offalyhistoryblog

Henry Egan of The Hall (now the Tullamore Town Hall) died on 18 May 1919, one hundred years ago, and on 18 May 2019 his contribution to the economy and to public life in Tullamore will be marked with recollections of his life and times and the launching of a new brand of whiskey in the Egan Collection. The great firm of P. & H. Egan went into voluntary liquidation in 1968 having been in business in Tullamore and the midlands since 1852. Today it is still recalled as the great shop, grocery and department store in Bridge Street where the Bridge House pub, restaurant and hotel are now located. The heritage of the firm in grain handling, malting and wine, brewing and wine and spirits is  today celebrated in its association with the new Irish whiskey. The two largest native firms in Tullamore up to the 1960s, Egan’s and Williams’, now have whiskeys associated with them that are known throughout the world. It is something that is distinctively Tullamore and it sends out the message that our midlands heritage counts and that Offaly people can be proud of the commercial heritage of Tullamore and the midlands in the post-Famine years of recovery and up to the 1960s.

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This is a story from my childhood in the 1950s. We lived on a farm in a place called Clerhane about two miles north of the village of Shannonbridge. We did not have electricity or indeed running water. The Rural Electrification Scheme in county Offaly which lasted from 1947 until 1962, was very much in vogue and was a topic of everyday conversation in the early 50s. Our farm was contiguous to the river Shannon, which had been the source of electricity since the opening of the Shannon Hydroelectric Scheme in 1929 by W.T. Cosgrove, President of the Executive. However, notwithstanding this, it was remote to our lives. (more…)