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THERE WAS A lot of reminiscing about the past on Dublin’s Talbot Street today, as shoppers lamented over the closure of Guiney and Co.
Long known for being one of Dublin’s best known shops, the place which seemed to stock everything was held in high regard by those who knew it best – its shoppers.
Catherine Freer, a native of Kilkenny who now lives in Dublin, had shopped in Guineys for years. Recalling the shop as always being ‘great value’, beach towels for summers past had always been purchased there, not to mention “all the kitchen stuff and the bedroom stuff.”
“From a needle to an anchor is what I’d actually say about Guineys,” she said, describing the wide variety of items that could always be found there.
Having shopped there as recently as last week for a solitary mat, today’s trip was scuppered by the shutters which remained down.
I wanted to get tea towels in there today, good thick ones. They were always very good quality.
Pointing through the gaps in the shutters toward an alarm clock on display, Freer talked of another purchase she had made recently: an alarm clock for an 83-year-old friend.
While he had struggled to hear other alarm clocks, the one from Guineys ‘hopped off the table’ when it went off, solving that particular problem.
The go-to for Freer had always been Guiney and Co:
I hear it every day of the week, with friends and family. ‘You know where you’ll get that? Guineys.’ That’s said at least twice a day in my home.
Today’s closure is just the latest of what Freer has come to notice more and more.
Every time I come through [Dublin city centre], I notice something else gone. Isn’t it terrible. I just can’t believe it.
Catherine Freer (Paul Hyland/TheJournal.ie)
Paddy Kilmurray (Paul Hyland/TheJournal.ie)
Paddy Kilmurray – who grew up on nearby Gardiner Street – had hoped to buy a folding table, only realising when he arrived that the shop had been closed.
While he hopes that somebody will take it over, he still found today’s discovery something of a shock, having ‘come into town to find that what you were used to seeing everyday is gone’.
Looking though the shutters at all the product’s which remained on display, he wondered how suddenly things had changed for the shop.
If they knew they were going to close, they could have sold everything off. People would have bought everything in there. Look at the stuff that’s perfect in the window.
Having purchased his ‘shoes, shirts, blazers and Trilby hats’ in the shop over the years, quality at the right price had kept him coming back.
I got this for a fiver [pointing at this hat]. The same type of hat is €45 in Marks and Spencer. I’m retired now… it was great to find a shop that was decent and never screwed you on price.
Patricia Murphy (Paul Hyland/TheJournal.ie)
Speaking outside the still-open Michael Guineys on Talbot Street, Patricia Murphy, from Clontarf in Dublin, had always shopped closeby, as that was where her bus stopped. “I was a bit disappointed because I knew it so well,” she said, reacting to news of today’s closure.
Having purchased there as recently as last week, bedclothes, curtains and towels had been the main draw. “It always had what I needed.”
Bridie Lynch (Paul Hyland/TheJournal.ie)
Bridie Lynch, along with her late husband, had gotten to know two employees from the shop over the years – John and Joe.
Trying to put a date on the length of time she had known them, one occasion stood out.
We formed a syndicate when the lotto started. That’s how far back it’s going. We won prizes, no big prizes, just little ones.
Lynch’s purchases over the years had varied, including purchases for both her late father and herself:
I would have bought stuff for my father… warm socks. Real wool knitted socks. I also used to buy little tops, they’d have my size.
I know so much about this street. I don’t waste my life. I don’t waste my time. I talk to people and study the places, thinking ‘I wonder why that’s there?’
Listen to some of today’s shoppers as they talk to TheJournal.ie about the closure.
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One of the most heinous crimes committed by the Provisional IRA, the McConville family deserves justice and to know the truth.
@Stephen Kearon:
And there were many.
@Stephen Kearon: WTF are you on about? This is about the complete let down of the family by the British social services and you are banging on about the Provos. Did you even read the article before you started mashing the keyboard with your usual one-sided rants? Maybe your lack of research and actually informing yourself of the issues at hand is why you failed dismally in the elections.
@CBD Suppliers: if the provisionals hadn’t killed her, then her children wouldn’t have been in a position to be let down by the northern Irish public services
@CBD Suppliers: so you’re saying the IRA didn’t cause the problem by abducting and murdering the mother of a young family?
@Conoroconnor: I never saod anything of the sort. The article is about the let down of the family by the social services but hey if you want to go off on a tangent then be my guest. Lets ignore the call for an inquiry by Michael McConville becuase that doesn’t matter.
