Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 15 August 2013

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

704a. Former Donnybrook Woollen Mills, built 1866

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent,  15 August 2013

Kieran’s Heritage Week, 17-25 August 2013

 

National Heritage Week is upon us again at the end of next week (17th – 25th 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 18 August 2013 –Making a Venice of the North, Exploring Eighteenth Century Cork City (new tour), explore a world of canals, and eighteenth century Cork society, meet at City Library, Grand Parade, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Monday 19 August 2012 – Shandon Historical Walking Tour, Discover one of the City’s key historical quarters; learn about St Anne’s Church and the development of butter market and the Shandon Street area, meet at North Gate Bridge, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Tuesday 20 August 2013- Blackpool Historical Walking Tour, From Fair Hill to the heart of Blackpool, learn about nineteenth century shambles, schools, convents and industries, meet at North Mon gates, Gerald Griffin Avenue, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Thursday 22 August 2013 – From a Workhouse to a Hospital, The Story of St Finbarr’s Hospital, Discover the history of the workhouse, meet at entrance gate, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Friday 23 August 2013, “Where the future and the past meet, A historical walking tour of Mahon, to mark the 100th anniversary of Dunlocha Cottages” (new tour), meet at Blackrock Garda Station, top of Avenue De Rennes, Mahon, 7pm (free, duration: 1 ½ hours).

Sunday 25 August 2013,  Douglas Historical Walking Tour, Discover about the sailcoth and woollen mills, meet at St. Columba’s Church Car Park, Douglas, 2pm (free, duration: two hours).

The story of Douglas and its environs seems to be in part a story of experimentation, of industry and of people, and social improvement; the story of one of Ireland’s largest sailcloth factories is a worthwhile topic to explore in terms of its aspirations in the eighteenth century;  that coupled with the creation of 40 or so seats or mansions and demesnes made it a place where the city’s merchants made their home it 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.

The District of Douglas takes its names from the river or rivulet bearing the Gaelic word Dubhghlas or dark stream. 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 Sail Cloth Factory was begun to be built. Samuel Perry and Francis Carleton became the first proprietors. The factory is said to have been founded by a colony of Huguenot weavers from Fermanagh. The eighteenth century was a golden age for wooden sailing ships, before the 1800s made steam and iron prerequisites for modern navies and trading fleets.  The era was also a golden age too for maritime exploration, with the voyages of James Cook amongst others opening up the Pacific and the South Seas.

Indeed by 1810, William West in a travelogue of Ireland states that upwards of 1,000 hands were employed in the extensive concern belonging to Messrs Besnard & Sons, who also at a short distance had an extensive ropeworks. They had several grants for sailcloth and spindles through the Napoleonic Wars. In 1817, Peter Besnard (eldest son of Julius) was appointed Inspector General for the provinces of Leinster, Munster and Connaught in succession to Charles Duffin. There were also industries also at Dunmanway and Innishannon where up to 60,000 people were employed in Ireland.

The Besnard family discontinued flax spinning before 1830, but they continued to work in the linen trade. In 1824, Besnard and Herrick with an address in Perry Street, Cork were large shippers of brown and white linen and beetled hollands. The firm was in business until at least 1830, and up to that time were apparently the most influential shippers in Munster.  By 1837, the business had declined owing to English competition, but the manufacture was being carried on, together with a trade in cordage (cords or ropes, especially the ropes in the rigging of a ship), which was held in high repute.

After a gap of 40 years the Patent Hemp Spinning Company of Wallis and Pollock, Douglas introduced mechanised flax-spinning into the area. They established themselves within the former Douglas sailcloth factory, erected scotching machinery and encouraged flax cultivation. They destroyed the eighteenth and nineteenth century buildings and a new 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. Its essential design was modelled closely on contemporary Belfast mills. Its main enclosing walls were built with Youghal brick and are externally faced with Ballinhassig (Ballinphellic) Brick.

In 1883, the factory changed production from flax spinning to woollen manufacture become apparent, when the mill was producing Cork tweeds. In 1889, the mill was bought by James and Patrick Morrogh 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.  To learn more, come along on the walking tour!

