Forthcoming history-related events

Plenty of history-related events on during the Hay Festival in Kells (the Meath one), starting tomorrow, Wednesday 22 June 2016, and finishing this Sunday 26 June:

Full 2016 Programme here.

1. Tomorrow, Wednesday 22 June: Antiquarian & Rare Book Auction
Event 3 • Wednesday 22 June 2016, 11.30am - 5pm • Venue: Usher’s Auction Rooms, John Street

A treasure trove for book lovers. Rare books, manuscripts, literature and historical memorabilia, including The Carrigglas Manor, Longford library (Part 2). On view Monday 20 and Tuesday 21 June, 10am–5pm. Call for more information: 046 924 1097 and 086 170 6767, or visit www.usherauctions.com.

2. Thursday 23 June (morning): 1916 Commemoration events

Thursday 23 June 2016, 10.30am - 1pm • Venue: Presbyterian Church

2A 10.30am - Séamus Mac Gabhann

Forging Irish Cultural Identity: The scholar poets of Meath

The Easter Rising might never have happened were it not for the cultural revolution that preceded it. Meath historian Séamus McGabhann examines the impact of Meath’s scholar-poets from Gallegan to O’Growney, who helped salvage Ireland’s Gaelic heritage, which was a vital resource for the nationalist thinkers and writers who were to forge a new Irish identity in Irish and English in the modern era.



2B. 11.00am - Noel French

Noel has written widely on the local history of Meath. His most recent publication is entitled 1916 Meath and More. His talk outlines some of the influences that developed in Meath leading to the Rising, the many links the county has with the Rising, and its aftermath. Focusing on human lives, he examines some of the interesting individuals and incidents of the period.




2C. 11.30am - Las Fallon

As the British Army and the Volunteers – mostly the former – laid waste to Dublin during Easter week 1916, other lives were put at risk, including those of the firemen entrusted with the task of ensuring the city centre wasn’t razed to the ground. Las Fallon, himself a Dublin fireman, will talk about the history of the Dublin Fire Brigade during the Rising and the later Anglo-Irish and Civil wars.



2D. 12.00pm - Glen Gendzel The USA and the 1916 Rising

Crucial in the organisation of the Rising was the American input of Clan na Gael. But how did the US Government react to events in Dublin? Professor Glen Gendzel teaches American history at San Jose State University.




2E.12.30pm - Paul Maher

Among the earliest casualties of the Easter Rising was Dublin Metropolitan Police Constable Michael Lahiff. Although unarmed at the time – as were all his uniformed DMP colleagues – he was killed in the Stephen’s Green area. Sergeant Paul Maher of the Garda Historical Society examines the role of the DMP during Easter Week.



3. Thursday 23 June (afternoon): 1916 Commemoration events


3A. 2.00pm - Sinéad McCoole

Curator, historian, author and broadcaster Sinead McCoole has made a huge contribution to the historiography and literature of the 1916 Rising with her book Easter Widows: Seven Irish Women Who Lived in the Shadow of the 1916 Rising. It explores the legacy of Easter Week in terms of the effect it had on the families deprived of husbands and sons by the British military response to the insurrection.

3B. 3.00pm - Catríona Crowe

One of this country’s great treasures is the National Archives and the greatest treasure of that institution is Catriona Crowe, historian and archivist. She examines the economic, cultural and political life of Dublin in the days before the Easter Rising.

3C. 4.00pm - Pádraig Yeates

Who better to examine the effect of the 1916 Rising on the nation’s capital than ‘the historian of Dublin city’ himself? The city bore the brunt of the IRB Military Council’s Easter adventure. Historian and journalist Padraig Yeates is the author of a number critically acclaimed works on Dublin, including Lockout: Dublin 1913 and A City in Wartime: Dublin 1914–18.


4. Friday 24 June 2016, 10.30am • Venue: Presbyterian Church: Tony Bucher, Irish Rogues of the Barbary Coast
A welcome guest from the West Coast of the USA, Tony Bucher is steeped in the history of ‘Irish’ San Francisco. Not all of it was to the credit of our ancestors in the ‘City by the Bay’, of course. Tony focuses on some of the more dubious characters in Irish Rogues of the Barbary Coast.

5. Friday 24 June 2016, 12.00pm • Venue: Heritage Centre / Meath County Council Stage: Brian Irvine, Sons of Ulster and the Battle of the Somme

6. Friday 24 June 2016, 1.30pm • Venue: Church of Ireland / Charles Noell Stage: Ronan Fanning will discuss his new account of the life of ‘The Long Fellow’, Eamon de Valera: A Will to Power


7. Friday 24 June 2016, 3.00pm: Ireland and the Somme (Myles Dungan and others)


8. Saturday 25 June 2016, 11am: Myles Dungan ‘No Laughing Matter’: Punch Magazine and the Great War


9. Sunday 26 June 2016, 2pm: Antiques & Interiors Auction, Venue: Dukes Yard, Market Street

There are loads more talks, from Éamonn Gilmore to Des McHale, Kevin Barry, Patrick McCabe and Paul Kimmage.

Back to Tír Eoghain again for some cultural history:

A Commemoration of the Bi-Centenary of the Death of the Harper
ARTHUR Ó NÉILL 1816

Saturday 2nd July 2016
Servite Priory Benburb, Co. Tyrone

Arthur Ó Néill commemoration

The 2016 Milestones of Medieval Dublin series begins next Tuesday, 12 July. The first talk is by Áine Foley and is entitled 1392—Attack on St. Thomas’s Abbey by the Citizens of Dublin

It begins at 13:05 in the Wood Quay Venue. Admission is free and no booking is necessary.

There are a huge number of free guided history tours on each day throughout Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown from 27 June 2016 until 4 September 2016.

The full brochure is here: Summer of Heritage 2016

gaiscioch wrote: »

There are a huge number of free guided history tours on each day throughout Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown from 27 June 2016 until 4 September 2016.

The full brochure is here: Summer of Heritage 2016

I'd recommend doing the tours in the above brochure of Blackrock Park and Deansgrange Cemetery. I never realised Blackrock Park was not only built on reclaimed sea but on a landfill site (as are many parks, apparently). The Deansgrange tour guide was particularly fascinating as he was the graveyard supervisor and had detailed knowledge of body decomposition processes and times. It added an edge to his huge knowledge of people buried there. The tours of Monkstown Castle and Carrickbrennan Cemetery (where Joseph Holt of 1798 fame is buried) will hopefully be greatly improved by next year.

National Heritage Week is coming up from 20- 28 August. Here's the guide to events across all 32 counties:

What's On: National Heritage Week 2016: 20- 28 August.

Another talk from Tír Eoghain, this time on Phelim Ó Néill of 1641 fame, so it should be of interest to many 3rd level history students as well:

THE ONEILL COUNTRY HISTORICAL SOCIETY


Talk on Tuesday 10th April at 8.00pm in the Old Court House Caledon.

THE O'NEILLS OF KINNARD AND SIR PHELIM O'NEILL, Speaker: Dr David Brown T.C.D


We assume that vulture funds, credit defaults and much of the other paraphernalia of modern banking are peculiar to the 20th /21st centuries.
This talk will inform us that such devices were in use by English banks in Ireland during the 17th century and the O'Neill estates in Caledon ( Kinnard or Cion Aird ) under Sir Phelim O'Neill were the target for them.

The question may reasonably be asked, did this situation influence his political judgement ?