On Sunday last, Tipperary Museum of Hidden History, Neil Dennehy and Will O’Connell guided 55 enthusiastic walkers and hikers to Glenary Village.
The guided hike was the first of its kind in over 30 years and it was conceived by Marie McMahon Tipperary Museum Curator and Will O’ Connell who are part of an extensive project team of proactive traditional Irish skilled craftspersons and sustainability advocators.
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They are collectively striving to encourage schools and their local communities to discover and revive traditional skills, such as stone carving, dry stone building, tin-smithing, wood turning, casting, knitting, willow, sewing, felting, lumra, thatching, jam making, growing your own crops, farm to fork and so much more.
Marie McMahon says “It’s a vast project with many elements, and has been piloted for three years and backed by the Heritage Councils Heritage Stewardship Funding in its 4th year.
Traditional skills are dying fast and we need to encourage our ETBs, schools and mainstream educators to include some elements of our traditional crafts into everyday school’s curriculum and include it as part of our youths life skills journey.”
“The hike practice is part of the project’s message, to restore life skills and learning. Discovering the endurance of the people living in Glenary, and understanding our wellness and sustainability within the project, is a huge part of this initiative. Pausing to appreciate our environment and advocate for it, is vital,” said Marie McMahon.
“We were honoured to welcome Richard Howley to join us on the hike. He knew many of the people living in Glenary since he was a boy, as he lived in Scrouthea, The Old Bridge, Clonmel. Richard, Neil and Will regaled the enthusiastic group with many stories and anecdotes from memory and research which was done years after Glenary Village was no longer inhabited,” she said.
As Will O’ Connell stated, “it’s important to take guidance from the people of Glenary and bring it into our present world.”
Neil Dennehy brought a wellness aspect to the hike by bringing an awareness to the forest, the village, flora and fauna and of our hurried lives.
Setting off the group were ready to keep an open mind to experience the beauty around them.
“The Museum seems like an unlikely conduit for a project of this scale and range, but I feel its important to bring the museum’s collection out of Museum. By introducing the concept of a Green Museum, we bring our collection of artefacts – historical crafts, traditions, art, poetry, music, stories, sustainability, out of the physical building. To offer the objects as sources of learning and utilise them as tangible entities, no longer considered dying, gone or lost traditions. We have the ability to bring them to life, encourage our communities to immerse and nurture themselves throughout the process and enable our past to become the present and future,” said the manager of the museum services in the county
GLENARY
Just two miles from Clonmel, lies the now deserted old village of Glenary.
It traditionally would have been known as a Clochán / Clochan (enclosed / sheltered).
Nestled on the foothills of the Comeragh mountains, it was once a relatively densely populated area of Irish speaking inhabitants, with only two families speaking English.
A community where Meitheal (people or group working together) was integral to their success. This was a vibrant community that contributed and provided much produce to the people of Clonmel such as vegetables, crops, poultry, and milk.
It was considered a high value commodity when villagers arrived into Clonmel, to barter or purchase necessary supplies. Glenary school children would walk the long boreen from their homesteads to Russelstown school and meet their school teacher Master McGrath.
HARSH ENVIRONMENT
The people of this beautiful village lived in an environment that was harsh in winters and many seasons within one day. An old passage described them well: “Their eyes were like open windows and all the fresh humours of the weather seemed to come through them. Their cheeks had been painted by air and light. They were touched always and all days by limitlessness – by great views, winds and somehow they brought the stare of it with them”. The population of Glenary and its environs once numbered approx. 250, however by the turn of the twentieth century (census 1901) it numbered 72 people and this number steadily declined. This was mainly due to modern agricultural practices, better opportunities, living standards, emigration and sadly the Irish Language.
The last inhabitant to leave was Tom Burke, he lived his life with pride and love of Glenary Village until he died in 1968.
The importance of Glenary Village cannot be underestimated and due to this project and the people who feel its embrace and enchantment, we want it to be remembered and hope people reconnect with this timeless place that can offer us so much in terms of values, folklore and stories, not forgetting the white dog. Legend has it that it still haunts Glenary to this day!
Tipperary Museum of Hidden History would like to thank William O’Connell for contributing to this piece, the hike and the upcoming Vernacular Furniture project with Gael Coláiste Cheitinn and the Senior College Students commencing I September 2025.
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Thanks to Neil Dennehy who imparts his hiking knowledge, holistic wellness and appreciation of Glenary to our participants. Neil will also be bringing the above school groups on this hike to firmly land their appreciation of the Lost Village of Glenary while creating Tradition Irish Vernacular pieces of furniture.
This project also coincided with the 2025 Heritage Week theme “Exploring our Foundations”.
