Former Lord Mayor and Independent Cllr Kieran McCarthy has called for public consultation to be included in any future management strategy for All Saint’s Cemetery on Carr’s Hill. In raising the historic cemetery at the February Cork City Council meeting, the Chief Executive outlined that since the completion of the transfer of ownership of the Carr’s Hill graveyard to Cork City Council in mid- 2023 a review of all surveys and information pertaining to the site is being undertaken in order to inform a sustainable maintenance and management strategy for the site. An archaeological conservation strategy is not currently being undertaken.

A number of non-intrusive archaeological surveys have been carried out including GPR (ground penetrating radar) and drone photogrammetry surveys which have created a detailed 2D and 3D model of the physical landscape and features at Carr’s Hill.

A bio-diversity study for the site was completed late last year. Further analysis of these surveys and studies is ongoing and Council Members will be updated as matters progress. In the meantime the graveyard has been included in the Parks work programme for 2025 and grass-cutting on the site will commence next month.

Cllr McCarthy noted: “The detailed survey work on All Saint’s Graveyard is welcome. I asked specifically at the Council meeting that there would be a form of public consultation woven into the future of any evolving management strategy for the site. Arising from public conversations, there are positive suggestions of how to improve access to the site and there are calls for improved interpretation on the site itself. There are also calls that that access to the site is maintained and improved. The maintenance of the Sorenson memorial Cross is essential as well as creating opportunities to commemorate more the victims of the Great Famine. There are also growing public calls to commemorate the children buried there from the City’s Mother and Baby Homes”.

View the site here and explore a short history video, October 2021:

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 6 February 2025

Making an Irish Free State City – Figures of the Cork Shakespearean Company

As time rolled on for the Cork Shakespearean Company, many of its members stayed to champion the Company, but grew older, or left to take up duties in several walks of life. A short few of these members were showcased in the press such the Cork Examiner over the decades.

On 18 October 1933, the Cork Examiner notes that congratulations were given by the Company to young actor Jack Curran. Jack was raised to the Priesthood in Rome. He was the first Company member to be ordained. The Cork Examiner noted: “To the older members it seemed a very short time ago since Jack Curran, as a little boy, struggled with difficulties.  Overcoming these difficulties he was able to play Hamlet with distinction at the Cork Opera House”.

On 26 March 1938, reference is given in the Cork Examiner that another popular actor of the Cork Shakespearean Company Henry A MacCarthy, had been appointed as Ireland’s representative on the Advisory Committee on Social Questions at the League of Nations. Henry came from a well-known Cork family, being the son of Mr Charles MacCarthy, sanitary engineer with Cork Corporation.

Henry MacCarthy qualified for the bar and was called in 1916. He had a flourishing practice in Cork both in the days of the British Empire and later under the Irish Free State legal system. He also enjoyed many social activities in the city. Chief of these was his interest in the Cork Shakespearean company and one of the roles by which he was best remembered by Cork audiences was that of Christopher Sly in the prologue of the Taming of the Shrew.

Henry was noted to have been gifted with a very fine diction. He was appointed to teach elocution in the Cork School of Music. He had just given only two or three lessons when the news of his appointment as a district justice was received. He acted as a temporary district judge filling in for justices who are on holidays or otherwise unable to carry on. In this capacity he visited practically every court in the country. The appointment was made about 1931 and soon after Henry became permanent in the Dublin District Court where he was regarded as a kindly and popular gentleman. In Dublin Henry took part in the Dublin Shakespeare Society for many years and also in several drama festivals in the Dublin region.

Another key stalwart of the Company and who assisted Fr O’Flynn to keep the Cork Shakespearian Company on the road from the 1930s to the 1960s was Eileen Curran. She was involved with the company from the very beginning. She was a member of a well-known Cork family, her great grandfather, was Patrick Curran, a well-known baker. She was sister of Rev Bernard (Jack) Curran OP of St Mary’s, Cork, Mr Chris Curran who was a well-known stage, radio and TV actor, Mrs Seán Clayton, Dún Laoghaire, County Dublin, Miss Chrissie Curran, Cork, and Alfred Curran.

In the Cork Examiner across the 1940s advertisements showcase her giving elocution/ speech training at Skerry’s College on the16 South Mall. She was also a popular recitation artist at variety concerts across the city.

Eileen maintained the closest association with the Cork Shakespearean Company over the years and continued the great traditions set by its distinguished priest founder. She was also responsible for the annual musical productions in St Aloysius College on Sharman Crawford Street, where she taught elocution and singing.

On Eileen’s death on 9 April 1977 Mr Pearse Gunn, well-known Cork producer, who had been associated with Miss Curran for many years noted to the Evening Echo that Eileen’s contribution to the Cork Shakespearian Company was monumental. He noted: “The Company would not have survived after the death of Fr O’Flynn, but for her work and dedication. Fr O’Flynn left the Loft to Eileen Curran and by that I mean he intended that she should carry on the work he started. He had a very distinct method and style, and none could interpret its greatness better than Eileen who was a founder member and an actress of no mean ability”.

