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Aldi Co-Founder Theo Albrecht Dies Aged 88

Theodor Paul Albrecht (28 March 1922 – 24 July 2010)

Theo Albrecht, the joint founder of the popular budget supermarket giant Aldi, last seen in public after his release from kidnap 39 years ago, has died aged 88. The company said he died on Saturday in his home city of Essen, but gave no cause of death.

The Albrecht brothers, Karl and Theo, co-founders of Aldi, were amongst the two wealthiest people in Germany, with fortunes in excess of €17.35bn and €16.75bn respectively.

Little is known about the two reclusive brother billionaires, with Theo’s last public appearance being in 1971, shortly after his release, after 17 days captivity, by kidnappers who were reportedly paid a $4.67 million ransom.

One rare photo of Theo Albrecht, from the 1980s, shows a nondescript looking man with grey hair and glasses who apparently devoted his spare time to collecting old typewriters, growing orchids and to playing golf on his own private greens.

The first Aldi stores – an acronym standing for “Albrecht Discount” – opened in the early 1960s under the motto: “Concentrating on the basics: a limited selection of goods for daily needs.” The stores began sprouted up all over Germany and are now to be found in nearly 20 countries since their conception.

The Aldi group presently operates about 8,210 individual stores worldwide. A new store opens every week in Britain alone, and the company operates approximately 70 outlets here in Ireland with one popular outlet here in Thurles, Co.Tipperary.

Theo Paul Albrecht was renowned as a hard working man who was always decent with his business partners and employees and who always treated people with the greatest respect.

Mr Albrecht and his elder brother both served as German soldiers in the Second World War, before returning home to Essen and taking over a grocery store their parents owned. They flourished as the German economy, then in shambles after the war, came back to life in what is often referred too as the “Economic Miracle”.  If you think Ireland has severe financial problems presently, remember Germany, according to the Potsdam Conference held between July 17 and August 2, 1945, had to pay the Allies $20 billion mainly in machinery, and manufacturing plants.  In addition, in accordance with the agreed policy of de-industrialisation and pastoralization, large numbers of civilian factories were dismantled for transport to France and the UK, or simply destroyed.  Germany paid Israel 450 million DM in Holocaust reparations, and paid 3 billion DM to the World Jewish Congress to compensate survivors in other countries.

When Forbes featured the brothers in 1992 as two of the world’s richest men, the magazine had to uses silhouettes rather than photographs to illustrate the article since no pictures of them had been published in many years.

The German Retail Federation said that Germany had lost one of its greatest entrepreneurs. “There are only a few people who have stamped their mark on an entire business sector of the economy. Theo Albrecht achieved just that,” the Federation’s managing director, Stefan Genth, said in a statement.

Aldi now has more than 4,000 outlets in Germany alone, where it is known for its no-frills quality shopping environment, streamlined processes and a limited range of discount products.

The brothers retired as CEOs in 1993 and gave most of their wealth to foundations. The Aldi group operates about 8,210 individual stores worldwide, with a new store opening every week in Britain alone.

Go ndéana Dia trócaire ar a anam dílis.

“Invaders” GAA Medal Goes On Sale

"The Invaders" GAA Medal

A rare Co.Tipperary GAA medal, commemorating the first ever GAA hurling match in America is to be auctioned on Thursday, July 29th, at Mealy’s auctioneering premises in Castlecomer, Co Kilkenny. This is the first medal ever to go on sale from the GAA’s first official trip to the United States in 1888.
1888 was the year that the Gaelic Athletic Association organised a trip to New York for hurlers and with the view of strengthening the interest of the exiles in their native pastime, but more importantly to raise funds for the hosting of a ‘Celtic Festival’ or ‘Tailteann Games‘ (An Aonach Tailteann).

The medal soon to be auctioned is, we understand, presently is in the ownership of as yet an unnamed Tipperary family.

Five players from Tipperary were included in this group of 51 persons, dubbed “The Invaders” or Invasion Tour and included members of the Tipperary team who had won the previous year’s inaugural All-Ireland Hurling final.

39 members of "The Invasion" Tour. (Figure left with hammer is Maurice Davin.)