 

Captions:

704a. Former Donnybrook Woollen Mills, built 1866 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article, Kieran’s Heritage Week, 17-25 August 2013

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

703a. John Rocque's Map of Cork, 1750

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article, 

Cork Independent, 8 August 2013

Kieran’s Heritage Week, 17-25 August 2013

 

National Heritage Week is upon us again at the end of next week (17th – 25th 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.

Heritage Open Day, Saturday 17 August 2013 – Historical Walking Tour of Cork City Hall; Learn about the early history of Cork City Council; discover the development of the building and visit the Lord Mayor’s Room, 11am, free but ticketed, contact The Everyman Palace, 0214501673 (duration: 75 minutes). 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 9 July 1932.

Heritage Week:

Sunday 18 August 2013 –Making a Venice of the North, Exploring Eighteenth Century Cork City (new tour), explore a world of canals, and eighteenth century Cork society, meet at City Library, Grand Parade, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

For nearly five hundred years (c.1200-c.1690), the walled port town of Cork, built in a swamp and at the lowest crossing point of the River Lee and the tidal area, remained as one of the most fortified and vibrant walled settlements in the expanding British colonial empire. The walls served as a vast repository of meanings, symbolism, iconography and ideology, as well as symbols of order and social relationships. However, economic growth as well as political events in late seventeenth century Ireland, culminating in the destruction of the city’s core in 1690, provided the catalyst for large-scale change within the urban area. The walls were allowed to decay and this was to inadvertently alter much of the city’s physical, social and economic character in the ensuing century. By John Rocque’s Map of Cork in 1759, the walls of Cork were just a memory- the medieval plan was now a small part in something larger – larger in terms of population from 20,000 to 73,000 plus in terms of a new townscape. A new urban text emerged with new bridges, streets, quays, residences and warehouses built to intertwine with the natural riverine landscape. New communities created new social and cultural landscapes to encounter, several of which are explored on my tours for this year’s heritage week.

The 1759 Map is impressive in its detail. John Rocque (c.1705–62) was a cartographer and engraver of European repute. He could count among his achievements maps of London, Paris, Berlin and Rome. In Britain, his many projects included plans of great gardens, several county and provincial city maps and a great and a great, highly innovative, survey of London which resulted in a 16-sheet map of London and its immediate hinterland (1746), and an immense 24-sheet map of the city itself (also 1746), laid out at a very large scale close to 200 feet to an inch.

 

The unofficial title of the Venice of the North was given to Cork in the eighteenth century. This was a type of branding exercise, a cultural code in a sense, a reference by native and foreign merchants that Cork was part of several cities in northern Europe (Saint Petersburg, Amsterdam, Bruges, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Hamburg, and Manchester) that contained canals, all compared to the enduring connection with water in Venice, Italy over many centuries. Cork and other cities in northern Europe were to be conditioned by ideas of the ideal city tradition. During the post medieval centuries European artists and engineers began to represent political and social ideas and concepts in graphic terms. In truth, this encouraged planners to imagine the ideal port city as a complete unit of which the river, harbour, or canal was an integral part, conceptually and figuratively. This tour explores these ideas and how they influenced perception and culture in growing eighteenth century ‘Venices of the North’ such as Cork.

Kieran’s other tours are:

Monday 19 August 2012 – Shandon Historical Walking Tour, Discover one of the City’s key historical quarters; learn about St Anne’s Church and the development of butter market and the Shandon Street area, meet at North Gate Bridge, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Tuesday 20 August 2013- Blackpool Historical Walking Tour, From Fair Hill to the heart of Blackpool, learn about nineteenth century shambles, schools, convents and industries, meet at North Mon gates, Gerald Griffin Avenue, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Thursday 22 August 2013 – From a Workhouse to a Hospital, The Story of St Finbarr’s Hospital, Discover the history of the workhouse, meet at entrance gate, 7pm (free, duration: two hours).

Friday 23 August 2013, “Where the future and the past meet, A historical walking tour of Mahon, to mark the 100th anniversary of Dunlocha Cottages” (new tour), Blackrock Garda Station, top of Avenue De Rennes, Mahon, 7pm (free, duration: 1 ½ hours).

