Introduction
In 1955, with failing health, poverty, and inability to cope with my two sisters and I, my mother handed us over to the care of the Irish State. We were interred in separate “orphanages” on opposite sides of Dublin. My institution was called Artane Christian Brothers School. Two years earlier my dad had left us, after the scandalous birth of twin boys; born while he’d been away for a year in the American army. The twins had also been given over to the state some months after their birth. My mother never told me I was being placed in an institution. I was simply dropped off and told “ I’ll come and get you at Christmas.” Not knowing what had happened to my sisters and with none of my toys or clothes, I was left alone in a strange hostile world which was to be my “home” for the next eight years.
Artane Industrial School was an institution now infamous for the abuses committed by the Irish Christian Brothers on the boys incarcerated within it’s gray walls. But this CD, while it conveys an accurate account of the sufferings I personally experienced at Artane, is not just about suffering and abuse. It is also an exploration of the inherent strength, courage and resilience of the human spirit. Every curse has a blessing hidden within it and my nature has always been to try to ferret out the blessing. From that point of view my whole life has been a blessing.
In 2001 when I was first struck to write about my experiences in Artane I was totally unaware of the furor in the Irish and international press surrounding the abuses committed in that institution. Living in America for ten years, and the previous fifteen years in England, I was more than a little out of touch with current Irish thought on this subject. It wasn't until some friends, to whom I’d played the songs, told me of their subsequent research on the internet, that I realized I the subject was now big news. By that time most of this material had been written, and in the context of the harrowing reports of the inhuman abuse I’ve since read on the internet, my humble expression may seem trifling and lightweight. I would agree that most of the poor lads in Artane had a much worse time of it than I, and I apologize to those who may feel that I don’t come down hard enough on the Christian Brothers. My purpose with this CD is not to assess blame; that is being well documented elsewhere. To my mind, the finger of blame would have to be very wide indeed to include all those who were culpable, all those who turned a blind eye, while the forgotten children of Ireland were bullied, battered and bruised by the Irish Clergy in the Orphanage and Industrial School systems.
So, while my whole life has been impacted by the abuses I suffered in Artane, the genesis of this work stems not from abuse but from abandonment. The realization that my mother had deserted me was a deeper, more primal pain that anything the Christian Brothers threw at me. And that particular pain is what inspired this CD. That pain, I now realize, was buried deep inside me, hidden behind an identity of musical excellence, and a spiritual worldview which, while it tried to view all life as a gift, somehow managed to deny the expression of the trauma I suffered as a lad. I'd never truly "lived" the pain of that abandonment nor did I feel any need to revisit it. But late one night, in the middle of a tiring string of gigs, I sat tinkling on my keyboard in my studio. I felt the saddest feelings spring up from within me and out came a song about my first day in Artane and my mother's deception as she abandoned me. I was shattered by the raw emotion I was allowing myself to express. To my "spiritual" way of thinking, it all seemed very indulgent and somehow "wrong."
“800 Voices” was the first song to emerge about my Artane experiences since leaving the institution in 1963. The first verse came out in one big lump, as lyrics often do, and for the first time in my adult life, I was crying for that lost little boy left alone with strangers in a truly frightening world. When I got to the line of the song about my mother‘s leaving; “and that eight year old abandoned lad still waits for her right now” I was totally overcome. This line actually crept up on me and came out all on it’s own. I was aghast at it’s nakedness and convinced that it was way over the top and far too perssonal to express openly. I didn’t think I could let it stand; and it was two days before I could sing it to my wife, whom I normally drive crazy with my new songs. She cried and had the good sense to insist it stay as is and encouraged me to just let go to the memories.
This was in 2001, and as I’d been involved in meditation and other healing practices for thirty years, I was taken aback at the depth of the emotions I was feeling. I thought I’d left all that stuff behind years ago! Well, maybe from the perspective of my adult soul, I had left them behind. But something remains of old pain that, although there is no more blame or vindictiveness, there are pockets of unresolved, nonverbal feelings that long for verbal expression. As a child those things I suffered made impressions on my psyche that were not accompanied by verbal understanding or articulate cognizance. So despite an adult’s “mature” appraisal of a “larger picture” the pain of those inarticulate, original wounds remain. The writing of this CD has been a very painful but very enlightening experience for me; reopening those wounds after years of transcending them, reliving the old hurts, this time knowing where and what my true self is: The adult reaching back a hand across the years, assuring the child; “Hang on in there kid, this is gonna work out fine!”
800 Voices
My first day at Artane was a mixture of fear, wonder and ultimately, absolute terror. The noise of 800 wild kids playing, fighting and screaming scared and thrilled me. This unbelievable cacophony echoed between the two main buildings, conjoined in a L shape, which housed the five dormitories. The acre and a half of concrete playground and the handball alleys further amplified the din. The atmosphere of dread, interlaced with wild, angry abandon is impossible to describe. There was nothing of the easygoing pursuit of fun, displayed by normal kids at play, whose parents were within earshot; there was a grim desperation in the way these lads went about the business of play.
In 1955, in this heartless institution, there was nothing even approaching orientation for new lads just arrived. I was simply told to “go and play”. So I wandered into the playground scared and wide eyed and was soon being pushed about by lads running to and fro in play.
The games were mostly ball; Gaelic football, (soccer was forbidden and punished) handball, hurling and games of tag and Relieve-ee-yie-o. Some lads simply hunched down, legs wide apart and using their body weight to try to shoulder their opponent off balance. Later, I learnt to love this “wrestling”. It was enormous fun and kept us really warm. It also got you fond of the hard, physical tomfoolery which was the order of Artane everyday life. Although it did happen, bullying was kept to a minimum. The Irish Christian Brothers liked to be the ones who did the pushing around.
If you did get in a serious disagreement with a lad and it came to a Brother’s notice, you either shook hands and made up with a whole heart or you were both forced to put on boxing gloves and go three rounds with each other. The Brother and the surrounding lads shouted abuse and encouragement and generally made sure the occasion was suitably gladiatorial. You still had to shake hands afterwards and oftentimes you both became the best of friends. These confrontations happened to me so often that I joined the boxing team to learn to defend myself. Unfortunately I couldn’t box eggs so they threw me out.
