DESMOND O`NEILL AGE 85, SEAMOUNT ROAD, MALAHIDE

Both Kinsealy Hall and Kinsealy House were owned by Desmond O’Neill’s family until the properties were sold in 1998. His grandfather bought an additional farm at Artane which was bequeathed to the Catholic Church in 1939. Desmond spoke of the many changes in farming traditions and practices, of the changing of the seasons from setting to harvesting, of selling at the Dublin markets and of local placenames. He has clear memories of hard times during the Economic War in the 1930’s and he recalls the experience of parting with the land at Kinsealy, which brought to an end a long line of the O’Neill family in the area.