Sunday 25 August 2013,  Douglas Historical Walking Tour, Discover about the sailcoth and woollen mills, meet at St. Columba’s Church Car Park, Douglas, 2pm (free, duration: two hours).

Further details from Kieran McCarthy can be got, if needs be at 0876553389.

 

Caption:

703a. John Rocque’s Map of Cork 1750 (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 1 August 2013

Cork History, Uncategorized

702a. Raising the Irish tricolour, Camden Fort Meagher, 10 July 2013

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent,  1 August 2013

Rescue Camden Fort Meagher

 

It’s hard to imagine that in 2010 community volunteers had to cut their way into Camden Fort Meagher near Crosshaven. The scale of restoration work since then has been remarkable and is a testimony to the spirit and hard work of the whole project team. Passionate and imaginative are perhaps two key terms to describe the work of the community in their ongoing success in re-telling the story of the fort. There are multiple sides in their work from seeing its potential not just for the tourist market but also a way of bringing people together collaboratively and on rebuilding the fort’s sense of place set against the spectacular backdrop of Cork Harbour.

Camden Fort Meagher is internationally recognized as being one of the finest remaining examples of a classical coastal artillery fort in the world. It combines a rich British and Irish military history. I was fortunate recently to be involved in creating a short video on the history of the site driven by the onsite marketing team. Fortifications on this site date back to 1550 and for almost 400 years the fort played an important role as a strong strategic position for the defence of Ireland, the west coast of England and Wales. However, most of what the visitor sees now was built during the 1860s by British Forces and finished around 1871. It has been documented that it took 500 men 40 years to carve out the moat, which goes around three sides of Camden Fort Meagher – as of course on the 4th side one has the harbour.

At the gate to the fort, you can see the original pillars of the fort and they are inscribed with ‘Dun Ni Mhecair’, which is the Irish for Fort Meagher. The fort was named Fort Meagher in 1938 after Thomas Francis Meagher, who was the leader of the Young Irelanders. Ninety years previously in 1848 Meagher and fellow patriot William Smith O’Brien went to France to study revolutionary events there, and returned to Ireland with the new Flag of Ireland, a tricolour of green, white and orange made by and given to them by French women sympathetic to the Irish cause.

A map reproduced for the visitor at the entrance to the fort was originally produced in 1896 by the royal engineer Lieutenant Colonel H. Kirkwood. The fort itself is 45 acres and resources of the fort are 65% underground. There are numerous gunning emplacements that protected the forts on all sides. One of the most interesting facts about the fort is that it once housed one of only eight installations of the Brennan Torpedo worldwide. The Brennan Torpedo was the world’s first practical guided torpedo. Remains of a gunning emplacement show that it housed a heavy mechanical gun and that would have had quite a long range on it. You can also see the remains of pulley bars that would have enabled the pulling and dragging of heavy guns by many men. The bulk of ammunition and shells relevant to each gunning emplacement would have been kept directly underground in a magazine and store.

Further inside the fort, there are the casemated barracks where approximately 240 soldiers would have slept at one time. There were 13 casemated barracks in peace-time and 22 in war time. Some of these rooms have been imaginatively re-used to house exhibitions covering the timelines of British and Irish history at the fort. One of these rooms houses a remarkable photographic exhibition documenting the events of the 9-11 tragedy.

The impressive tunnels, some of which are accessible, were built with a ‘cut and cover’ method, which meant that the workers would dig trenches in the ground, put up support structures, brick over that, then remove the support structures and then fill the earth back over the tunnel. The underground magazine is the biggest chamber in Camden Fort Meagher and was once a store for the forts vast amounts of munitions, approx 30 feet underground. The acoustics in here are intense – this is due to the vaulted ceiling, which was designed to support the weight and stress of the Parade Square which lies above it. You can see the boxes at the gable end here are numbered 2, 3 and 4 – these were light boxes that were secured tightly with glass and putty and would have been lit from an access passage behind the magazine. This kept flames and sparks separate from the munitions for obvious reasons.