@Disco Inferno: Yeah we all know what happened to her but what has that to do with the social services letting down the family. Did you even read the article?
@CBD Suppliers: you’re speaking as if the two situations aren’t intrinsically linked. Yes everybody involved has let down the family but none moreso than the IRA who abducted and murdered thus bans mother and the IRA leader who gave the order. He’s not admitting anything either.
@Conoroconnor: **this mans mother
@Conoroconnor: Everyone knows about the Provos role in her murder, that’s a given however all anyone here seems to be interested is in her murder and not the dereliction of the family by the social services which is what the article is about. Do you not see the irony that apart from myself, everyone else is more preoccupied with the PIRA than this mans call for an inquiry into the social services, the RUC and the Church? Other commentators are doing exactly what the British authorities did to his family over the years and that is ignoring the families plight while scoring cheap political points.
@CBD Suppliers: no, all I see is your deflection. I’d be pretty sure you weren’t too bothered when the family were ignored by SinnFein IRA when they were trying to find out what happened to their mother. The wrongs perpetrated against this family in the aftermath and subsequent years by social services etc are only in the halfpenny placed compared what the terrorists did.
@Conoroconnor: Deflection? Listen the only one deflecting here seems to be you and a few other commentators. I have twice acknowledged that the PIRA was responsible for her murder. You, on the other hand, have completely ignored what the article is about and instead has concentrated solely on the PIRA involvement. The funny thing is that you don’t even seem to realise it.
If you want to accuse someone of deflection than maybe you should look at what you are writing.Not only that but twice you have tried to put words into my mouth or insinuated that I wasn’t “too bothered when the family were ignored by SinnFein IRA ” I’m well capable of forming my own opinions and I don’t need any help from you. If you couldn’t give a monkeys about what the article is about and just want to push some sort of other agenda then that’s up to you. Ignore the families call for an inquiry all you want and continue with your own deflections if that’s what rocks your boat but to be honest, to accuse someone of deflection while engaging in it yourself just makes you look like a hypocrite.
@Stephen Kearon: The most heinous crime carried out during the troubles was the mass murder of children and adults alike (The Dublin Monaghan Bombing). It was the single largest loss of live during the troubles. Your party refused to investigate it. Some of the actors involved, through remorse, offered their testimony and YOUR party have refused to this day to investigate it. You need to get a grip.
@Stephen Kearon: your a disgrace to FF
Her only crime was to comfort a dying soldier
Her murderers had to concoct a story about her being an informant to try and justify their disgusting act.
@The Great Unwashed: and the one who likely ordered the murder is still too cowardly to admit his membership of the Provos, let alone the numerous war crimes he was responsible for
@The Great Unwashed: on the Boston tapes that were published after his death, Brendan Hughes said that she was an informer. It was so wrong what happened to her but I think brendan Hughes would have better knowledge on the situation than you
@@at: that is not true. She was not an informed. Also to allow for discussion here if she was an informed why was her body not given to her family and her family not intimidated. To say this woman is an informer is a scandalous disgraceful comment. How dare you.
@Mjhint: you seem to have great difficulty with the English language
I never says she was an informer. I said that ‘brendan Hughes’ says she was an informer
You silly moron
@@at:
Brendan Hughes said she admitted to being an informer. He didn’t say how much they had to torture her before she made her ‘confession’.
There is zero evidence that she was ever an informer.
@@at: I’d say your cordial manner does wonders for traffic to your website.
@The Great Unwashed: BS . Brendan Hughes said there was a transmitter found in her flat. You never listened to the tapes did ya, you are just spoofing now
@Clifford Brennan: when I see someone telling lies I call them out. Simple as that
Some people on here would sell their granny for a few bob, not me kiddo
@@at: who found the transmitter in the flat ,was it the provos
@The Great Unwashed: if you believe that, you will belive anything, she was warned before what would happen if she kept it up.
@Stephen Kearon: fighting for Irish freedom, maybe start at the genocide of the Irish nation and come back when you have a brain.
@The Great Unwashed: was warned twice
@Mjhint: she was
It is sad to thinks they are no more forward in this investigation 2019, than they were when their poor mother was murdered in 1972.
@Paul Maguire: I know. Last week our Garda commissioner who was previously deputy leader of the PSNI in the North refused an application by families associated with the Paedophile ring during the same period in the North. The FG and FF members of the Dail apparently have nothing to say on the matter. We are still waiting on the media to publish articles on this injustice.
Maybe if she cared more about her children, she was on her second warning but didn’t seem to care
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