Originally built for the Dublin International Exhibition of Arts and Manufactures of 1865, the structure is converted into the central building of University College Dublin (UCD) at the foundation of the National University of Ireland in 1908. When UCD begins to relocate to a new campus at Belfield in the 1960s, part of the building is converted, and reopened as the National Concert Hall in 1981. Since then, the structure has been shared with UCD. In 2005 it is announced that UCD is to relocate all of its faculties to Belfield in the near term, allowing the NCH to develop a major expansion plan on the entire site, bringing it in line with international peers.
Today the National Concert Hall is one of Ireland’s National Cultural Institutions, under the aegis of the Irish Government‘s Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht and, as such, is grant-aided by the Irish Government. The National Concert Hall is a statutory corporate body, with a management team, and a Government-appointed Board.
Although its facade is quite impressive, the venue’s architectural acoustics have been criticized. It is also unsuitable for large-scale opera stagings, lacking full stage facilities. Consequently, calls for a purpose-built venue are made from time to time.
Due to its central location, lunchtime concerts and recitals are common and attended by many workers from nearby office buildings. During the summer, outdoor recitals are given in the adjacent Iveagh Gardens. The resident orchestra is the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra. Other regular performances are made from the rest of the RTÉ Performing Groups.
The National Concert Hall generally makes a small surplus, unlike most of Ireland’s National Cultural Institutions. This is despite the fact that although it has a high level of attendance, it has only a small public funding element, especially compared to the Abbey Theatre.
Irish Press Ltd. is officially registered on September 4, 1928, three years before the paper is first published, to create a newspaper independent of the existing media where the Independent Newspapers group is seen as supporting Cumann na nGaedheal/Fine Gael, and The Irish Times being pro-union, and with a mainly middle-class or Protestant readership.
The paper’s first issue is published on the eve of the 1931 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final between Cork and Kilkenny. Other newspapers do not cover GAA sports in any detail at the time. Margaret Pearse, the mother of Patrick and Willie Pearse, presses the button to start the printing presses. The initial aim of its publisher is to achieve a circulation of 100,000 which it quickly accomplishes. It goes on to list 200,000 subscribers at its peak.
The money to launch the Irish Press is raised in the United States during the Irish War of Independence by a bond drive to finance the First Dáil. Five million dollars is raised; however, 60 percent of this money is left in various banks in New York City. No one knows why de Valera ordered the bulk of the money to be left in New York when he returned to Ireland in late 1920.
In 1927, as a result of legal action between the Irish Free State government and de Valera, a court in New York orders that the bond holders be paid back outstanding money due to them. However, de Valera’s legal team has anticipated the ruling and has prepared for the outcome. A number of circulars are sent to the bond holders asking them to sign over their holdings to de Valera. The bond holders are paid 58 cents to the dollar. This money is then used as startup capital to launch the Irish Press. Following the 1933 Irish General Election, de Valera uses his Dáil Éireann majority to pass a measure allowing the bond holders to be paid the remaining 42 percent of the money still owed.
In December 1931, editor Frank Gallagher is prosecuted by an Irish Free State military tribunal for publishing articles alleging that Garda Síochána had mistreated the Anti-Treaty republicans of the Irish Free State government. This is facilitated by Amendment 17 of the Constitution of the Irish Free State and Gallagher is convicted and fined £50. An example of animosity from those who support Independent Newspapers and the Free State government is that the Irish Press is excluded from the special train which delivers newspapers from Dublin to the countryside. As a result, it is circulated throughout Ireland by a specially rented train.
The Irish Press sustains itself with its own resources until The Sunday Press is founded in 1949. In its heyday, the Irish Press has a number of first-rate reporters and columnists. One notable section, New Irish Writing is edited by David Marcus.
In the 1970s, the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, Conor Cruise O’Brien, tries to use and amend The Emergency Powers Act and Section 31 of the Broadcasting Authority Act, to censor coverage of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. The Irish Press editor, Tim Pat Coogan, publishes editorials attacking the Bill. The Fine Gael/Labour Coalition Government tries to prosecute the Irish Press for its coverage of the maltreatment of republican prisoners by the Garda “Heavy Gang,” with the paper winning the case.
The Irish Press starts two further newspapers, the Evening Press (1954), and The Sunday Press. The Evening Press is aimed at an urban readership and achieves a daily circulation of 100,000. The new newspapers subsidise the Irish Press when its circulation sags. Its adoption of a tabloid format does not rescue its declining circulation.
