The era which came not long after rural electrification saw families in the early 1960s, particularly in rural areas, settle down to watch television programmes on the newly-arrived Telefís Éireann, which depicted characters not dissimilar to those they knew all their lives.
Many readers will remember that the first show which reflected Irish farming life was The Riordans, set in the fictitious village of Leestown, Co Kilkenny.
First airing on Telefís Éireann on Monday 4 January 1965, the programme created by James Douglas was promoted at the time as a weekly family serial set on Tom Riordan’s 120ac farm in the midlands – although in reality, it was actually shot on location on a farm in Dunboyne, Co Meath.
Irish viewers learned about the world of the middle-aged, heavy-smoking farmer, Tom Riordan (played by John Crowley) and his loyal wife, Mary (played by actress Moira Deady). Those two names, along with many others of the cast such as Tom Hickey and Biddy-White Lennon (who played Benjy and Maggie Riordan) became as recognisable to the viewers as their own family.
The simplicity, humour and light drama was a must-watch for families (not just rural) for a half-hour per week. The programme showed the agricultural world, and was noted as being very close to the reality of farmers lives in the 1960s.
Changing face of agriculture
One of the UK’s most popular programmes, Emmerdale owes its roots to The Riordans. Both series were set on the land, and depicted farming lives and the changing face of agriculture.
The Riordans was filmed with an outside broadcasting unit and due to its rural scenes, it was unlike anything being screened in the UK. Yorkshire Television sent a team to Ireland to watch The Riordans being produced in Dunboyne.
Strong rural storylines continued in The Riordans through the 1970s – although there was disappointment when the popular Tom Hickey left the series in 1978, so producers and chief writer, Wesley Burrows decided to send his Benjy Riordan character to Africa as a lay missionary.
A young man called Pat Barry, then came to Leestown to work on the Riordan farm. He was played the up-and-coming actor, Gabriel Byrne, who later went on to great things in Hollywood.
Just prior to Christmas in 1978, it was announced that The Riordans was being cancelled. There was shock everywhere because the programme was still pulling in high ratings. The final episode was in May 1979.
Robert Carrickford as Stephen and Joe Lynch as Dinny in Glenroe in 1983. \ RTÉ
Rural storylines
Shortly after the series ended, Wesley Burrowes started penning a new rural series, Bracken – which served as a spin-off of The Riordans featuring its final lead character, 29-year-old Byrne as Pat Barry. The premise had Pat leaving Leestown to go back home to take over his late father’s sheep farm in Co Wicklow. Bracken began in January 1980, running on Sunday nights at 9.30pm as a six-episode limited series. The series was set from June to November 1979, and each episode depicted a month in Pat’s life.
Gabriel’s co-stars were an interesting bunch of Irish actors including Niall Tóibín, Joe Lynch, Mick Lally and Hollywood veteran actress, Dana Wynter.
Pat had a genuine friendship with father and son, Dinny and Miley Byrne, who were played by Joe Lynch and Mick Lally.
The six initial episodes of Bracken were a smash hit with Irish viewers, and Byrne and Lally won Jacobs awards for their acting.
It was obvious that there would be a second series and in early 1981, the core cast of Byrne, Tóibín, Wynter, Lynch, and Lally returned to shoot a further six episodes. The new shows depicted Bracken life from December 1979 to May 1980.
The new episodes were not screened on RTÉ 1 until January 1982, when it was shown at 8pm on Thursday nights.
There were some changes in the second series – Pat was continuing to farm the land with great difficulties throughout a harsh snowy winter and Miley had left the area for London after an argument with his father, Dinny at the end of the first series.
At the end of the second series, it became obvious that Byrne would be moving on to pastures more glitzy in Hollywood, thus ending the show.
Burrowes then created a new series, Glenroe, with Lynch and Lally reprising their Bracken roles of Dinny and Miley.
Glenroe became an instant TV hit after its first episode aired in September 1983 on RTÉ 1.
It opened with Dinny and Miley selling up their sheep farm when life in the mountainous area got tough for the ageing Dinny. The lads bought a farm outside the nearby Glenroe, in Co Wicklow. They found new neighbours, mother and daughter, Mary and Biddy McDermott. There were great chats in kitchens up and down the country when the early episodes revealed that Mary was having an affair with businessman Dick Moran.
The relationship of Dick and Mary was important for the series, as viewers watched Dick go through a church annulment before the couple tied the knot – although as we all remember, Dick continued straying with other women.
Dinny makes a killing in the first season when he sells supermarket eggs to passing customers, who think that they are getting real farm eggs. It was all in great fun, and humour was a huge part of Glenroe.
