Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent,  27 August 2015

Kieran’s Heritage Week Tours, 22-30 August 2015

We’re into the final few days of National Heritage week. I have two tours left this week:

Friday 28 August 2015 – Cork’s Elegant Suburb, historical walking tour of Sunday’s Well, meet at St Vincent’s Bridge on the North Mall side, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Saturday 29 August – Park Stories, Historical walking tour of Fitzgerald’s Park, meet at band stand in park, 2pm (free, duration: two hours).

   With regard to the Sunday’s Well tour, I am a big fan of St Vincent’s Church. The site of the church was donated to the Vincentian Fathers by a Miss Mary Mac Swiney of Sunday’s Well. The plans for the church were prepared by Sir John Benson whose other works, included the building of thirty bridges in County Cork, the re-construction of the North Gate Bridge, the city’s Athenaeum which was later converted into the Opera House, just to mention a few. The original plans of the church were to be dominated by a large ornate spire. However, owing to its cost of construction, it was not incorporated into the building. Instead, twin turrets were added.

    The proposals also set out designs for the building of a house for missions and retreats. The funds were collected by the very Rev. Michael O’ Sullivan, who was Vicar-General of the Diocese at the time and who had become a Vincentian on 1 February, 1848. The foundation stone was laid on 24 October 1851 on the Feast of St Raphael, by Rev. Dr. Delaney, Bishop of the Diocese. Two years later in 1853, disaster struck. The walls had now been built and the church was partially roofed, when a terrible catastrophe occurred. On 4 November 1853, a powerful storm swept away the roof and stonework. This provoked the sympathy and support of the people of Cork and many friends in the south of Ireland. At a public meeting in the city, the Vincentians collected £700. A bazaar was organised by the Ladies of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul and this raised £600. The Archdiocese of Dublin sent £100 and the dioceses of Munster also sent a large contribution. Subsequently, the church was soon re-built and opened.

   On 20 July, 1856, St. Vincent’s was re-dedicated. Dr. Delaney performed the ceremony and celebrated the Solemn High Mass while the sermon was said by the most Rev. Dr. Dixon, Archbishop of Armagh. The Archbishop of Dublin and seven bishops were present. The church itself was only consecrated on 14 October 1906. The old High Altar, which has been replaced by a modern liturgical altar, was of marble and Caen Stone. The Tabernacle was surrounded by a decorative canopy and spire. Today, a small ornate altar exists.

    The Passion Altar is also of Caen stone and varied marbles. The story of the Passion is carved behind the altar. The left hand side altar (facing the main altar) displays the Pieta, Mary holding Christ in her arms. The right hand side altar is dedicated to Mary, mother of Christ and is comprised of Cobh and Midleton Marbles, with Connemara green. This contrasts well to the rest of the Church’s silican white, black and gold marble. It was in the 1960s that the old High Altar was changed to a new more modern altar.

   One of the main features of St Vincent’s Church is its stained glass windows. For example, the eastern window has the Blessed Virgin in the centre; St Joseph and St Patrick stand on her right and on her left hand, St Vincent and St FinBarre. The rest of the window represents the life of St Vincent. Another feature is the organ, which was originally built by Messrs Telford, Dublin in 1859. This was divided into two sections by Messrs Magahy and Son, Cork, in 1904.

   The sacristy was a gift from Fr Sean Campell C.M., was opened in 1900 and is composed of two pictures, St. Patrick and St. FinBarre on its side walls. Both are of the Munich School of Art. The Stations of the Cross were presented in 1856, to the most Rev. Dr. Gilooly, Bishop of Elphin, who as a young priest worked as a builder of St. Vincent’s Church. Indeed, it is noted that the main body of the church was not completed until 1886 under the direction of new plans by Samuel F Hynes. Hynes was part of a wider group of late nineteenth-century architects employed to create new symbolism for the Catholic Church which was growing in strength since the passing of the Catholic Emancipation Act in 1829. Hynes was an architect of great experience, and had been involved in the re-building or design of additions in several churches within the Cork area and wider afield. He re-interpreted a smaller version of Cormac’s Chapel for Gougane Barra. Samuel Hynes, who completed much work for the Diocese of Cork and further afield. He was involved in the design of eight churches over a sixteen year period. The eight churches, somewhat similar in design, created a forum for engaging with the Catholic Church and its character.

