Emotional scenes as Storm Isha brings old tree down
On the day that Galway’s hurlers played Wexford in the 1976 All-Ireland semi-final in Pairc Ui Chaoimh, a future chairman of Turloughmore hurling club Jarlath McDonagh was out for a walk by the River Clare.
It was a day that Jarlath – later a senator and local councillor – brought the transistor radio with him and, although Galway lost to Wexford, he picked up a sapling and when he returned home planted it in the front garden of the house that he had newly constructed in Lackaghmore.
“I’d noticed a nice plant growing so I picked it and planted in my own front lawn,” he recalls.
Over the years that sapling grew into what he described as ‘a massive, beautiful tree’ in the front of what had then been his new home – until the Sunday night when Storm Isha uprooted the tree.
There was much sadness in the McDonagh household as the tree held special memories for Jarlath and his strong connection with hurling was deeply saddened to see the demise of the tree.
“After 48 years, the storm swept it from its roots – and down it came,” he says.
So Jarlath will remember Storm Isha for the wrong reasons - although thankfully no one was hurt.