Episode 5 Real Lives Reunited

Extraordinary stories from a shared past.

There was 12 people on board the aircraft that day,

six of us made it, six of us didn't.

Bonds forged in tragedy...

I'm sorry.

..and triumph.

The little girl that you helped 15 years ago.

Brought together by fate...

It just overwhelmed me a bit.

..but separated by time...

God, where did all those years ago?

Decades on, we reunite them.

Derry, a city famed for its musical talents down the generations.

And it was in the 1950s that a group of schoolchildren from the city took

America by storm with their singing skills.

Now, more than 60 years on,

some of those children will reunite for one more performance.

Ask anyone about music in Derry and the name James MacCafferty

will always come up.

Over the decades he taught music to thousands of schoolchildren.

Una MacCafferty was James' daughter.

There was always music going on,

at some level, not always professionally,

just around the house, little soirees

and singsongs and whatever.

My father was a very talented musician and an all-round musician.

You know, he was involved with dance bands, jazz bands, choirs...

Among James' choirs were the girls

from the local Nazareth House Orphanage.

They were making a name for themselves

winning competitions all over.

In 1956, their winning ways came to the attention

of American impresario Albert Marini, who had made his name

promoting the Vienna Boys' Choir.

Marini knew American audiences would pay good money to hear the Derry

girls sing. He convinced James MacCafferty to bring together

some of his music students with the orphan choir

and the Little Gaelic Singers were born.

Next stop, the United States and a three-month long

coast to coast tour.

Everybody then, parents,

teachers, and all at the time thought it was a big educational thing.

There is absolutely no way it would happen now

because the trust was enormous.

Life is so much more complicated.

We didn't see at the time, anything,

we just thought this is what you do, if you're asked to do it,

and because we were trained so well, off we went.

Maureen Brolly was a 15-year-old resident at Nazareth House

when she got picked to join the tour.

She has lived in England since the 1960s,

but today she is returning home

to the Derry orphanage where it all started.

Being picked for the Gaelic Singers was just brilliant.

And it was just, well, I suppose it's a dream,

but you were really lost,

because you just weren't used to going outside at all.

Out in the big wide world.

It was just brilliant.

And just going off that day to America, it's unreal.

Also on that trip was Una's nine-year-old cousin Patricia.

I assumed it was normal, to get three months off your school.

I think they reckoned it would be an education, which it was.

I knew nothing about America.

We just knew it was a long, long way away.

But she and the rest of the 25 strong choir were about to find out.

In the 1950s, air travel was only a dream for most.

For the Derry choir, it was about to become reality.

It was a long journey.

The Lufthansa hostesses were so lovely

and gave us all little bags with Lufthansa on them

and we were delighted.

I swore then I was going to be an air hostess. And I was.

When we left Derry in 1956, it was quite grey.

The first thing that struck me about America was the colour.

The colour of cars, the warmth of the people,

it was the most colourful and exciting country,

and I loved it then and I love it now.

We toured around America in a big bus, obviously.

We had a driver - very, very nice.

Mr Stademark, I think, was his name.

When we arrived in America, he says come along here, kids,

and there it is.

The Little Gaelic Singers from County Derry.

Across this huge big bus.

We all tumbled in, there were enormous big seats,

you could flick them up and you could stick...

We had never even tasted Coca-Cola, but we were all drinking Coca-Cola.

We went Waley, Chicago, upstate New York, all along the Canadian border,

back down, Maryland, Washington.

Playing huge venues like Carnegie Hall,

the Little Gaelic Singers enchanted their US audiences.

These were enormous concert halls, thousands,

bigger than anything we'd ever seen.

Making news everywhere they went,

it was only a matter of time before they would perform

before the biggest audience of all.

Mr MacCafferty, strike up the piano.

CBS' Ed Sullivan show.

THEY SING

For most performers,

an appearance on the Ed Sullivan show would be the pinnacle of their

careers, but for this group of singers,

something more memorable was about to happen.

The big moment of all our lives was...

This gorgeous, divine creature, Elvis Presley.

Because of my uncle James,

Una and I were brought along into the audience of the rehearsals.

I had no idea of Elvis, who was going to be on.

We went up around the back of the stage and here was this absolutely

gorgeous man standing in the back

and we were chatting away and then he was sitting down

and asking us what we were talking about.

I got up on his knee and I sat on his knee

and wouldn't get off it and Una was raging,

I think, because she would have liked to have sat on his knee.

He was the most charming, lovely gracious man.

That night he wore a green jacket

in honour of the little kids from Ireland.

Such a sweet thing, isn't it?