Captions:

807a. Interior of St Vincent’s Church (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

807b. Samuel Hynes, architect, who prepared the plans to finish off the interior of St Vincent’s Church in 1886 (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article, 

Cork Independent, 23 July 2015

Shandon and Blackpool Historical Walking Tours

    I have two more summer walking tours coming up – this time the focus is on the Shandon and Blackpool area – Friday evening, 24 July is the Shandon historical walking tour; discover the city’s historical quarter; learn about St Anne’s Church and the development of the butter market and the Shandon Street area; meet at North Gate Bridge, 6.45pm (free, duration: two hours). The second walking tour weaves through Blackpool, Thursday evening 30 July 2015; from Fair Hill to the heart of Blackpool, learn about nineteenth century shambles, schools, convents and industries, meet at the North Mon gates, Gerald Griffin Avenue, 6.45pm (free, duration: two hours).

  The walking tours intertwine from Shandon into Blackpool and Gurranbraher highlighting several centuries of life in these corners of historic Cork from education to housing to politics, to religion, to industry and to social life itself. Tradition is one way to sum up the uniqueness of Shandon Street. Despite being a physical street, one can stroll down (or clamber up), the thoroughfare holds a special place in the hearts of many Corkonians. The legacy of by-gone days is rich. The street was established by the Anglo-Normans as a thoroughfare to give access to North Gate Drawbridge and was originally known as Mallow Lane. Shandon Street locals identify with the special old qualities of the street. Different architectural styles reflect not only the street’s long history but also Cork’s past.

  In the time of the Anglo Normans establishing a fortified walled settlement and a trading centre in Cork around 1200 A.D., North Gate Drawbridge formed one of the three entrances –South Gate and Watergate being the others. North Gate Drawbridge was a wooden structure and was annually subjected to severe winter flooding, being almost destroyed in each instance. In May 1711, agreement was reached by the council of the City that North Gate Bridge be rebuilt in stone in 1712 while in 1713, South Gate Bridge would be replaced with a stone arched structures. The new North and South Gate bridges were designed and built by George Coltsman, a Cork City stone mason/ architect.

  Between 1713 and the early 1800s, the only structural work completed on North Gate Bridge was the repairing and widening of it by the Corporation of Cork. It was in 1831 that they saw that the structure was deteriorating and deemed it unsafe as a river crossing for horses, carts, and coaches. Hence in October 1861, the plans by Cork architect Sir John Benson for a new bridge were accepted. In April 1863, the foundation stone for the new bridge was laid. The new bridge was to be a cast-iron structure with the iron work completed by Ranking & Co. of Liverpool. An ornate Victorian style was incorporated into the new structure with features such as ornamental lamp posts and iron medallions depicting Queen Victoria, Albert the Prince Consort, Daniel O’ Connell, the Irish Liberator and Sir Thomas Moore, the famous English poet. The new North Gate Bridge was officially opened on 17 March, St Patrick’s Day 1864 by the Mayor John Francis Maguire in the company of Sir John Benson, the designer and Barry McMullen, the contractor. Nearly 100 years later – circa early 1960s, the bridge would have to be reconstructed again due to increased traffic.

  On 6 November 1961, the new and present day bridge, of concrete slabs was opened by Lord Mayor, Antony Barry TD accompanied by the Parish Priest of SS. Peter’s and Paul’s Church, the Rev. Canon J. Fehily who blessed the structure before it was opened. The new bridge was named Griffith Bridge in honour of Arthur Griffith head of the Irish delegation at the negotiations in London that produced the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921.

    There are multiple layers of history around the Shandon quarter. Amongst them is the story of the great butter market. By the mid 1700s, the native butter industry in Cork had grown to such an extent due to British empire expansion that it was decided among the main city and county butter merchants that an institution be established in the city that would control and develop its potential. The Committee of Butter Merchants located themselves in a simple commissioned building adjacent to Shandon. The committee comprised 21 members who were chosen by the merchants in the city.

    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 Tannery and distilling through families such 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 also times of determination to survive against the odds.

 See you on the tours!