The final issue of the Irish Press and Evening Press is on Thursday, May 25, 1995. The newspapers close because of a bizarre industrial dispute over the sacking of the group business editor, Colm Rapple. The group has not been in a healthy financial state for several years. When it eventually closes, with indebtedness of £20 million, 600 people lose their jobs.
(Pictured: Cover of last ever edition of the Irish Press from May 25, 1995)
Michael “Mick” Lally, Irish stage, film and television actor, dies in Dublin on August 31, 2010. He departs from a teaching career for acting during the 1970s. Though best known in Ireland for his role as Miley Byrne in the television soap Glenroe, his stage career spans several decades, and he is involved in feature films such as Alexander and the Academy Award-nominated The Secret of Kells. Many reports cite him as one of Ireland’s finest and most recognisable actors.
In 1982, Lally stars in the TV series The Ballroom of Romance alongside Brenda Fricker. From 1983 he plays the role of Miley Byrne in the RTÉ soap Glenroe, reprising the character that he played earlier in Bracken in 1978. In 1979, he wins a Jacob’s Award for his performance as Miley in Bracken. He also has some musical success when “The By-road to Glenroe” goes to the top of the Irish charts in 1990. He is also involved in voice-over work, including a noted advertisement for Kilmeaden Cheese during the 1990s. Other TV appearances include roles in Tales of Kinvarna, The Year of the French and Ballykissangel.
In 1994, Lally plays the character Hugh in The Secret of Roan Inish, and in 1995 portrays Dan Hogan in the film adaptation of Maeve Binchy‘s Circle of Friends. Other film roles included Poitín, Our Boys, The Outcasts, A Man of No Importance and others. In later years, he provides the voice of Brother Aidan in the Academy Award-nominated The Secret of Kells, an animated film directed by Tomm Moore.
Lally appears in several TV advertisements encouraging elderly people to “release the equity tied up in their homes” during the Celtic Tiger.
Mick Lally dies on the morning of August 31, 2010, after a short stay in the hospital. The cause of death is reported as heart failure, arising from an underlying emphysema condition. His funeral takes place in Dublin on September 2, 2010. The Irish Examiner comments that the “nation has lost one of its favourite uncles.” Personalities from TV, film, theatre and politics attend, while President of IrelandMary McAleese sends a letter and Lally receives a standing ovation at the end.
By the middle of August, the Provisional Government of the Irish Free State under Collins has control of Dublin. Collins himself has established a Criminal Investigation Department based at Oriel House, Westland Row. These former IRA Volunteers, turned Free Staters, acquire a ruthless reputation and become known to republicans as the Oriel House Gang. They are plain-clothed and heavily armed and Oriel House is notorious for ill-treatment of republican prisoners held there. Accounts of the killings of August 26 indicate that the Oriel House Gang is responsible.
The day after Collins is assassinated, Richard Mulcahy, Chief of Staff of the Free State Army, sends a message to his soldiers. He urges them to “stand calmly by your posts” and says, “Let no cruel act of reprisal blemish your bright honour.” Yet in Dublin, within days of that message, and as the body of Collins lay in state in City Hall, Free State forces carry out atrocities which have been almost totally forgotten.
Following the assassination at Béal na mBláth on August 22, Collins’s body is brought to Dublin and lay in state in City Hall. On August 26, a short distance away from City Hall where crowds are still filing past the coffin, Bernard Daly is working as a bartender in Hogan’s licensed premises in Suffolk Street. At about 3:30 PM three armed men enter the pub and arrest Daly at gunpoint. He is dragged to the cellar and then taken away in a Ford car.
Plain-clothed, armed men travelling in a large Ford car, possibly some or all of the same individuals, are responsible for the second summary execution of August 26. Seán Cole of Lower Buckingham Street and Alf Colley of Parnell Street are officers of Fianna Éireann, the republican youth organisation. They are arrested at Annesley Bridge and taken to Yellow Lane, Whitehall. They suffer the same fate as Bernard Daly, only this time there are witnesses.
The Irish News reports that soon after 6:00 PM, a group of children and young people playing on the road are surprised when a large Ford car comes to a sharp halt. There are five or six men inside – Cole and Colley and their abductors. The two Fianna members are forced out of the car while the crowd is held back at gunpoint. One of the Free Staters tries to open a gate to a field, which is presumably to be the site of the executions, but the gate is locked.
Cole and Colley are placed with their backs to the gate, held in position and killed with revolver shots to the body and head. Their killers then drive away from the scene.
The sites of the executions of Bernard Daly, Seán Cole and Alf Colley are marked by small memorials.
(Pictured: Seán Cole and Alf Colley – summarily executed in revenge for death of Michael Collins)
Maureen Toal, stage and television actress whose professional career lasts for more than sixty years, dies on August 24, 2012.
