I find it hard to imagine that Tom Scanlan is dead over 30 years.

Tom was 75 when he died suddenly in June, 1994 - at the time I was 37. Though close on four decades separated us in age, we were great friends. Similarly, he’d been a close friend and neighbour of both my father and my father-in-law.

All three were born between 1910 and 1920 - a tumultuous decade in the history of this country. Not having known my father, I loved to hear Tom and Jimmy Meade speak of him and his ability and skill as an ‘inventor’, woodworker, electrician, beekeeper, and greyhound breeder.

In the 1970s, Bartlemy Macra na Feirme were researching the history of the parish and Tom Scanlan was a fount of knowledge on history, folklore, traditions and genealogy. He imparted so much information to me, showing me paths, wells and forts, remains of castles and old cemeteries.

He told me so much, and yet I felt I’d only got the ‘tip of the iceberg’ as regards our locality. I still miss him and for years after his death, when someone put a ‘historical query’ to me, without thinking, I’d answer “I’ll ask Tom about that”.

After he died, I wrote a little tribute to Tom. In 1994, there was no internet or fax or computers or anything like that. Nevertheless, the piece I wrote found its way across the Irish Sea to England.

In the 1950s, a man named Johnny Slattery was working in the north-east Cork area. Mechanisation was coming into Irish agriculture with tractors replacing working horses on many farms. Then the coming of ‘the electric’ with rural electrification brought a further revolution on farms.

The back-breaking twice daily work of........

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