A couple of photos from the early fifties. The first is of Betty Lynch with her future husband Tommy Hayes outside the Sweep Inn, Kilmeaden. In the second is her sister Nellie with Tom snr and a friend (in the dark hat) at the farm Old Tom bought, formerly Cookes, at Adamstown, after he moved up from Orchardstown on marrying the girls’ aunt, publican Lil Power. Both were widowed.

Tom was father of the famous hurler Mick Hayes and his publican brother Tommy, also a well-regarded GAA player.

My father remembers Tom walking his High Nelly bicycle (seen in the background) across the main road to a pighouse he had at the corner opposite Burkes shop, with a bucket of slops on each side of the handlebars. I suppose that’s what you call a balanced diet.