Churchtown's History

DR BARRY AND THE STANDING JUMP

by Jim McCarthy

Many people of my generation and later will remember the three large stone steps (now gone) which lead up to the door of the residential part of the old Market House in Churchtown.

At some time, I do not know the year, there lived in the parish a Veterinary Surgeon who was familiarly known as Dr Barry. One evening some local lads were playing pitch and toss in the forecourt of the Market House when the vet joined them. Dr Barry who in his young days was a noted athlete. On the evening when he arrived during the game of pitch and toss he was well into middle age. When the game was over the lads began to have a chat with the vet on the days gone by and they began to ask him about the feats of his youth. Then Dr Barry strolled up the stone steps of the Market House and stood on the upper step.

To the amazement of all he took a spring, or what was known as a "Standing Jump", clearing the passage to the school, and the two walls on either side, and landed in the forecourt outside the centre window of the old school. That story was often related to us schoolboys by the master, the late Thomas Tierney, who as a young man was there on the evening Dr Barry made that memorable jump.

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