PM O’Sullivan
The walls of Thomastown Concert Hall come alive with the music of many decades.
Just the photographs, just the calm care of arrangement. Here are the individuals who contributed right across this community’s spheres. You could even say centuries. One image shows Grennan Castle on its mound, ruined but implacable, attending the hurling pitches. Here is the 13th century, still keeping watch.
“It’s nice to have some kind of archive in a place,” Séamus Quigley notes. “Thomastown has an amount of history. The Hall is here since 1910. It’s always easier to lose things than to hold on to them. I suppose I have always been a person for trying to hold on to things.”
I am struck by one poster, framed and perfectly preserved. The advertisement was for a dance in October 1963 that honoured the four Thomastown hurlers ― Oliver Gough, Ollie Walsh, Tom Walsh and Cha Whelan ― who featured in Kilkenny’s 15th Senior triumph. My parents, not long turned eighteen and newly given to each other, were there. Countless people danced within these walls.
This individual? Best possible guide. Séamus Quigley is a fresh man in his sixties, active and energetic. Chairperson of Thomastown Community Centre and Manager of the facility, he walks me around the building, endlessly courteous and patient. There is much to see.
From outside, you cannot appreciate this place’s scope. The Concert Hall now counts as only one element in an array of resources.
The Darwin Room lies adjacent at the front. “A meeting room,” Quigley clarifies, “and named for Storm Darwin, back in 2014.” We turn left and walk on towards the Clifford Room, a remarkably ample space, a perfect auditorium in its own right.
“This facility was built first in 1979,” he recalls. “As a sports hall and a dance hall. A lot of the bands would have played here. We’ve renovated in partnership with Thomastown’s new library.”
Keen thought drives all decisions: “We’re calling it the Clifford Room for a particular reason. We didn’t want it known as ‘The New Hall’, because the Concert Hall would then become ‘The Old Hall’. The Concert Hall is young again, after the refurbishment.”
Quigley elaborates: “I love history. I love going back and thinking of where things came from. This ground was originally in the Clifford Estate. The Carricks, another landlord family in Thomastown, would have owed the Cliffords money. Instead, they gave them property, including the ground here, where the playground and the car park now is.
“In 1976, that ground was transferred [by the Cliffords] to Thomastown Community Council, to build the original sports hall. So this room is part of the Clifford Estate’s history.”
The Lindsay Room, another meeting room at the building’s rear, similarly references an important historical figure. “Kathleen Lindsay was the driving force behind the original Hall’s construction,” he explains. “She was part of the Butler family and did a lot of good work around here.”
We move next door to a key resource. Séamus says with quiet pride: “It’s a commercial kitchen. It was a gents toilets before we got it all reconstructed, in 2013. We can cater for anyone and anything. Next December, for instance, will be the eighth Christmas Day Dinner we put on for locals. Anyone can come in and join us.”
Over tea and a scone, Séamus details what happened. Nothing whatsoever stood given. Focus and hard work offered the only route. And chance, more or less, delivered his presence: “I got involved in 2004. People like Tom and Alice Dack, Séamus O’Brien, PJ Whelan Joe Jagger Weyms were the driving force that kept it going for 25 years.
For years and years, they were only patching holes. Water was coming in everywhere. The floor of the Concert Hall was rotten. You’d go down through it…
“There was no funding there to do anything big. But one day, out of the blue, Séamus asked me aboard: “Do you want to do some work for us?” He was then the Chairperson. Little did I know what he had in mind for me…”
Quigley continues: “I had an accident in work in 1998, to my right foot. And I suppose it took me two years to recover. It’s not as though we planned it all. Sometimes life has a way of showing you what the next step is going to be.”
Once aboard, he found capable colleagues: “So myself and Ailish Hayes and Mary Wallace and Carol Whelan became the Management Committee with a board of directors. I am the Chairperson since September 2009. Carol is Treasurer. Ailish is Secretary. And I manage this facility, on a voluntary basis. I could give 50 hours a week here.
“I’ve been really fortunate in the support my wife, Joan, and our daughters, Niamh and Laura, have given me over the years. I’m originally from Newtown in Kells. I met Joan, a girl from Legan, up the Kilkenny Road, and I came to live in Thomastown in 1992. We got married that Whit Monday.”
Necessary work proceeded in four phases: “We started on the 30th of August 2011. We formed a limited company called Thomastown Community Centre Limited, and the freehold of the site was transferred into that company. It’s entirely vested in the community but we can do what’s needed to keep past and present together.
“First, we restored the Concert Hall and did the meeting rooms, with the aid of Kilkenny Leader Partnership funding. Then, in 2015, we did the kitchen and the concourse area, with some Kilkenny County Council ‘Community and Cultures Facilities’ funding.”
The locality swung firmly behind this project’s growth: “There was tremendous community support. One gentleman gave us 23 thousand towards this kitchen. Just out of his own pocket, like. Phase 3 was redeveloping the balcony. Another gentleman gave 15 thousand towards that work. Local families sponsored the seating. Phase 4 was the Clifford Room, which started in 2024 and is now complete.
“It’s such a community facility. And to date we can say that there’s no debt on this facility after spending almost 600 thousand.”
Difficult pasts, handled deftly, can unfold thriving futures. This achievement now offers a yardstick for comparable ambitions. As Quigley details: “We have groups coming from all over. Kilkenny Leader Partnership and Kilkenny County Council would have said to them: ‘Before ye start any work on renovating yere old halls, you’ve got to visit Thomastown.’ We honestly believe we have set the bar here for what you can do with facilities, because this was so rundown.”
The future shimmers. Séamus remains grateful to each and every participant: “In fairness to Lake Productions and Ger Cody, they have really put this venue on the map for theatre goers. We have drama groups coming from all over as well, from the Vat Pak in South Kilkenny to groups in Carlow and Laois. We have the Fionn MacCumhaill Players from Fethard in County Tipperary.”
This venue keeps on coming into its own: “Music Network in Kilkenny have four concerts planned for the autumn and winter. They all love coming here. Particularly for the acoustics out in that Hall. Sometimes the piano is on the stage. Other times it’s on the floor. So we can put the seating in a half moon on the floor.
“And it’s just… The ambience… It’s just a facility that’s second to none. And to have it here in Thomastown… Especially with the train there. People can come out to the concerts on the afternoon train ― they start at four o’clock, those concerts ― and get back in on the evening train.”
He summarizes in compelling fashion: “We’re a theatre today, we’re a cinema tomorrow, we’re hosting a humanist funeral the next day. We’ve had four or five of them at this stage. People are delighted with the facility. We go above and beyond to make sure that everyone is welcome here. The kettle is always boiling.
“This facility is multi purpose. The real sense of community is in this building. We cater for so many different groups. Doesn’t matter: colour, religion, sexual orientation… Doesn’t matter.”
Thomastown nub: “We cater for everyone.”
1910 First Committee, Walter and Lady Kathleen Lyndsy from Mount Juliet Estate. R. J. Pillsworth , Miller. James Ryan, Patrick T. Kelly, J. B. Hodgert.
As time went by, those involved included: Joe Prendergast, Paddy Murphy, Sean Ryan , Michael O Brien, Edward Ryan, Denis Treacy, Larry Flynn, Johnny Minogue, Jim Walsh, Paddy Carroll, Julia Stapleton, Cathleen Finan, Andy Farrely, Bobby and Annie Power, Angela Barrett, Antionette Dunphy, Rita Kirwan, Jimmy Dunne, Mrs Dempsey Chapel Hill, Pim Dunphy Sally Flood and Christie Keating.
