Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 13 November 2014

Memories of Oliver Plunkett Street

     It is true to say that Cork City and County is lucky with the calibre of dedicated Council library staff, who bring their enthusiasm and knowledge to bear on their collections. Since 1892, Cork City Libraries has provided a service to the citizens of Cork. Part of that valuable service has been a local history element for the people of Cork and beyond, as well as for researchers, students of all ages, and writers.

    For nearly forty years, the enormous collections of local history materials that Cork City proudly possesses was developed and minded by recently retired librarian Kieran Burke, who for all intensive purposes, was their guardian. Up to a decade ago, the city’s library service was available only to people calling in person to the library premises. However, since 2004, online library services are available through two websites: (i) the general library website at CorkCityLibraries.ie (where, for example, you can search the book catalogue or request and renew borrowed items), and (ii) the popular Cork Past and Present website.  

      For over a century, if an enquirer wanted to check a historical map of Cork, or if they wanted to check an old street directory showing who lived in what street or what business was carried on there, they would have had to call to the library premises — and only during opening hours. Now since 2004, with the online service of the Cork Past and Present website, people can browse the local history treasures of the Library from the comfort of their homes, from their place of work or recreation, or while travelling, or even when out of the country.

    City Librarian Liam Ronayne has driven the expansion of online library services since his appointment as City Librarian in 2004. He established a special eLibrary Services department to develop online library resources. Arising from these developments more material is digitized every year and added to the Library webpages, providing 24/7 access to anyone requiring it. For nine months up to last summer, three new sections to its websites were developed. The first section deals with two decades of theatre in Cork city from 1972 to 1991 showing 4,000 high-quality photographs of theatre productions in Cork. Another new web section presents brief accounts of the Shandon area with some images. The third addition contributes to understanding the stronger identity, which pervades in Oliver Plunkett Street, a vital and busy spine running through our city centre. As well as having intrinsic interest, these new web pages support the efforts of the businesses in our city streets to focus greater attention on the historic and overall attractions of the city centre. With so much nostalgia in the City Centre, it offers a rich cultural experience hard to beat.

     The new web pages on Oliver Plunkett Street explore the historical development of the street from its beginnings in the early eighteenth century – the challenges posed by building on a marshland, a number of buildings of significance on the street, and also charts the history of some of the long-standing retailers synonymous with Oliver Plunkett Street. Some of the intriguing images show an auction of greyhounds in the former Conway’s Yard, now part of Casey’s furniture store and car park. Other pages remind one that the lovely limestone-clad building behind the EuroGiant shop was once a nineteenth century Congregational Chapel, or that today’s Saville menswear shop was a cinema (the Imperial Cinema) from 1913 until the 1950s. The Karizma Turkish barber shop on the corner of Oliver Plunkett Street and Princes Street was the site of the city’s first purpose-built theatre which opened in 1732 and operated out of there until the Theatre Royal moved in 1760 to where the GPO is today, where the theatre house survived until the postal authorities purchased the premises in 1875.

   Notable for its striking Tudor-revival facades and indoor architecture one can read about the history of Winthrop Arcade. It was officially opened by Lord Mayor Seán French on 1 May 1926. The arcade was one of the first shopping malls opened in Ireland and survives today in its original design and purpose. The man responsible for establishing the arcade was Cork businessman Patrick Crowley. Guy’s business directory for 1913 records that he operated a public house named ‘The Arch’, at 7 Winthrop Street. His business and properties on the site of the future arcade were destroyed by rampaging British forces during the Burning of Cork in December 1920. He invested the financial compensation he received following the event, along with funds of his own, to create the Winthrop Arcade.

    Other retailers, including, Liam Ruiséal Teoranta, Cronin’s Menswear, Casey’s Furniture, Keane’s Jewellers, M J Galligan Furnishing Fabrics, the Uneeda bookshop, and Minihan’s Chemists. There is even a section about Oliver Plunkett Street as an area prone to flooding and its links to the development of the swampland. Cork City Libraries is to be commended for its ongoing efforts to add to the cultural richness of Cork city and for providing greater access both through its seven premises throughout the city and through its webpages, such as this new section on Oliver Plunkett Street, which everyone should browse.

