Celebrity Deaths 2023

Did Switzers not have a trolley?

That’s the beauty of a microwave, you can almost instantly reheat.

2 Likes

Jim was a northsider and an O’Connells boy who abandoned the Northside at the first opportunity

They did but Jim made it sound like he was parked outside.

You would never guess Jim and Barry Keoghegan attended the same school.

1 Like

An extraordinary collection of posts in this thread from @Cheasty since the unfortunate passing of John Motson, you won’t read better in any of the weekend newspaper obits/columns which will inevitably deal with it :clap::clap:

4 Likes

Was Carney the first Sunday Game presenter?

That mcrowave killed him in the end

1 Like

He was I believe, alongside Bill O I recall hearing around the time of Bill O’s passing.

1 Like

My oul’ fella would have been around three years behind Jim in O’Connells. He never told me Jim went there, which disappoints me.

My oul’ fella’s future brother in law also went to O’Connell’s. He was in the same year as my oul’ fella.

There was a brother there called Brother Curtain/Curtin. His nickname was The Bull.

The future brother in law had some problem or other which necessitated his mother going in to speak to Brother Curtain.

The mother went in and asked to speak to Brother Bull. When the mother told the future brother in law she had gone in to speak to Brother Bull, rather than Brother Curtain, he thought his world had ended and that six of the best were on their way the following morning.

Brother Curtain said nothing and no lashes of the leather were doled out.

Brother Ernest Carew was the real lover of the leather in O’Connells in the 1950s.

On March 31st, 1993, I met my oul’ fella outside Liberty Hall to pick up a ticket off him for Ireland v Northern Ireland at Lansdowne Road. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Brother Carew, stooped over and outwardly not far off death. He told me they exchanged “that look”, the sort of wordless look Gerry Thornley used to make up tales about schools rugby players giving each other 15 years after they had clashed on the pitch. Brother Carew died a few months later.

I don’t think I ever heard about any abuse of that nature in O’Connells, only the leather, which is not to say it did not happen.

However the other night I came across a Facebook group for past pupils of another CBS I attended which wouldn’t have been too far from O’Connells, and past pupils were openly talking on this page about having been abused in that way up to the 1980s, which sort of shocked me and yet didn’t shock me.

I wonder how many schools in Ireland remained untouched by that sort of abuse.

I think with hindsight the brothers were keen to keep the worst abusers out of the jewels in the crown, O’Connells, Synge Street and my beloved Mount Sion (the origin of the species).

The principal in the primary, Brother Grennan or Boris as he was known because of his uncanny resemblance to Mr Karloff, was a demon with the leather but wasn’t a sex abuser. However down in the Manor CBS primary a half a mile away there was a notorious sex abuser who preyed on vulnerable kids whose fathers had died or fled the nest. Powery went there but escaped with his dignity intact because his father would have murdered anyone who laid a finger on him and you could tell that by looking at him. He was known as the Hammer.

We had a brother later who bet the leaving shit out of Frankie Walsh’s son one day. This bollix used to get migraines and visions. Frankie was GAA royalty. The brother was moved on quick smart. A few weeks later we were playing Templemore CBS in a schools match in Boherlahan and here was the same Brother Devanney on the line for them. They told us he was clattering all around him there as well.

6 Likes

My term of incarceration was with 14 priests and 1 lay teacher. 10 of the priests were possessed of some sadistic gene that was only sated by beating the shit out of us with whatever was handy. I was struck with t-squares, long torches, canes and once with a metal dustbin. You could be hit a box or a kick at a whim.
Fr.Bohan (Baldy Pete) was the most dangerous. A lad came in as a 4th year from the boys school in Granard and asked at 6pm study break did anyone else think Pete was watching him alone during study. We were all corralled into the study hall in lines with Pete sitting behind a lectern at the back supervising. He had a look like a Sacred Heart picture, covering every angle. Somebody rather unwisely told Frankie if he noted it again just give him a little wave to let him know all was cool.
Unfortunately about 10 minutes into the next study Frankie fell into the trap. Did Pete cough and rise slowly to see what was wrong? No Siree, he kicked the 4’ lectern over in his rush to batter Frankie, he tumbled him onto the floor , hit him with his chair and then tumbled the desk on top of him.
Frankie gathered himself, abandoned the rest of his gear in the dormitory and promptly fled home never to return. How right he was.
Personally I never heard of any other hanky-panky business but it was an era of my life I wouldn’t care to revisit.

3 Likes

tom sizemore on the way out. coaines a helluva drug

Some life. Hi di Ho indeed.

1 Like

he did indeed. the heidi fleiss years were particularly off the wall

French footballing great Just Fontaine. RIP.

1 Like

I was sure he was already dead.

Not that I ever gave it much thought.

Former France soccer great Just Fontaine, who in 1958 scored a record 13 goals in a single edition of the World Cup, has died, his former club Stade de Reims confirmed on Wednesday.

Fontaine, 89, netted 30 goals from 21 caps for France between 1953-1960.

In 1958, he was instrumental in Les Bleus reaching the semi-finals in Sweden.

A prolific striker with 259 goals from 283 matches in his club career, Fontaine was one of the key players of the great Stade de Reims team who reached the European Cup final in 1959.

Reims, who won three French top flight titles with Fontaine, lost 2-0 to Real Madrid but ‘Justo’ ended up as the competition’s top scorer with 10 goals.

“A star of French football, an outstanding striker, a legendary Reims player… To his family… Stade de Reims send their most sincere condolences,” Reims wrote on Twitter.

“A thought for Just Fontaine,” French champions Paris St Germain wrote on Twitter.

As a coach, Fontaine helped PSG gain promotion to the first division in 1974.

1 Like

Steve Mackey of Pulp

Only 56

RIP

4 Likes

RIP

He was involved in the production of the ‘Everything Now’ album from Arcade Fire with other big hitters so obviously a talented bloke.