It is understood that only 39 of these silver medals, in the shape of a ‘crosse pattée‘ featuring a design of crossed hurley’s in the centre, were originally distributed. An interesting fact is that when “The Invaders” tour left America on October 31st 1888, its original number had fallen somewhat from the original 51 returning home, with 17 men at least choosing to remain in America permanently.

In 1888 the idea of hosting this ‘Celtic Festival’ was discussed and plans were put in place to hold this festival in Dublin in the Summer of 1889. This festival was to include athletic contests, field games, an Irish industrial exhibition and traditional music /literary competition. The estimated cost of hosting such a festival was estimated at £5,000.

To raise necessary funding it was planned that a group of Irish hurlers and athletes would embark on a fundraising tour of strongly inhabited Irish centres in America staging displays of hurling and athletics. While the process of selecting hurlers and athletes to accompany the tour began, £1,000 had to be raised through a  nationwide fundraising campaign to cover players fares and each of the 800 or so affiliated clubs were asked to contribute a small amount.

Continue reading “Invaders” GAA Medal Goes On Sale

Cahir Swiss Cottage Celebrate 200th Anniversary

The Swiss Cottage Cahir

As part of the 200-year anniversary of the iconic Swiss cottage situated in Cahir, Co Tipperary, a family day will be held tomorrow.

The Swiss cottage was built around 1810 at Kilcommon, Cahir, County Tipperary. The building  is a very fine example of cottage ornée, or ornamental cottage. It was originally part of the estate of Lord and Lady Cahir, and used mainly as a hunting and fishing lodge and for entertaining guests. The cottage was probably designed by Anglo-Welsh architect John Nash 1752-1835, famous for his designing of much of Regency London.

John Nash came to work in Ireland as an architect after 1793 and also designed St Paul’s Church of Ireland church in Cahir, which was built in 1818 and one of only two known Nash designed churches to survive.

Cahir, may have been built by Richard Butler, 12th Baron Caher, 1st Earl of Glengall (1775-1819), who married in 1793, Emily Jeffereys, daughter of James St John Jeffereys of Blarney Castle, Co.Cork.  Milady Cahir is referred to by Napoleon Bonaparte’s Josephine ( Joséphine de Beauharnais) in connection with the Château de Malmaison, latter formerly her residence and was from 1800 to 1802 the headquarters of the French government.

The Swiss Cottage, after many years of shameful neglect, was fully and painstakingly restored by the OPW starting in 1985 and was opened to the public again in 1989.

The family day will include an angling demonstration, guided woodland walks and demonstrations of traditional crafts such as thatching and stone carving. Admission for the day is free and programme of events start at 12.00 noon tomorrow until 5.00pm. If you are out and about for a leisurely drive this weekend, this event is well worth a visit.

Loughmore Descendants Celebrate Golden Jubilee

Pierce Hayes and Johanna Finigan survived the Great Famine here in Co Tipperary and emigrated to America as very young children.  Local Church and tenant records indicate that they had lived in the town-lands of Derry, Curraghmore, Clougherailymore, and Clougherailybeg, in East Loughmore, near Thurles.

Other surnames attached to the ancestral family through marriage include the inevitable Irish names of Ryan and Maher.

Back L-R: Joseph, Paul, Vincent, Patrick. Seated L-R: Bernardine, Rita, Therese, Mary, Louise.

The emigrant families remained in close contact while in Massachusetts.  Pierce Hayes went on to join the Union Army during the American Civil War and was seriously wounded in 1861. Pierce and Johanna later married in Massachusetts in 1862.

Fast forward now four generations and we come upon a descendant Hayes family of nine siblings, all born in Norwalk, Connecticut, but now spread all across America.

On June 13th, 2010, the eldest sibling, Therese Hayes, celebrated her Golden Jubilee,  fifty years dedication to her convent.  Sister Therese is a member of a small order, The Medical Mission Sisters, headquartered in Philadelphia. She spent her early years working for a hospital in Ghana and later doing inner-city AIDS mission work in Philadelphia.  The convent has published several brief articles recalling her devout and dedicated service.  (See Links  http://www.medicalmissionsisters.org/healing/AIDS.htm and http://www.medicalmissionsisters.org/healing/200yearsinmission.htm.