The Parade Square at the centre of the fort dates from 1550 right up to 1989. Today the Parade Square is used for re-enactments highlighting different eras and displays. In 1989 the Irish Army handed the fort over to the local authority, Cork County Council. Despite best efforts to restore the fort as a tourism site it became overgrown for almost two decades.  With serious input by a community of volunteers and financial and logistical support from the local authority, Cork County Council has been crucial to the development of the project. Worker placement schemes from FAS and SECAD have also added to this project’s success. Go and visit this great community project.

See www.rescuecamden.ie for more details and opening hours

Caption:

702a. Raising the Irish tricolour, 10 July 2013, an  event to mark the 75th anniversary of the handing over of Fort Camden (now Camden Fort Meagher) by the British to the Irish government in July 1938 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

Blackrock Historical Walking Tour, Saturday 27 July 2013

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

 

As part of ongoing community project into the local history of the south-east ward, Cllr Kieran McCarthy will conduct a historical walking tour of Blackrock Village on Saturday 27 July 2013, 2pm, leaving from Blackrock Castle (approx 2 hours, free event).

 

The earliest and official evidence for settlement in Blackrock dates to c.1564 when the Galway family created what was to become known as Dundanion Castle. Over 20 years later, Blackrock Castle was built circa 1582 by the citizens of Cork with artillery to resist pirates and other invaders. In the early 1700s, the prominent Tuckey family, of which Tuckey Street in the city centre is named, became part of the new social elite in Cork after the Williamite wars and built part of what became known in time at the Ursuline Convent. The building of the Navigation Wall or Dock in the 1760s turned focus to reclamation projects in the area and the eventual creation of public amenity land such as the Marina Walk during the time of the Great Famine. The early 1800s coincided with an enormous investment into creating new late Georgian mansions by many other key Cork families, such as the Chattertons, the Frends, the McMullers, Deanes and the Nash families, amongst others. Soon Blackrock was to have its own bathing houses, schools, hurling club, suburban railway line, and Protestant and Catholic Church. The pier that was developed at the heart of the space led to a number of other developments such as fisherman cottages and a fishing industry. This community is reflected in the 1911 census with 64 fisherman listed in Blackrock.

 

Cllr Kieran McCarthy noted: “A stroll in Blackrock is popular by many people, local and Cork people. The area is particularly characterised by beautiful architecture, historic landscapes and imposing late Georgian and early twentieth century country cottages; every structure points to a key era in Cork’s development. Blackrock is also lucky that many of its former residents have left archives, census records, diaries, old maps and insights into how the area developed, giving an insight into ways of life, ideas and ambitions in the past, some of which can help us in the present day in understanding Blackrock’s identity going forward.”

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 25 July 2013

Cork History, Uncategorized

701a. Nother Jones plaque, Shandon

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

 

Cork Independent, 25 July 2013

 

Spirit of Mother Jones Festival, 30 July-1 August

 

The 2013 Spirit of Mother Jones Festival will run in historic Shandon from Tuesday 30 July to Thursday 1 August 2013. Cork City Council recently declared 1 August as Mother Jones Day.  This international “Shandon Summer School” event will see speakers from Ireland joined by participants from the United Kingdom and the United States, who will attend to discuss issues associated with social justice, labour and union history. These were issues close to the heart of Cork born Mary Harris known throughout the world as Mother Jones.

 

In 2012 Shandon was the location for the inaugural Mother Jones Festival, which celebrated the 175th Anniversary of the birth of Mary Harris nearby. A beautiful plaque was unveiled at last year’s event and this will also be the focal point for the 2013 festival. The entire event was hugely successful, attracting large crowds, receiving media coverage throughout Ireland and America and placing the ancient Shandon quarter in international focus.

 

The Cork Mother Jones Committee felt Shandon should continue to celebrate and honour Mother Jones by providing a platform to highlight and discuss labour history, trade union issues and social justice in the setting of the very birthplace of Mary Harris. The Shandon festival/summer school will have a mixture of speakers, lectures discussions, films a parade of banners, music and songs associated with these struggles over three days.