The first winter, it snowed pretty heavily and one morning the brothers lined the whole school up on both sides of the football field between the shelter and the refectory. (See “Radio” song.) They wanted to see us charge and have a snow battle. Now that might sound like fun, but to a skinny little eight year old it was sheer terror. 400 mad, screaming kids running at you with malice in their eyes and hearts was not my idea of a good time. Some lads were badly beaten up in this madness and I remember one lad, Frank Dempsey, being pelted mercilessly by seven or eight bullies. To this day I remember his tearful but courageous; “I’ll have any one of you bastards one at a time. Any one of yez!” There were no takers.
My mother had told me, when I was incarcerated, that she’d come back for me at Christmas. So when Christmas came and all the lads were bussing it into town to see some pantomime or movie I stayed behind waiting at the entrance gate at the top of the long avenue. I stood there in the cold, looking down the avenue, waiting for a sight of my mother. Occasionally someone would come walking up and with my heart racing, I’d hold my breath till they were in sight enough for me to see it wasn’t her. I was still waiting when the lads came back from town four hours later.
The story of the lad on the wall in the song is totally true as are all incidents reported on the album. His words have always remained with me; a wonderfully Irish metaphor for sweeping change. “There’ll be raisins in the holy communion”: Now that’d be progress indeed. Return to Top
The Bold Christian Brothers
On my second day, my first morning, at Artane, I was awakened by the loud, aggressive handclaps of Brother Walsh walking down the center isle of dormitory # 5, shouting abuse and threats, occasionally ripping a blanket of someone. Apparently this was the preferred “ good morning” greeting of the brothers. He wasn’t such a bad fellow but most of the Brothers were capable of wanton violence at the slightest provocation. The accounts of physical abuse by the Christian Brothers are well documented elsewhere and I don’t want to dwell too much on those matters here. But there is one incident I want to report, partly because it’s a classic example of Artane’s injustice and mindless brutality but also because I feel this incident affected me for the rest of my life: Something happened to my breath that day that has remained with me until now.
On my first day a whistle blew and everyone ran to one side of the playground. I was still playing with a spinning top so I didn’t really notice what was going on; everyone was lining up in straight lines in response to the whistle blowing. The next thing I knew I was being clouted about the ears from behind by a Brother and told to report to Brother Buckley, the disciplinarian , and tell him what had happened. Of course I didn’t really know what had happened. I’d just arrived some hours before.
I found Buckley with some difficulty and he growled, “Out with it, boy, what have you done” I started to mutter something like; “a whistle blew and I was still playing and ….” Before I could finish he hit me full force across the face, knocking me to the ground. He set about my legs , backside and torso with his black leather strap with a fury and a gusto that I’d never imagined possible from a human being. My mother had often beaten me and my sisters black and blue with a stick but this was on a whole other level. He went completely berserk, screaming and beating me, emphasizing each word with a full swing of the heavy leather strap on any part of my body he could hit: “ When …..will…. you… lads… learn… that… when …the whistle …blows you drop….. everything and run for the lines.”
I’d never felt anything like that terror and pain. But what really scared me was his absolute abandon to the violence and total lack of control. He was a black specter from hell with eyes bulging , swirling cassock and flailing arms. I really felt he could kill me and no one would even care. When he finished he was sweating and red faced, I was sobbing uncontrollably unable to stand or catch my breath . When I could breathe it was in jumping little gasps that rose from my belly to my chest. “Off you go now and be a good little boy.” My first day at Artane!
Not all of the Brothers were this cruel but a good percentage were. Some were kind and tolerant but this kind of insane attack was a daily occurrence in Artane. One especially mean trick favored by the most callous of the brothers was to delay punishment till evening; “ meet me in the boot room after lights out tonight” ( see “ Radio” song ) The unfortunate boy who received this invitation lived his day in abject fear, knowing that all he had to look forward to was a cruel beating before bed. He couldn’t eat or play or study with this hanging over his head. We’d lie in bed listening to those beatings and the pitiful, unheeded pleas of the lads; “ Please, sir , I’m sorry, sir” and the heartless ; “Not as sorry as you’re going to be, me bucko”.
I managed to avoid most punishments by being clever in my transgressions but some poor lads seemed always to be in the thick of it; caught daily with their hands in the cookie jar. On more than one occasion when I was ordered to report to the dreaded “boot room” I simple didn’t show, hoping that the brother would have forgotten in the rush of the day. Thankfully, I was always right!
I wish I’d had the same good sense that first day on the playground; thus armed I certainly wouldn’t have reported so obediently to Buckley. Carrying that tendency to deviousness and disrespect for authority all my life, I must admit until recently, I’ve found it very hard to fit in to society; totally unwilling to submit to it’s rule, I’d remained on the fringes, cynical and distrusting, yet secretly envious. I feel the writing of this album is helping me to understand that dynamic. Return to Top
When Tommy Bonner Sang
There were plenty of reasons to pretend to be sick at mass but Tommy Bonner wasn’t one of them. He was a tall lad with light hair and although his eyes were soft and his face kind I saw him thrash a bigger bully on the playground one day. He was a wonderful model for me of the power of the easy going. I’ve searched the internet high and low to find Tommy to no avail. Maybe he’ll hear this song and contact me. I sincerely hope so.
I remember my first week in Artane when I couldn’t stop crying I was sent to see the priest. Father Moore , I think his name was. He asked me why I was crying.
“I want to go home to me mammy,” I said. He was a kind man and what his words stayed with me all my life;
“Son, your mother and father have left you here and won’t be back. But your heavenly father will never abandon you. He was with you before you were born and will remain always even after you die.” God’s eternal love was introduced to me in the same sentence as the destruction of my family ties. God and annihilation; the Catholic promise?
I left the Sacristy in a daze and walked outside to the cold of the playground. I distinctly remember standing under the huge shelter, looking across the football field at the big refectory clock and totally accepting that I’d been forever abandoned by my mother. At the exact same moment, I as I let her go, I felt a strange, empty peace replace her presence in my heart. It’s the same kind of bottoming out one feels at a funeral or some really bad news. I learnt to treasure that feeling of emptiness, equating it with peace and independence but I probably took it a little too far at times; making a lifelong friend of melancholia and fatalism.