Such was the impact of their appearance,

they got an invite back for the Christmas special.

Sharing the stage, bizarrely, with a group of performing bears.

Only in America!

Over here, there is something else that is typically American

at Christmas time and that is the American toys, you know?

Here are the lines of trains. Have you ever seen them?

No. Go in there and take a look at the trains.

Have you ever seen anything like that?

CHILDREN: No!

We were introduced as the orphans from the Nazareth House,

so I suppose that is why he had this train set and he had it running.

It was absolutely brilliant, we were all standing around it.

The Americans were truly smitten by these little Irish orphans.

Often their chaperones were asked about taking them home.

Ed Sullivan also wanted to adopt me.

Well, he thought, as I say... And to be told no.

They knew the majority of the kids were from the Nazareth House,

and said, is there anyway we can adopt that little one?

I was never personally asked, but anyway,

I grew into myself eventually.

60 years on, the day has arrived for Maureen to reunite

with the girls she shared a trip of a lifetime with

and there is no better venue than St Colum's Hall.

The practising and all of the rehearsals and things

took place here.

It was our first kind of public performance before we went away

-was in St Colum's Hall.

-Yes.

Maureen Brolly was great fun to be with

and she was a very genuine, nice, jolly girl

and she had this lovely thick, curly hair

and was always smiling, very enthusiastic.

Very musical girl. Very lovely girl.

Good morning. Lovely to see you again.

God's sake.

Oh!

Maureen, do you remember me?

-Just about.

-Just about.

Lovely to see you!

We were just looking at the photographs this morning.

Do you remember the skirts?

-The Can-Can.

-Can-Can skirt. I loved that.

I was put up...

When I came back, the nuns put me up on the desk

in school, in St Julian's, and twirled me around.

They were more interested in that than anything else.

I think, my skirt.

Una, Maureen and Patricia take a trip down memory lane

in the cinema they frequented as children,

with a special screening of their very own show.

Mr MacCafferty, strike up the piano.

There is our wee daddy.

There couldn't have been a better song.

-Gorgeous.

-There you are Maureen.

-There you are, love.

# So she'll dance and dance and dance

# She will dance today. #

There you are, Patricia.

That's how I remember you.

# And we will dance, dance, dance

# Dance again with joy. #

Still singing after all those years.

The Little Gaelic Singers would return to America three more times.

Later in the programme,

we bring together those child stars from six decades ago

for one more performance.

Boys and girls.

Now that we are all together,

I think it would be nice if we had a wee bit of a song.

What do you think?

# All things bright and beautiful

# All creatures great and small. #

Sion Mills, the town that inspired All Things Bright and Beautiful,

famous for its linen industry, Georgian architecture...

and cricket?

For it was here in this hallowed cricket green

back on a sunny summer's morning in July 1969

that one of the biggest shocks in world cricketing history

would take place.

And he is out. And he is out bowled.

And he is out.

And he is out.

It was the day Ireland clobbered the West Indies,

beating them by nine wickets.

And the West Indies are all out.

For 25.

Such was the shock of what happened here that day,

it made newspaper headlines all around the world.

Journalists called it unbelievable, unthinkable, impossible, yet true.

And he's out.

Bowled by Goodwin.

The man who was commentating on the match for the BBC

was Neil Durden Smith. He described the chaos of what was going on.

When the scores fell in single figures

and these wickets were falling,

I suddenly thought, we are making history here.

Or Ireland is making history here.

This is going to reverberate, not just around the cricket world,

but around the world.

And he is out.

He is caught at mid-on.

I really couldn't believe my eyes, but I was thrilled for Ireland,

because it was really historic and unique.

The two bowlers bowled so brilliantly.

They didn't bowl a bad ball and the catching was outstanding.

And that is out. Caught at mid-off.

No. Yes.

Caught at the third attempt.

Ireland thoroughly deserved to win.

I would have to say, that commentating for television

on that match at Sion Mills has to be one of the greatest memories

I have of my broadcasting career.

On the winning Irish side that day, Ossie Colhoun and Ivan Anderson.

Hello, hello. Now who is who?

-Ossie.

-Ossie, I'm Jo.

Lovely to meet you.

Thanks for coming today.

-I'm Ivan.

-Hello, Ivan.

The two one-time heroes of Irish cricketing

return to the sleepy village where they played their part

in sporting history.

It is one of those things which is indelibly marked

in the history of West Indian cricket

and I think if anyone wants to ever annoy any of the West Indies,

they keep bringing this up,

what about the day you were all out for 25 at Sion Mills?

