SR. PHILOMENA MC CARTHY

Mary Frances Cusack, historian, author and once a Poor Clare Sister in Kenmare Convent, Co Kerry, is remembered by Sr. Philomena, a Poor Clare Sister in the same convent built in Kenmare in 1861. Sr Philomena discusses her own great interest in the history of Kenmare and its environs. She also offers her memories of growing up in the early twentieth century on a small farm on the outskirts of Kenmare. She talks about the origins of local place names as well as traditions including a cursing stone attributed to St Fiachna, the patron saint of Bonane – typical of the overlapping of pagan and christian beliefs. Sr Philomena recalls the spinning of wool by young girls as part of the local cottage industry. She then moves to a discussion about her entry into the enclosed Poor Clare Order in the 1930s. The recording closes with a discussion about landlordism in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.