Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 8 September 2011

Cork City Events, Cork History, Uncategorized

607a. Opening of Cork City Hall, 8 September 1936

 

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 8 September 2011

Building a City Hall

 

“In the rebuilding of Cork City Hall of Cork, they turned to that other road, to the road of building up, not undoing, but doing, from failure to success, from hopelessness to hope. That day they threw out again from the outer walls the banners of cultural progress, civic ambition and national hope” (Hugo Flinn, T.D. at the luncheon prior to the opening of Cork City Hall, 8 September 1936, 75 years ago today).

Ten months after the laying of the foundation stone of Cork City Hall in April 1933, contractors for the erection of the new buildings received directions to go ahead with the work. About three-fifths of the contract, which was to amount to £150,000 had not yet begun. That being said in the same month, Cork Corporation decided to place a crucifix in the Council Chamber of the new building. The decision was taken following a request conveyed in a letter from the Hon. Secretary of An Rioghacht. The group were also known as The League of the Kingship of Christ and had been established in Dublin in 1926 and sought to spread more widely Catholic social principles. Alderman Horgan noted at the Council meeting said that they were tolerant of the view of everyone and that an overwhelming majority in Cork were Catholics. He noted that the crucifix was an emblem of Christianity and should be in the new council chamber.

On 1 February 1935, various municipal departments, housed at Fitzgerald’s Park since 1920, were transferred to the new building. The part of the building ready was the western wing and contained offices, the council chamber and committee rooms. On the 23 April 1935, the Council met for their first meeting in the new chamber.  A telegram from Alderman Byrne, T.D., Lord Mayor of Dublin, wished health and prosperity to Cork and its people. Admission to the council chamber public gallery was by ticket. The Irish Independent noted of the building at that stage:

“The Hall, which replaces the structure destroyed by British forces has been designed to harmonise with Georgian period of architecture and native limestone has been largely used in its construction…the entrance to the offices now completed is through a marble-paved vestibule. The main staircase has marble steps with ornamental balustrades. The Council Chamber is lofty and well lighted, with galleries for the public and important visitors. The suite of rooms for the Lord Mayor is commodious and beautifully fitted. Irish materials have been used as much as possible…local workmanship has been used as far as possible throughout the reconstruction, and the building has provided much needed employment in a number of Cork trades.”

In late June 1935, the Old I.R.A. Men’s Association wrote that suitable memorials should be erected in the new City Hall to the memories of the late Lord Mayors Tomás MacCurtain and Terence MacSwiney. Alderman Allen noted that he had brought the matter up previously and had asked for the placing of a bust of Tomás MacCurtain in the council chamber. The Lord Mayor said the Corporation had decided that suitable memorials would be erected to the memory of both Lord Mayors once City Hall was near completion and installation would be possible. The Lord Mayor further noted that “the matter was not been lost sight of, it would not be desirable at the moment to rush the question of having busts executed, as these might not meet the requirements of the Council or of the citizens”.

On 8 September 1936, the fateful day of the official opening of City Hall arrived. President of the Executive Council of Ireland Eamonn DeValera, accompanied by the Minister for Defence, Frank Aiken were met at the Borough boundary at Tivoli at 12.45 by the Lord Mayor, Ald. Seán French and city councillors, J.C. Rohan, Chairman of the Harbour Commissioners, Colonel McCabe, O/C. Collins Barracks, Cork and Chief Superintendent Hannigan of the Garda Síochána. The party then drove to the city in open carriages and on their arrival at the Victoria Hotel, a luncheon was given before the opening ceremony. Eamonn DeValera was received by a military guard of honour and the national anthem was played. The official opening time was set for 4pm. In the new assembly hall of City Hall there were seated 2,000 people. Admission was by ticket as the number of applicants for admission would have filled the place three times over. Four Mayors of Boroughs in the Irish Free State (Clonmel, Limerick, Waterford and Drogheda), Church dignitaries, deputies and representatives of various walks of life in the City were present.

The Cork Examiner recorded that every vantage point was filled around City Hall. When the President proceeded to the main door of the building and opened the main door of the building with a gold key (made from Messrs. Egan and Sons) there were fully 20,000 people watching the event. A fanfare of trumpets was given by trumpeters of the band and the tri-colour was run up on the City Hall.  A second later the air resounded to the booming of artillery as a salute of 17 big guns was given from the opposite quay by a detachment of artillery from Collins Barracks.

