Enjoying a chat by the hearth in Tom Concannon’s house in Annaghdown yesterday. Tom will turn 98 in October and was the first person to be interviewed for our Native Speakers Project last year.

There is no better storyteller in Gaeltacht an Eachréidh than Tom Concannon, from Annaghdown, and we had a wonderful afternoon in his company yesterday.

Tom was the first person we intervewed as part of our Native Speakers Project in December 2023 and he gave us a wonderful, warm welcome at his home for a three hour visit yesterday.

He was delighted to meet up again with Alanagh Ni Chioniola Ni Ghriofa, the young woman from Conamara who intervewed 20 native Irish speakers between Gaeltacht an Eachréidh and An Bruach Thoir last year. The ten videos from this area are on our YouTube channel.

You can find Tom’s interview ‘as Gaeilge’ with Alanagh here: https://youtu.be/GKkx6Ox-CaQ?si=n2yKgXeex8ddR5Hh

Tom had a special welcome for Alanagh, as she is about to set off for a new adventure teaching Irish in Canada for a year. He told her to make sure to come home, because Ireland cannot afford to lose its best young people.

Joining us was poet Sean O Coistealbha, from An Spidéal, who has had a great connection with the people of Gaeltacht an Eachréidh since he was a young man.

For more than three hours, Sean and Tom regaled us with stories of poitin-making, rebellion, the strict clergy, and what it was like to grow up in Irish-speaking households on either side of the Corrib.

Tom told us about the strong links between the Irish-speaking communities on both banks of the Corrib when he was a younger man and pointed out that his own wife crossed the river from Cloniffe, near Moycullen.

Tom is due to turn 98 in October and he expressed sadness that his good friend John Murphy (96) passed away earlier this year.

Tom still works on the farm every day, but says it is hard to find native speakers in the locality to talk Irish to. That said, he loves to have visitors and regularly hosts academics, writers, and language enthusiasts who love the richness of his language from the eastern banks of the Corrib.

It was a lovely afternoon full of joy and wonderful stories ‘as Gaeilge’.

“Go maire tú an céad!”

Míle buíochas Tom!

 

https://www.youtube.com/@GaeltachtanEachr%C3%A9idh-f6z/videos

Tom, Sean and Alannagh enjoyed more than three hours of chat ‘as Gaeilge’ yesterday. Alannagh wanted to say goodbye to Tom before she spends a year teaching Irish in Canada.

Tom and poet Sean O Coistealbha sharing stories by the hearth in Annaghdown.

 

Tom with Alannagh. He was the first person she interviewed for our Native Speakers Project which we launched in October of last year.