Another core supporter was Gus Healy. He was chairman and a founder member of the Cork Shakespearean company. Many actors who performed at the Loft were initiated into the arts of acting through his efforts. Gus played the leading role in many Shakespeare plays.

The Dictionary of Irish Biography denotes that Gus was born on 20 May 1904 on Castle Road, Blackrock, Gus was the second of two sons of Timothy Healy, collector for the Cork Gas Company, from Cork, and his wife, Pauline Groegor, from Germany. Gus was educated at the North Mon. When he left school he worked for a year in a saddlery business on Leitrim Street, Cork. He then went onto train as a dental assistant under Isa Scher at St Patrick’s Hill. By 1938 Gus had opened his own business in Grand Parade, Cork.

In 1943, Gus ran a successful campaign as an independent Councillor candidate in the Local Elections for Cork Corporation. In 1948 he joined Fianna Fáil. In February 1957, he was elected to Dáil Éireann. He married Rita McGrath on 4 February 1957 and they lived at the View, Montenotte, Cork and later at Church Road, Blackrock.

Gus lost his Dáil seat in 1961 but served in Seanad Éireann for the following four years. He was re-elected to Dáil Éireann in 1965 and remained a Deputy until he retired in 1977. The Dictionary of Irish Biography recalls he held a number of chairmanship positions in Dail Eireann committees.

Gus was twice Lord Mayor of Cork in 1965-6 and 1974-5. As part of his Corporation work, he held a number of positions. The Dictionary of Irish Biography recalls; “Mr Healy was a member of Southern Health Board and the City of Cork VEC. He was chairman of the Cork Film Festival, which also included the Cork International Choral Festival, and a director of Cork Opera House. He was chairman of the Cork Tóstal council from its inception in 1954, chairman of the former Cork advisory committee and regional director of the Ivernia Regional Tourist Company”.

The Dictionary of Irish Biography also outlines that Gus took a prominent and active part in sport in Cork. He was a teacher of swimming with long ties with Sunday’s Well Swimming Club. The Gus Healy swimming pool in Douglas is named in his honour. He became president of the Irish Amateur Swimming Association in 1943 and later President of the Munster branch of the Irish Rugby Football Union. He was president of the Aloysius Camogie Club, Cork for over thirty years. A director of the National Association for Cerebral Palsy, Gus was also chairman of its local branch, the Cork Spastic Clinic and of the Cork branch of the Irish Red Cross.

To be continued…

Caption:

1290a. Front cover of 1930 programme for Cork Shakespearean Company (source: Cork City Library).

The always most awaited results of the annual Discover Cork: Schools’ Heritage Project.

Thanks to all students who entered a project.

It’s year 23 of the Project with 30 City schools, 800 students, over 200 projects submitted, hours and hours of entertaining reading and shortlisting, and one jury who had to make difficult decisions on who should win.

But the Project at its heart remains an opportunity to explore Cork’s history and to be creative in the telling of its stories, and to build a sense of pride in our City.

My thanks to the Heritage Office of Cork City Council for their ongoing financial support for the project and to the Old Cork Waterworks Experience for hosting the projects, whilst reading and judging is ongoing.

Read the 2025 results here: http://corkheritage.ie/?page_id=10008

The proposed development comprises:

• The construction of a new part 3-storey/part 2-storey/part single -storey residential building comprising four number own door access residential units, including two number accessible 2-bed ground floor units, one number 2-bed first floor unit and one number 3-bed duplex unit on the first and second floor.
• The demolition and reconfiguration of the existing front wall.
• All ancillary site works, and signage as outlined in the plans and particulars

More detailed information and plans can be found at www.consult.corkcity.ie

Submissions and observations can be sent to Mark Birch, Acting Programme Manager, Housing Directorate, Cork City Council, City Hall.

The closing date for submissions and observations is Monday 28 April 2025 at 4pm.

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 30 January 2025

Making an Irish Free State City – Pursuing the Beautiful in Drama

From 1927 to 1932 Fr O’Flynn and his Cork Shakespearean Company were a highlight of the annual programme at Cork Opera House. Over the six week long programmes, eighteen different Shakespearean plays were presented. The time and effort into rehearsals and financial investment into costumes and venue hire were high.

Despite the challenges the Company remained steadfast in its ideals of Irish culture as something that should be supported to grow and open to all citizens to engage with. For example, in a 1930 season Programme for Cork Opera House, Fr O’Flynn condemned the censorship of the Irish government by using the metaphor that more lights need to be lit for culture more than establishing darkness in Irish culture. It was a nod to the State’s first Censorship of Publications Act of 1929; “To put out the darkness strike a light. Better for a nation’s organisations to establish Culture than organisations to prevent what is degrading. Vigilance Committees and censors and uproar in this Country show that the Irish people’s minds are idle. As with the individual, its government (the will) takes care to flood the soul with light when darkness would possess it, so with the nation, the Government should consider the negative goodness of prohibitive legislation worthless as compared with striking the light of Culture”.