What about the West Indies side, how were they thought of?

Cricket circles when you mention the West Indies,

you think about maybe the top three, in those days,

they were maybe in the top two sides in the world,

there was the West Indies and maybe England.

-COMMENTATOR:

-Ossie Colhoun wants to make this

into an even bigger fairytale than it is.

He is looking almost smug now.

His nose right over the stumps.

So was there any expectation that you would win that day?

Not really. We were a side of complete amateurs

playing club cricket one day a week and here we were

playing a test side, a side of professionals.

We were going to give our best,

but there was no real expectation that we could beat them.

We kept expecting someone to come in and get their head down and score 60

or 70, maybe even 100,

but it just kept repeating on and on

and I think the crowd were a bit gobsmacked.

Also to some extent disappointed,

because they had come to see a great test side playing cavalier cricket,

lots of runs coming from them

and they thought they were not getting value

for their entrance money.

The West Indies are six runs for five wickets.

Rumour persists that the West Indies embarrassing performance was due to

their over enjoyment of the local stout the night before.

For one run they are now 6 for 5.

John Shepherd, one of those on the losing side, knows the truth.

You see that night before...

-Yes.

-Was there a time for a few pints of Guinness perhaps?

That is the myth, you see, because everybody said,

you got bowled out for 25 against Ireland.

I hear that the Irish had got you drunk on Guinness

and that was not the case at all.

Nobody would have foreseen what happened.

And coming back, coming back to the scene of the crime,

so to speak, and I would love to go back and see the ground.

I haven't seen it since that day in 1969.

It is a long time.

I am really looking forward to seeing again some of

those guys who played in that match.

It would be 34 years before Ireland would defeat another

test-playing side. Perhaps the decimation of the West Indies

meant that no other team would ever take for granted the Irish again.

The victory that day can never be erased and perhaps, one last time,

a chance to relive it.

-Hello, there.

-Hello, gentlemen.

-Ivan Anderson.

-John, you are looking very fit.

It is the pills.

Mr Shepherd. Lovely to see you.

It was still calypso in those days.

We had a reputation for being calypso cricketers, but

believe me, people thought, "The West Indies, they're always smiling,"

but nobody took their cricket more seriously than we did.

The West Indies got to 12-9 and you could not get the last man out.

Another 13 runs. What happened?

It was just by design.

And there were eight catches.

-That's right.

-There was one run out, one bowl, eight catches.

You caught everything in sight.

-COMMENTATOR:

-Ivan Anderson, underneath it

and he has outplayed Walcott.

The heroes of '69 have another surprise in store

as they are reunited with Pat Dineen, Michael Reith

and Alec O'Riordan, three of their team-mates from that historic match.

How are you?

How are you doing?

INAUDIBLE CHATTER

I know, I know.

Well, gentlemen, I am sure it is lovely to be back. Well, Michael,

the baby of the team, it was your debut that day.

What a day to make a debut.

Yeah, it was unbelievable.

It was great to make my debut for Ireland,

but against the mighty West Indies,

that made it really, really special and what happened on the day made it

totally unbelievable.

And, Pat, tell me,

if you could name a man of the match on that particular day,

who do think it might be?

Oh, me!

It is absolutely unbelievable for me,

because they're legends here and again, being the local boy,

to have them back again, after so many years, it is outstanding.

It is just a miracle. It will never happen again.

We will never know what exactly happened that day.

Perhaps it was the luck of the Irish after all.

Well, it's time to let the old boys return to the field

where their dreams were made. We're never too old to relive our youth,

even if it is just for a short moment.

Really tremendous performance and they deserve every clap.

Having captured the hearts and minds of North America in 1956,

The Little Gaelic Singers returned two years later,

but this time without the children from the orphanage.

The powers that be said they thought it took the wee ones

a while to settle down after being in America

so Daddy accepted what their ruling was on it.

But there were plenty more candidates

lining up to take their place.

There was 20 girls and four boys and we went from train from the GNR

to Dublin, and from Dublin then, we went to Cork

and then the next day we were taken to Cove,

and that's where we sailed from.

It took a week, to go to America.

And I was a very bad traveller, which wasn't nice.

I was sick for about three days.

The next thing, we were in New York.

We went to Boston, Philadelphia, Washington,

Pittsburgh and then we went to California.

Then we went up to Canada, we went to Toronto, we were in Vancouver,

Victoria, Seattle, I remember all those places, yeah.

Damien Parlour was just 12 years old when he joined the tour in 1958.

Living in Dublin now, it's been over 40 years

since Damien has met the choristers.

