When I was somewhat younger I seemed to be at the dentist fairly often and my mother used to have to bribe me to go. My reward, on the journey home, was a visit with her to Peebles' shop in 4 Grattan Street. There I could choose from a selection of Matchbox model cars. I loved the boxes the little cars came in nearly as much as the shiny, glossy toy itself. It was a bonus if the doors or bonnet opened or if it was a truck that tipped up its load.
Peebles shop was a very old premises, almost of a bygone age, musty and athmospheric like a Dickensian curiousity shop. In every corner and on every shelf, there were pleasing touches of magic, books, toys, papers and and other items to imbue wonderment.
Billy Peebles, the elderly proprietor, seemed to have the same distinctive character as his shop. He was polite and jolly, bald, short and round-faced. He smiled a lot and always seemed to take delight from selling you the item that was perfect, just for you. He wore round, wire-framed glasses and a printer's apron. The apron, was possibly the last vestige of an era when his family printed a local paper, the Sligo Independent, on the premises.
The promise of a visit to this quaint Aladin's Cave certainly sugarcoated the dentist's visit, and was fair recompense for the discomfort undergone just a little while earlier.
Hi Nelius
ReplyDeleteDid Billy Peebles also sell bamboo canes to teachers??? Independent Socialist Councillor Declan Bree ran his first bookshop there in that same premises in mid 1970s. Publications stocked were more to Left of political spectrum than Mr Peebles! Great shopfront photo.
Loved your recall of the football years with Slashers and Distillery (There was also Cranmore Celtic and Doorly Park Rangers ie DPR, in my fold at one stage or another). Of all the things I've done -- be it journalism for 17 years, Community Games starting out, the specialist hospice movement for 17 years also, or the current community campaign on eastern bridge route -- the football years were 'The Harvest Years.' They were 100% magic. I LEARNED almost I had to learn from the guys on those teams; nearly 500 guys passed through those teams in a decade; the respect was a two-way process. It NEVER ceases to amaze me, getting closer to 60, how many guys from those teams came back to say T-H-A-N-K-S for, above all, the TIME given.
It as a bonus that we won everything in sight at town level....but the team which we had built for Community Games could/should have gone further....if we hadnt run into the Maugheraboy 'roadblock' that night; the Ken brothers, John and Jim, proved their class as adults but Jim especially stopped our star John Skeffington that night. (When Roy Keane played in Showgrounds in 1989 John Skeffington was Man of the Match).
I remain good friends with some of that Maugheraboy team too - Jim McGarry has been elected Mayor of Sligo twice since and has greatly assisted our community in the eastern bridge route campaign.
I remember you cycling home from Sunnyfresh. Vincent 'Dixie' Kelly qas there too?? He would have played on Doorly Park Rangers (DPR) football teams with the twins Sean and Gerard Morrison, whom you mention.
Billys Boots. Love it! Shameful not to have even one Distillery team photo from that time - have Slashers 1972, 1974, 1976 and indoor football from mid 1970s.