To be continued…

 

Captions:

607a. Opening of Cork City Hall, Tuesday, 8 September 1936 (picture: Cork Corporation Diary, 1936)

607b. Gold key that opened Cork City Hall, now in Lord Mayor’s Chambers (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

607b. Gold key that opened Cork City Hall, 8 September 1936

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 1 September 2011

Cork History, Uncategorized

 606a. Ruined Old City Hall Building

 

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town,

Cork Independent, 1 September 2011

Planning a City Hall

In an effort to mark the upcoming 75th anniversary of the official opening of Cork City Hall on 8 September 1936, I wish to note some interesting histories about its evolution before its opening. Three years after the arson attack on the building (1920), a town hall competition looking for architects took place in July 1923. Plans were put up for public inspection in the Cork Municipal School of Art. On the 29 March 1924, Jones and Kelly architects were the chosen winners of the competition. The architectural partnership, between Alfred Edwin Jones ALFRED EDWIN and Stephen Stanislaus Kelly was formed in Dublin in 1919. The following year they won the competition for Ballymena Town Hall and in 1923 gained wider recognition as the winning entrants in the Cork City Hall competition. A contractor was then sought. Tenders were sought in November of that year.

However, in 1923 and 1924 the Irish Government found it necessary to remove the members of several local authorities and replace them temporarily by paid commissioners. Among the bodies removed were the Dublin and Cork city councils. Cork Corporation itself had been dissolved in 1924 after an investigation into its activities demanded by the Cork Progressive Association (which was founded in 1923). After some experience of the work of the commissioners in these cities there was a body of opinion in favour of retaining the commissioners after the elected councils were eventually restored.

The priorities of Cork Commissioner Philip Monahan were not in the rebuilding of City Hall. Housing and slum clearance became his priorities. a local committee of commercial and industrial interests was formed in Cork in 1926 to consider a scheme of city government and it appeared that the council-manager plan of city government would be acceptable. After discussion between the Minister and local representatives, the Minister, Richard Mulcahy, introduced as a Government measure the Cork City Management Bill, 1929 and it became law despite at times, vehement opposition to it. Dublin city got its Management Act in 1930 and was followed by Limerick in 1934 and Waterford in 1939.

With the return of Cork City councillors in 1929, focus was again on the rebuilding of a city hall. In April 1929, a sub committee was appointed to look at the costs of a new building. Connected with that, public discussions also took place in local and national newspapers in the ‘letters to the editor’ pages. One such discussion took place in late April 1929 when writer Daniel Corkery proposed a site for the new City Hall near Cork’s Coal Quay. He argued that the old City Hall site was not the way forward for a new building because of its close proximity to deep water quayage, the Customs House and Harbour Offices, the heart of City’s industrial and commercial activities. His proposal took in a semi-circular area extending from the corner of Kyrl’s Street, Cornmarket Street and looking down Lavitt’s Quay towards St. Patrick’s Bridge and swinging round Kyrl’s Quay to the northern end of Kyrl’s Quay.

At a Council meeting near the 23 October 1929, the Lord Mayor, Alderman Sean French noted that an agreement had been arrived at with regard to the site of the City Hall. The City’s Town Planning Association had agreed to the old Anglesea Street site but suggested that the main entrance should be on Anglesea Street and not on the quayside. With the councillors pushing the project, further discussion appeared in the makeshift council chamber in the Crawford Art Gallery.

In mid January 1932, the Corporation decided to ask the Minister for Local Government for his consent to go ahead with the job, on the assumption that they would get a £40,000 loan, plus cash on hand amounting between £12,000 to £15,000 and leave the borrowing of the balance of an estimated total of £150,000 to a future date. At a Council meeting in early February 1932, it was reported that three tenders had been received for the erection of the new City Hall. The City Manager noted that the three tenders did not conform to the terms of the advertisement, in regard to prices or to the construction time limit. It was noted that if the furnishing was taken out of the bill, the price for the completion of the building at least could be paid for. Hence the tender of John Sisk and Sons, Cork at £139,870 was accepted and in the last week of March 1932, the contract for the rebuilding was signed. In the event of certain provisional items being included, an extra £11,000 would be added.

