Dumping a load of innocence

Last week this column mocked the standard talking (moaning?) heads, sock-it-to-the-church documentary formula, before going on to praise John MacKenna's mould-smashingly good Children At The Bottom Of The Garden. The ink was scarcely dry on those comments when I heard What Are The Spuds Like Today? (Clare FM, Tuesday), an hour of two fellas giving out about boarding school (or "incarceration camp", as they preferred to call it) in the 1960s and the nasty priests therein - to the accompaniment of moody music, clips of old hits and the odd sound effect.

And it was pure class, witty and wise. Producer Ray Conway's format for the documentary was a visit back over the huge, grey walls of St Flannan's in Ennis, Co Clare, by two former students, Billy Loughnane and John Skeehan. The production left the listener walking between the two men - one in each stereo channel, crossing over and back periodically - as they observed and reminisced with manic energy. Fair dues to St Flannan's for having them back, because there's no doubt but that they hated the place; even on a summer's day they could feel the chill in its halls. Still, maybe the school got it right: as the men moved around, their hatred gave way, a bit, to animated storytelling - and they did notice how much nicer the place looks 30 years on. The men's schoolboy characters emerged nicely, too - Billy had clearer memories of sneaking into the tower, sneaking the best potato from the pot, sneaking a smoke in the loo.

Hardy John, on the other hand, was apparently the only non-victim of the Great Feast of the Immaculate Conception Food Poisoning of 1965, when toilets were in short supply. Amidst the mess next morning, Billy recalled, "there was a USA Assorted Biscuits tin with a load in it".

Adolescence wasn't nearly so crude in Nicer Than Spice (RTE Radio 1, Thursday). Ann-Marie Power followed three young Waterford women as they prepared for their debs' night, chatted (together and separately) about life and love - and rowed with the mammy about money.

Nicer Than Spice had its fly-on-the-wall moments, but there was an inevitable sense of caution and performance about what its subjects revealed on tape. Power owned up to this honestly; she virtually finished the programme, outside one girl's home on the big night, with the sound of a firm "this is as far as you go" and a car door slamming. What remained was a startling monument to idealism and innocence. Sure, one girl lamented: "I'm 18, I don't want to meet `the right man' - I should be meeting all the wrong men!" Another dropped a cynical-sounding line about the uses of her attractiveness: "Beauty is power". But their faith about futures of romance was blinding; we should all have such a tape of our teenage selves.

Finally, there was more bittersweet looking-back on Thursday's Gay Byrne Show (RTE Radio 1, Monday to Friday), which celebrated the character and career of Monica Carr. Actually, though the occasion was touched by the fact that Carr is ill, these memories were far more sweet than bitter.

The Farming Independent columnist and broadcaster is a legend in her own time among many farming people - and we heard just how legendary her long-maintained public persona was. While Carr in her columns conjured up a bucolic home life on the farm with husband Tom and three kids, the real-life Mary Norton was a very definitely independent woman. This could prove awkward when she and her radio sidekick, Peter Murphy, travelled to agricultural shows around Ireland - "Don't call me Mary, I'm Monica!" she'd warn him - and members of her loving public would ask after the family and offer to make a match for her eldest boy. She finally abandoned the fiction. Such a double life would prompt much psycho and social analysis nowadays, but two decades and more ago it seems to have been taken for granted. The same goes for sponsored radio programmes, where she made her living as a broadcaster; last week, on Gay's show, the repeated references to the Nitrogen Eireann Programme sounded strange and vaguely sinister to this younger listener.

As Gay might say: bless 'em, they were more innocent days.