Centenarian Jane Mooney passes away

Centenarian Jane Mooney (nee Reilly) from Drakerath, Carlanstown, who celebrated her landmark birthday in May, passed away peacefully at Beaufort House Nursing Home on Wednesday.

Jane, known as Jennie, celebrated her 100th birthday on 23rd May with a party in Headfort Arms Hotel, Kells. After two years of lockdowns, it was a wonderful occasion where among the 100 guests, Jennie was joined by her five children, ten grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren, family and friends.

Jennie will be laid to rest tomorrow (Saturday) after 11am Mass in Staholmog Church.

Her remains are reposing at the home of her son Gerry this afternoon from 2pm to 6pm with removal to St Michael's Church, Staholmog for 7pm. Funeral Mass takes place tomorrow (Saturday morning), at 11am with burial afterwards in adjoining cemetery.

In an interview with the Meath Chronicle on her 100th birthday, Jennie recalled how she was born in Bohermeen and was the second youngest in a family of ten born to John and Kathleen Reilly. She had six brothers and three sisters.

"I went to school in Bohermeen. It was a very closed in life. My father worked as a herd and we lived up an avenue. I loved living on the farm. I helped mammy in the house. I was the only girl at home to help with the boys and then as they all moved out and I had only one younger brother left at home, I started to get itchy feet at home.

"I said I would love to work at something and I went to work in the carpet factory in Navan. Daddy got me a bicycle and I cycled to work every morning and helped mammy in the house in the evenings."

Jennie loved working in the factory but had ongoing problems with a sore throat and sore nose and when she got it checked out by the doctor he told her it was the jute for the carpets that was causing it and she reluctantly gave up her job.

"I was sorry to leave. I was very happy there but then my sister living in Dublin got me a work in a private house in Rathgar with the Byrne family as a cook and I worked there until I got married."

Jennie recalled that she knew Paddy Mooney from Castletown and laughed how whenever she went to visit her Aunt Lizzie, "he always seemed to be there". Their romance blossomed after meeting at a dance in Dubin after a Meath game and they married shortly after that in 1949.

"I moved to Castletown and moved in with his mother. We had no electric light or running water. It was a big change from Dublin. I said am I gone mad?" Jennie also helped care for Paddy's blind uncle who lived with them.

They hadn't much starting out but they were happy and reared their family of five children- PJ, Kathleen, John, Gerard and Jennifer. The family moved to Drakerath, Carlanstown, in 1974. PJ now lives in the UK, daughter Kathleen O'Brien lives in Tara, John in Kinsale, while John and her daugher Jennifer Gilsenan live in Drakerath.

Jennie was a wonderful homemaker and daughter Kathleen told how they were self-sufficient with her mother growing all their own vegetables and they had their own eggs, butter and milk and she was a great cook.

Jennie was also a skilled knitter and dressmaker and made her own wedding dress. Jennie recalled how she made all her children's clothes. She made her daughters' communion dresses, going up to Dublin to Hickeys to get the fabric and she also made her granddaughters' communion dresses.

"I worked very hard but I enjoyed it."

"We weren't educated very well so we said we would send our children to secondary school if we could. There was no free education then, you had to pay fees but they all went to secondary school and did their Leaving Cert. The boys went to the Christian Brothers, they cycled in, and the girls went to Eureka."

Paddy was a farmer and later bought a lorry which was a huge investment at the time, to transport turf from Ballivor to Dundalk where it was used to heat the Louth County Hospital.

The couple were married for 56 years before Paddy passed away in 2005, aged 84. Jennie continued to live alone until she was 99 but had her son and daugher living beside her and also had home help for support.

Last October Jennie moved to Beaufort House and told how she really only intended to come for a short stay and see what it was like. "It was a big transition and took me a while to get settled but I am very happy here and well looked after and the staff are so good."

"I have made some lovely friends here as well."

Jennie spoke of how difficulty how the Covid pandemic was very for her. When it began she was still living at home and how they would have to talk through the patio door or the window. She loved going out for a spin, so staying at home isolating was very tough.

Jennie loved to keep up with the news on the television and kept up to date with technology with her own mobile phone. She also did an IT course with the over 60s youth club in Carlanstown and was a member of Kilbeg ICA for many years.

She loved to travel in later years and went on a number of cruises, visited America and went on several Meath Pilgrimages to Lourdes. She also visited Rome with Paddy, staying in a convent there and saw Pope John Paul II.

Jennie was the last member of her family left and she recalled that five of her brothers died within months of each other between December and St Patrick's Day, and they all would have been in their eighties.

However, her sister Rose Carolan from Proudstown, Navan, who passed away in 2018, was 104 when she died. Her sister Kitty was 96 when she died and her own father, John, lived to be 94, so longevity was certainly in the Reilly genes.