The foundation stone was laid on 9 July 1932 by President of the Executive Council, Eamonn DeValera. In previous articles I have written about this. The foundation stone bore an inscription in Gaelic to the effect that on that day DeValera had laid it. He spread the mortar with a silver trowel and announced in Irish that the stone was well and truly laid. He added in English that he hoped that the new building would be “symbolic of the prosperity and the future glory of the country, to come as a result of the sacrifices, which had been made by the men like those to whom the Lord Mayor had referred to, Terence MacSwiney and Tomás MacCurtain”.

To be continued….

Captions:

606a. Ruined old Cork City Hall Building (pictures: Cork City Library)

606b. Cork City Hall under construction, February 1935

606b. Cork City Hall under construction, February 1935

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article, 25 August 2011

Cork History, Uncategorized

 605a. The imposing Christ the King Church in Turners Cross opened in October 1931

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 25 August 2011

 

Lecture: Creating an Irish Free State City

 

Continuing with the showcasing of some of the work I am pursuing for heritage week, there are two events over the next week, which engage with aspects of Cork’s development in the 1920s and 1930s. The first event is a historical walking tour of Cork City Hall on this Saturday for Cork Heritage Open Day and the second is a lecture on Cork in the 1920s and 1930s for the South Parish Historical Society.

It’s difficult not to be enthused by what was achieved in Cork during the 1920s and 1930s. I have documented aspects of this era in this column over the last number of months by exploring the twentieth century heritage on the Carrigrohane Straight Road. However, there is much I am still researching and trying to come to grips with. Indeed, the City is blessed with an enormous newspaper clippings archive in Cork City and County Archives in Blackpool, where 90 years ago someone cut hundreds of columns out of Cork Examiner newspapers to create scrapbooks. Negotiating ten years of them one begins to see one strong element shining through – the strong vision and ambition that the management of Cork Corporation had at that time. The opening of City Hall 75 years ago on the 8th September may seem a pinnacle of success in those times but there were in my opinion other impressive strands to the Corporation’s work.

The slow rebuild of the half burnt St. Patrick’s Street is evident in the archive’s collection of letters from the Corporation asking for updates from the shopkeepers. The debate by City councillors to rebuild the burnt out City Hall also echoes strongly in the stream of debate in the makeshift Council Chamber in the lecture theatre of the Crawford Art Gallery. However, with the dissolution of the Council in 1924, the young national government appointed a city commissioner in the form of City Administrator Philip Monahan.

Philip Monahan was appointed in November 1924. In the early 1920s, he had being Mayor of Drogheda and a member of Louth County Council. He was also a commissioner in Kerry by 26 years of age. Finding his feet quickly in Cork, by the following March 1925, he was talking to the press and setting out his goals; Using some of Westminster’s compensation package for the burning of the city, he sidelined the rebuilding of City Hall, not all of it, he did set about getting new designs; However, he was to set aside £25,000 for the installation of a new filtration plant at the waterworks, invested £50,000 for asphalting 68,000 square yards of streets, pushing for the completion of St. Patrick’s Street, the  re-building of Parnell Bridge, the purification of the city’s sewage schemes, the replacement of the eighteenth century culverts under St. Patrick’s Street to create new sewers, strove to create a new cattle market for the city and took over of management of what the press called the ‘Mental Hospital’ in Sunday’s Well.

Being invited to lecture on aspects of democracy and local government in the new Irish Free State, Philip Monahan called for the adoption of Cork: A Civic Survey. In 1926 the Cork Town Planning Association produced the latter document, which provided a debate template on the City’s slum conditions. The founding of the Cork Town Planning Association in 1922 marked the beginning of a serious attempt to deal with the problem of the dreadful housing conditions in parts of the Middle Parish and the areas around Barrack Street, Shandon Street and Blarney Street. Indeed in March 1925, Monahan pitched that he would invest £70,000 for the provision of 200 houses in Turners Cross in the immediate interim. He also put down his marker that he was to build efficiency in the local public sector. Indeed with the threat of using direct labour, he pursued an agenda to reduce the wage of Corporation workers to 4s. 6d. per week.

In an age of a non welfare state, it is also interesting to read of work of the Corporation Schools Medical Officer Dr. Annie O’Sullivan. By 1930 arrangements had been put in place for the treatment of ear diseases and defects and diseases of the eye, nose and throat. In 1933, 8,139 children had been checked at clinics at city schools. School meals were given of hot cocoa with bread and butter or jam or currant buns with milk in some schools. The Cork Children’s Fresh Air Fund, established in 1932, helped 500 children. In 1933, 442 children, 229 girls, 213 boys (5 to 14 years of age) were sent to Rostellan, Rathcormac, Ringaskiddy and Youghal and housed there for a fortnight. The initiative was funded by concerts, flag days and garden fetes. These were difficult and stressful times and also times where people worked harder to mind their families and survive. But certainly the array of ideas put forward by Monahan and his team makes for interesting reading in revealing their determination, realism and ambition in making the City a better place to live and work in.