The choir sang on most Sundays and really was a source of great comfort to me especially when Tommy sang solo. They were conducted by a Mr. George Crean who also conducted the #2 band. He was a wonderful, cultured old man with a beautiful voice and we became friends when he saw my eagerness for everything musical. Tommy Bonner was his protégé but when Tommy left he never had another student like him. Later, when I joined the choir, my own voice was hard and edgy from the slums of Green Street. Although Crean spent many hours trying to darken it with the perfect “Oh” vowel, I never came within a mile of Tommy’s beautiful molten chocolate sound. I learned years later; that it’s not just the voice, it’s the feelings, the eyes……… and of course the heart! Return to Top
The Treasures of the Sons
The hand ball alleys were on the west side of the playground. Twenty feet high and sixty feet long, they were hard fought for, by lads eager to play that fun game. After breakfast, lunch and supper, we would be lined up outside the huge refectory, one hundred and fifty yards to the north of the playground and when the whistle blew, we’d un like blazes to claim the ball alleys or the large auto tires that littered the yard. Other areas would also be claimed for ball games needing an improvised goal; like a doorway.
In most kinds of weather; winter, summer or fall, unless it was a blizzard of snow, or the rain was blowing horizontally, we played outdoors. We had a choice, on the rare occurrence of severe weather, to play in the long hall behind the classrooms that were to the right and west of the refectory. If the weather wasn’t too bad, we played under the huge. one hundred and fifty foot long shelter. This was open to the elements from all sides and was supported by steel posts about ten feet apart. One favorite game was a variation of handball, where we would hand propel home made cloth balls across the shelter width, using the posts as goals. These cloth balls were works of art; using various lengths of half inch wide cotton or tweed, we’d roll them round and round , stitching the sides all along each layer till you ended up with a heavy object capable of bruising a skull or bare arm or leg.
We’d make a spinning top by scouring down the bottom half of a used wooden bobbin, rescued from the tailor’s shop garbage bin. This scouring was done by a waxie, using the boot finishing machine in the cobbler shop, or a carpenter using a chisel.. We’d stick a wooden dowel through the bobbin’s center hole and put a boot stud in the end of the dowel and there you have it ! A perfect spinning top that would last for months. The studs from the hobnail boots also made great ammunition for sling shots which were strictly forbidden. The studs got worn down pretty fast, running round the concrete playground, and if one had a magnet and patience, one could collect pounds and pounds of the resulting metal filings that gathered in the lines and faults of the yard.
I had a wonderful bow and arrow, which I made from two chimney sweeping rods I found in the woodshop. With thick waxed thread from the waxies shop and thin feathered sticks and nails from the carpenters, I had a formidable weapon which I hid for two years down at the “Quarry Pond”. {see “Idle Dan”) Apart from the bow, which lasted a comparatively long time, one got quite used to having one’s treasures stolen or lost on a daily basis, resulting in a detachment from material things which remains with me today.
The “half a tin hen” story is quite true. The St Vincent De Paul Society and other charities were responsible for providing toys at Christmas. They’d pack these parcels of toys and comics at their warehouse and you’d find all kinds of oddities in them; golf balls, axles of toy cars, lead soldiers and heaven forbid; even dolls!! But we were more than happy to get anything at all. I never remember a birthday present or party and to be truthful , I never missed them either! Return to Top
The Artane Boys Band
I’d never heard a brass and reed band before that first Sunday. I’d heard some fife and drum or bagpipe excuses for bands when I’d lived in Green Street but nothing compared to the blast from these lads. Fifty or sixty angry young buckos each one trying to play louder than the next. I was swept away in a waves of ecstasy and shivers of ancient warrior abandon that still often overtake me today when I play my trombone. Brother Joe O’Connor was the generalissimo and driving force and he ruled with an iron fist and a barbed tongue. He was almost always fair though, and could truly inspire with his long, lofty speeches and sense of integrity. On Sundays, the entire school would march behind the band. We’d parade round the considerable grounds with the fire of the rebel battle hymns coursing through our veins. When one first came to Artane one was given a chance to join the band. A rusty old bugle would be passed around a bunch of hopeful lads standing in line and whoever played the loudest got the job. When it was my turn I nearly blew the roof off the place; with every fiber of my being I was determined to play in that band. I got the job but was soon thrown out for fighting and it was two years before I got a second chance. This time I had more sense and quickly made good progress on the trombone. Before long I was in band #1 and giddy to be playing engagements outside the school. Freedom!
There were actually three bands. The #1, and principal unit was the concert and marching band that played engagements outside of the school. The second was a beginners band that played simple hymns and chorals and the third was the miscellaneous others who were just learning to blow and read music. A notable outside venue was Croke Park, the Super Bowl of Gaelic football. We would play there on Sundays and march around the field playing rebel airs often in rain and snow with the football teams all cocky behind us and the crowds of thousands shouting and clapping and us gathering mud that accumulated under our shoes so that we were six inches taller by the end of the marching. It was great fun and the lemonade and sandwiches made it more so. O’Connor would talk to us before each gig and pep us up with encouragement and threats of eternal shame should we blow it. Many good friends come to mind from the band but for some reason most of my best friends were not among the members.
How I loved it when we would go to some of the big cities like Cork or Galway or Derry and we’d stay with the parents of the kids in the school that was sponsoring our visit. I was twice invited to spend summer holidays by some of these good people, most memorably, the Sheehys of Listowel, County Kerry. The other family was from Waterford and just as kind but unfortunately I can’t remember their names. We were treated like royalty and understandably were often the butt of spite and jealousy from other boys and Brothers. Oftentimes folks would give us money and over the years I managed to save the princely sum $50 which I used to buy a trombone when I left school.
We were invited to play at many a state and religious occasion; the visits of President John F. Kennedy , Bing Crosby, and one Cardinal Papal Ambassador whose name I can’t remember. Of course our own President, Eamonn De Valera often had us play for him as did many of the bishops and parish priests throughout Ireland. Someone found a forgotten cache of old Irish airs in the band’s library and my word! it was some of the most beautiful music I’d ever heard. I still can hear those melodies.
