Have you ever wondered why there is a mosaic which reads “BENNETT & CO” in the doorway of the Moorland Café in West Street? Or have you ever noticed it? In his latest column Historian Sean Collins gives us the answer.

By Sean Collins

The Moorland Café in West Street has been serving coffee and cake, and much more besides, to the people of Drogheda since 1929. In five years’ time it will have been doing so for 100 years.

In the 1880s the premises traded as an LN (London and Newcastle) store which issued tokens (see photo below) to encourage customer loyalty.

Many different types of business issued LN tokens including general stores, grocers, department stores, dairies, meat markets, drug stores, bars, taverns, barbers, coal mines, lumber mills and many other businesses.

Having been an LN Store, it then became Bennetts, “The Irish House” which sold Fancy goods, and household items, a fine mosaic bearing the name is still in the main doorway.

Catherine Wall of the “Moor” farm in Priory land, Duleek married Patrick Callan and in 1929 they acquired 96/97 West St, which they named the “Moorland”. They opened a café and confectionary store which also served as the main town bus stop for GNR services.

The café also provided catering services and in 1931 provided lunches at the Drogheda Fatstock Show, and dinner at the Tredagh Tennis Club Dinner in the Mayoralty House. In 1934 the Drogheda Bridge Circle made the Mooreland it’s weekly venue.

For six weeks in 1936 Patrick Gargan of St. Patrick’s Cottages displayed a working model of a locomotive he had made in the Moorland window.

My Mother told me that when she married in 1940, wedding services were usually performed at 8.00 am Mass in St. Peter’s after which the newly married couple with best man and bridesmaid went to the Moorland for a wedding breakfast of bacon and eggs. A long way from the wedding extravaganzas of today’s nuptials.

By 1949 the Moorland advertised wedding cakes made with white flour only and no coupons required, signalling an end to Second World War rationing. Also in 1949 Patrick and Christina Callan registered Moorland Café Ltd.

From 1950 onwards the Moorland became the venue for the weekly Monday luncheons of the Drogheda Rotary Club.

At Christmas time in the 1960s the Moorland advertised “over 500 boxes of buns, cakes and sweets to choose from” and Christmas Cakes could be ordered and delivered to your home up to the 22nd of December.

Throughout this time the shop was managed and owned by Mr. Raymond Callan, a son of the founders. Ray was a very friendly man, many readers will remember him. The local bakery family McCloskey’s now make ‘the best buns in Ireland at West Street.