Toal is born in Fairview, Dublin on September 7, 1930. She begins performing at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin in 1946, when she is just sixteen years old. She becomes a fixture at the theater, portraying some of the strongest roles on the stage including Bessie Burgess in The Plough and the Stars and the Widow Quinn in The Playboy of the Western World. She also appears in several one woman shows, including Baglady, which is written by Irish playwrightFrank McGuinness.
In 1952, Toal marries fellow Irish actor Milo O’Shea. They divorce in 1974.
Playwright John B. Keane writes the role of Mame Fadden in his play The Change in Mame Fadden specifically for Toal. Hugh Leonard also pens characters in his plays A Life and Great Big Blonde with the intention of casting Toal in the roles. Toal is best known to Irish television audiences for her role as Teasy McDaid on RTÉ One‘s Glenroe during the 1990s.
In 2010, Toal is awarded an honorary doctorate in literature at University College Dublin for which McGuinness delivers the citation, describing her as “our greatest actress.” He also praises her performances including Maggie in Arthur Miller‘s After the Fall and particularly her lead roles in his own plays, The Factory Girls and Baglady, where, he says, she tells the toughest of stories with devastating honesty. “Hers is the look out of which were fashioned the masks of comedy and tragedy.”
Maureen Toal dies in her sleep at her home in Sandycove, Dublin, on August 24, 2012, two weeks before her 82nd birthday. She is survived by her son, Colm O’Shea, two sisters, one brother, and three grandchildren.
Drew is most recognised for his lead vocals on the singles “Seven Drunken Nights” and “The Irish Rover,” both charting in the UK top 10 and then performed on Top of the Pops. He is recognisable for his long beard and his voice, which was once described by Nathan Joseph as being “like the sound of coke being crushed under a door.”
Drew is born in Dún Laoghaire, County Dublin on September 16, 1934, and is educated at CBS Eblana. Despite his aversion to education, he is considered the most intelligent in his class by schoolfriend and future Irish film censor, Sheamus Smith. Drew also sings as a boy soprano before his voice breaks.
In the 1950s, Drew moves to Spain to teach English and learn Spanish and flamenco guitar. His interest in folk music begins at the age of nineteen. When he returns to Ireland, he performs in the Gate Theatre with John Molloy and soon goes into the music business full-time, after holding a number of short-term jobs.
In 1962, he founds the Ronnie Drew Group with Luke Kelly, Barney McKenna and Ciarán Bourke. They soon change their name to The Dubliners, with John Sheahan joining shortly afterwards to form the definitive line-up and quickly become one of the best-known Irish folk groups. They play at first in O’Donoghue’s Pub in Merrion Row, Dublin where they are often accompanied by Mary Jordan on the spoons and vocalist Ann Mulqueen, a friend of McKenna’s. Mary Jordan’s mother, Peggy Jordan, introduces them to the Abbey Tavern in Howth, which becomes a regular Monday night venue for the emerging group. They also play across the road in the Royal Hotel, at all-night parties in Peggy’s large house in Kenilworth Square in Rathgar, and in John Molloy’s flat at Ely Place.
Drew leaves the Dubliners in 1974, goes to Norway in 1978 and records two songs with the Norwegian group Bergeners. He rejoins The Dubliners in 1979 and leaves for good in 1995, though he does reunite with the group in 2002 for a 40th anniversary celebration. He makes several television appearances with the group between 2002 and 2005.
He fronts a campaign to encourage the use of Dublin’s light-rail infrastructure (the DART) and, before that, the “My Dublin” ads for radio stations 98FM and FM104. He narrates a retelling of the great Irish Myths and Legends over a six CD set in 2006. He also narrates the stories of Oscar Wilde in his distinctive voice for a series released on CD by the News of the World newspaper. Both were re-released as CD box sets in 2010.
On August 22, 2006, Drew is honoured in a ceremony where his handprints are added to the “Walk of Fame” outside Dublin‘s Gaiety Theatre.
In September 2006, Drew is reported to be in ill-health after being admitted to St. Vincent’s University Hospital, Dublin, to undergo tests for suspected throat cancer. On October 25, 2007, Drew, now bald and beardless, appears on Ryan Confidential on RTÉ One to give an interview about his role in The Dubliners, his life since leaving the band and being diagnosed with throat cancer. Later in 2007, he appears on The Late Late Show, where he speaks about the death of his wife and his ongoing treatment for cancer.
Ronnie Drew dies in St. Vincent’s University Hospital, Dublin, on August 16, 2008, following his long illness. He is buried three days later in Redford Cemetery in Greystones.
