Ardfield’s Church of Ireland church was consecrated in September 1849 and decommissioned on 1 June 1960. Most of the materials were auctioned off and my grandfather, Sonny Nyhan purchased the roof timber for use on his farm across the road and built a hayshed with it the following year.

Researching for this, I found two images of the old church in a copy of the Ardfield Rathbarry Journaland after years of wondering about their origins, I realised there are three windows around the yard that came from the same church.

It’s a building that has witnessed a lot of change since I set foot in it first at some point in the spring of 1983. I wasn’t long turned two as I sat on a wooden stool on the galley head side of the door watching my grandparents milking the cows. There were three Shorthorns in front of me and the Friesians were to their left. That evening’s milking is probably my first memory.

The auction of the cows which took place on 30 April 1983 would be my most vivid early memory, but that milking obviously took place before then.

Before anyone thinks my power of recollection is too good, I have a catalogue and cassette tape recording of proceedings that carry the exact date. I recall the dungstead being set up for it, the extra people around and the auctioneer with his white coat.

Dad then converted the stall into a slatted house, and by the October bank holiday weekend of that year it was ready for the slats. With the help of two young lads who were working with him at the time, a total of 43 9ft long single slats were carried in by hand through a door a little over a metre wide.

Forty-one years and two weeks later, 40 of the 43 were lifted by hand, placed on steel rollers and pushed back out the door. For good measure, one of those young lads returned to do the final concrete work to keep them in place.

It was a job that has been on the must-do list for a long time and finally this autumn everything fell into place. W & M Kielys supplied the slats and after a bit of coming and going, they measured it to perfection.

Opening the roof and placing them in from above wasn’t possible, so full gang slats weren’t an option. Instead, doubles and triples were carried in with a 3t mini digger and lowered in from the feed passage. The fact that the building is on a hill complicated things too, but all obstacles were overcome thanks to an efficient builder.

The dimensions of the tank were determined by the reach of the back actor digger that dug it out 41 years earlier. I don’t know if it was by accident or design that the floor of the tank had a fall of over two inches in it and I’d go with that design again.

The sloped floor towards the sump meant there was relatively little silt left. In keeping with the old school nature of the job it was shovelled into the tractor bucket in the feed passage above.

Those slats mark the latest addition to the shed and won’t be the last. Two sections of roof were replaced due to storms, one not long after it was built, another in the last decade, the gable facing the sea has been changed and its timbers replaced at least twice. Who knows what will be next.

It may not have the same ring to it as the Ship of Theseus or Trigger’s broom, but Tommy’s slatted house is en route to falling into the same category.