In the late November 1931 Cork Opera House week long season, one of the most entertaining of all the Shakespearean comedies – King Henry IV, Part 1 – was performed. The proceeds that the show made were handed over to the Society of St Vincent do Paul as an offering to help in the noble work of the Society for the “relief of distress and want in the city”.

The Cork Examiner on 27 November 1931 remarked that the Cork Shakespearean Company’s version of the play was growing in its comedy and story-telling; “The company have never exceeded the standard of perfection shown in their previous performances of this play, and consequently the rich humour will be fully reproduced, as will also the nobility of more than one great figure. The character of Falstaff is outstanding in classical literature, and even now his wit and nimbleness of tongue can delight more thoroughly than many a famous cinema comedian. It is a play that well merits study, and nobody, who goes to it will have the slightest ground for regretting his choice”.

The November 1931 season concluded with The Merry Wives of Windsor. The Evening Echo on 30 November 1931 details that the Saturday matinee provided an additional angle to the work of the Cork Shakespearean Company. On the Saturday afternoon they presented a very varied and thoroughly Gaelic programme, which drew on everything from the poetry of Pádraig Pearse to presenting pieces from Irish playwrights.

The Evening Echo continues to praise the several productions of the 1931 week especially in the face of growing cultural trends such as cinemas. The editorial remarked: “This group of amateurs in the city continue to pursue an art that has everything to commend it. Had they been operative in a previous generation their work would have been ever so much easier, and encouragement, far more than the present day quantify, would have been bestowed on them. All the greater, then, is their triumph, when, in face of all the opposing forces of the modern types of entertainment. They are still able to carry on and can find audiences big enough to enable them to pay their way”.

At the conclusion of the performance on the Saturday night Mr Henry McCarthy, on behalf of the Company, thanked those present for their kind patronage throughout the week. He outlined that the patronage had enabled them to do more, than clear their expenses, and, although they did not gauge the measure of their success by the box-office receipts, it was always encouraging to receive such support. He remarked that their work on this occasion had been a labour of love, and if they had helped or given real enjoyment to a few they were satisfied with the outcome of their efforts. Mr McCarthy remarked that if the country was to continue on prosperous lines the Irish must support, everything produced at home – everything both intellectual and material; “We look confidently for support from the citizen. Our culture and civilisation are threatened on every side, and we must do our best to retain them in Ireland. To regain our Christianity we must begin at home on cultural lines”.

At the end of the 1932 season in Cork Opera House. Fr O’Flynn spoke himself from the stage to the audience. He reiterated the motto of the Cork Shakespearean Company “An Áilneacht in Uachtar”, which he translated as ‘pursue the beautiful’. He referred to a time in the world when people found life and happiness in seeking and contemplating the beautiful. He related that for centuries now the world looked for happiness in making money. He called it the “practical way”; “This practical way has caused the present state of life; it has poured the sweet milk of concord into hell. The company knew that the so-called practical way spelled decadence. Hence, they seek and appreciate appreciation and not the making of money. They could easily make money by playing the things of plots and thrills that nowadays fill the boxes. Or they could visit Liverpool or Manchester, get a good Press, and return to be followed. They preferred the way they have chosen: the way of hard work on their part, and the approval or disapproval of those who come to hear them”.

To be continued…

Caption:

1289a. Front cover of Cork Shakespearean Company programme, 1928 (source: Cork City Library).

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 23 January 2025

Making an Irish Free State City – Fr O’Flynn & the Cork Opera House Week

In early May 1927 Fr O Flynn rented Cork Opera House and staged a week-long season of six Shakespearean plays. Large scale financial investment was made and a large effort was made to assemble daily audiences. There were six evening performances and one matinee performance. The plays Richard II, Twelfth Night, Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, Othello and Richard III were all performed by players who played different characters in these plays.

The worst fears of the Cork Shakespearean Company were seen on the first night. Richard II was played before an attentive audience, but not as large the Company wished for. The big influence on this was the fine weather that Corkonians began to enjoy that week. The Cork Examiner on the following day (on 3 May) praised the production; “The public are still apt to look with suspicion on what is slightingly referred to as ‘local talent’, but even the most hardened Philistine, must be converted by the wonderfully fine work of this enterprising society. When an unfamiliar historical play such as Richard II can be staged so well that it evokes enthusiastic applause, as it did last night, the public can he assured of a faultless rendering of the more popular Shakespearean plays which will be seen during the week…Taken all round, the production would be considered highly creditable even for a professional company.