My thanks to John Mullins, Cork City Library and Lord Mayor Cllr Mary Shields for their help with the above piece.

Caption:

768a. Memories and histories, Oliver Plunkett Street, Present Day (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article, 

Cork Independent, 6 November 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 93 of 93) – For the Public Good”

       In reaching the end of the series on the Crawford Municipal Technical Institute, there are always the plaguing questions of what other sub topics on the Tech that could have been written about. Discontinuing at the development of the new Art College premises and the RTC seems a logical stopping point. More present day local histories require a delicate balancing act between memory, fact and history. Certainly, CIT’s forty year heritage deserves a book on its own charting its rise and significance for this country, socially and economically.

       The story of the Tech is a layered and complex story. To explore these complexities in a methodology sense, I have used mostly Institute archival documents, VEC minute books, and newspapers to tell the great tale of the Crawford Tech. I have used some interviews to expand the narrative. Certainly there is a need to do a proper set of interviews with past pupils and former lecturers on the importance of vocational education in this region.

      Since January 2012 one of the aims of this section of the Our City, Our Town series was to showcase the development of our city as a strong heartland of education and science. The City is lucky that we have archives where one can read about the viewpoints of the leaders of vocational education throughout several decades and how such spaces like the Tech encompass those ideals. Whereas the Tech was a very real space, it also existed as a strong symbol of where Cork and Ireland needed to go in terms of educational progress. Against the backdrop of political campaigns for Home Rule, many demands for investment into Ireland, housing, and attempts to stop large scale emigration, the Agriculture and Technical Instruction (Ireland) Act in 1899 recognised the need for an Irish framework for technical education in an attempt to halt industrial and manufacturing decline. In many parts of the country, young people needed to be mentally challenged, and the schools needed to be become more efficient. There was an almost complete dearth of higher education suited to the latter needs. Concepts of progress in intellectualism and education and energy in idealism swept across the country through the technical institutes. These institutes and their aspirations were the foundations of the country’s regional colleges and universities.

     Concepts of progress at the Crawford Tech followed the economic needs of the country. The hands on approaches in 1912 in subjects such as experimental science, drawing, and manual work, and domestic economy were swept away by the need for understanding the use of large scale mechanised machinery. As outlined throughout this column series, the Tech impressively showed leadership in all its actions, programmes, ongoing discussions and ideas. The technical movement was also open to every Irish man and woman; it did not engage in political or religious difference. Improvement and development became hallmark words when it came to progress. Practical experience and wide knowledge were freely given for the public good. The Crawford Tech’s first principal John H Grindley in one of his first reports wrote about the concept of the public good; “the work of the institute cannot fail to have far reaching affects on the intellectual well being of the workers, in training the intelligence of the leaders of industry”.

     Fast forward in time and one gets the rich and layered leadership stories of industry in the Cork City and harbour region in the 1950s and the creation of a number of large industrial projects – two were developed by the ESB – the Lee hydroelectric scheme and the Marina plant; then there was Whitegate Oil Refinery, Verome Dockyard, Goulding’s Fertilisers and Irish Steel Ltd on Haulbowline. These were followed by the construction of Cork Airport, and developments at Fords and Dunlops at the Marina, Cork City. All of these require further research in terms of their significance in framing the development of Ireland’s industrial culture.

      So many people have passed the doors of the Crawford Tech building over the years. It is a space of inspiration. How many people have been pushed forward and inspired there is incalculable. Its current use as the City’s art college allows visitors at the end of year art exhibitions to wander the old rooms of the Tech. The artworks place their own meaning on the building’s web of corridors and multiple rooms. But beyond that you will see the beauty of Arthur Hill’s red brick structure. Sometimes we as citizens don’t look up enough to appreciate the beautiful and multi-layered architectural styles we have. Arthur Hill (1846-1921) was a reputable architect in his day and has left Cork city with many beautiful architectural set pieces, all of which are worth of multiple studies in themselves. With such a depth of architectural splendour and human histories, the Crawford Tech rightly deserves to be written about and showcased. If you’ve missed any of this series or previous years, log onto my website www.corkheritage.ie in the index section. The end of this series also marks the fifteenth year mark of this column, which I have always attempted to celebrate the stories and memories, which this city and region has to offer. Where to explore next is the big question!