In 1962 we were flown to Boston, each lad carrying five bottles of duty free Irish whiskey. I’m guessing this was for the consumption of the Catholic Memorial High School committee which partly sponsored our trip. We played at the residence of the Cardinal of Boston, l who gave each lad an autographed photo of himself. They were all so kind to us and we truly felt welcomed and special. I met my dad when we went to New York to play at Carnegie Hall and some Gaelic Football matches. He was a kind and gentle but broken man, an alcoholic who never got over my mother’s infidelity. He gave me a tape recorder, a radio and a BB gun!!!
Towards the end of my time in the ’Tane, as Artane was often called, I was privileged to be the Drum Major and led and conducted the band for six months or so. I was happier just playing trombone but O’Connor insisted. The influence that he and the band experience had on my life is immeasurable. He has since been accused of sexual abuse but I personally never heard of, or experienced any of that from him. Return to Top
Who Trew Da Boot
The five large dormitories were housed in a huge “T” shaped building only half of which in an “L “ shape could be seen from the playground Three stories high , Gothic, gray and forbidding, these buildings also contained the “Long Hall” splendid and pretentious with it’s plethora of grand pianos, portraits of clergy and a bust of the beatified Edmund Rice (the founder of the Irish Christian Brothers) Dormitory # 5, where the “Boot” takes place was above the theatre where on most Saturdays we’d view movies and at Christmas, plays and pantomimes. .
Each dorm was big enough to boast at least 150 beds in ten rows of fifteen. I’m guessing in size, they were around one hundred feet long by sixty wide. “Lights out” was around ten o’clock or so, depending on the brother in charge.. Till then we would listen to the radio for an hour or so; either Radio Eireann or Radio Luxemburg, again, depending on the brother in charge. Then the lights would go out and the radio off. One remaining light would dimly illumine the large room and snores , farts and coughs would soon echo round and round till morning. Those lads with weak kidneys would be woken up a few times during the night, by the night watchman, to relieve themselves in the bathrooms outside the dormitory doors. Bed wetters were cruelly ridiculed by the lads and whipped by the brothers. The washroom was to the left and in front while the boot room was to the right. No toothbrushes and no hot water.
The poor night watchman in charge of Dorm 5 could never stay awake. The name I’ve given him; “McCarthy“, has been changed as was “O’Reilly’s.” I simply can’t remember their real names. O’Reilly actually worked in the kitchen but in the song, for reasons of clarity, I have him in the bakers. Bread was baked in batches of sixteen loaves, four by four. If you were unlucky enough to get a corner loaf; with four sides having been exposed to the oven heat, you’d better have strong teeth! They really were hard as a rock. Such was O’Reilly’s loaf, and when it landed on the floor it echoed round the room like thunder, waking McCarthy from his slumbers. Sleepily he stood up, scratched his head and I can still hear his words in my mind to this day;
“Ok now, OHHH Kayee” he drawled slowly, in what he thought was his most threatening and intimidating tones.
“Who trew da boot?”
It really is impossible in song, to describe the mayhem that resulted from those immortal words. Punished severely for any talking or laughing after lights out, we nearly choked with laughter. Suppressed laughter in a room of 150 lads has never stayed suppressed for very long and soon we’d abandoned ourselves to it completely. McCarthy went berserk, running round whacking shaking blankets that failed to smother the uncontrollable laughter of their owners underneath. It went on for ages; quieting down to a giggle only to erupt again like a sleeping volcano. I remember the tears of laughter and the red hot heat of my body under the blankets and the feeling that my chest was going to burst. That miracle of uncontrollable laughter, in the face of the most threatening behavior from adults, is something I’m sure every child remembers with fondness and glee.
Music for a friend
After a short time in the band I was thrown out for fighting. It wasn’t that I was a tough fellow, it was more like I was a wee bit crazy. Sickly and painfully thin, anyone could kick my ass but I neglected to notice that fact till I was in my forties. I had a short fuse and a temper that got me into more trouble than I can relate. You might ask how a lover of music and an out of control firecracker could exist in the same body. The answer is that the music was a salve for the heat. I was so close to music all my life that it was impossible for me to imagine an identity without it. Music is always playing in my head and I’m pretty sure it started with the following story:
Having been thrown out of the band I was persuaded by my friend Blawka that the kitchen was the best place to be. Plenty of food, warm in winter and leaving class early to get the grub ready for the hungry lads were only a few of the perks. But first one had to get past Brother O’Driscoll. To call him bad tempered was as unnecessary as to call rain wet! For some odd reason though, I wasn’t scared of him. I suppose I instinctly knew he wasn’t really cruel by nature; he was just plain cantankerous. Maybe for this reason he treated me with respect. So I was now working in the kitchen.
One beautiful starry night as I walked alone to the dormitories, after a late night working in the kitchen, I looked up at the sky and heard the most beautiful melody imaginable coming from a cluster of stars. It was like angels’ voices; other worldly, full of purity and simplicity, swirling around in my head in a dance of mirth and joy. I remember it so distinctly even now as I write. I was too shy to tell this story until the writing of this song. As I write my melodies today, I am always trying to reach the purity of those notes heard that l night. My mind is always playing with different combinations of melodies, even in my sleep. In fact I often wake up and have to rush to the piano to write down the music I’ve just been dreaming of.
In the kitchen, I was forever singing and O’Driscoll would often have me stand on a chair and sing for the lads who ribbed me mercilessly. It was O’Driscoll who interceded with Bro. O’Connor and got me back into the band after a long stint in the kitchen. He was somehow an angel of fortuitism in my life and this serendipity was repeated in a chance meeting many years later. I think it was around 1977, I was walking along a country road in county Cork, some miles from a friend’s house where I was staying. I came across a beautiful old country manor that had been turned into a hotel. I entered the lobby and walked through to the back where there were some very nice gardens. It was late summer and the air was warm but O’Driscoll’s ample form was spread out on a chaise lounge covered with a checkered blanket. He was asleep and snoring loudly and at first I didn’t recognize him. Then I saw those little spectacles on his big whisky nose and his battered farmer’s hat. I was delighted and was transported back to the kitchen and the day he got me reinstated in the band. I sat down beside him on a nearby bench and after a few minutes he woke up and looked around sleepily. “Thank God for a beautiful day!” he said cheerfully.