On Tuesday 3 May, Twelfth Night was performed. The news report in the Cork Examiner, the day after, reported that the audience enjoyed the performance; “The reception, which a representative and discriminating audience gave to Twelfth Night, shows that a lighter comedy capably produced will not only please, but captivate a public. Of course, much depends upon the players, and how they can enter into the spirit of the piece…Last night’s performance was a treat for all who love Shakespeare. There was not a dull moment from start to finish. The play went with a swing, and the audience were not slow to appreciate the fact that they were listening to artists who had clearly given thoughtful preparation to the work and many of whom could hold their own against recognised professionals”.

On Wednesday, 4 May for Hamlet a very large crowd of school children, boys and girls, occupied the gallery of Cork Opera House and remained chatting throughout the performance. The following day, the Cork Examiner praised the resilience the actors who continued to perform through much noise; “The highest compliment that can be paid to the Cork Shakespearean Company is that last night they gave an excellent interpretation of Hamlet under conditions that at times would have been regard as intolerable by the most seasoned professional touring company. A very large crowd of school children, boys and girls, occupied the gallery, a circumstance in itself highly satisfactory as evidence of the interest in classical drama aroused by the influence of their teacher or those who prescribe books for examinations. But the conduct of the youthful galleryites last night was such as to give one the impression that a little more attention should be given to the teaching of manners in the school or the homes”.

Fr O’Flynn wrote to the Cork Examiner and defended the young people’s chattering; “They came to see the ghost. And the pictures have trained them to express themselves aloud. They aro not to blame. They have not had the stage that trained the older generation. We felt inclined to relieve the congestion in the gallery by filling the boxes with these little spiritual ones who came to see a ghost. These are the ones who in after years fill boxes to enjoy true art. We forgive them heartily”.

On Friday 6 May the Company performed their Othello. The play was broadcast from the stage on local radio through the Cork Broadcasting Service.

If 1927 was a major project, the ambition for 1928 far exceeded it. In one week in November 1928, Fr O’Flynn and the Cork Shakespearean Company staged six Shakespearean plays across six evenings and two matinees. They staged Hamlet (Monday evening), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Tuesday evening and Wednesday matinee), Much Ado About Nothing (Wednesday evening and Saturday matinee), As You Like It (Thursday evening), Hamlet (Friday), The Taming of the Shrew (Saturday evening).  Some of the young actors took part in every one of the eight performances during that week in 1928.

In a 1928 programme note, Fr O’Flynn wrote about a labour of love for Shakespeare; “From our Loft in Musgrave Place we bring eight or works of art – our reason for so many is just love for work, and that the stars in one play may be given the part of a soldier, servant or noises of in some other to advance the aspiring stars a little further on their way. No company in the world, for pay, would undertake a week like this; with us it is a pleasure, a labour of love”.

The Committee of the Cork Shakespearean Company in 1928 comprised Fr O’Flynn, President; Mr Gus Healy, Chairman, Mr M McCarthy, Honorary Secretary; Mr Tom Vesey, Treasurer; Mr L O’Connell, Mr Ted Healy, Stage Manager, Misses Eileen Curran, Rita Coughlan and P Murphy.

From 1927 to 1932. Fr O’Flynn’s Shakespearean seasons were a highlight of the year’s programme at the Opera House. For the young actors the rehearsals were very time-consuming and made heavy demands on their loves. In addition, at performances audience numbers fluctuated, but media responses were positive and supportive. The change to later times of year for performances such as November instead of May created more of an audience attendance as well.

Caption:

1288a. Cork Shakespearean Programme flyer for Cork Opera House, November 1928 (source: Cork City Library).

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 16 January 2025

Making an Irish Free State City – Fr O’Flynn Produces Shakespeare Plays

In the mid-1920s, the Cork Shakespearian Company presented full or extracts of Shakespearean plays at places across Cork City and County. On the first weekend of August 1925, against a backdrop of Capel Island and the beaches of Youghal, the Cork Shakesperean Company staged outdoors The Merchant of Venice at Knockadoon.

A Cork Examiner journalist on 4 August 1925 remarked on the training of the players and their speech training by Fr O’Flynn; “These players have all been moulded to their present ability by long and careful training, by receiving full explanations of the sense and meaning of the plays they study, by long and careful instruction in all the many details of elocution and by continuous practise of such teaching. The society is comprised of youth of both sexes, mainly from the North Parish, Cork”. 

The Cork Examiner article went on to point out how young the players were and Fr O’Flynn’s detailed work; “Some of these young people when they left school had ideas on Shakespeare in no way different to those of thousands of others not; alone in Cork and elsewhere. In the mere pronunciation of words, they were also no different…Their elocution is an outstanding feature, rhythm clarity of words, full light and shade within over short sentences. The players accord all the credit to the Rev J C O’Flynn, who is a perfect elocutionist and faultless in ear, able to discern the very least falling off in tone in either speech or song…the play was a veritable triumph, and within that fact the strongest evidence was that held by the rapt attention of the audience”.