Pictured above are some of the cast from a Christmas episode of Glenroe in the 1980s, featuring Mick Lally as Miley Byrne (back left); and Mary McEvoy as Biddy Byrne (front centre). \ RTÉ
The supporting cast was made up of Mary McEvoy as Biddy, Geraldine Plunkett as Mary and Emmet Bergin as Dick.
Like The Riordans in the ’60s and ’70s, Glenroe kept up to date with what was happening in the farming community, and had a number of agricultural advisers on the programme.
After 16 years on the air, rumours that McEvoy and Lynch wanted to leave Glenroe surfaced.
We witnessed Biddy’s dramatic exit in the 1999/2000 season finale and during that summer Lynch also left the series and the character of Dinny Byrne, was killed off.
One year later, in 2001, the cast and crew were heartbroken when Glenroe was cancelled. At the time Ireland and the UK were going through the foot-and-mouth crisis, which was written into the hit series, with Miley getting friendly with a female journalist who came to Glenroe to write about the issue.
However, there the series ended.
Irish folk of a certain age still remember The Riordans, Bracken, and Glenroe – with Benjy on the tractor, the life and loves of Pat Barry, and the first time they encountered the iconic Dinny and Miley Byrne.
Those old rural television programmes are sadly long gone from screens, but never forgotten by those of us who sat down in front of the TV eagerly awaiting the opening notes of the iconic theme tunes.
In the early 1970s, Benjy Riordan’s wife Maggie, brought scandal to The Riordans with the revelation that she was going on the pill, following the birth of her son, Brendan. Contraception still hadn’t been legalised at the time, and it was the first time the subject was mentioned on Irish television drama. To make matters more awkward, Maggie discussed the issue with her local priest, Fr Sheehy who was understanding.
In the final season of The Riordans, Benjy left for overseas to become a lay missionary and a new man was needed on the farm – enter Pat Barry (played by Gabriel Byrne). Pat shares a kiss with Maggie in one of the farm sheds, and whatever happened next was not seen until Maggie’s mother-in-law, Mary Riordan caught the duo asleep together in the straw of the shed.
In an unexpected plot development on Glenroe, a drunken Miley Byrne and his wife’s cousin, Fidelma, had a love tryst in the hay of the farm shed. A remorseful Miley confesses all to wife, Biddy.
The era which came not long after rural electrification saw families in the early 1960s, particularly in rural areas, settle down to watch television programmes on the newly-arrived Telefís Éireann, which depicted characters not dissimilar to those they knew all their lives.
Many readers will remember that the first show which reflected Irish farming life was The Riordans, set in the fictitious village of Leestown, Co Kilkenny.
First airing on Telefís Éireann on Monday 4 January 1965, the programme created by James Douglas was promoted at the time as a weekly family serial set on Tom Riordan’s 120ac farm in the midlands – although in reality, it was actually shot on location on a farm in Dunboyne, Co Meath.
Irish viewers learned about the world of the middle-aged, heavy-smoking farmer, Tom Riordan (played by John Crowley) and his loyal wife, Mary (played by actress Moira Deady). Those two names, along with many others of the cast such as Tom Hickey and Biddy-White Lennon (who played Benjy and Maggie Riordan) became as recognisable to the viewers as their own family.
The simplicity, humour and light drama was a must-watch for families (not just rural) for a half-hour per week. The programme showed the agricultural world, and was noted as being very close to the reality of farmers lives in the 1960s.
Changing face of agriculture
One of the UK’s most popular programmes, Emmerdale owes its roots to The Riordans. Both series were set on the land, and depicted farming lives and the changing face of agriculture.
The Riordans was filmed with an outside broadcasting unit and due to its rural scenes, it was unlike anything being screened in the UK. Yorkshire Television sent a team to Ireland to watch The Riordans being produced in Dunboyne.
Strong rural storylines continued in The Riordans through the 1970s – although there was disappointment when the popular Tom Hickey left the series in 1978, so producers and chief writer, Wesley Burrows decided to send his Benjy Riordan character to Africa as a lay missionary.
A young man called Pat Barry, then came to Leestown to work on the Riordan farm. He was played the up-and-coming actor, Gabriel Byrne, who later went on to great things in Hollywood.
Just prior to Christmas in 1978, it was announced that The Riordans was being cancelled. There was shock everywhere because the programme was still pulling in high ratings. The final episode was in May 1979.