Then in his 80’s he mind was ebbing somewhat and he obviously had no clue who I was. When I introduced myself he scratched his stubbled chin for a moment and said; “Danny Ellis, you’re that bloody mad musician aren’t ya?” We talked for a while with him mentioning the “grace of god” every few sentences. I let him know how much I appreciated his intercession with O’Connor but he shrugged it off with an annoyed little grunt. He never really knew the affect his actions would have on my life. In this song he comes to represent the paradox present in many of the Brothers in Artane and throughout Ireland; kindness and genuine piety commingled with wanton violence and intolerance. It's the kindness that endures here in my memories of him. Return to Top
The Twist within the Tweed
When a lad reached age 14 he was assigned a trade which he was expected to learn and eventually support himself in the “real world.” I was at first a “waxie” or shoemaker, then a tailor and finally a carpenter. Never really wanting to learn any of them, I was a bit of shirker. Music waa my destiny and well I knew it!.So as a "trader" I was on vacation. I spent most of my time gallivanting and skipping off somewhere in pursuit of fun and “the crack.” The men in charge didn't casre too much. (See Idle Dan)
But some lads took their trade very seriously only to find they were almost unemployable when they left Artane. The training was sketchy at best and the men in charge of the shops weren’t very inspiring or energetic in their mentoring. These men were ordinary lay folk from the "outside" and for the most part were kind but indifferent. The man in charge of the weaver’s shop was an exception; he was a violent and vicious man who ironically really tried to teach weaving to the lads. Unfortunately fear is not a good companion to learning. In the tailor’s I came under his tutelage as we tried to study cloth and the mores of different weaves and fabrics etc. I failed to be impressed, anyway, the noise of the huge looms left your brain a might otherwise engaged!
The character in this song is a combination of different lads. In particular, one fine fellow; Ignatius Llewellyn, who also played trombone in the band with me. We became good friends and he was one of the few lads in the band I was close to. I’ve recently come back in contact with him after 42 years in between after a gloriously fortitous meeting of both our sisters, in a New Jersey health food shop, who didn't know one another from Adam. I was inspired to write this song when he reminded me, on the phone, that he’d had an easier time than I in Artane because he’d been given up by his mother at a very early age. Because of this he’s had no memory at all of what it’s like to have a family life. Unlike myself , who’d been with my family till age 8. “Old enough to miss the treacherous kiss that sent them packing!” Ignatius’s mum eventually got him out of Artane when he was 15 which was a bitter sweet moment for me; I was glad to see him free but missed him as a friend.
On Corpus Christi, the whole school would parade behind the band singing hymns under the watchful eyes of the brothers. The folks from the surrounding districts of Coolock, Artane, Donnycarney and Killester would be allowed to take part in the celebrations. Mostly curious older ladies, they would gather by the sides of the procession clucking like hens, looking admiringly at the lads ; “Would ya look at them, aren’t they marvelous!”
The Stolen Child
As a lad, I hated poetry with a passion known only to those forced to recite it mindlessly and punished severely for lapses in it’s remembrance. How can you possibly enjoy anything that carries beatings with it? There were two exceptions to my aversion; WB Yeats’ “The Stolen Child” and “The Fairies” by William Allingham. Both these poems deeply touched my young imagination but most especially, Yeats’ masterpiece. This beautiful, ode to the faery world quite took my breath away and I really did believe in faeries till I was about fourteen . I would wait by the edges of the playing fields in hopes that those magical beings would come and sweep me away across the meadows to “Tir na N’og”; the mythical land of ageless youth so much a part of Irish legends . I would imagine I heard them whispering amongst each other in Gaelic, arguing as to whether they should take me or nay.
I remember when the movie"Darby O'Gill and the Little People" came to the school I was a mite disappointed at the portrayal of the leprechauns and fairies. I thought they were a little gross, cherishing the more ephemeral aspects expressed in Yeat's poem. My imagination was a little too fertile at times and as well as magicl little fairies and gnomes I could just as easily imagine being chased by monsters. I suppose it goes with the territory although the monsters have gone now!
The faeries never did come to get me but I could always imagine I them near, whispering encouragement; jewels of hope in that world of random cruelty and laser malice.
“ Come away O Human Child.”
Kelly’s Gone Missin’
Every now and again some poor fool would up and run. This was especially true when grave punishment was looming: “meet me in the boot room after lights out tonight” (See ‘Radio’) Like all my little stories on this album and these pages, the Kelly story is entirely true, although I can’t remember his real name. Where can you run to if your folks are dead or they have, themselves, handed you over to the “care” of the Christian brothers? Kelly was brought back the next day or so and was everyone’s hero for about ten minute. Many times I wanted to run, but to where? I contented myself with breaking every rule I could, climbing over walls and gathering chestnuts or robbing the orchard. Once I rejoined the band (after being thrown out the first time for fighting) I found life much, much easier. Brother O’Connor threatened the band lads with expulsion if we got in serious trouble elsewhere in the school. If we did get in trouble elsewhere , he would often punish us doubly for “giving the band bad name.”
Most of the lads were interred voluntarily by their parents because of poverty. Some were orphans or delinquents and some were removed forcibly from their homes by authorities, when neighbors or teachers reported neglect or (cruel irony) "abuse." The school received a certain amount of money per boy and it was obviously enough to make the Artane authorities hold on to their little wards like gold!
I have a feeling that the social authorities were made aware of my mother’s lack of parental skills by our neighbors; my sisters and half brothers and I were often left alone all night , shivering in the dark, scared and hungry. Mammy was only eighteen years old when I was born, and had hardly known any life at all until she was thrust into parenthood. Virtually abandoned by my father who had left to join the American army, she was totally incapable of motherhood. I made her life hell; I wouldn’t stay in any school for long, climbing out bathroom windows and tearing across the fields With no family around to support her ( her own parents had left for America too) she fell into depression and who could blame her for staying out nights with her friends. She came to see me once in Artane, climbing the wall by the Malahide Road and walking through the fields when the main gate was closed after 7.00 pm. She was drunk and incoherent and her shoes covered in cow dung. When she asked me if I could read I lied and said “Yes”. With that, she pulled out a comic from her coat pocket and asked me to read it for her. I couldn’t read a word and I broke down in tears, ashamed of my lie and brokenhearted that I’d let her down. I never saw or heard from her again. I was eight years old.