 

Kieran’s Events:

Saturday, 27th August 2011, 1.30pm; History and legacy: A historical walking tour through Cork City Hall, meet at Cork City Hall, Anglesea Street entrance. Booking at 021 4924717.

Wednesday 31st August 2011, 8pm; Creating an Irish Free State City, Cork in the 1920s & 1930s in association with South Parish Historical Society, South Parish Community Centre.

 

Captions:

605a. The imposing Christ the King Church in Turners Cross opened in October 1931 overlooking Capwell Road houses, which got their first Corporation tenants in April 1928 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

605b. Photograph of Philip Monahan, City Manager in a late 1920s Cork City Hall diary (source: Cork City Library)

605b. Philip Monahan

Douglas local history: Did you know?

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized, Ward Events

Thanks to everyone who turned out for the history of Douglas talk this morning (25 August 2011).

 Douglas Library, History of Douglas Talk, 25 August 2011

 

Douglas: Did you know?

·         The district of Douglas takes its names from the river or rivulet bearing the Gaelic word Dubhghlas or dark stream.

·         In an inquisition of the lands of Gerald de Prendergast in 1251, Douglas is first mentioned. In 1299, Douglas was one of the towns listed in County Cork, where the King’s proclamation was to be read out.

·         In 1372, in an inspection of the dower of Johanna, widow of John de Rocheford, there is a reference to allotments of land to her in Douglas. The Roches originally came from Flanders, then emigrated to Pembrokeshire in Wales, before three of the family – David, Adam and Henry de la Roch – joined Strongbow in the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland in the 12th century. In all there are sixteen Rochestowns in Ireland and innumerable Roche castles.

·         In 1586, the townlands in Douglas that are mentioned are “Cosdusser (south of Castle Treasure house), Castle Treasure, Ardarige and Gransaghe”.

 

·         On the 1st June 1726, Douglas Factory was begun to be built. Samuel Perry and Francis Carleton were the first proprietors. They were also members of the Corporation of Cork.

·         The 18th century was the last golden age for wooden sailing ships, before the 1800s made steam and iron prerequisites for modern navies and trading fleets.  It was a golden age too for maritime exploration, with the voyages of James Cook amongst others opening up the Pacific and the South Seas.

·         Robert Stephenson, technical expert on linen industry, who visited every linen factory in Munster, Leinster and Connaught on behalf of the linen board visited Cork on 9 August 1755: “ Near this city and in it are carried on the only sail cloth manufacturers worth notice at present in the Kingdom; Douglas Factory, the property of Messrs. Perry, Carelton and Co. contains about 100 looms, with Boylers, Cesterns, Kieves and every apparatus for preparing the Yarn to that Number which they kept employed till the Duty on Irish Sail Cloth, that had drawn the Bounty was laid on in England; the Hemp manufactured there now is entirely Foreign, they have been so much discouraged by the London Market (to which they export entirely) of late Years, and the Duty charged in England, with other Occurences, as to reduce their number of looms to about fifty, and those are now employed.”

 

·         On the 21st July 1784, “the Corporation of Cork granted £50 to Messrs. John Shaw (Sailcloth manufacturer), Jasper Lucas (gentlemen), Aylmer Allen (merchant) and Julius Besnard towards the new church now erecting at Douglas, provided that, a seat shall be erected in said Church for the use of the Corporation.”

·         In 1863, Wallis and Pollock’s Douglas Patent Hemp Spinning Company were the largest ropeworks in the south of Ireland, which had been established within the former Douglas sailcloth factory, erected scotching machinery.

 

·         The surviving multi-storey flax-spinning mill at Donnybrook was designed and built by the Cork architect and antiquarian, Richard Bolt Brash, for Hugh and James Wheeler Pollock in 1866. It’s essential design, like that of the Millfield flaz-spinning mill, was modelled closely on contemporary Belfast mills.

·         in 1889, the mill was bought by James and Patrick Morrough and R.A. Atkins, the High Sheriff of Cork. In 1903, the mill employed 300 people, many of whom were housed in the 100 company-owned cottages in Douglas.