 

On Tuesday evening, 30 July, the Chairperson of the Hillsborough Family Support Group, Margaret Aspinall, will speak on the traumatic events, which took place at the Hillsborough Stadium on 15 April 1989, when 96 Liverpool supporters lost their lives. Margaret’s son James was among those who never came home from that game. The Festival committee are pleased to announce that the recipient of the Spirit of Mother Jones Award for 2013 is Ms Aspinall (google youtube video, Campaigning Mum of the Year 2013).

 

Wednesday afternoon, 31 July, will see Ken Fleming of SIPTU and an Inspector with the International Transport Workers Federation (ITF) give a lecture on the exploitation of some seafarers on vessels in Irish ports. Later that evening Padraig Yeates, journalist, writer and author of the book “Lockout”, an account of the bitter workers strike in 1913, will give a lecture on the Dublin Lockout. The Lockout was a watershed in Irish political and labour history. Padraig Yeates is an expert on this period in Irish history. His centenary lecture will take place at 7pm on Wednesday 31 August at the Firkin Crane. The Dublin Lockout lecture will be introduced by Joe O’Flynn General Secretary of SIPTU formerly the Irish Transport and General Workers Union, which was founded by James Larkin. Luke Dineen will present his paper on the Cork Strike and Lockout of 1909 at the Firkin Crane to be held also on Wednesday afternoon. This very significant but largely forgotten strike had a major influence on the later Dublin Lockout. 

 

On Thursday 1 August, Mother Jones Day, Professor Simon Cordery of Western Illinois University will deliver the annual Mother Jones lecture. Simon has written extensively on the activities of Mother Jones and recently completed a book entitled Mother Jones “Raising Cain and Consciousness”.

 

Jim Nolan, one of the organizer had commented: “All the speakers will present in their different ways a common thread through history of ordinary people and families fighting for basic rights whether in their work places or in their daily lives as epitomised by the spirit of Mother Jones who spent most of her life defending the rights of workers and their families in the United States of America”.

 

The festival will see Andy Irvine return to Cork to perform a special concert in honour of Mother Jones at the Firkin Crane on Thursday 1 August. Richard T Cooke will present a special Mother Jones Festival tribute concert also at the Firkin Crane on Wednesday evening 31 July. Actor Jer O’Leary will perform a Jim Larkin monologue while the famous Cork Singers Club will render a series of songs associated with Mother Jones at the Maldron Hotel. Jimmy Crowley, legendary Cork singer and songwriter will present a workshop entitled “Songs of a Beautiful City” at the Maldron Hotel. Also playing at the Maldron Hotel will be Hank Wedel and Two Time Polka. The event will culminate with the famous Butter Exchange Band performing a recital of music associated with Mother Jones at the plaque on John Redmond Street on 1 August.

 

All are welcome to attend this unique event, which forms part of the “Gathering” events in Cork City in 2013 and part of a wider series of festivals and events taking place in Shandon throughout this year. All events are free; walk in on a first come first served basis (with the exception of the Andy Irvine fundraising concert, see www.tickets.ie). For further detailed information, google www.motherjonescork.com

 

Don’t forget the historical walking tour of Blackrock village, Saturday 27 August, 2pm, leaving from Blackrock Castle (free, two hours). In addition, Cork Heritage open Day takes on Saturday 17 August followed by National Heritage Week; for details of my events, see heritage events under www.corkheritage.ie

 

 

Caption:

 

701a. Mother Jones plaque Shandon, unveiled in 2012 (source:www.motherjonescork.com)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, Historical Walking Tour of Blackrock, 27 July 2013

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

700a. Dunlocha Cottages, 2013

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 18 July 2013

Historical Walking Tour of Blackrock, 27 July 2013

 

On Saturday 27 July 2013, I am running a historical walking tour of Blackrock Village (free, meet 2pm, Blackrock Castle, approx two hours). Within the story of Blackrock and its environs, one can write about a myriad of topics from its connection to the river and the harbour to its former mini demesne type landscape in the nineteenth century to its heart of a small village of hard working labourers and fishermen who struggled to survive.

This year as well, the residents of Dunlocha Cottages are celebrating the centenary of the cottages being built in 1913. They plan to host an event on Saturday 24 August to mark it. The cottages were developed by the Cork Rural District, which existed through Public Health Acts of the late 1800s giving them authority to improve public health in the areas they represented and Labourers Acts of the late 1800s, which them authority to clear slum like areas and build new houses for the poorer classes.