In the 50’s on every fourth Sunday we were allowed to visit with friends and family if they lived in Dublin. In the 60s this was increased to every week. The poor country lads had to be content with sporadic visits from their out of town families. I went to spend those Sundays with my uncle Mattie, my mother’s brother in Whitehall, and his wife, Margaret. He was a kind gentle man who encouraged my music with his records of Glenn Miller and Frank Sinatra. We would be advanced the bus fare by the brothers who would expect us to recoup that money from our relations or friends. Mattie and Margaret never seemed to have much money to spare but Sunday dinner was always a grand affair with sausages, bacon, mash potatoes and peas with the occasional pork or lamb chop. They always gave me the money for the movies, which couldn’t have been very easy for them in tight times. For some reason Uncle Mattie never invited me out for summer holidays, a fact which never struck me as being strange until recently. Maybe I was too much of a handful. Return to Top
Summer Sandals
One of the sad facts of living without parents, amongst hundreds of bigger and older lads, is that at first, you believe everything you hear. Because there’s no wise dad or loving mum around to disabuse you of it, you often carry around a belief for longer than you might otherwise. This was the case when I first heard the casual phrase, “don’t waste you breath”. I distinctly remember how my heart dropped on hearing this. It filled me with dread to think I was allotted a certain amount of breath and that I could waste it and die. I had great difficulty falling asleep because of this belief so I’d lie there holding my breath thinking I was adding to my lifespan. I still suffer form insomnia today and I suspect an analyst could gleefully trace it‘s root to those nights in dormitory # 5. Now I know that breath holding is a very effective mechanism for closing down one’s feelings. The opposite is also true; letting go to the breath can reawaken and heal old hurt. My early preoccupation with breath led me to study it later in life to find that indeed there are many secrets hidden within it’s flowing mantles; our original state of joy and innocence, and the scars of the trauma that took us away from that state. Thankfully, that which can be captured and bound can also be set free.
Roughly made by rougher lads, the hobnail boots we wore really were a curse. It took me weeks to get used to them as they left large welts on the ankles and distorted the poor feet like gnarled tree limbs. Every few weeks or so we’d line up to have a Brother examine the soles to see if any studs were worn or missing or the steel heels worn thin. If the soles or heels were worn down to the leather you were in big trouble; the studs should have been replaced before it got to that stage. Those boots in need of repair were sent to the Waxies and with our dormitory and bed numbers stamped between the heel and sole, they were easy to keep track of.. Often they came back with nails protruding through the inside or with soles so roughly patched you couldn‘t walk straight for a month.
On winter evenings, if frost was expected overnight, we’d throw hundreds of buckets of water down the incline of the concrete playground, from the shelter wall to the theatre entrance beneath the dormitories. If the water froze we were in for some great fun!! Hundred of lads sliding down an acre of ice, falling and shouting, dropping a mitten for a friend behind to skillfully bend and retrieve it, all rosy cheeks and grinning and grimacing like mad urchin ballerinas. Those were fine times and for me, it felt good to discover athletic skills on the ice; woefully absent elsewhere..
The red , softer leather of the sandals issued in summer, was a welcome break hard to describe. You really felt like you could take off and fly. Rough and hand made like the boots , they were much lighter with no studs or steel heels. When July came, those lads lucky enough to be invited out by friends or family to spend the summer holidays, would joyfully leave for the month. From 1955 to 1960 I must admit to deep feelings of melancholy and jealousy as I watched most of the school depart for the summer. The remaining lads had an easy time of it though; no marching or exercise drills, plenty of free time with no school or work, under the relaxed gaze of new young Brothers drafted in for the summer. We pretty much did as we pleased. With smaller numbers and the euphoria of summer, you’d often make friends with someone who’d been your sworn enemy.
On balmy summer evenings some of us would form groups and run round the circumference of the large football and playing fields for hours on end. I learned to love running and although never a sprinter I could hold my own in a marathon.. Every Wednesday or Thursday if it didn’t rain (pleeeease God!) we’d all march down to Coolock train station and entrain for Portmarnock beach singing pop songs and hanging out the windows, throwing toilet rolls at the astonished Dubliners below. We’d walk the mile from the station, smelling the sea air, delirious with anticipation as we climbed the high, silver sand dunes to be greeted by the stern majesty of the Irish Sea below. Skies were almost always gray as was the sea but we didn’t care. Nor did we care how cold the water was or how much sand got in the ham sandwiches.
In ‘61 and ‘62 I’d learned the trick from some band friends of how to - not so subtly - mention the summer holiday possibility to the kind folks who housed us on our outings; and I spent those summers holidaying with the Sheehy family, in Listowel, Co. Kerry and in Waterford city with some kind folks whose name, to my shame, I can’t recall. Return to Top
Idle Dan
There was so much regimentation at Artane that if a lad paid close attention he could easily find ways to take advantage of this predictability. That was my life’s work; finding ways to fool the system. With so many boys doing so many different things, it was easy to hide behind some activity that looked legitimate to the casual glance. For instance, if a lad was to walk down the ¼ mile avenue that linked the school to the Malahide Road. whilst carrying a garbage bin, it was immediately assumed by one and all that he was heading for the “Quarry pond” to dump it. God only knows why, but the powers that be intended to reclaim this wonderful refuge from mother nature and so every useless item imaginable was dumped in it’s mysterious depths. This included a half dozen grand pianos that once graced the hallowed “Long Hall” beneath the dormitories. No one knew why it was called the “Quarry pond” as no quarry was to be found anywhere in sight, but a pond it was, and reputed to be bottomless. This legend was no doubt initiated by the Brothers to scare us away from it. I remember it being about fifty to sixty feet from bank to bank, full of frogs and minnows that would attack any poor worm tied to any string by any cruel delinquent. Wildlife abounded, rabbits, mice, birds and the occasional myopic duck. I spent many happy hours alone at the pond as I let my imagination run wild.
Getting back to fooling the system; the best approach seemed to be to get yourself a reputation for being a reliable sort and then proceed to break every rule in sight. This I did with shameless efficiency. There is an old Irish proverb that goes something like; “if you get a name for rising early, then you can stay in bed till noon and no one will notice.” Trusted by the brothers for some unknown reason , maybe because I was especially good at school and could spell “delinquency,” I would often just walk out of bounds, looking official, and everyone would assume I was on some important errand. Many times I walked out the main gate, caught a bus into town and went for a swim in Tara Street Baths, returning just in time for supper, where my absence would have been noticed. Unfortunately, when at sixteen, I entered the “real” world, this bravado and cynical circumvention of protocol did not go unnoticed, and in time, I was painfully forced to recognize that maybe I‘d taken a good thing a mite to far; Briseann an Duchas!