Captions:

 802a. View of recent Shandon Street Festival 2015 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

 802b. View of recent Shandon Street Festival 2015 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

I have two more summer walking tours coming up – this time the focus is on the Shandon and Blackpool area – Friday evening, 24 July is the Shandon historical walking tour; discover the city’s historical quarter; learn about St Anne’s Church and the development of the butter market and the Shandon Street area; meet at North Gate Bridge, 6.45pm (free, duration: two hours). The second walking tour weaves through Blackpool, Thursday evening 30 July 2015; from Fair Hill to the heart of Blackpool, learn about nineteenth century shambles, schools, convents and industries, meet at the North Mon gates, Gerald Griffin Avenue, 6.45pm (free, duration: two hours).

Comments by Cllr Kieran McCarthy

12 June 2015

Forever Summer

  Lord Mayor, can I add to the congratulations on a successful year and to your focus on building community capacity and topics such as equality and social inclusion.

  I met you last week on The Marina, opening the new slip of the Lee Rowing Club.

  We are blessed to live in a very beautiful city, especially now as the new leaves are appearing on our trees.

  I am always impressed by the city’s blossom trees and As each summer rolls around, those trees in places such as the gorgeous Marina and places such as Pearse Road. The summer offers warmth, which your own personality abounds in and offers as well renewal, re-birth, growth, hope, re-imagination and inspiration. The dark evenings end as the daylight lengthens. It’s hard not to romanticise about the blossoms and their effects on all those who drive and walk the local roads.

  They add immensely to the sense of place and identity of this area…their roots spreading into the undulating topography of the city. . It’s as if the blooms want to say ‘remember us’, ‘wonder in us’ be inspired; they are in their own way, part of the city’s cultural DNA, a piece of life, a way of life, the trees are always in flux just like politics and the essence of the chain you hold.

  Cork songwriter John Spillane writes of the cherry blossoms “as putting on the most outrageous clothes and they sing and they dance around”.

 The Vita Cortex workers in their struggle in 2012 commented on the cherry blossoms on Pearse Road;

“They stand tall like us, magnificent in their beauty. They sway in the wind and bend with it but remain unbroken. They have been there lining the street as long as any of us can remember.  For everyone in Ballyphehane they are part of the local landscape and history, The cherry blossom trees on Pearse Road are like sentries guarding the road to the factory; our home, our workplace,

But the trees were no accident in their original planning but part of a wider renewal plan in this area way back in time.

  The stories of Turners Cross & Ballyphehane and other suburbs are also one of re-birth, renewal and experimentation, the creation of new architecture and housing – which defined the ethos of making a Modern Ireland – a Chicago architect’s design for a modern church that of Christ the King – and the planning for the future of new communities, building on successful social housing models in Capwell Road, in the Congress Road area and in Gurranbraher, and just like the framed branches of the blossom trees, creating different scenes, ideas framed the idea of what community should be.

A Re-New-ed Republic:

  A number of the roads in the area are named in honour of famous people. These included the names of the signatories of 1916, Pearse, Connolly, Kent, Clarke, MacDonagh, McDermott, Plunkett. All of whom we will commemorate next year, which the new Lord Mayor will have to negotiate. The line of the blossom trees exaggerate the boulevard-esqueness of Pearse Road just like the edginess of the 1780s Lord Mayor’s chain. Pearse, the first President of the Irish republic, founded the Gaelic league at an early stage and acquired a fluent Knowledge of Irish. In 1903 he became the editor of An Claoimh Solais, the official organ of the Gaelic League. He wrote many stories and poems in Irish.

   The country looks forward to the 1916 commemoration activities, which will ignite renewed interest in the essence of our country, our cultural heritage, our common past, our inheritance and let us aspire to hope, re-birth, re-imagination and inspiration.

  Ireland is trying to emerge a very tough economic phase in its evolution. And much effort is being put into rebuilding the economy whereas less effort is being put into rebuilding society

The country, yes, badly an economic plan but so do Irish communities.

 Lord Mayor you headed up the passing of our development plan over the last few months, which will go along way in pushing this fair city forward

  Our communities need a plan to create a better society, something that is better that what we left during the now mythic Celtic Tiger days. During your year, you and your colourful and energetic Deputy Lord Mayor, Cllr O’Flynn, espoused the need to take responsibility for part of this plan.

 Society leaders like yourself are like giant spotlights in the sky; they can and will continue to uphold human values for all to see and replicate, they can send out the message that we do need to care – care about something… to do something purposeful…to move ourselves forward… to hone our personal talents, which we all have or even seek advice.

 Today’s Society needs all of those traits in abundance.

 Lord Mayor I welcome you back to the benches and thank you for a great year of inspiration. 

Go raibh maith agat.