Caption:

767a. Crawford Municipal Technical Institute, Cork, c.1912, now the Crawford College of Art (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 23 October 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 91) – Premises for a College of Art”

    With a new RTC up and running in Cork from October 1974, attention soon turned to the future of the Crawford Municipal Technical Institute. Education leaders in Cork turned their focus to converting the premises into an art college whilst creating more gallery space and a larger civil art centre at the Crawford Art Gallery.

     In the early 1970s, the Cork Vocational Educational Committee (VEC) made a policy decision, which included the conversion of the Crawford Tech into the Cork School of Art. The Irish Press on 21 February 1977 (p.6) outlines that a meeting was held of representatives comprising concerned groups and people in the School of Art. Some criticism of the proposed transfer was made but a show of hands displayed firm support for the move. The VEC CEO Patrick Parfrey referred to a special committee on art accommodation in Cork and stressed that the existing accommodation for the visual arts was grossly inadequate both for students and the public. They had found themselves unable to exhibit or even store their own paintings or to accept works on loan from other galleries; “as the second city in the State to ask for the money for an extension to our gallery, I say unblushingly that the state should have no hesitation in providing it…the galleries we have were built through the generosity of the Crawford Family nearly a century ago and they have served us all during this time”.

    Mr Parfrey detailed that the School of Art had 173 full time art students and eleven courses. Most of those who had qualified in previous years were able to get teaching jobs and he foresaw more vacancies for future teachers. Stressing the role of the school in Cork’s cultural life, he added; “we were the first gallery to run art classes for children and have been running them for over 135 years. We were also the first gallery to have lunchtime recitals”. He explained that the planned conversion into an art centre would include more “hanging and storage facilities, library space and a restaurant”. In addition there would be enough space on a site within the gallery grounds to build proper headquarters for the National Ballet Company, which was looking for accommodation; “With the Opera House adjoining us on one side and with the ballet headquarters on the other, we would be in fact and in name a real art centre – though of course, the ballet company would have to provide its own funds for its building”. Other speakers including members of the teaching staff of the school and Miss Joan Denise Moriarty supported the arts centre project. The ballet centre eventually materialised though at the Firkin Crane in Shandon.

     The move of the School of Art was critiqued though. Artist Gladys Leach reminded the meeting that the Cork School of Art was built specifically for art students and it was important to remember its past functions; “ it has magnificent rooms with northern lighting and there is an atmosphere of art her which you will not get at a technical school. It would be a crying shame if these rooms are used for other purposes other than their original purposes. There is no comparison here with conditions in the Dublin College of Art – it was only a wing of Leinster House but this is a building specially designed as an art school and gallery”. Mr Parfrey noted the concerns of Ms Leach whilst highlighting that the decision was made by the VEC and the project and the transfer were going to happen. A member of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society spoke of his concern about the changes which might take place in the physical appearance of the present school; “It is a venerable building and there are few of its kind in Ireland. I hope this will be borne in mind when any conversions are being made. We have too many bad examples around us of conversions”. Following a proposal to form a steering committee to implement the decision on the art centre and to raise funds for the alteration, the following with two members of the VEC were appointed; Art critic Hilary Pyle, architects Jim Barry and Frank Murphy, Tony Thornton, President of the Cork Chamber of Commerce and Mrs Dennis Murphy.

    Fast forward to February 1980 and the Irish Press also detailed the actual move (14 February, p.9). About £240,000 had been spent on conversion and furnishings of the new schools in the 1912 building. The Cork School of Art had always elicited respect through the quality of its work and teaching, particularly in the realm of sculpture, and two of its graduates were chosen to represent the new avant garde in a show of contemporary Irish artists being held in the Angela Flowers Gallery in London as part of the Sense of Ireland Exhibition. The two young women were both from Cork, Éilís O’Connell and Vivienne Roche. Éilís showed three works on paper, which she described as “three dimensional drawings” and Vivienne exhibited watercolours. Another graduate Dorothy Cross had gone onto study at the Leinster Polytechnic and in California, where she specialised in sculpture. All three of the latter are still artists of great repute exhibiting at home and abroad.

