Search Results for 'Mick Higgins'

In 1940, Shantalla was just green fields with an occasional farmhouse. A decade later, it was a sprawling housing estate with a large young population. They were slowly developing a sense of community, but sadly, they had no facilities such as parks or pitches to play games on.

This is the time of the year when our thoughts turn to schoolbooks, copy books, pens and pencils, bus schedules, etc, as we prepare our children and grandchildren for the new school year. Inevitably it brings our thoughts back to our own school years, the friendships we formed, the teachers we liked or disliked. In those first days in class you felt you had been abandoned by your mother as she left you in with a crowd of complete strangers presided over by an adult that you had never seen before. In the case of anyone who went to Scoil Fhursa that adult was known as Bean Uí Duignan. She was a saint who quickly became a surrogate mother to every child that entered her classroom, walked them up and down the clós during sosanna, and prepared them for whatever was ahead.

Now that GAA club games are being played again, we thought to show you the county champions of 1936, Wolfe Tones. They were a city based team who also won the championship in 1941 but after that they seemed to fade out. Another city team of the period, Galway Gaels, who were champions in 1930, also faded out in the 1940s. Maybe some of the members of both clubs joined Father Griffins which was founded in 1948.

St Michael’s Club was formed in 1956 after Galway won the All-Ireland football final. The first AGM was held in Tom Connolly’s house in Lower Shantalla Road, and they played their first game in 1957. Among those who founded the club were Pa Boyle (whose brainchild it was), Mick O’Toole, John Duignan, Mick Higgins, Liam Cunningham, and Sergeant O’Toole. They started as a dual club, but after a few years they concentrated solely on football.