·         In 1883, the O’Brien Brothers built St. Patrick’s Mills in Douglas Village. It was designed by a Glasgow architect.

·         O’Brien’s Mills were extended in the closing decades of the nineteenth century, and by 1903 it operated with some 80 looms and employed 300 workers, many of whom lived in company-owned houses in Douglas village.

 

·         In 1837, there were 40 or so seats or mansions and demesnes in the environs of Douglas, which made it a place where the city’s merchants made their home and also these suburban spaces make for an interesting place to study in terms of ambition. Those landscapes that were created still linger in the environs of Douglas Village.

 

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 18 August 2011

Cork City Events, Cork History, Uncategorized, Ward Events

604a. Mosaic of life on Shandon Street on the Street itself by Cork Community art link

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 

 

Cork Independent, 18 August 2011

 

Kieran’s Heritage Week

 

National Heritage Week is upon us again next week (20th – 28th August). It’s going to be a busy week. I have set up a number of events. They are all free and I welcome any public support for the activities outlined below:

Sunday, 21st August, 2pm; Heritage hunt across the Shandon area, meet at entrance to the Gate Cinema, North Main Street for details, co-ordinated by Kieran, duration: 1 hour.

This is a family activity, which leads participants into the heart of old Cork looking for clues. This year the focus is on the Shandon area. Clues will be found across the landscapes and buildings of this area. The trail is a hands on fun activity that requires looking up and around and finding clues to reveal a special prize!

Sunday, 21st August, 4.30pm (now fully booked up); Historical Walking Tour of the North Monastery area with Kieran, meet at gate of North Mon school.

In association with the North Mon Bicentenary celebrations, this is the first of two historical walking tours around the North Mon area. The first tour was open to booking through the North Mon Past Pupils Union facebook account and is now fully booked up. A second tour runs on Thursday 25 August at 7pm from the gates of the North Mon (To book your place for this your please email your name with the subject title as “Tour” to northmon.ppu@googlemail.co​m). The North Mon is a place deeply rooted in Cork’s cultural identity. One is dealing with a long standing culture of hard slog, struggle, hardship, discipline, ambition and determination that has brought the North Mon to this point in its life. This walk explores the early origins of the school and the context in which it was established.

The school was set up by the Christian brothers as a response to rampant poverty in the city. Way back 200 years ago John Carr, an Englishman, a travel writer of sorts in 1805, describes Cork’s economic fabric and social life. Cork was the largest butchery in Ireland and living conditions for the poorer classes in Cork were terrible and shocking. Many of the impoverished homes were located in narrow lanes and varied from cabins to cellars. This historical walking tour weaves its way from the North Mon into Blackpool, Shandon and Gurranbraher highlighting nineteenth century life in this corner of Cork from education to politics, to religion, to industry and to social life itself.

Tuesday, 23rd August, 7pm; Historical walking tour of City Centre with Kieran, meet at gate of St. Finbarre’s Cathedral; discover the origins and evolution of the city.

Thursday, 25th August, 11am; Perspectives on the History of Douglas, lecture at Douglas Library.

The story of Douglas and its environs is in essence a story of experimentation, of industry and of people and social improvement.  As early as the late thirteenth century King John of England made a grant of parcels of land, near the city of Cork to Philip de Prendergast. On 1 June 1726, Douglas Factory was begun to be built. Samuel Perry and Francis Carleton became the first proprietors. They were also members of the Corporation of Cork at the time. The Douglas sailcloth factory was founded by a colony of weavers from Fermanagh. The eighteenth century was the last golden age for wooden sailing ships, before the 1800s made steam and iron prerequisites for modern navies and trading fleets.  It was a golden age too for maritime exploration, with the voyages of James Cook amongst others opening up the Pacific and the South Seas. Douglas in its own way added in part to this world of exploration.

 

Friday, 26th August, all day event, “Voices of the Lee Valley”, Photographic Exhibition, Lifetime Lab.

Come view my new photo exhibition on the heritage of the Lee Valley called “Voices of the Lee Valley” in association with Water Heritage Open Day at the Lifetime Lab on the Lee Road, Cork. It celebrates the memories of some of the people I met in the field over the five and a half years of the Lee Valley study in Our City, Our Town.

Saturday, 27th August, 1.30pm; History and legacy: A historical walking tour through Cork City Hall, with Kieran, meet at City Hall, Anglesea Street entrance in association with Cork Heritage Open Day.