In celebrating her Golden Jubilee in June, Sister Therese was joined by all eight of her younger siblings and an additional twenty nine nieces, nephews, spouses and friends.  Indeed, such grand family reunions are organized every few years.

Brothers Paul, Vincent, and Patrick last visited their ancestral town-lands in Loughmore in February of this year, 2010, when they were briefly the guests of Thurles Town Mayor, Mrs Evelyn Nevin and Thurles Town Clerk, Mr Michael Ryan.

You may find more about this families history by viewing their Family Tree report. (See Link  http://home.comcast.net/~hayesmcsweeney)

There are now 115 descendants of Pierce and Johanna living in America who can trace their ancestry directly to these two famine children from Loughmore East.

To Sister Therese: Congratulations on achieving your Golden Jubilee and from Tipperary go our best wishes for your continued good health and happiness and in the words of an old Irish Blessing:-

May the blessing of light be on you—light without and light within.
May the blessed sunlight shine on you and warm your heart, till it glows like a great peat fire.

Note: If there are any people out there who can shed further light on the Hayes and Finigan family roots here in Loughmore, we would love to hear from you and we will be happy to put you in contact with their American descendants – they would love to hear from you.

Snails Eat Mail In Tipperary

The era of Queen Victoria was a time of industrial, cultural, political, scientific, and military progress within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Before our independence, postboxes bore the insignia of British reigning monarchs. “VR”, “ER” and “GR” latter insignia referring to Queen Victoria, King Edward VII and King George V.

Some of these beautiful boxes can still be seen in parts of Ireland today. Postboxes erected since 1922 bear Irish logos, e.g. a harp entwined with the letters SÉ, short for Saorstát Éireann and later PT (Posts and Telegraphs) and, since 1984, An Post.

Since 1861, The residents of Kilmoyler have been posting letters in one of these designer Victorian cast-iron postboxes, embedded in the ivy clad wall opposite the Lady Gregory public house since 1861.  Alas, now in this present age of speedy communication and sophistication, this simple luxury is no more, thanks to snails.

Recently the local postman noticed this mailbox had been infiltrated by snails who were munching on the envelopes contained their-in. On reporting this matter, An Post decided to suspend its daily collection and seal the box causing not a little complaining from local letter writers.

So Why Have Snails In Tipperary Begun Invading Our Perfectly Good Postal System?

In their natural habitat, land snails eat mushrooms, fruit, leaves and any other kind of vegetation they can find. Mostly, snails eat living plants, but can also eat decaying ones. Other forms of food include plant bark, flowers and algae. In order to get a nutritional supply of calcium for their shells, snail food includes limestone and they also eat ready available chalk from rocks.
Snails however also can easily acquire a taste for damp paper and cardboard, because same are mostly made from a fibre called cellulose that comes from trees harvested from plantations and forests. Wood chips are mechanically and/or chemically treated to release these fibres. This produces a pulp which is then mixed with large amounts of water to make a  mush that is passed over a continuous, rapidly moving mesh. The water is drawn through the mesh, leaving the fibres behind. These damp fibres are then passed over a series of rollers to flatten and dry it, then rolled onto huge spools, and sent to factories for cutting and shaping. So remember that paper is made from plant materials and snails simply see it as another food source.

Snails also do not like hot and dry conditions as presently being experienced in Co.Tipperary. They like their atmosphere moist or humid and not too bright, so where better to spend their slow moving leisurely time than in a cast iron letter box, whose dark interior walls are covered in condensation.

So What Is The Solution To This Snail Mail Problem?

Continue reading Snails Eat Mail In Tipperary

Queen Elizabeth II – Welcome Home

Ireland and the UK have been EU partners since 1973 and both Ireland and the British Isles share a long interlinked history and essentially the same popular culture. It is now high time to move on from the past to a complete normalising of relations between both our countries. It is not surprising therefore that An Taoiseach Mr Brian Cowen has signaled that Queen Elizabeth II will probably make a state visit to this country before the end of next year.

Speaking in London after a meeting with British Prime Minister David Cameron, Mr Cowen signaled that the visit would, only rightly, be before the end of Irish President Mary McAleese’s second term in office which regrettably comes to an end next year.