The infirmary was down past the farms, close to the north gate and was a refuge indeed, if you could manage to get past the fact that there was nothing wrong with you at all. If you reported sick, the first thing the nurse would do was take your temperature. I learned early on, that even when I was sick ,no one would believe me, so I loaded the dice in my favor by holding the thermometer on the hot radiator while the nurse’s back was turned. Now I know, that I have a subnormal basal temperature of 97.2 degrees. So, even when I a real temperature of 100.5 degrees, the thermometer registered me as being fairly normal. In matters of thermometers radiators are the great levelers!
!
The Brother Mackey mentioned in this song really did catch me at some of my illicit gallivanting, but with his great sense of humor and humanity, he was always more interested in how I managed to pull it off than in punishing me. A tall athletic man, he was a bit of a rebel himself and soon after I left Artane he left the Christian Brothers order. He had an enormous influence on me and I feel lucky to have had him around in those formative years. I’ve tried to find him on the net to no avail. I’d love to meet with him today. There were some really fine young men amongst the newer breed of Brothers that started to appear around 1960. Still tough enough, but they were more tolerant and hip, less prone to gratuitous beatings and generally they seemed a happier and more intelligent lot. Return to Top
Let me be lonely
I was never a gregarious lad, especially in those first years at Artane. The brothers tried to get my aunt and uncle, with whom I was allowed to visit with every fourth Sunday, to influence me to spend more time with other lads, to no avail. I was painfully shy and extremely sensitive to the cruel banter that characterized Artane life in the fifties. I spent most of my free time alone, playing spinning top or ball. I tended to have one or two best friends to the exclusion of others. Melancholic, very imaginative and quite sickly and frail I found it very hard to make friends and when I did, I was loyal to a fault; devastated at any falling out.
Snitching and betrayal was somehow a big part of social life, encouraged as we were by the brothers to betray friends and playmates in class and the playground. I remember one incident in classroom where we would often pass our schoolwork behind to other lads who would correct it. The brothers would mercilessly lay in to lads less capable mentally and there was one boy who was always getting beaten up for his arithmetic mistakes. One day I took pity on him and as I checked his work I gave him a higher mark, erasing some of his wrong answers and writing correct ones in their place. Imagine my surprise when, instead of thanking me, he reported to the brother, a particularly vicious character named McCrutten. I was beaten severely by this psychotic bully and was pushed even deeper into my reclusive ways.
The brothers empowered some lads to oversee others. These hugely unpopular snitches were called “monitors” and they earned their name well. They were petty and vindictive almost to a man. On the playground or in the refectory, they could make you report to the disciplinarian for the slightest infraction and it was impossible to get back at them in any way. Occasionally one would fall out of favor and would be demoted. As you can imagine, that lad’s life was hell after that.
Even after I rejoined the band, I was pretty much a loner, preferring to practice my trombone to playing games. Pale, thin and sickly I was terrible at all sport except ping pong and running and would often spend days without speaking to anyone. I was very good at schoolwork which slightly alienated me from others. Serious minded, with almost no sense of humor, most lads didn’t quite know what to make of me. I wasn’t unpopular as such, but I think I turned potential friends away by my introversion. This got a little better though in the sixties as pop songs on the radio provided me a way to expressing myself. I would sing in class or in a crowd of lads with a friend named Michael Tinsley who was an extremely talented clarinetist in the band. One of our favorites was “ The battle hymn of the Republic” by Lonnie Donegan. With Tinsley, who was outgoing and outrageously funny, I learned to step out of myself a little. I formed a little Dixieland band, with him on clarinet, Bernie Whelan on trumpet and Eddie Kerrigan on tuba. We had a lot of fun trying to play the works of “Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen” and Chris Barber.
Music really did save me from a life of total seclusion and I don’t know how things would have turned out without it. It was my gateway back to wholeness, allowing me to grow and express, as I slowly regained my sense of self in an area where I was truly blessed. Return to Top
Briseann an Duchas tre Shuilibh an Cait
Old Irish seanfhocal or proverb literally translating to;
“The breeding (or nature} will break out through the eyes of a cat”
To work in the kitchen was a real godsend. To work in the Brother’s kitchen was even more so because the grub was better and the work easier and the Brother in charge was seldom around. I did both for a while and had a blast. Man, sometimes I ate so much I could hardly breathe. I don’t know how to spell it or even whether it‘s a Gaelic word or what, but “Maniumers” was the name they called us after the word “manium”, meaning grease. We would boil up the huge hunks of meat until the grease rose and gathered at the top of the big domed boilers. We would then ladle the grease into buckets and serve it up on the aluminum plates to be used as a spread for bread. It got in our clothes and our hair and we smelled of this grease twenty four hours a day even in bed. We were overseen by brother O’Driscoll , a big fat , wheezing man with a red whisky nose. He took a liking to me for some reason and was instrumental in getting me reinstated in the band two years or so after I’d been thrown out for fighting. (See Music for a Friend Song) A second chance at the band was rare indeed; everyone wanted to be in.
My friend , James Blake, nicknamed “Blawka” from the Gaelic for his surname, worked in the kitchen with me for a while before he became a cobbler, or a “waxie”, in the vernacular. Reckless and daring to the extreme, I once heard him reply to Brother O’Driscoll’s; “You’re very fast on your feet young man” , with , “ A lot faster than you old man”. Of course, O’Driscoll thrashed him severely with his leather; the first and only time I saw Blawka cry. He was bright and cheerful, fast with words and faster with his fists, outrunning and out smarting everyone in sight. He was my hero and best friend and I‘d have died for him. He taught me all about loyalty and courage, how to curse for five minutes without repeating myself, to wink, whistle through my fingers and most profitably; to cheat at cards! Partners in crime, we somehow got our hands on an old book of card tricks and other roguery and together we learned how to cheat at marbles and chestnuts and cards as we connived many secret hand signs and code words to confound and confuse one and all. For hours we would practice dealing from the bottom of the deck always knowing what card was on the bottom. When he left early in 1961 it was a sad day, but only one of many such partings. I saw him only once after he left Artane, I was on a band outing; he comes riding down the road on a bike, his feet on the handlebars, his hands in his pockets and whistling a tune with his post office hat at a cheeky angle on his head.