            Searching through newspapers and Cork street directories reveals that the Cork Rural District comprised 65 representatives from 30 areas in Cork’s metropolitan area (averaging two representatives per area). Their work was funded by a portion of the rates of ratepayers in the city and county. On two of Dunlocha Cottages are two plaques to Richard Wallace and Daniel Coakley, which serve to remember the two councillors involved in pushing for the creation of the cottages. According to the census of 1911, Richard Wallace lived in Blackrock and was a reputable carrier agent for the Cork Macroom Railway with his office at Marlboro Chambers, (that lovely red bricked building with YMCA inscribed on it). He was 37 years of age, was 13 years married to Elizabeth with three young kids, 11, 9, and 3.  In 1911, Daniel Coakley, lived in Ballinure, was 58 years of age, 35 years married to Hannah, with six grown up children in their twenties. Daniel was a market gardener in Ballinure in Mahon. The Blackrock rural district area was a large one and extended from Mahon through Blackrock, Ballintemple and Ballinlough to the Cross Douglas Road.

            Both Richard Wallace and Daniel Coakley were busy public representatives. In the three years previous to the opening of the cottages, Wallace was a member of the Board of Guardians in the Cork Union on Douglas Road and was quite well aware from that as well what was needed to improve the poverty of his constituents. Daniel Coakley was the same through his work as a hard slog market gardener. In 1913, at the heart of Blackrock Village and environs was a slum-like centre. Over 2,500 people lived in over 400 houses. Several decades earlier ninety families are recorded as living in one roomed cottages, 260 in two rooms and just over 200 in three or more rooms, the average number of persons to a bed were three. The census of 1911 shows a tight knit community with a myriad of occupations, 64 registered fishermen, and several involved in agricultural labour, shipping, carpentry, smithies. In other words there was a hard working population who strove to provide for young families. The average age of heads of households of Blackrock in the 1911 census was between 40 and 45.

            As early as April 1910, Daniel Coakley remarked at a district council meeting that land needed to be bought in Blackrock to provide spaces for new houses to relieve some of the conditions. However, buying property was expensive and the proposal to buy a field called Jameson’s Field in Blackrock was expensive. From 1910 through to the end of 1913, the field was to be a common item on the agenda of the District Council.

            The field was named after Richard Longfield Jameson who had leased the property from the Chatterton family of Castlemahon in the nineteenth century plus then sublet it again; both the Chattertons and Richard lost their lands through the collapse of their rent schemes during the time of the great famine. The Chatterton family suffered financial problems and lived more frugally in Dorset and, from 1852 at Rolls Park in Essex. However the name of Jameson stuck. The lands were sold off by the Encumbered Estates project in the post Great Famine years. Richard Longfield Jameson had several valuable houses, and premises, situated on the South Mall, Morrison’s Island, Queen Street and Logan Street in the City of Cork. His property was sold in fifteen lots. By 1910, the lands in Blackrock were the property of Dr Edward Magner, a medical doctor, living in Ballinure, who had a practice on the South Mall. During 1910 at various meetings of the district council, the protection and enhancement of people’s lives seem to fuel the passion of Richard Wallace and Daniel Coakley.

            By the time Dunlocha cottages were built, the number of cottages the Rural District Council had built in previous years was nearly 1,400 and they had 85 in hand including the Jameson Field project. In the bigger picture, nationally, since 1866 5,500 houses had been built accommodating 4,600 families at a cost of £700,000 or about E.45m in today’s money. In otherwords, the Cork Rural District Council was a key runner in Ireland in the provision of new cottages.

 

Caption:

700a. Dunlocha Cottages, 2013 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Articles, 11 July 2013

Cork History, Uncategorized

699a. City of Cork VEC administration staff posing for official photograph, Crawford Art Gallery, 27 June 2013

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 11 July 2013

Technical Memories (Part 59) – Serving a City

 

Standing recently in the sculpture gallery of the Crawford Art Gallery, the William Crawford statue provided the podium setting for the final public gathering to mark and remember the work of the work of the Cork City Vocational Educational Committee. As this column works through the work of the former Crawford Municipal Technical Institute and its connection to the VEC through the years, it is also appropriate to mark the end of the VEC era this week.