To be continued…

Caption:

765a. Canova casts at Crawford Art Gallery (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 16 October 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 90)

– Forty Years Ago, Cork RTC Opens”

An important occasion for the Cork Regional Technical College was how the principal James P Roche described the conferring of 135 students from eight faculties with national certificates and diplomas. The conferring was performed by Pádraig Mac Diarmada, Director of the National Council for Education Awards in the presence of a distinguished gathering (J A Cullen, journalist, Evening Echo, Tuesday 19 November 1974, p.9).

     Cork’s CIT campus celebrates its 40^th birthday this month. The new college at Rossa Avenue officially began operations on 1 October 1974 with close on 4,000 students enrolled (most of them male). Those who received certificates and diplomas at the first conferring ceremony in November 1974 had pursued their studies in the Crawford Municipal Technical Institute, its annexes and the School of Commerce. Remarks by the principal Mr James Roche in the Evening Echo on 19 November 1974 highlighted the important difference between the Cork College and other regional colleges – the Cork College was to be a “confluence of activities and traditions already in existence rather than a new department in technical education”.

     The Cork College was by far the largest of the regional colleges and at that point in time the college was awaiting the addition of courses in navigation studies and catering studies. The journalist reporting on the conferring noted of potential space problems going forward; “The College must be extended in the near future to provide for the development in range and level of courses, which is inevitable”. In the beginning, the role of the college extended over the region comprising Cork City, Cork County and South Kerry and embraced a population of nearly half a million people. Mr Roche detailed that in the past technical education in Cork City had provided a service mostly to people within the urban area; “the Regional College must serve and must be seen to serve the whole region in a much more extensive way, from the outset, and must not be identified as a city college”.

    Mr Roche added that the college was to provide an opportunity for young men and women in the region for obtaining an education and training over a wide range of disciplines and with a flexible and extensive award system; “The flow of students from all parts of the region to the college to take these courses was considerably strengthen the college both in size and in standard; “Also, the flow and qualified and trained graduates from the college back to all parts of the region will immeasurably enhance and strengthen these areas and help in the development and support of economic improvements. This is the real importance of the college and the real responsibility which it must face”.

    In the Cork RTC in 1974, there were a substantial range of courses, for example the courses for certificates and diplomas in business studies, certificated and diplomas in applied chemistry, applied biology, civil engineering, mechanical engineering and marine engineering. There were construction studies leading to certificates and to diplomas in construction economics and architecture. There were certificate courses in instrument physics, electrical engineering and medical laboratory technology. There were courses in textile technology, marine electronics and radio/television servicing. Some of these courses were new in Cork whilst others were long established with a graduate output which had made substantial impact over the previous decade in business and industry. According to Mr Roche, “this acceptance by industry of graduates is a further guarantee of the validity and relevance of the courses”. Some of the work was of particular national significance, for example the Marine engineering course. There was also a course for the training of engineers to professional level and it was hoped at the time to provide an avenue through the Diploma in Engineering on to professional level.

    Mr Roche also alluded to the perspectives of educational leaders in Tralee, who argued that the technical college there should be designated a Regional Technical College with a region comprising all of Co Kerry, South Limerick and North Cork. To Roche this represented a “major deletion from the catchment area of the Cork RTC”. The proposal was well supported in Tralee and had been canvassed for at national level as well. Roche claimed the need for standards and a large catchment area; “there is a standard for technical colleges, an international standard, and the technical colleges here are bound by that standard. There is a critical size and necessary range of activities for a bona fida college. The Cork RTC can meet these criteria but it must serve and be supported by a major catchment area”.

     Mr Roche also commented on the close link between technical education in Cork and University College. A successful example of that had been the Diploma in Chemical Technology, which was highly rated. There had also been the partnership with UCC in a food science diploma. This kind of development, said Mr Roche, was of great significance in the regional context’ “it highlights the need for a real appreciation and understanding of the importance of the RTC in providing education and training at the appropriate levels as a fundamental service to every part of Cork City, Cork County and South County Kerry”.

To be continued…

Captions:

764a. Aerial of Cork City Centre 1975 (source: Local Studies, Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 2 October 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 89) – Planning a Cork RTC”

“In technical education also, good work has been and is being done…for we are entering upon a fiercely competitive era in which skills of all kinds will mean the difference between survival and stagnation. We have plans in that regard too in relation to the technological colleges and the regional technical colleges. If agriculture and industry are to flourish here and for our survival they must do so and the prime necessity for that will be technical skill” (Jack Lynch, The Irish Times, 20 June, 1967, p.7).