The Irish Lights vessel Granuaile begins laying the cable a few hundred metres offshore. Divers pull the cable ashore while the ship continues laying to a point about 4 km offshore. From there another vessel, the Reliance, takes over the task, relay-race like, and begins laying further out towards the United States.
The fiber optic cable is owned and operated by Irish company Aqua Comms and will run directly from Ross Strand in Killala to Long Island, New York. It has the capacity to handle up to one third of the world’s telephone calls and can cover the entire Internet traffic of Europe and the United States. The system will enable 53.8 millisecond transfer speeds across the Atlantic Ocean when it goes live in early 2016.
Silicon Republic describes Mayo as “Europe’s entry point to a vastly superior service when construction is completed by next year.” These connections are expected to create “thousands of jobs” in data centre operations. It will have a 53.8 millisecond latency and be capable of handling a third of the world’s phone calls, with over 1.6 million simultaneous Ultra HD video channels, or over 32 million LTE wireless callers.
CEO Martin Roche says, “It will also be the most secure transatlantic cable system, due to the carefully mapped route and the design built into the construction of this project.”
TaoiseachEnda Kenny says, “This new digital infrastructure is essential to help create jobs and new business opportunities across Ireland.” He also added, “This is the most important landing since [French general] Humbert in 1798.”
Local councillor Jarlath Munnelly says the project could “transform” Killala and the north Mayo region. “This is an exciting project, which I am enthusiastically supportive of. It has the potential to transform North Mayo, not just Killala, by enhancing the telecommunications infrastructure in the area, and putting Ireland and Mayo into the centre of a global network,” said the councillor.
He starts as a stand-up comedian in San Francisco and Los Angeles in the mid-1970s. He is credited with leading San Francisco’s comedy renaissance. After rising to fame as an alien called Mork in the TV sci-fi sitcom series Mork & Mindy, he establishes a career in both stand-up comedy and feature film acting. He is known for his improvisational skills.
On August 11, 2014, Williams commits suicide at his home in Paradise Cay, California, at the age of 63. His wife attributes his suicide to his struggle with diffuse Lewy body dementia. His body is cremated at Montes Chapel of the Hills in San Anselmo and his ashes are scattered in San Francisco Bay on August 21.
Williams’s death instantly becomes global news. The entertainment world, friends, and fans respond to his death through social and other media outlets. U.S. PresidentBarack Obama said of Williams, “He was one of a kind. He arrived in our lives as an alien—but he ended up touching every element of the human spirit.”
Ramón Gerard Antonio Estévez, known professionally as Martin Sheen, American actor of Spanish/Irish descent, is born in Dayton, Ohio on August 3, 1940. He first becomes known for his roles in the films The Subject Was Roses (1968) and Badlands (1973), and later achieves wide recognition for his leading role in Apocalypse Now (1979) and as President Josiah Bartlet in the television series The West Wing (1999-2006).
Sheen is born to immigrant parents, a first-generation Irish mother, Mary-Anne Phelan from Borrisokane, County Tipperary, and a Galician father, Francisco Estévez from Vigo in Galicia (Spain). He adopts the stage name Martin Sheen to help him gain acting parts from a combination of the CBS casting director Robert Dale Martin, who gives him his first big break, and the televangelistarchbishop, Fulton J. Sheen. He is the father of four children (Emilio, Ramón, Carlos and Renée), all of whom are actors.
Although known as an actor, Sheen also has directed one film, Cadence (1990), appearing alongside sons Charlie and Ramón. He has narrated, produced, and directed documentary television, earning two Daytime Emmy Awards in the 1980s. In addition to film and television, he has been active in liberal politics.
Paddy Moloney, musician, composer and producer who is the founder and leader of the Irish musical group The Chieftains, is born at Donnycarney, Dublin on August 1, 1938. He has played on every one of The Chieftains albums.
Moloney’s mother purchases him a tin whistle when he is six years old, and he starts to learn the Uilleann pipes at the age of eight. In addition to the tin whistle and the Uilleann pipes, he also plays button accordion and bodhrán.
Together with Garech de Brun (anglicised to Garech Browne) of Luggala, Moloney founds Claddagh Records in 1959. In 1968 he becomes a producer for the label and supervises the recording of 45 albums.
Moloney is married to artist Rita O’Reilly and has three children, Aonghus Moloney, Padraig Moloney and actress producer Aedin Moloney. He is a fluent speaker of the Irish language.
On September 13, 2012, Moloney receives Mexico‘s Ohtli Award, the country’s highest cultural award.
