Cheque still in the post for Glenhest centenarian

When Mamie Marley celebrated her 100th birthday on February 19 she received a lovely letter of congratulations from the President of Ireland, but one very important detail was missing – the cheque.

The former Postmistress of Glenhest may have turned 100, but in the eyes of the State and those who hand out the cheques, she still has a few days to go.

“There was a mix up on my birthdays. In those times, we were not registered for a week or two after being born. I will have to have the party again when I get the cheque,” laughs Mamie.

Mamie’s birth was registered on March 12, 1925, but her baptism certificate has her birth down as February 19, and that is the day she has always celebrated.

“I don’t want to be getting any more cards… I don’t have a place for anymore,” she quips, nodding in the direction of the scores of birthday cards surrounding her.

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Sitting in her living room, which is heated by a vintage turf-fueled range, Mamie is the picture of health as she and her granddaughter, Clodagh Geraghty, welcome The Mayo News to her home.

Heart of the community

Apart from a few years spent in Gloucester after she married her late husband Kevin in the late 1940s, Glenhest has always been home to Mamie.

After returning from England, Kevin and Mamie opened a small shop in their home, which lies between St Joseph’s Church and Cloondaff National School. Very soon it became the heart of the community, selling everything from ‘an anchor to a needle’. The Glenhest Post Office was later incorporated into the shop, and for 27 years Mamie was the local postmistress, until her retirement in the early 2000s.

“I miss the shop very much,” Mamie recalls. “We got the post office in later years, and that was great because we knew all the community.

“I miss the customers and the people calling in every day. Going by the amount of cards I got, they still remember me.”

There is no doubt that Mamie and her family are still held in high esteem by the local community – so much so that the Glenhest Community Council presented her with a special plaque to mark the special occasion of her birthday.

Happy out

Mamie was the fourth of seven children born to Dan McManamon and Bridget (nee Gillespie), who were both from Cloondaff, Glenhest. She recalls a happy childhood where her family were self-sufficient, with vegetables from the garden and cattle and sheep for milk and wool.

Her mother Bridget, she says, was a talented dressmaker, and they would spin their own wool and bring it to the village weaver, who would make the fabric for their clothes.

“All families were all self-supporting because they had to be. It was a great community and still is.”

There were 60 children going to Cloondaff National School when Mamie was young. The schoolmaster at the time was Michael T Mullahy, a Ballinrobe man who Mamie recalls had a great love for Irish.

“Any bit of education we had at the time was all through Irish. There were two teachers, but he was the master. I enjoyed school, and why wouldn’t we… we had our own fun.”

She recalls the rations of World War II, or The Emergency as it was known in Ireland, but says their community was sheltered from the devastation in Europe at the time.

“Everything was rationed during the war. Tea and sugar. ‘God bless de Valera, who gave us the black flour and half ounce of tea’ – that was sung in our day. There was no such thing as white bread or loaves. The tea was very scarce.

“There were no newspapers or radios around here, but we were happy out. There could be war in Dublin and we wouldn’t know it.”

Pupils from Cloondaff NS in Glenhest celebrate Mamie's 100th birthday at her home

Rambling house

Going to the dances at the nearby Glenhest Community Centre was the highlight of Mamie’s youth, and it was there she met her future husband, Kevin Marley, who lived nearby. She was 23 when they married and took the boat to England, where she worked as a bus conductor in Gloucester.

She enjoyed life in England, but when her eldest child, Marie, came along, they decided it was time to return home and try to make a living at home. They opened the shop, and Kevin also bought a car, which he used as a hackney taxi.

“It wasn’t easy but we were thrifty – and you had to be thrifty. Our neighbours were very good and supportive to us,” Mamie says.

The Marley home was known as a ‘rambling house’, where the door would always be open and people were welcome to call in for the craic, and that has not changed to this day.

Her eldest granddaughter, Clodagh, grew up in Castlebar and explained that she adored her visits to her grandparents in Glenhest and to the shop.

“We loved coming to Glenhest because there was a shop and we’d get a Mars bar and a can of coke on the way home. We absolutely loved coming here.

“The one thing I could not understand when I was a child was the shop had no closing time. If people wanted a loaf of bread they were always here to serve them, no matter the time. I could not understand it. In Castlebar the shop always closed, but not here,” Clodagh recalls.

Great honour

During her life, Mamie has seen big changes in Glenhest, with the introduction of electricity in the 1950s changing the way they lived, while the mobile phone has brought instant connectivity.

Clodagh says her grandmother is very much up to date when it comes to the changes in technology, although Mamie jokes that while her young people have their heads in their phones she is still very content with her rosary beads.

Mamie and Kevin reared seven children – Marie, John, Kathleen, Gabrielle, Kevin, Declan and Sharon – and she is the proud grandmother of 19 grandchildren and 25 great-grandchildren, ‘with more to come with the help of God’.

Mamie says she is very lucky that all her children stayed close to home, and Clodaghs says her grandmother likes to keep up to date with what her grandchildren and great-grandchildren are up to.

“When I come down here I get the big news and little news from Granny because she still hears it all.”

On reaching 100, Mamie is very modest and says there has no secret to her longevity other than she is lucky to have lived a healthy life.

“We lived a hard life, but it was also a simple life. It is a great honour for the Lord to have spared me this length and given me good health all along.”