Memories of the Morris Minor and a trip to Alfred the Great
Country Living with Francis Farragher
It’s many decades back now, but there was a farmer close to me who was well into mid-life when introduced to the world of mechanically propelled vehicles. At the time there were no such things as driving tests, not to mind theory examinations, but with the help of a friend here and there, he gradually got to grips with the workings of an old Morris Minor, secured some paperwork for the windscreen, and what a difference it made to his lifestyle.
As the years moved on, he progressed onto a Morris Minor van, although the capital expenditure on such motors was always pretty modest. In those days, there were few indications from the number plate as to the age of the vehicle.
Seldom, if ever, did the old car or van ever visit the city of Galway, but for daily trips to the local shop; a weekly visit to Tuam; and a journey to the local pub most nights of the week for two pints, the motor was an absolute Godsend.
He drove ‘Old Faithful’ right up to within weeks of his passing and never had an accident on the road, although here and there, an odd impatient driver might honk his horn at him for the slow pace of his driving.
Apart from that, the man was no danger on the road to anyone and ‘The Leo’, as one of my neighbours christened him, would really be in a serious hurry somewhere if the speedometer hit the 40mph mark.
In current motoring jargon his time for making it from 0 to 40mph through the four sticky gears might be closer to 15 minutes than 15 seconds. Really, there couldn’t be anymore by way of polar opposites than ‘The Leo’ behind the wheel and a young snipper-snapper nowadays with a Golf GTI.
On one of his rare sojourns to the town of Tuam in the dying days of 1969, ‘The Leo’ embarked on an evening trip to the local cinema for a showing of the Alfred the Great film, a lot of which had been shot in parts of Galway including Castlehackett near Belclare in Corofin.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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