There was only four boys, Ron and Jerry were the dancers.

I was a singer, PV, then he played the violin.

Then there was 20 girls.

We were all more brother and sister kind of thing,

there wasn't that girlie,

boy thing. Damien was blonde, lovely, lovely voice.

He was a boy soprano.

Some of the girls, they would have gone on afterwards and had singing

careers, like Maureen McGuiness had a big singing career.

My voice broke at 15, so my career peaked at 12, and that was it.

While the schedule was hectic for the children on the road,

there was often time for some fun.

We would have done concerts nearly every night

and sometimes twice a day.

And then sometimes we'd get a day off.

Big memories I would have of it would be Disneyland.

We met Walt Disney and he gave us all a book of tickets.

All we ever had here back in Derry would have been slides and swings

and seesaws.

It was something else, it was fantastic.

While the first tour had met Elvis, the children from the 1958 tour

would get their chance to mingle with the stars of Hollywood.

There was a morning that we got up,

had breakfast and James MacCafferty said,

"Would you like to go to the CBS studios

"or would you like to go to meet Bing Crosby?"

So everybody, of course, Bing Crosby, Bing Crosby.

We met Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney.

They were recording at the time and they came out

and we had a chat and we got our photo taken with them.

We sang for them, a beautiful Gaelic song, which I still sing,

Eileen Aroon.

They were crying while we were singing.

It was a very emotional event.

I don't know why, but we were a wee bit of Ireland really,

for everybody out there.

I mean, they were so nice to us.

I remember her with her lovely blonde hair.

Imagine, George Clooney's aunt.

Nearly 60 years on,

Damien Parlour makes the trip home to Derry to meet with the girls from

the 1958 tour.

It'll be interesting to see, do they recognise me, you know?

And it'll be interesting for me, do I recognise them as well, you know?

But I'm looking forward to seeing them.

Oh, God, it would be lovely to meet him now.

Can't even think what he would look like now.

I often wondered. Has he changed an awful lot?

Damien Parlour.

It is, aye. Good to see you.

You are looking fantastic.

-You're living in Dublin?

-Yeah.

-Are you still singing?

Not at all, I haven't sung in years, since I was 15,

I think it was the last.

You don't believe there's so many years have gone by.

I mean, 58, long time.

With the passing of time, photographs may crumble and age,

but thankfully memories never fade.

Maureen, Loretta and Damien are taking the chance

to look through some of the old programmes

that accompanied their tours.

-The wee cross.

-Yes.

-For goodness' sake, it is only looking back

at them you realise how much we travelled inside such a short time.

I have a funny feeling we did something like 50,000 miles.

Maire Ban Asthore, there was your song, that was your solo.

Yes.

-Could you sing it now, Damien?

-No.

-I couldn't even whistle it now.

-You never know until you try.

Could you not?

But there's one more surprise for Maureen, Loretta and Damien,

because joining them in the hall are the other members

of The Little Gaelic Singers.

EXCITED CHATTER

For the first time in decades,

back in the hall where they spent hours rehearsing together,

the children of the 1958 tour, now adults, reunite one more time.

Boys and girls,

now that we're all together,

I think it would be nice if we had a wee bit of a song,

-what do you think?

-ALL: Yes!

Louder.

# Oh, a stream like crystal it runs down

# It's rare for to be seen

# Where there you'll see the Irish oak trimmed with the ivy green

# The shamrock, rose and thistle and the lily too beside

# They do flourish all together, boys, along the Faughan side

# If ever I return again I will make her my bride

# I'll hold her in my arms

# Down along the Faughan side. #

APPLAUSE

Fabulous.

I just enjoyed meeting everybody, it was a bonus I saw Maureen as well.

And to recognise everybody and them to recognise me.

What you could say is the centre of our faces don't change too much.

A wee bit here, and a wee bit there changes, but it was lovely.

As for Damien, that was a lovely surprise.

Lovely surprise.

58 years, it is a long time and I did recognise so many of them.

It is another little memory, another little treasure.

It really brought back memories,

seeing the girls and still sing the high notes,

I probably would have towered over them,

but I've quite enjoyed it actually.

This is the actual hall where we did all of our...

when were training to go to America, this is where we did our practising.

So it was just like being back again,

going back so many, many years.

Too many years to remember.

If my dad had been here,

he would have been just delighted with all the boys and girls

he put so much work into, had them from when they were very small,

brought them up as if they were his own children.

Enjoyed their sense of humour and all their individual characters,

he would have been so proud if he'd been here.

And he would have had a lot of fun too.

I kind of think he was here.