In 1926, the Cork Shakespearian Company rented a premises over a sweet factory in John Redmond Street. In the early days The Loft, as it was known, was never meant to be more than a temporary home for the Cork Shakespearean Company. Indeed, the room in which rehearsals were held was quite small, but the Company persevered and made the most the space over the ensuing decades.

In early summer 1927 Fr O Flynn rented Cork Opera House and staged a week-long season of six Shakespearean plays during the first week of May. A journalist in the Cork Examiner wrote half a page on the endeavour and focussed on the importance of the Loft’s civic work;  

“From a humble beginning this troupe has developed into an important civic asset, whose good work and unbounded enthusiasm should help to propagate that spirit of culture which has hitherto been only scantily ‘apparent. Denied the measure of support to which their efficiency entitled them, they have not, as was the case with so many other societies, succumbed to neglect; but, quite on the contrary, seem to have acquired a greater keenness now inspiring thorn to attempt an ambitious task which deserves the reward of success”. 

The article also focusses on bringing the work of Shakespeare alive for students and not that students learn off lines from Shakespearian plays for the sake of it; The journalist remarked; “The present system develops the memory only – the imagination and the personality it fails to reach. Consequently, when the pupil leaves the school he brings with him, as Pope said, ‘a load of learned lumber in his head’, and a very natural inclination to bother his brains no more with the philosophy of Shakespeare or anybody else of his ilk”.

Fr O’Flynn’s civic work also evolved into financial cost. Hiring the Cork Opera House for a week in 1927 was £200 – a steep financial commitment. Fr O’Flynn attained the week at a discount for £175. The week did not include rehearsal time and literally the Company walked straight onto the stage to perform.

The cost of costumes for six plays was also steep. Tom Vesey, the Treasurer of the Cork Shakespearean Company, was tasked with attaining costumes from London based costume sellers. Fr O’Flynn borrowed £300 from the bank and guaranteed by O’Flynn Brothers, Victuallers. By train and ship, Tom made it to London where he filled six hampers with costumes, swords and wigs.

Back in Cork Fr O’Flynn launched a robust publicity drive. Posters, hand bills, press releases, and word of mouth were all harnessed to make all citizens aware of his attempt to bring Shakespeare to Cork.

Fr O’Flynn penned a letter to the editor of the Cork Examiner in which he hoped that the public would co-operate with the Cork Shakespearean Company in making their week at Cork Opera House a successful one. He wrote: “On their part, no effort, individual or collective, has been spared to make effective the staging of the dramas of the immortal Bard. Even such details as costumes and accessories have been carefully looked after by a small and zealous committee…everything humanly possible has been done to render the production of each particular drama and educative entertainment for the audience and an aesthetic treat”.

A further letter to the editor of the Cork Examiner appeared on Monday, 2 May 1927 – the Monday of the week long performances where Fr O’Flynn made a further plea for local support; “I can guarantee to those who attend any one of the plays this week that they will see a performance by the youths and maidens of our city which will be as good as, if not better than, any professional performance of Shakespearean play that we have seen in Cork for some years back…The spectator will no longer see the youths and maidens of his city, but the characters of Shakespeare’s imagination living in the very flesh. I trust especially that the patrons of the boxes, circles and stalls will be generous in their support for, I regret to remark, that from personal observation these parts of the theatre are practically empty whenever anything of a local endeavour is running”.

To be continued…

Caption:

1287a. Plaque on Linehan’s Sweet Shop, John Redmond Street, Shandon commemorating the Cork Shakespearean Company’s The Loft, present day (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 9 January 2025

Making an Irish Free State City – Fr O’Flynn and the Shakespeare Mission

Fr Seamus O’Flynn’s championing of community life in his North Parish was exemplary. In 1911, the Christian Brothers at the North Monastery Schools celebrated their centenary. They decided to put on a pageant of Irish mythology and history and invited their past pupil, Fr O’Flynn, to act as producer. He took on the project and soon after he was scouring the shelves of the libraries in Cork for books on Irish mythology. He produced a pageant, which the North Monastery community was proud of. Pictures of the pageant still adorn the corridors of even the modern day North Monastery schools.

The Irish Outlook, a weekly review of literary and social events, said of Fr O’Flynn in July 1912; “There is a strong magnetic quality in his personality; the magnetism that sways, that encourages, that inspires with hope and confidence. He is enthusiastic and has a multitude of interests, all national in character. His energetic mind is devoted to the re-establishing of the native language, and swayed by his enthusiasm many readily enrol themselves under his intrepid banner. As an orator, he possesses eloquence of a high order; his indisputable and his power to grip and hold an audience unique”.

Arising from his explorations of Irish culture in West Cork Fr O’Flynn believed in a revival of the Gaelic tradition. He became president of the Gaelic League in Cork City and acted as chairman of the Munster Feis. He continued to bring energy to the activities he organised. In the autumn of 19I7 he delivered six lectures to Gaelic Leaguers in Bolton Street Technical School, Dublin on Irish music and on Shakespearean dramas.

