Local Buildings Past and Present

By the end of the 1840’s Thomas Dillon’s small grocery shop had grown to twice its original size. Before his death, Thomas handed over the business as a going concern to his widowed sister, Monica Duff, and she in her turn passed it on to her daughter, Anne Deane, also widowed after a brief and not very happy marriage. Under her regime the firm of Monica Duff and Co. continued to prosper and expand. At the time of John Blake Dillon’s death in 1866 his niece, Anne Deane, had built up the family business to the point where it was Ballaghaderreen’s biggest employer. This was a role it would continue to fulfill for the next 100 years. To the original grocery shop had now been added a large drapery department: an ironmongers: a boot, shoe and leather warehouse: a spacious yard dealing in guano manures, farm seeds, animal feed-stuffs, fuel and builders supplies: a bakery and a thriving farm at Kilcolman.

The firm had also gone into the beers, wines, spirits, and tobacco, trade in both retail and wholesale. Later still a mineral water manufacturing plant would be set up. By the 1880s the firm had its own MONDUF brand label on almost every grocery and household product on the market. Monica Duff & Co. was also the town’s Post Office. The firm had been chosen to be Ballaghaderreen’s first post office when the postal service was introduced in this area. A shipping office stood to the front and many a ticket was sold for America. Anthony Trollope visited to organise services and post-boxes. It is believed he finished one of his books (the Barchester chronicles) while residing in Ballaghaderreen. In my childhood in the 1950s I remember shelves stocked with bales of Donegal tweed, Foxford rugs and blankets, Irish damask tablecloths, knitting wool, curtain materials and men's shirts and ties and upstairs, the Ladies' department overseen by Miss Kielty. I loved to be sent on a message there. Full of importance I would ascend the stairs; all around were beautiful garments, knitwear, scarves, underwear, in glass case displays. Stockings, were arranged individually in boxes covered by tissue. "Legs ankle tailored by Bradmola" was the slogan. All the old manufacturers' names are like a distant litany: Bradmola, Brendalla, Highland, Clydella and Goray.
Over in the grocery section bacon pieces were laid out and what huge bacon pieces, people bought then for families. The coffee grinder ground the finest blends and great tea chests of tea lined with foil had their innards shovelled out slowly into half-pound and pound bags bearing the oak crested logo of Duffs. Before Christmas if there was no "trouble in Jordan and the Middle East" the dried fruits and almonds arrived. Long, narrow, coffin-like boxes bore citron, lemon and orange peel caramelised and sugared and I can still remember the taste of the sugar from the centre of the citron pieces. All the ordinary dried good and tinned stuff was pyramided neatly on white painted shelves. There was an aroma of Loughglynn cheeses (no longer made) in their great wheel shapes. The most abiding memory for many people is of the smell of baking loaves rising over the chimney tops at mid-day and later their being carried on great trays to the shop:- steaming turn-overs, deep crusted pan loaves with a taste and texture second to none. In the early 1950s a loaf cost sevenpence farthing. In October Duffs made their unforgettable bracks. These were made with the finest ingredients, fruit, eggs and of course the Halloween ring. These bracks were posted all over the world to emigrants, wrapped in their double wrapping of white greaseproof paper and a shiny red wrapper bearing proudly the oaktree logo.

Across from the grocery was the bar, which had a large pot-bellied stove constantly fed with great shovels of coal. On long benches the loyal clients sat and others arranged themselves on high bar stools. It was an all male club ….. almost, supervised by the superb John McGoldrick, Paddy Flynn and Haulie Costello. In the great yards up the back a busy office was kept going and a further front office manned by Gerry Tighe. Further up was the bakery under Tom Griffin and his helpers, and in that huge network of outbuildings a bonded warehouse and enough storage space for an occupying army. Managing all was the capable Michael Cawley. Back stairs, front stairs and passages connected all areas while the ghosts of Matthew Gallagher (a long dead old retainer) and the still living faithful Tommy Walker kept vigil. One by one the many different departments of Duff & Co closed down. First to go was the ironmongery section, followed by the mineral water manufacturing plant. The yard greatly reduced the scope of its activities. The farmland went and the land was sold to Roscommon County Council. In the summer of 1985 the drapery, household, grocery and bakery outlets closed, gone forever were the MONDUF unsliced and unwrapped pan loaves that had been Ballaghaderreen's favourite bread for more than a 100 years. What happened our Titanic? The great iceberg of change in shopping habits, multi-national stores, decline of labour intensive personal service, the shift in the mobility of customers and the ageing of owners all torpedoed the old family owned departmental stores. Wages that were once considered good became static and limited advancement contrasting with opportunities opening up in multinational’s nationwide were other factors. Heirs to these great stores chose other lifestyle’s and professions. An upwardly rising mercantile class had abandoned ship recognising change before it occurred. Shops with a large staff and miles of counter fell out of favour. In early February, 1986 it was announced that Monica Duff & Co would completely close down in March. On its final days as a department store, Duffs saw feverish sales; attended more by strangers than by regular customers. In its drapery window reposed a broken wooden fashion model - its fragmented limbs teetering across a once elegant shop window. This well remembered store, having connections with Parnell and Davitt with the Marshall Field Store in Chicago, (James Dillon learned business there) all its politics, loyalties, service and labour, became an empty hulk. The old cherry tree that Parnell and Davitt had probably seen still grows overhanging Duff’s outer wall and I sense that ghosts still keep watch. © Mary Murphy-Gallagher 1998 Historic reference to early shop taken from "Irish Times" local History Project by John Gallagher, Main Street, Ballaghaderreen.