Robert Carrickford as Stephen and Joe Lynch as Dinny in Glenroe in 1983. \ RTÉ
Rural storylines
Shortly after the series ended, Wesley Burrowes started penning a new rural series, Bracken – which served as a spin-off of The Riordans featuring its final lead character, 29-year-old Byrne as Pat Barry. The premise had Pat leaving Leestown to go back home to take over his late father’s sheep farm in Co Wicklow. Bracken began in January 1980, running on Sunday nights at 9.30pm as a six-episode limited series. The series was set from June to November 1979, and each episode depicted a month in Pat’s life.
Gabriel’s co-stars were an interesting bunch of Irish actors including Niall Tóibín, Joe Lynch, Mick Lally and Hollywood veteran actress, Dana Wynter.
Pat had a genuine friendship with father and son, Dinny and Miley Byrne, who were played by Joe Lynch and Mick Lally.
The six initial episodes of Bracken were a smash hit with Irish viewers, and Byrne and Lally won Jacobs awards for their acting.
It was obvious that there would be a second series and in early 1981, the core cast of Byrne, Tóibín, Wynter, Lynch, and Lally returned to shoot a further six episodes. The new shows depicted Bracken life from December 1979 to May 1980.
The new episodes were not screened on RTÉ 1 until January 1982, when it was shown at 8pm on Thursday nights.
There were some changes in the second series – Pat was continuing to farm the land with great difficulties throughout a harsh snowy winter and Miley had left the area for London after an argument with his father, Dinny at the end of the first series.
At the end of the second series, it became obvious that Byrne would be moving on to pastures more glitzy in Hollywood, thus ending the show.
Burrowes then created a new series, Glenroe, with Lynch and Lally reprising their Bracken roles of Dinny and Miley.
Glenroe became an instant TV hit after its first episode aired in September 1983 on RTÉ 1.
It opened with Dinny and Miley selling up their sheep farm when life in the mountainous area got tough for the ageing Dinny. The lads bought a farm outside the nearby Glenroe, in Co Wicklow. They found new neighbours, mother and daughter, Mary and Biddy McDermott. There were great chats in kitchens up and down the country when the early episodes revealed that Mary was having an affair with businessman Dick Moran.
The relationship of Dick and Mary was important for the series, as viewers watched Dick go through a church annulment before the couple tied the knot – although as we all remember, Dick continued straying with other women.
Dinny makes a killing in the first season when he sells supermarket eggs to passing customers, who think that they are getting real farm eggs. It was all in great fun, and humour was a huge part of Glenroe.
Pictured above are some of the cast from a Christmas episode of Glenroe in the 1980s, featuring Mick Lally as Miley Byrne (back left); and Mary McEvoy as Biddy Byrne (front centre). \ RTÉ
The supporting cast was made up of Mary McEvoy as Biddy, Geraldine Plunkett as Mary and Emmet Bergin as Dick.
Like The Riordans in the ’60s and ’70s, Glenroe kept up to date with what was happening in the farming community, and had a number of agricultural advisers on the programme.
After 16 years on the air, rumours that McEvoy and Lynch wanted to leave Glenroe surfaced.
We witnessed Biddy’s dramatic exit in the 1999/2000 season finale and during that summer Lynch also left the series and the character of Dinny Byrne, was killed off.
One year later, in 2001, the cast and crew were heartbroken when Glenroe was cancelled. At the time Ireland and the UK were going through the foot-and-mouth crisis, which was written into the hit series, with Miley getting friendly with a female journalist who came to Glenroe to write about the issue.
However, there the series ended.
Irish folk of a certain age still remember The Riordans, Bracken, and Glenroe – with Benjy on the tractor, the life and loves of Pat Barry, and the first time they encountered the iconic Dinny and Miley Byrne.
Those old rural television programmes are sadly long gone from screens, but never forgotten by those of us who sat down in front of the TV eagerly awaiting the opening notes of the iconic theme tunes.
In the early 1970s, Benjy Riordan’s wife Maggie, brought scandal to The Riordans with the revelation that she was going on the pill, following the birth of her son, Brendan. Contraception still hadn’t been legalised at the time, and it was the first time the subject was mentioned on Irish television drama. To make matters more awkward, Maggie discussed the issue with her local priest, Fr Sheehy who was understanding.
In the final season of The Riordans, Benjy left for overseas to become a lay missionary and a new man was needed on the farm – enter Pat Barry (played by Gabriel Byrne). Pat shares a kiss with Maggie in one of the farm sheds, and whatever happened next was not seen until Maggie’s mother-in-law, Mary Riordan caught the duo asleep together in the straw of the shed.
In an unexpected plot development on Glenroe, a drunken Miley Byrne and his wife’s cousin, Fidelma, had a love tryst in the hay of the farm shed. A remorseful Miley confesses all to wife, Biddy.
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