One of the most splendid buildings of Cork is Cork City Hall. The current structure, replaced the old City Hall, which was destroyed in the ‘burning of Cork’ in 1920. It was designed by Architects Jones and Kelly and built by the Cork Company Sisks. The foundation stone was laid by Eamonn de Valera, President of the Executive Council of the State on 9th July, 1932. The first council meeting was held in City Hall on the 24 April 1935. Celebrating its 75th anniversary this September, the building was formerly opened by Eamonn DeValera on 8th September, 1936. The building is designed on classic lines to harmonise with the examples of eighteenth and nineteenth century architecture. The facades are of beautiful silver limestone from the Little Island quarries.

More information from Kieran if required at 0876553389 or email info@kieranmccarthy.ie

Captions:

604a. Mosaic of life on Shandon Street on the street itself by Cork Community Art Link, August 2011

604b. Douglas Village, c.1900 (source: William Lawrence Photographic Collection, National Library, Dublin)

604b. Douglas Village, c.1900

Kieran’s Heritage Week Activities, Cork City

Cork City Events, Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized

Cllr Kieran McCarthy is participating in National Heritage Week. His events are listed below and are free to attend. Further city wide events will also be listed on Kieran’s facebook site, ‘Cork: Our City, Our Town’.

Sunday, 21st August, 2011, 2pm; Family orientated heritage treasure hunt across the Shandon area designed by Kieran, meet at entrance to Gate Cinema, North Main Street.

Tuesday, 23rd August 2011, 7pm; Historical walking tour of City Centre with Kieran, meet at gate of St. Finbarre’s Cathedral.

Thursday, 25th August 2011, 11am; Perspectives on the History of Douglas, lecture with Kieran, Douglas Library.

Thursday, 25th August 2011, 7pm; Historical walking tour of North Monastery area including Blackpool with Kieran, meet at gate of the North Mon, in association with North Mon Past Pupils Union.

Friday, 26th August 2011, all day; come view Kieran’s new photo exhibition on the heritage and history of the Lee Valley called Voices of the Lee Valley in association with Water Heritage Open Day at the Lifetime Lab, Cork.

Saturday, 27th August 2011, 1.30pm; History and legacy: A historical walking tour through Cork City Hall, 75 years open, with Kieran, meet at City Hall, Anglesea Street entrance.

Wednesday 31st August 2011, 8pm; Creating an Irish Free State City, Cork in the 1920s & 1930s, lecture with Kieran in association with South Parish Historical Society, South Parish Community Centre.

Map of Fair Hill 1801, Cork City

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 11 August 2011

Uncategorized

603a. View from Fair Hill, Cork

 

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article 

Cork Independent, 11 August 2011 

Northside Walking Tour

 With heritage week, nearly upon us (Saturday 20th-27th August), there are alot of great heritage events on from lectures, walks and the great Heritage Open Day on the second Saturday. For my part, I am experimenting with a couple of events, which I’ll market here over the next three weeks.

 

The first of my experimented events is a walking tour in association with the North Mon Past pupils of the North Mon, Blackpool and ending in Gurranabraher. Dripping in local history and nostalgia, walking through these areas even without a guide, one is drawn to street names, old laneways, ruined buildings, monuments, churches, remnants of industry to the development of early twentieth century housing schemes.

 

The walk centres on the North Mon, a school, with deep roots in Cork’s cultural identity. Indeed one is dealing with a long standing culture of hard slog, struggle, hardship, discipline, ambition and determination that has brought the North Mon to this point in its life. It is perhaps from those traits that the themes along this walk stem. The walk addresses places that were prominent in the nineteenth century and which sought to give a sense of humanity and a sense of social justice to people who struggled in difficult times.  Certainly the themes that run through places such a Blackpool with its myriad of industries two hundred years make it an enormous place of experiment and an important cog wheel in the history of the city. The variety of buildings addressed on the walk if anything reveal how this part of the city is a place of remaking,  re-assembling, re-building in a physical material way and socially.

 

One of my stops talks about Fair Hill and its purpose in bringing the bones of 90,000 cattle into the City’s Cattle Market  to be butchered for export purposes between August and December.  Indeed standing on Fair Hill and looking down on the impressive view of the city from areas such as the Fair Green beyond Farranree one cannot only imagine the farmer’s view of the city two hundred years and the trafficking of their animals like a conveyor belt. Their slaughter offered employment but not to everyone. The subsequent export of the meat to areas such as Barbados, Carolina, Georgia, Jamaica and Newfoundland and Britain perhaps connected Fair Hill in the production chain to far flung places of the known world.