In 1918 Fr O’Flynn became a member of the newly appointed sub-committee of the Cork Municipal School of Music. He travelled to Belfast and asked traditional Irish music arranger and specialist Carl Hardebeck to accept the positions of Professor of Irish Music and the Headmastership of the Cork Municipal School of Music. Carl Hardebeck was convinced and agreed to come to Cork. The core issue back in Cork though was Carl’s German origins. The teaching staff resigned in protest at the appointment of a German headmaster in light of the First World War. A complete suite of new staff were appointed.

The Oireachtas – the annual festival of language, song, poetry, music, dancing and games of the Gaelic League – was held in Cork city from 3 to 9 August 1919. Fr O’Flynn had worked on several of the committees to ensure the success of this event.

In 1924 the nuns of St Vincent’s Convent School, Peacock Lane, asked Fr O’Flynn to help students of theirs to stage a scene from The Merchant of Venice. Two girls involved in this event were Kathy Hickey and Eileen Curran. About this time Fr O’Flynn began to develop his idea of establishing classes for the study of Shakespeare’s plays. In November 1924, the Cork Shakespearean Company commenced. Almost all members of the Company came from the area around the North Cathedral. This was a slum ridden area and very much at the heart of Fr O’Flynn’s work as well was to lift people out of poverty and give them opportunities and hope.

Among the first members were Eddie Golden, James Stack, Tom Vesey, Harry McCarthy, Roly Hill, Peadar Houlihan, Leo Griffin, Harry Weldon, Ken O’Shea, Dan Skidd, the Buckley brothers Daniel and James, the Flanagan brothers, the Healy brothers Gus, Ted and Jerome, and the Archer brothers Liam and Fred. The ladies of the Company included Eilen Curran, Kathy Hickey, Betty Arrow, Rita Coughlan, Maeve and Ina Cronin, Annie Hickey, May and Rita O’Neill , Nan Power, Rose Dennehy, Evelyn (“Fluffy) Clancy, Kitty Nott and Lena Long.

At first, classes took place in the Presbytery of the North Chapel, then in room over a shoemaker’s shop in Gerald Grifin Street. Fr O’Flynn’s players ranged in age from 12 to 26. Gradually a repertoire of Shakespearean plays was built up. It was time to go on the road and soon the company was fulfilling engagements at a number of halls in the city.

In the mid-1920s, the Cork Shakespearian Company presented plays of Shakespeare in full or in extract at places such as the Municipal Hall, Kinsale, The Palace, Fermoy, Fr Matthew Hall, Cork, The Ursuline Convent, Blackrock. They also gave open-air performances in a number of venues – the Mardyke Cricket Grounds, UCC (where they presented Twelfth Night), as well as Kinsale, Fermoy and Mallow. They put on Richard III in a disused mill at Newcestown near Bandon.

For example the Cork Examiner records that on Sunday evening, 19 April 1925, Twelfth Night, one of Shakespeare’s comedy plays, was staged at the Gymnasium, Collins’ Barracks, Cork, by the North Parish Shakespearean Society. This play had been produced at the Palace Theatre with exactly the same cast. Public sentiment deemed it to be one of the best amateur efforts seen in Cork within the recollection of many older citizens who would come out to support Shakespeare’s works. The Cork Examiner wrote in praise of Fr O’Flynn; “The generosity of the Rev Fr O’Flynn and his talented society in producing this play for the entertainment of the troops is deeply appreciated by the General Officer Commanding and Entertainment Committee”.

To be continued…

Caption:

1286a. North Cathedral area, Cork, c.1920 (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town

Cork Independent, 2 January 2025

Making an Irish Free State City – Fr O’Flynn, Shakespeare and the Education of the Heart

The mid-1920s coincided with the emergence of Fr Seamus O’Flynn’s growing interest in Shakespeare. The Cork Examiner on 17 December 1924 notes that under the auspices of the Fermoy Catholic Young Men’s Society, Fr O’Flynn, accompanied by some of his pupils, delivered to a crowded house a most instructive and educational lecture entitled, “How to Study Shakespeare”. The lecture in Fermoy was one of Fr O’Flynn’s first public lectures on the benefits of studying the work of Shakespeare. It was four years since the creation of the Cork Shakespearian Company and fifteen years since his first staging of a Shakespeare play in a Cork community setting.

Fr Fitzgerald, CC, President of the Fermoy CYM Society, said it was his privilege to introduce Fr O’Flynn, of the North Cathedral parish and highlighted that he was known beyond the limits of his native county, and well known to many friends present. Fr Fitzgerald outlined that for many years FrO’Flynn had been an ardent promoter of the Irish language, Irish culture and Irish traditional music, and for many years had been promoting such interests and embedding them in local Cork communities.