The Taoiseach said that no obstacle now exists to prevent a State Visit to Ireland by Britain’s Queen taking place, and I like the vast majority of Tipperary people fully agree.

As a citizen of a modern, sovereign European state, I have no difficult with the head of state of my nearest neighbour coming over for a visit. She is not only the Head of State of our nearest neighbour, but also our most important trading partner and home to at least a million of our citizens.

This proposed visit is a measure of the long overdue parity of esteem that we as a Nation worked so hard for and achieved in the last 10 to 15 years. To those who voice opposition, I say leave the past to the past, where it rightly belongs and move on.

The very few opponents to her intended visit to this country need to grow up, so come on Ireland, show how far we’ve come and put out your ‘Welcome Mats’. This is a wonderful opportunity for the future of this country. Let us show the world that when it comes to ‘Welcomes’, there is no welcome like an ‘Irish Welcome’.

Already the smart busy tourist attractions like Kerry are ‘sticking their spade in’ suggesting she should visit their natural beauty spots, like Muckross Estate, but when Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II comes to Ireland, the most obvious place to take her is to her ancestral home, here in Thurles, Co.Tipperary.

As our readers can observe by clicking on our ‘Family Tree’ picture, (on right of this screen), Queen Elizabeth II not only acquired her christian name, but is also a direct descendant of Viscount and Lady Elizabeth Butler of Thurles (Latter formally Miss Elizabeth Poyntz, daughter of Sir John Poyntz,Bart., of Acton in Gloucestershire, England.) through their eldest son, the Duke of Ormond. The Duke’s daughter, also Elizabeth, married Philip Stanhope, 2nd Earl Chesterfield, and their daughter Elizabeth Stanhope married John Lyon, 4th Earl Strathmore. Six generations later in direct line was the 14th Earl Strathmore whose daughter, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon married the future King George VI; and these are the parents and grandparents respectivly of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and her son Charles, latter heir apparent to the thrones of the Commonwealth realms.

Your Majesty we would love to have you amongst us, here in Thurles, as our guest, even if only for an hour or so.

Bolton Library – An Exceptional Collection Of Rare Literature

Bolton Library in the shadow of The Cathedral of St. John The Baptist, Cashel, Co. Tipp.

An exceptional collection of literature, described by experts as the one of the most important of its kind in Ireland has been taken into the care of the State, by the Office of Public Works (OPW).

The Bolton Library in Cashel, Co Tipperary, was first established by an 18th century Church of Ireland Archbishop and skilled Canon Lawyer, Theophilus Bolton, (1678-1744), grandson of Sir Richard Bolton, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. Educated in Trinity College Dublin, Archbishop Bolton became Chancellor of St. Patrick’s Cathedral  in 1714, Bishop of Clonfert and later Bishop of Elphin in 1724, before becoming Archbishop of Cashel in 1730. The Cashel Palace Hotel directly opposite Cashel Cathedral was originally built for his convenience, as a place of residence.  His rare collection of some 11,000 books maps and pamphlets were bequeathed to the Cashel Diocese following his death.

This unique collection of antiquarian European books contain the thoughts, words and deeds of mankind for over 2,500 years, and include works by Dante, Machiavelli, Homer, Herodotus, and Plato.  Amongst this collection can be found an interesting letter from a citizen of Athens to the then Roman Emperor, pleading for fair and reasonable treatment of Christians and amongst the maps a Geographical Survey of Ireland printed in Dublin in 1840, which warns of the disastrous effects of continuing to plant the potato crop.

The collection, currently securely housed in the Chapter House of the Cathedral of St. John The Baptist, has been traditionally cared for by the local Protestant Clergy and despite its immediate proximity to the Rock of Cashel, this rare collection is little-known and has attracted few visitors down the years.

Continue reading Bolton Library – An Exceptional Collection Of Rare Literature

Lest Tipperary Forgets Anzac Day

Jesuit priest, Fr Michael Bergin, William Maurice Armstrong, Sir Sackville Hamilton Carden KCMG , are just some of the Tipperary men, numbered among the many, whose heroics,  Australians celebrated yesterday in their Anzac Day commemorations.