Artane was what was called an “Industrial” institution. Meaning, we made and mended our own clothes and shoes and some of our own “furniture”, wove our own tweed , baked our own bread and grew our own vegetables. We had farms and orchards with cows, turkeys and hens. For some reason when I reached the age of fourteen; the official age at which one learned a trade, I was shunted from the waxies to the tailors and finally to the carpenters. A jack of all trades with little interest in any of them, music was always going to be my life and well I knew it. From the moment I felt the blast form that first horn rip through my body like Irish whiskey.
Needless to say there were many minor and some major accidents and I once heard a legend of a lad who was pulled into one of the giant mechanical looms in the weavers. The school psyche was full of old stories; ghosts and hauntings, murders and maimings, robberies and escapes. Great delight was to be had exaggerating this mythology to wide eyed new lads. Lots of boys suffered from nightmares; you’d hear them screaming at night and the shouts of “Shut up for god’s,” sake from all quarters of the dormitories. Return to Top
Radio
As I said earlier, in the dormitories at night, there was some time; maybe an hour or so, before lights out, when we could read, and swap comics or toys, sew the buttons on our trousers or coats, all the while listening to the radio. The receiver was housed in the brother- in - charge’s room; a tiny, cluttered, ten by six cell built into the rear corner of the dorm. We got to know the pop songs of the fifties and sixties very well and sometimes were allowed to sing along if the brother -in charge was in a good mood. If he was having a bad day he might tune the radio to a classical station or even turn it off altogether.
In ’62 when I came back from America, having toured there with Artane Boys band, I was the proud owner of a transistor radio; given me by my dad. I was one of maybe four or five others to have one and what a hero I was to other lads. They would gather round on the playground and I’d turn it up or down or off to my hearts content, often just to annoy an enemy who‘d tried to join the circle. It had a tiny earphone so I could listen in bed after lights out or at mealtimes. My identity was, from very young , a musical one but the radio took that obsession to new heights. With only a year to go in Artane, I’d already left in spirit, my mind able to escape to another world.
We had a television (telly), with one station; RTE, set up in one of the school rooms and we’d watch “The Fugitive” and “ Bonanza” and sometimes live jazz music. In fact the Artane Boys Band had performed at the inauguration of RTE; Ireland’s national station. Elvis had been the main radio icon but when I saw the “Beatles” perform live on TV, I was transported to another world of rebellious fun. I knew every word of their songs; “Love me do”, “Please , please me” and “ When I saw her standing there”. The phenomenon of radio and TV was only just beginning in the sixties and the brothers really didn’t quite know what to make of it. It seemed to lend us a power that they couldn’t break through, especially the music of the “Beatles“ and Elvis. The brothers were very threatened indeed by pop and rock and roll. It was as if we somehow sensed, through it’s liberating influence, that their ways of cruelty and abuse were coming to and end and were emboldened enormously. The older lads especially, grew more and more cheeky and rebellious. I later read of the effect Western music had on the people of the Soviet Union and knew exactly what it must have meant to them. Return to Top
The Day I left Artane
I can’t remember exactly where I got the gray flannel for my “fourteen inch bottom” trousers from. But I sure remember how good it felt not to be draped in the heavy homemade tweed that felt like cardboard about your legs. I also had a nice jacket given me by some kind folks in Boston Ma. from the Catholic Memorial High School. I thought I looked pretty cool as I walked down to the main office just outside the entrance gate at the top of the avenue. It was clerked by Michael Roach, a kind, cheerful chap of 25 or so. He had been an Artane lad himself some years before. He had been in the band in his time and was active in helping out on outings so I knew him quite well. It was his job to officially sign me out and I seem to remember there were some papers I had to sign, but I’m not sure.
The story in the song as to how I realized my two half brothers were in Artane actually happened slightly differently than in the song. For reasons of privacy I’ve changed my mother’s maiden name to “McIvor”. Her real name is pronounced differently in the USA than in Ireland. Having been to the US the year before I was trying to be cool in using the American version. Roach would have none of it being a stickler for detail. “Not at all”, said he, “it’s pronounced “so and so “. Then to make his point, he said something which made the hairs on the back of my hair rise; “It’s just like Mathew and Henry “so and so” the two twins in the band”
My head reeled as I tried to comprehend what I’d just heard. As I stood there staring at Roach, the years rolled back and I remembered my mother’s illegitimate sons.; twin baby boys whose birth had rang the death knoll for my family. Beautiful little lads, full of laughter and fun and many’s the time I’d played with them and rocked them to sleep as my mother left us alone at night to go out with her friends. The twins were called Henry and Mattie!! In the two years I’d known those lads in the band, teaching them music, I’d never heard both their names said together with their surnames like Roach had just said. Now, on my last day at Artane, the penny dropped and I stuttered something like “Oh, my God, that must be me brothers!”
Roach then looked them up in that big, black famous book, to check on the details of their parents. And there it was, in black and white, the secret no one had ever noticed. Sure enough, we shared the same mother, same address in Dublin, but under the column labeled “father”; was that loneliest of words; “unknown.” I turned on my heels without a word and ran out to the playground where everyone was playing and shouting. Being July, most of the lads were on their “holliers” and so it was fairly easy to find Henry and Mattie playing together as they always did . I was breathless with excitement but they took the news fairly quietly, without much emotion. My own excitement stemmed more from the sheer irony of the situation, rather than from the joy of the reunion, so I shouldn’t have been surprised that they couldn‘t really take it all in. We stood talking for a while and I gave them a half a crown from my pocket which I think, was the highlight of the occasion for them. They were only ten.
I don’t remember seeing them again until ten years later, by which time I was fed up with anything from my past and wasn’t really able to accept them. My two sisters who were interred in another Dublin institution, received the same cold shoulder from me when they tried to befriend me. My heart was closed for years to anything to do with family. I’d learned very well how to shut it down and it was a skill I wasn’t willing to relinquish in a hurry.
That’s changed.
“And you’ll spend your life unlearning all the things you learnt the best” (From Briseann an Duchas”)