The choice of Fr O’Flynn’s lecture subject was How to Study Shakespeare. Fr Fitzgerald articulated that in the local schools the plays of Shakespeare had been taught to the pupils year after year and year after year had been appearing on exam papers. Hence to him the lecture topic was not out of place to champion.

Fr O’Flynn was received with applause and at the outset he gave an explanatory discourse on the means necessary to read and recite well lines within Shakespearean plays. He showed how the thoughts of the writer should first be grasped and then delivered his thoughts as Shakespeare himself might have uttered them. He noted examples of lines from Hamlet. He pointed out the methods involved to attain a perfect understanding of the construction of sentences, the ability to analyse complex forms of composition, to discriminate between essentials and expletive words and the regulation of the voice to suit the sound to the word. “Nothing marked out a finished reader so clearly as his power of modulating his voice. It was by the subtle changes of tone that the infinite variety of feeling was represented. The effects should of course be natural, with no undue straining after effect”.

After the lecture Fr Fitzgerald, in his vote of thanks to Fr O’Flynn, noted that his explanation of how to interpret Shakespeare was “simple yet eloquent”, and his selections from the various plays were “apt and very instructive”. His demonstration of how each character could be found in ordinary daily life was “striking, clear and very real, even in some instances surprising to a degree”.

There are many pieces written on the life and times of Fr O’Flynn. One striking book by writer Richard O’Donoghue, entitled Like a Tree Planted, Fr O’Flynn and the Loft and published in 1967, makes reference to Fr John Forde, parish priest, Newcestown, County Cork, who was the literary executor for Fr O’Flynn when he died in 1962. Richard writes that Fr John Forde gave him a suitcase filled with the notebooks and the recordings of Fr O’Flynn. Richard then supplemented his work by a series of interviews with members of the O’Flynn family, with past pupils of The Loft and with contemporaries of Fr O’Flynn in the North Cathedral Parish and at Passage West.

Richard writes that Cork born Fr O’Flynn’s interest in acting and performance can be traced back to his youth. Born in 1881, the young Seamus attended Blackpool National School and the North Monastery.  In September 1899, he enrolled as a student at the junior seminary of Farranferris and on the accomplishment of his studies he went to St Patrick’s College, Maynooth,

On 20 June 1909, Fr O’Flynn was ordained. Cork’s Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas O’Callaghan cancelled an arrangement to send the newly appointed priest Fr O’Flynn from Maynooth to Portsmouth. He appointed him to the staff of the seminary at Farranferris to teach elocution. With a talent for acting, his well-developed voice and his love of Shakespeare, Fr O’Flynn was very content and most enthusiastic.

Later Fr O’Flynn wrote in one of his many notebooks: “I began in Farranferris in 1909. We put planks on porter barrels and covered them with an old carpet, and each year produced a full-length play of Shakespeare’s. Encouragement came from my Bishop, Dr O’Callaghan – God be good to him-and from his relative, Dr Sexton, the President of the College. By means of Shakespeare I aimed not only at helping the students to speak correctly, but at a cultivation of the noble emotions – education of the heart”.

Early in 1910, Fr O’Flynn was appointed to serve as chaplain in Our Lady’s Hospital on the Lee Road. He said Mass, administered the sacraments, visited the patients each day and frequently entertained them with his songs and dramatic pieces. There he also got a close up perspective of the human condition.

In 1910 Fr O’Flynn visited the Irish-speaking districts of West Cork and for the first time came in contact with the old Gaelic world and those who preserved the stories and championed them. He recorded; “There, rummaging among the ruins of the nation, I discovered the remnants of a supremely beautiful culture of emotion in language, story, song and dance still living in the hearts of these people, that completely captivated me”.

For many summers Fr O’Flynn spent his holidays in one or other of the Irish-speaking districts of Munster – Ballingeary or Gougane Barra, or Ring in County Waterford. But his favourite haunts lay far to the west in Kerry – Dunquin, the Blasket Islands and Ballinskelligs. It was there his interest in the marrying of education, culture, and storytelling developed even more and set him on a path to bring the power of storytelling further into the heart of Cork city’s communities.

To be continued…

Happy New Year to all readers of the column. Missed a column from 2024 log onto my website www.corkheritage.ie

Caption:

1285a. Fr Seamus O’Flynn as a young priest, c.1915 (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 19 December 2024

The Decanting of the Canova Casts

The Crawford Art Gallery’s iconic collection of Canova casts have departed the building for the first time in 140 years, with a delicate process of crating and removing the much-loved artworks concluding the last few weeks. The Crawford Art Gallery closed to the public in September of this year to undergo an enormously exciting capital redevelopment project: Transforming Crawford Art Gallery. 

This multi-million euro investment will increase gallery space by almost 50%, preserve and protect three centuries of existing built heritage, and create a cultural legacy for a new century as Cork continues to grow. The project is a Government of Ireland 2040 project funded by the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media in partnership with the Office of Public Works (OPW). 