Speaking at the official opening of the Christian Brothers’ new national school at Blarney Street on 19 June 1967, the Taoiseach Jack Lynch commented on the importance of the new regional technical colleges. He noted of a shortage of medium grade and higher technicians and that it was for the new colleges to provide skilled men and women with roots in the country; “our national commitment to education will ensure that even if we cannot ever aspire to be numbered among the wealthier nations of the earth, every Irish father and mother can for the future say that their children will be given their chance in the world”.

Between 1965-67 investment in the State’s education was made. Over 130 schools applied for assistance under a new building grants scheme. A total of 25 sites for comprehensive schools were examined. There were over 50 projects for new day vocational schools at various stages of development. The planning of regional technical colleges, costing in total £7m, was ongoing. Tenders had been received for sites at Cork, Limerick, Galway, Sligo, Athlone, Dundalk, Carlow and Waterford.

In late November 1966 an interim architect’s report of Cork’s proposed £2m regional technical college was approved at the meeting of the Cork City Vocational Education Committee. By early January 1968, early indications appeared in the media (Irish Times, 13 January, 1968, p.13) that the Cork college would likely be sited 2 ½ miles from Cork City Centre in the south western suburbs. The CEO of the Cork City Vocational Education Committee Mr Parfrey noted that “by and large it would be post leaving certificate pupils who would be accepted by the college”. It was also planned that the college would also cater for post intermediate students. Confirmation of the site was given in late February 1968. The Minister for Agriculture agreed in principle to the granting of a site for the proposed college on the lands of the Munster Institute at Model Farm Road.

By July 1972 preliminary work had begun on the 48-acre site for Cork’s new regional technical college, near Bishopstown. According to an Irish Times reporter (12 July 1972, p.15), the proposed student population was to rise from an initial 2,000 to about 5,000. Mr Parfrey noted of a major problem that arose that of the provision of student accommodation in the college area. It was initially hoped to open in the summer of 1974 and the college was to be the biggest single modern building in Cork City. There were to be nine departments – science, mechanical engineering and electrical engineering, printing, nautical studies, building, automobile engineering, commerce, general studies and catering. A total of 260,000 feet was to be covered by the college, which was to have 30 laboratories, 56 classrooms, 36 workshops, 13 drawing offices and 36 specialist rooms with close circuit television. A planned sports complex was to include a swimming pool and squash courts. Space was also to be provided for five playing fields, three tennis courts, a basketball court and a sport’s hall. It was also flagged in the media that some of the smaller schools under the VEC would close eventually. However, the Cork Municipal School of Music and Crawford Municipal School of Art would continue as they were. On 1 August 1974, it was recorded by the Irish Times that 140 CIE trailers had began moving furniture into the new Cork college.

The mission statements for the Regional Technical College in Cork were also rooted in part in the Buchanan Report. Dáil Éireann archived speeches in May 1969 reveal that Colin Buchanan and Partners, the English architects and town planners, were commissioned by the United Nations on behalf of the Government of Ireland in 1966 to undertake studies of the nine planning regions in the Republic and to provide physical development policies for these regions. The consultants’ final report, Regional Studies in Ireland, and the two accompanying technical volumes, Regional Development in Ireland, were published in 1968.

The reports covered an extensive range of topics, such as population and population forecasts, employment and employment forecasts, migration and migration forecasts, industry, tourism, agriculture, transport, utilities, power, housing, and infrastructure. However, the Buchanan Report is most widely known for its policy recommendations and particularly the proposed strategy of promoting growth centres. The Buchanan Report singled out Dublin, Cork and Limerick-Shannon as main centres and Waterford, Dundalk, Drogheda, Galway, Sligo, and Athlone as part of a second tier of growth centres. The consequent debate about this policy was extensive, and the Government finally decided upon a policy of more dispersed development in 1972.

To be continued…

Caption:

762a. Aerial photograph of Cork Regional Technical College, 1975 (source: Aerial photograph collection, local studies, Cork City Library)