One of my favourite pubs is to be sold. Things will not be the same. Clarke’s bar is an institution in Ballaghaderreen and, though I was advised as a youngster that marriage was an institution and no man should live in an institution, Clarke’s is one where many are very glad to spend time. Women included.
There has been a pub there since 1834, with the Clarkes arriving in 1948. Men such as my father were regulars there. So for many of us Clarke’s is part of our inheritance.
It was presided over, kindly but firmly, by the late Maura Clarke – “Mrs Clarke” to my generation of well-behaved (while there) learner-drinkers, and since. She was succeeded by her daughter Angela Purcell in a transition that was as smooth as it has been consistent in style.
A cosy pub laden with memorabilia and photographs of people and events past, Clarke’s is part of who we are. Visiting “expats” even go there to be reminded.
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So many stories, but three stand out. One man used go on a binge of rum and blackcurrant at the Sligo races every year. Returning home once in great suffering, he announced: “You know, Mrs Clarke, that blackcurrant is awful stuff.”
Another man returned to his new house with fellow drinkers at Christmas only to find the fridge empty. A new pond he had built was well-stocked with trout. They fished out some and grilled them. Full of remorse the following day, as well as hungover, he told Mrs Clarke: “I’d never do it again. It was like eatin’ one of your own.”
And then there’s the story I heard there last November of a local from outside the town who, feeling the full effects of prolonged up close and personal acquaintance with alcohol, met a neighbour. Pointing to a shop across the street, he announced dramatically, “you know what I’m going to do now, I’m going across there to Mulligans and buy myself a rope and end it all.”
The neighbour replied: “Sure what would you do that for, and the fine river you have at the back of the house!”
Clarke’s, we shall never see its like again.
Best of luck to Angela and Tom.
Bar, from old French barre, for barrier or counter over which drinks or food are served.