It is a historic moment in the life of the gallery, the casts, and Cork, as 25 plaster cast and marble works departed the nineteenth century wing of the gallery, built by brewing magnate William Horatio Crawford in 1884, in part to house the sculptures.

In October 1818 a ship from the UK containing 219 sculpture casts arrived into Cork. The acquisition of classical casts made an important contribution to Cork burgeoning art scene and in today’s Crawford Art Galley a cross section of them form the centre of an impressive sculpture display. Their context and journey to Cork is a unique story. Circa 1810, Pope Pius VII was anxious to express his gratitude to the English people for the return to the Vatican Galleries of many masterpieces looted by Napoleon Bonaparte. The Pope commissioned Italian artist, Antonio Canova, to make a set of over one hundred casts from the classical collection in the Vatican.

Canova (1757-1822) was deemed the greatest sculptor of his time and his name was renown across Europe. A student of antiquity, he had interests in Roman restoration projects of artwork. His early work of a statuette of Apollo Crowning Himself, which he entered into a competition organised by the Venetian aristocrat Don Abbondio Rezzonico. This work led to a large successful line of marble statue commissions across Europe comprising Holland, Austria, Poland, Russia, and England. In France Napoleon Bonaparte was a patron of his commissioning large amounts of work and artistic depictions of Napoleon posing as the Roman God of War. Members of Napoleon’s family were also depicted in marble casts such as his sister, second wife and mother (appears in the Crawford Art Gallery). In 1802, be was given the post of Inspector-General of Antiquities and Fine Art of the Papal State.

As a diplomatic gesture, in 1812, a set of Canova casts were shipped to London by the Vatican as a gift to the Prince Regent, later George IV. The Prince showed a lack of appreciation towards his papal acquisitions and the casts lay firstly in the London Custom House and then in the basement of his residence in Carleton Gardens. William Hare, 1^st Lord Listowel of Convamore, Co. Cork (beside the River Blackwater), was a patron of the arts and as friend of the prince suggested that they be donated as a gift to the people of Cork.

The Prince Regent donated the casts to the Society of Fine Arts in Cork City, whose premises was located on what is now the intersection of St Patrick’s Street and Opera Lane. An article in the Belfast Newsletter notes that the casts were shipped on Saturday 24 October 1818 – arriving a few days after. A contemporary account best tells the story of this event, more especially when it comes from a manuscript autobiographical sketch written by one of the greatest beneficiaries from the casts, Corkman Daniel Maclise.

“A former theatre once supported by the Apollo Society of Amateur Actors was fixed upon as the most suitable place for the reception of the valuable collection of casts. It was situated in a principal street, Patrick Street, and the stage was screened off by a well-painted scene of the interior of a Greek temple. The pit was boarded over and the gallery was partitioned off. The boxes remained only as they were, and the statues were arranged around the Parterre with much taste on moveable pedestals under the Superintendence of a London gentleman who was sent over for the purpose, and whose name happened appropriately enough to be Corkaigne”.

Shortly after the acquisition, the Cork Society of Fine Arts suffered financial difficulty and could not pay the rent of the premises in which the casts were kept. Under considerable embarrassment, they applied to the government for monetary aid. The Westminster Government and under the recommendation of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland stated they could grant no aid but recommended them to amalgamate with the Royal Cork Institution. An arrangement was made that the Royal Cork Institution should attain the casts and pay the debt of £500-£600 that was contracted by the Society of Fine Arts. A compromise was made of £300 and the casts were moved to the Institution’s premises on Jameson Row. Years later again, they were moved to the Crawford Art Gallery when it opened in 1885

After months of planning for the delicate operation of moving the Canova casts in our time the operation has included Crawford Art Gallery staff seeking expert opinion from London sculptural conservators Taylor Pearce Ltd. Bespoke storage crates were commissioned for each sculpture.  Many of the sculptures are estimated to weigh in excess of two tonnes, with smaller pieces weighing in at anywhere between 75kg to 500kg. 

Gallery director Mary McCarthy praised the dedication of the team involved in the removal of the 3D artworks, and said the feat was a pivotal moment in the history of Crawford Art Gallery; She noted: “ I’m delighted to announce the successful removal of our beautiful Canova casts from the Sculpture Galleries, a big moment for Crawford Art Gallery as these treasured works have not been moved out of the building for 140 years. This is a huge milestone in the decant process of the entire collection into safe storage to prepare for Transforming Crawford Art Gallery, our capital redevelopment project.”

Mary also described that the planning and dedication and expertise that has gone into their safe removal has been awe-inspiring to see; “I want to pay tribute to our in-house technical team, supported by additional external experts ,our production manager and our registrar for their work in carrying off this historically important removal smoothly and with great professionalism”. 

Caption:

1284a. Crawford Art Gallery staff, l-r, Curator of Collections Dr Michael Waldron, Director Mary McCarthy and Production Manager Kathryn Coughlan pictured during the removal of the Canova Casts from the gallery (picture: Joleen Cronin)