After 84 years of service to communities across Ireland the 33 remaining VECs finally ended their long and illustrious journey on 1 July 2013 when they ceased to exist and were replaced by 16 Education and Training Boards (ETBs).  Standing under the William Crawford statue in the sculpture gallery, the City of Cork VEC Ted Owens introduced the speakers for the event. Perhaps what was apt was that the William Crawford statue came from the boardroom of the Cork Savings Bank in February 1958, the same month the VEC opened offices in the Crawford Art Gallery.

Lord Mayor, Cllr Catherine Clancy, commented on the interconnections between the past and present functions of the Crawford Art Gallery.  The building has been built over the past 300 years in four different sections, for different functional reasons. Yet it still manages to be married seamlessly into one coherent unit. Higher education establishments grew out of the building. In 1827, the old Custom House was given to the Royal Cork Institution, with the object of “diffusing knowledge and the application of science to the common purposes in life”. The institution campaigned for and was successful in seeing Queen’s College Cork established and opened by 1849.

Part of the custom house became a Government School of Design in 1850 and a magnificent extension, housing studios and galleries were added in 1884 to accommodate the growing number of students. The school was re-named the Crawford School of Art under the stewardship of the Technical Instruction Committee in 1899 and in another part the Crawford Art Gallery opened.

In 1930, the Technical Instruction Committee was replaced by the Vocational Education Committee, and the City of Cork VEC continued to operate the School of Art until 1979, when the transfer of the Old Crawford Technical Institute to the new Regional Technical College (RTC) in Bishopstown allowed it to move to Sharman Crawford Street. In 1993, the VEC was divested of the RTC, College of Art and School of Music to create another third-level educational body, the Cork Institute of Technology. Over the next six years, the committee, despite falling second level enrolments, managed to nearly double its full-time enrolments to almost 6,000 students by offering a range of new and exciting Further Education Courses. So successful had the VEC been in the this area that the first purpose further education college in Ireland was St John’s College of Further Education College. In 2000, the Crawford Gallery further expanded its gallery space by creating a new exhibition wing. Continued staff growth had meant that the VEC administration was scattered over a number of locations in the city and in 2006 also, these were combined in new headquarters in Lavitt’s Quay, freeing up more space for the gallery.

Cllr Jim Corr, the key note speaker, spoke about the ongoing and progressive contributions of the VEC to the provision of diverse aspects of education and training for all sections of the city’s communities. He noted that: “the records of this VEC show that a great cross-section of people; from the world of politics, teaching, commerce and community development have been members of this committee and have promoted progressive initiatives, designed to enhance the personal lives of individual people and to advance the economic, social and cultural life of our city”.

Cllr Corr has been a member of the City of Cork VEC for 39 years. He detailed that when he joined the committee, it was in the process of purchasing an expansive 44 acre site in Bishopstown for what today is the Cork Institute of Technology. In time new second level schools were built – for boys on Tramore Road called Coláiste Stiofáin Naofa, the Nagle College in Mahon and for boys and girls in MacSwiney College in Knocknaheeny. A Gael Colaiste, Colaiste Daibhéad, was established, which had numerous homes but is now located just off the South Terrace. Outreach centres were established for early school leavers, a school for the training of the travelling community, educational services in Cork prison and the committee assisted in the establishment and operation of youth and sports centres throughout the city. They also put in place provisions to assist people who were experiencing problems with literacy and numeracy. They were also one of the first pioneering VEC’s to introduce the concept of “Further Education”. The concept is about to become an independent sector in the overall national provision for education and training.

Cllr Corr also praised the work of former CEOs, Paddy Parfrey and Dick Langford and current CEO Ted Owens and former and present day administration and teaching staff. He wished that the “spirit of co-operation and commitment to people” and their educational and training needs would be characteristic of the new Educational Training Boards.

To be continued…

 

Caption:

699a. City of Cork VEC administration staff, posing for an official photograph, Crawford Art Gallery, 27 June 2013 (picture: Kieran McCarthy)