was young, I had a mathematical formula by which I could find out the age of a person by first asking them what size shoes they wore, and then working around it by addition, subtraction and multiplication. Bridie answered all my questions correctly (which was vital), and then I told her her age. Well, she got a rod and followed me twice around the table. Luckily enough I was alot faster than she was, and escaped out the door much quicker than I came in. It was the start of my genealogical lessons on how to find our womens' ages. Later her two nieces came from Glengarriff. Mary ran the shop and Sheila made beautiful Limerick lace. Next was Flor (the Shoemaker) O'Sullivan's house. Flor made and repaired shoes and boots. It was followed by Murty (Owen) O'Sullivan's bicycle shop. Murt had a latch on his door (There were no door bells that time). A few young lads used tie a "chord" to the latch and bring the "chord" across the road to Jim (Glas) O'Sullivan's unoccupied house. They would then pull at the "chord", and the latch on Murt's door would lift. Murt would come out thinking there was someone outside but he could see nobody. Then you had Mag Danileen's. She had a cloth shop and was a dressmaker. I remember playing cards ----(a game of "31") -----in Mag's house one night. Denny (Con) Shea and Josie (Jer) Denny were partners, and if they had played their cards correctly, they would have won. In the second last round, Denny (correctly) threw down the knave, knowing that if Josie had the five, he could keep it until the last round, and then have won with it. But when the cards came around to Josie, what did he do? He threw his five on top of Denny's knave, and they lost the game. Denny caught Josie by the back of the neck, brought him as far as the door and lifted him with a shoe in the posterior out on to the road !! To be continued........... Regards, Riobard.