The posting of a simple picture on The Anglo-Celt Facebook of a little girl outside Francie McDonald’s sweet
The posting of a simple picture on The Anglo-Celt Facebook of a little girl outside Francie McDonald’s sweet shop in Bailieborough sparked a hail of comments and ‘likes’. Here are a selection of our favourites...
Kate West Verrall: “Yes!! Was he known as Francie? Only place I spent my pocket money in the 80s. Used to get ‘fruit salads’, ‘black jacks’ and chewing gums with the tattoos in wrapper.”
Ann Marie McCabe: “Willy Wonka didn’t have a patch on Francie, penny sweets, chocolate bars, frozen drinks, toffee bars, burger bites anything you can think of he had it, great memories.”
Sharon Clarke: “Wow, what a wonderful flash of nostalgia! This picture encapsulates a child’s heaven of 1980’s Bailieborough! The wonderfully endearing Francie and his fabulous sweet shop! This is a place that only dreams are made of now. 10p really did stretch far then and if you got 50p to spend, well it was like winning the lottery! I remember the happy days running out of St Anne’s NS on a Friday with my two little brothers in tow, piling into Francie’s to stock up for our walk home out the Kells Road. Needless to say, there wasn’t a sweet left by the time we got through the back door, and if there were, they were surely stashed! Very, very happy days!!!”
Eileen Owens: “Danny Dalys sweet shop in Kingscourt. Time bars and gobstoppers.”
Fiona Soden: “The Saturday ritual of being brought to town, (which was a day out when you lived out in the country!) 10p for sweets in this shop and then brought to the playground at the side of the community hall...”
Sinead Farrelly: “Up and down to francies ten times a week and each time u walked in u got a new sense of excitement...wot to get for ur 10p..the choice was endless...and if u worked it right, u wud get all the fizz that was left at the bottom of the cola bottle box!! Wonderful memories of good old carefree days.”
Ann Marie McCabe: “Oh ya the fights for the fizz, forgot that Sinead.”
Alan Rogers: “Snooker balls chewing gum and 4p chocolate mice. Great times.”
Collie Farrell: “And poor Francie was blind as a bat, sliding his hand over the glass looking for the money, great memories.”
Carmel O’Callaghan: “Goodness all ye young ones, I remember his mother and at lunch time it was packed, she had a lovely cosy kitchen below the shop and all on my back door!”