The acronym ‘ANZAC‘ stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, whose soldiers were known as Anzacs. Anzac Day still remains one of the most important national occasions for both Australia and New Zealand, who remember the thousands of soldiers from all countries who lost their lives in the Gallipoli campaign, also known as the Dardanelles Campaign, which took place between 25th April 1915  and the 9th January 1916, during the First World War.

This eight month campaign during the First World War, which was an attempt to seize obvious strategic advantage and was authorised by the British, with an attack on the Turkish peninsula, aiming to capture Constantinople.

Continue reading Lest Tipperary Forgets Anzac Day

Did Churchill Secretly Father A Tipperary Son?

Sir W.Churchill

RTE documentary film makers are presently investigating whether Sir Winston Churchill‘s right hand man, Tipperary born Brendan Bracken, was really his illegitimate son.

This follows some 80 years of gossip and rumour that the Tipperary native and possibly one of the most powerful Irishmen and spin doctor of the 20th century, was long suspected, by even Churchill’s own family, as their father’s illegitimate child.

The documentary possibly to be entitled “Churchill’s Secret Son” is expected to be broadcast as part of RTE1′s winter schedule, in November next.

Who Was Brendan Bracken ?

Brendan Bracken was born in 1901 in Templemore, County Tipperary. He was the son of Joseph Kevin (J.K.) Bracken and Hannah Agnes Ryan.

J.K. Bracken was a successful builder, a member of the Fenian Brotherhood that had committed itself to winning Ireland’s independence from Britain by force and a founder member of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) established in 1884 here in the Haye’s Hotel in Thurles.

His father died when Brendan was just three years old. His mother remarried one Patrick Laffan, whose ideals leaned to armed rebellion, and they moved with Brendan, his three full siblings and his two step sisters, to Dublin city.

Continue reading Did Churchill Secretly Father A Tipperary Son?

North Tipperary Psalter To Go On Public Display

Faddan More Psalter

The National Museum of Ireland has announced that an eighth century religious manuscript, found at Faddan More, near Riverstown in north Co Tipperary will go on public display, for the first time, next year.

The Faddan More Psalter

The psalter was found in Faddan More bog, on the North Tipperary border on the afternoon of July 20th, 2006, by Mr Eddie Fogarty, a workman who was operating a mechanical digger. Mr Fogarty spotted the object in the bucket of his digger and contacted the bog’s owners, Mr Kevin and Mr Patrick Leonard, who gathered up the fragments and covered them with wet peat, before notifying the staff of the National Museum.

Trinity College manuscript’s expert Mr Bernard Meehan said it was the first discovery of an Irish early medieval document in over two centuries.

A specialist team from the museum, which later arrived at the scene, discovered that the psalter had fallen open, showing lines from Psalm 83 written in latin and clearly visible, “Quam dilecta tabernacula tua Domine exercituum,” (Translated “How amiable are thy tabernacles, O LORD of hosts! “)     It should be noted that Psalm 83 then, is now Psalm 84 today.

The Derrynaflan Hoard

The 1,200 year old manuscript,  now appropriately named the “Faddan More Psalter”  will form the centrepiece of a permanent exhibition at the National Museum’s Kildare Street gallery, following completion of its restoration work by senior conservator, Mr John Gillis .

The “Faddan More Psalter” is expected to go on display to the public in the early Summer of 2011 .

This is not the first priceless treasure found in North Tipperary.  An 8th or 9th century chalice, was found as part of five liturgical vessels, known as the Derrynaflan Hoard, on the 17th February 1980 near Killenaule in County Tipperary Ireland.

According to art historian Michael Ryan this hoard “represents the most complex and sumptuous expression of the ecclesiastical art style of early medieval Ireland as we know it, in its eighth and ninth century maturity.

The chalice was found with a composite silver Paten, a hoop, which may have been a stand for the Paten, a liturgical strainer and a bronze basin inverted over the other objects.

These latter historical and priceless items are currently on display in Dublin, in the National Museum of Ireland.

It is the currently held view amongst many historians that both of these objects, or at the very least replicas of same, should now be housed in their native County Tipperary, where they would attract much needed tourism to the area. Call it a kind of decentralisation or what you will.

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