Discover a world of history, drama, comedy, business and politics through Documentaries on KCLR. Meet storytellers, songwriters, actors, performers and uncover a wealth of information connected to Kilkenny and Carlow.
'The first thing I had to do was go out and buy a skirt’, so says Loretta Kenny after her first day in the Carlow Sugar Factory when she came to realise that women didn’t wear trousers there when she started in 1979. ‘ It was just jaw-dropping to walk into the factory to see the massive machinery in 100-foot high ceiling, big vessels big moving machines and you wouldn’t think that passing the road’, recalls former fitter Joe McDonald.
In the 2nd programme in the radio documentary series ‘Oh Sugar Sugar’, some of the former workers recall their first day on the job, the company’s sports and social club and its involvement with the community, their participation in the tops of the town and trips abroad. The apprenticeship scheme within the factory provided young people with great skills that were highly sought after and a pride and an ideas and inventions scheme encouraged innovation within the company.
Made with the support of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland with the television license fee and sponsored by the Sugar Factory Display at Carlow County Museum and the local studies section at Carlow’s Central Library
13 Jan 2026
Oh Sugar, Sugar Part 1: An Overview of the Carlow Sugar Factory
In December 1925 Bishop Foley came to the window of the old town hall and announced to the many excited people gathered there that the sugar factory was coming to Carlow. Thus began an important era in Carlow’s history and the first programme in KCLR’s 7 part series ‘Oh Sugar, Sugar’ looks at the set-up of the factory, its expansion and contraction and gives an overview of the industry which was to make such a mark on the socioeconomic and rural landscape of Carlow.
Made with the support of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland with the television license fee and sponsored by the Sugar Factory Display at Carlow County Museum and the local studies section at Carlow’s Central Library
7 Jan 2026
The Burning Of Woodstock (Radio Play)
“The Burning Of Woodstock” was first broadcast on KCLR on October 17th, 2022 and was supported by the Decade Of The Centenaries Grant 2022.
The play was written and directed by Gillian Grattan and was performed by Aoibhín Murphy, Delia Lowry, Declan Taylor and Brendan Corcoran.
Sound design, production and editing by Martin Bridgeman.
Special thanks to Eddie Cody, Davy O’Dwyer, Theresa Hayes and Stacy Jane Williams and to KCLR for studio facilities.
Research and newspaper articles were sourced from the Bureau of Military History, The British Newspaper Archives, from the books “The Story of Of Woodstock in Inistioge” by Thomas J. Whyte and “Kilkenny In Times Of Revolution” by Eoin Swithin Walsh.
The Kilkenny County Council Decade of Centenaries Programme 2022 is supported by the Commemorations Unit of the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sports and Media.
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