 

Without any enlargement of the housing capacity in Cork’s inner city, the poor were further concentrated in the former medieval area of North and South Main Street, around Barrack Street in the southern suburbs, and Shandon Street in the northern suburbs. Many of the impoverished homes were located in narrow and very unclean lanes. The habitations varied from cabins to cellars, all in a poor rundown state.  To counter the ever-growing filth of the small habitations, municipal relief committees were set up. In addition, finance was given to purchase fresh straw and to replace the old and infected material used by the poor. In addition the appointment of Dr. Francis Moylan to the See of Cork in 1786 marked the beginning of invitations to several religious orders to the city, namely the Presentation Brothers and the Sisters of Charity.

 

The walk takes its routeway from the North Mon into Blackpool exploring some of its industrial past. Blackpool was the scene of Industry in Cork in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for industries such as tanning through big names such as Dunn’s Tanney and distilling through families as the Hewitts. The leather industry at one vibrant in Blackpool with no fewer than 46 tanyards at work there in 1837 giving employment to over 700 hands and tanning on average 110,000 hides annually. Blackpool also has other messages about relief in the form of the former Poor House site at Murphy’s Brewery to Madden’s Buildings to highlighting the work of Ireland’s social reformers through street names such as William O’Brien, Gerald Griffin, Daniel O’Connell and Tomas McCurtain. All these messages inject the place with memories of difficult times but times of determination to survive against the odds.  

 

In the 1880s, 22,000 people lived in 732 tenement houses, ¼ of the city’s population needed re-housing. By the late 1920s, Just north of the market place for the very cattle which provided the foundations of Cork’s economic growth were located c.500 tenement houses. With four main routeways running west- east, Harding’s Lane, Corbett’s lane, Trimbath Lane, Skeyes lane with a further north south lane named Kearney’s lane, these provided a frame of sorts for just over 15 lanes for over 300 families by 1930. In October 1930, City Manager Philip Monahan brought before the city’s councillors a proposed housing scheme for north-west ward. The initial plan was to demolish 152 houses across 4 acres to be demolished. This figure after discussion came to demolishing over 500 houses across 20 acres. A further 11 ½  acres were to be acquired on the green fields of  Griffins’ Fields, where initially 208 houses were to be built. The tour explores these latter elements as well.

 

The first walking tour is booked out through facebook but the second tour runs at 7pm, Thursday, 25th August from the gates of North Mon school.  It’s free and all are welcome as well as people’s own memories.

 

 

Captions:

603a. View from Fair Hill, March 2010 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

603b. Map of tenements to north west of Shandon, 1900 (source: Phoenix map, c/o Cork City Library)

 603b. Map of tenements to the north-west of Shandon, c.1900

Kieran McCarthy’s Heritage Week Activities, 2011

Cork City Events, Cork History, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized, Ward Events

Cllr Kieran McCarthy is participating in National Heritage Week. His events are listed below and are free to attend. Further city wide events will also be listed on Kieran’s facebook site, ‘Cork: Our City, Our Town’.

Sunday, 21st August, 2011, 2pm; Family orientated heritage treasure hunt across the Shandon area designed by Kieran, meet at entrance to Gate Cinema, North Main Street.

Tuesday, 23rd August 2011, 7pm; Historical walking tour of City Centre with Kieran, meet at gate of St. Finbarre’s Cathedral.

Thursday, 25th August 2011, 11am; Perspectives on the History of Douglas, lecture with Kieran, Douglas Library.

Thursday, 25th August 2011, 7pm; Historical walking tour of North Monastery area including Blackpool with Kieran, meet at gate of the North Mon, in association with North Mon Past Pupils Union.

Friday, 26th August 2011, all day; come view Kieran’s new photo exhibition on the heritage and history of the Lee Valley called Voices of the Lee Valley in association with Water Heritage Open Day at the Lifetime Lab, Cork.

Saturday, 27th August 2011, 1.30pm; History and legacy: A historical walking tour through Cork City Hall, 75 years open, with Kieran, meet at City Hall, Anglesea Street entrance.

Wednesday 31st August 2011, 8pm; Creating an Irish Free State City, Cork in the 1920s & 1930s, lecture with Kieran in association with South Parish Historical Society, South Parish Community Centre.