The Irish Midlands flow to the relentless rhythm of the River Shannon and along its banks the Irish Stew podcasters found themselves again, Day Five of their “Off the Beaten Craic in the Hidden Heartlands” wanderings, gazing across its broad expanse from the docks of the County Offaly town of Banagher.

There, cohosts John Lee and Martin Nutty met local historian James Scully and caught up with an old friend of John’s, Mark Boylan, who covers horseracing for The Irish Field, to explore the history, legend, music, and all that gives life and character to this small Shannon-side community with a population aspiring to hit the 2,000 mark.

James met us at the cozy, convivial Flynn's Pub on Main Street, but the craic there proved too mighty for recording purposes, so the trio beat a retreat to the hilltop Church of St Paul's for what proved to be Irish Stew’s first recording in a church (but not their last as you’ll hear in the final Hidden Heartlands episode).

A lifelong educator and noted local historian, James set about unraveling the history of the old Irish saying, “That Beats Banagher!,” in a book of the same name which he co-wrote with Kieran Keenaghan. In this richly illustrated volume they explore the murky provenance of “That Beats Banagher!” and how it entered Irish political and cultural lore. A beguiling spinner of the town’s stories, James shares tales of the earliest days of the town, the arrival of the international man of mystery from the 1600s Matthew de Renzy, the town’s unexpected literary links to Anthony Trollope and Charlotte Brontë, Banagher’s vibrant community life, and its status as a popular port of call for the river cruising crowd.

They started the day in a pub, absolved their sins in a church, and then retreated to a pub, J.J. Hough’s Singing Pub, a renowned destination for trad music fans and tourists alike run by Ger Hough, who IrishCentral called the most creative publican in Ireland.

There they met David and Mark Boylan who John got to know when the Breeders’ Cup flew the whole Boylan family to Kentucky so the then 14-year-old Mark could sing his Breeders’ Cup song before about 80 thousand fans at Churchill Downs for the 2011 World Championship race meet. Mark may be all grown up but he hasn’t outgrown his love of horses and of his hometown of Banagher which shines through in the closing segment.

And in such a small, tight-knit community it was no surprise to learn that James was Mark’s teacher at St Rynagh’s School.

Well, that beats Banagher!

Next week Irish Stew hits pause on their Off the Beaten Craic series to embrace the season of giving with the story of a New York City charity rooted in the plight of the impoverished Irish immigrants in the notorious Five Points district in our conversation with Sean Granahan, president of The Floating Hospital.

Links
James Scully

• Book: That Beats Banagher!

Mark Boylan

• The Irish Field
• X
• Instagram
• Facebook

Hidden Heartlands Travel Resources

• Ireland.com
• Discover Ireland’s Hidden Heartlands

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Instagram
• LinkedIn

Episode Details: Season 7, Episode 36; Total Episode Count: 139

Ireland has no shortage of stately manors, but as Irish Stew hosts Martin Nutty and John Lee learned, no other historic property has a legacy like Co. Offaly’s Birr Castle Demesne, which for generations has been an incubator of breakthroughs in engineering and science.

With local historian and educator Brian Kennedy as their guide, the podcasters share the story of the Victorian-era, steampunk-style construction of timber, iron, and stonework that was the world’s largest telescope from 1845 to 1917. Built by William Parsons, the 3rd Earl of Rosse, “The Leviathan of Parsonstown” as it became known is a 20-foot-tall engineering marvel that enabled the Earl to map light-years distant nebulae with stunning accuracy that rivals modern Hubble telescope images.

Brian points out that the Parsons family's 400-year legacy includes what’s thought to be one of the world's earliest surviving suspension bridges on the grounds, Charles Parsons' invention of the steam turbine, and the work of photography pioneer Mary Wilmer Field, the 3rd Countess of Rosse.

Her 1850s glass plate photographs are preserved in Ireland’s Historic Science Centre at Birr, which not only tells the Birr science story in historical artifacts and interactive displays, but that of Ireland as well.

And Birr is still writing that science story today as it hosts the Irish station of the Europe-wide LOFAR radio telescope network, which in 2018 observed for the first time a billion-year-old red-dwarf, flare star.

Add botany and horticulture to the science mix with multi-generational botanical treasures on display across the expansive grounds including 17th-century box hedges (among the world's tallest), specimens from China and South America, and Victorian glasshouses under restoration.

“There's something in bloom every day of the year, throughout the whole year of plants from right throughout the world.” Brian says.

The conversation wraps with a discussion of the town's transformation from "Parsonstown" back to its original Irish name, its connection to St. Brendan's monastery, the charming town’s rich Georgian heritage, and things to see and do “off the beaten craic” in Birr’s environs.

But for Brian, it all starts with the Birr Castle Demesne, “Come early in the morning because one day is just not enough to take in all that the castle has to offer,” he advises.

Next week Irish Stew makes one more stop in Co. Offaly at the River Shannon town of Banagher where John and Martin record their first (but not their last) episode in a church!

Links

Birr Castle Demesne

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• X
• YouTube
• TikTok

Hidden Heartlands Travel Resources

• Ireland.com
• Discover Ireland’s Hidden Heartlands

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Episode Page: Brian Kennedy
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• X
• Facebook

Episode Details: Season 7, Episode 35; Total Episode Count: 138

The poet Seamus Heaney once said, "I think of the bog as a feminine goddess-ridden ground, rather like the territory of Ireland itself."

And that territory is 14- to- 21 percent bog.

So, on their fourth day “Off the Beaten Craic in the Hidden Heartlands,” Irish Stew cohosts John Lee and Martin Nutty head to Shinrone in Offaly near the Tipperary border to the farm of Donie Regan, a demonstration site for Peatlands for Prosperity, the brainchild of Douglas McMillan and his Green Restoration Ireland Cooperative team.

Doug explains how centuries of peat extraction left expanses of degraded bogland, often dismissed as wastelands. But they’re fields of dreams for Doug who outlines how rewetting bogs halts carbon loss, restores biodiversity, and opens the opportunity to the wet farming techniques known as paludiculture.

Using Donie’s farm as a showroom for how paludiculture can restore economic value to bog land, Peatlands for Prosperity is testing potential hydrophilic cash crops such as bog berries, cranberries, even lettuce and celery, as well as common wetland plants like bullrushes and common reeds which can be renewable sources of building and packaging materials. Both believe wetland agriculture can offer farmers meaningful new income streams from both these kinds of crops and from earning carbon credits for maintaining carbon-sequestering bogs.

The conversation probes the challenges of farmer hesitancy, policy confusion, cultural ties to turf cutting, and how the demonstration site helps other farmers see the program’s potential.

Donie speaks passionately about witnessing wildlife return to his land, and the team discusses educational outreach, including bringing schoolchildren onto the bog to inspire the next generation of environmental stewards, the ecotourism possibilities of restored boglands, and how transforming Ireland’s peatlands could be a win-win for climate, biodiversity, farmers, and rural communities alike.
But let’s give Seamus Heaney the last word from his poem Bogland:

Our unfenced country
Is bog that keeps crusting
Between the sights of the sun

Next week Irish Stew reports from Birr Castle with a focus on the groundbreaking science done there, exemplified by the world’s largest telescope for 72 years, the mighty Leviathan of Parsonstown.

Links
Green Restoration Ireland

• Website
• Peatlands for Prosperity
• Facebook
• YouTube
• LinkedIn
• Instagram
• Bluesky
• X
  
  

Douglas McMillan

• LinkedIn

Hidden Heartlands Travel Resources

• Ireland.com
• Discover Ireland’s Hidden Heartlands

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Episode Page: Peatlands for Prosperity
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• X
• Facebook