Bowman works mostly as a freelance journalist. He co-presents a radio show, The Rude Awakening, on Dublin’s FM104 with Scott Williams, George Hellis and Margaret Callanan for two years between 1993 and 1994 before joining the Sunday Independent newspaper as a columnist. He later presents television programmes on RTÉ, such as the quiz show Dodge the Question.
Bowman dies in a fall at his home on Fitzgerald Street in Harold’s Cross, Dublin, on March 6, 2000. He is found lying in the kitchen near the foot of the stairs. His death is believed to be the result of a fall down the stairs or from a stool, which is found nearby.
TaoiseachBertie Ahern says that he is deeply saddened on learning the news of Bowman’s death. His thoughts and prayers he says are with his family at this very sad time.
The leader of the Labour Party, Ruairí QuinnTD, expresses his shock and sadness on hearing of the death. He says that Bowman was without doubt one of the bright lights of Irish journalism. He extends his deepest sympathies to Bowman’s son, Saul, and to his parents John and Eimer.
The Fine Gael leader, John Bruton, says that few people he knew brought a smile to the face of anyone they met more readily. He says that his infectious good humour and iconoclastic attitude to life conveyed itself to all with whom he came into contact. He adds that Bowman will be missed for many years to come.
The editor of the Sunday Independent, Aengus Fanning, says that Bowman was one of the most brilliant journalists of his generation.
Bowman is survived by his parents, his sister Emma, his brothers Abie and Daniel and his only son Saul Philbin Bowman.
Colleran, and her twin Noreen, are born to John and Josie Colleran. One of a family of five children, her father is a school principal and her mother, also a primary school teacher, dies when she is just 11 years old. She completes her secondary education at St. Louis secondary school in Kiltimagh. She spends a lot of time outdoors as a child, particularly fishing, which sparks her interest in the environment.
On entering higher education, Colleran has a grant from the Department of Education, which requires that she do her studies through the Irish language. Her first choice, Medicine, is not available in Irish so she chooses Science. She graduates with a first class primary degree in Science at University College Galway (now National University of Ireland, Galway) in 1967.
Colleran lectures in biology at Athlone Regional Technical College (now Athlone Institute of Technology) and Galway Regional Technical College (now Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology) before her appointment as a lecturer in microbiology at NUI Galway in 1976. She is appointed Associate Professor of Microbiology by the Senate of the National University of Ireland in 1990. She is a member of the university’s governing authority for a number of years, but steps down in May 2000 in connection with the selection procedure for the new university president. In October of that year she is appointed professor of microbiology and chair of the department at NUI Galway.
Colleran is the first director of the Environment Change Institute at NUI Galway set up under the Higher Education Authority‘s Programme for Research in Third Level Institutions in 2000. In 2010, the Environmental Change Institute and the Martin Ryan Marine Research Institute are merged to form the current day Ryan Institute at NUI Galway.
In 1973 Colleran is elected to the committee of the Galway Association of An Taisce, part of a national voluntary organisation the aims of which are to conservation in Ireland through education, publicity and positive action. She serves as membership secretary and then treasurer to the Galway branch before becoming chairman. In 1981, as chairman of the Galway branch, she hits back at claims from Galway County Council that An Taisce are “an anonymous group, wielding power unfairly.” She is involved in the compilation of a controversial planning report, published by An Taisce in 1983, which highlights abuse of planning laws by city and county councillors across Ireland, and in particular in counties Galway, Mayo, Donegal, Kerry and Louth.
Colleran serves as Environmental Officer for An Taisce before being elected National Chairman in 1987, the first time a chairman has come from one of the western county associations. She continues to use her position to campaign against misuse of planning laws, for a clamp down on pollution of rivers and lakes, and against a move to scrap An Foras Forbartha, a body that provides independent monitoring of pollution. During her three years as chairman, until May 1990, she is particularly involved in debates over local environmental and planning issues, in particular over gold mining in the west of Ireland, a proposed airport for Clifden, and the planned sewage treatment plant at Mutton Island, County Galway.
In 1991 plans are announced for a new visitor centre, to be located at Mullaghmore in The Burren. Colleran is among those who are part of an appeal, saying that while the plan for the national park is welcomed by An Taisce, they want the visitor centre to be located three or four miles from Mullaghmore.
President Mary Robinson appoints seven new members to her Council of State in February 1991, including Colleran. Other new members appointed at the time are Monica Barnes, Patricia O’Donovan, Quintan Oliver, Rosemarie Smith, Dónal Toolan and D. Kenneth Whitaker. The new Council of State represents a wide spectrum of Irish life and is widely welcomed, although Fine Gael is disappointed that its leader John Bruton is not included.
In 1991, Colleran is one of 15 people appointed to TaoiseachCharles Haughey‘s Green 2000 Advisory Group, to determine which problems will face the environment in the next century. The group is led by Dr. David Cabot, special advisor on environmental affairs.
In 2003 Colleran is elected as a member of the Royal Irish Academy.
Colleran is recognised at the annual NUI Galway Alumni Awards in 2004 when she receives the award for Natural Science, sponsored by Seavite Bodycare Ltd., which acknowledges a graduate who has made an outstanding contribution in the field of natural science.
Barry is first elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fine Gael Teachta Dála (TD) for the Cork City South-East constituency at the 1969 Irish general election. He goes go on to win a Dáil seat at eight successive general elections, changing constituency to Cork City in 1977 and Cork South-Central in 1981. When Fine Gael comes to power following the 1973 Irish general election, he is appointed Minister for Transport and Power. In 1976, he becomes Minister for Education. In 1979, after Garret FitzGerald becomes leader of Fine Gael, he is elected deputy leader. From June 1981 to March 1982, he serves as Minister for the Environment.
From December 1982 to 1987, Barry is Minister for Foreign Affairs. In this capacity he is heavily involved in the negotiations which result in the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement. He also becomes the first joint chairman of the Anglo-Irish Intergovernmental Conference, established under the Agreement by the Irish and British governments. Following the Labour Party‘s withdrawal from the coalition government in 1987, he becomes Tánaiste, for a brief period. He is the first member of Fine Gael to hold the office of Tánaiste.
When FitzGerald resigns as Fine Gael leader after the 1987 Irish general election, Barry is one of three candidates, along with Alan Dukes and John Bruton, who contest the party leadership. Dukes is the eventual victor.
Barry dies in Cork at the age of 88 on August 26, 2016 following a short illness. Irish PresidentMichael D. Higgins says Barry will be deeply missed. “His view of Irish history was a long one and he brought all that wisdom to bear in his contributions to achieving the Anglo-Irish Agreement. As a person he was immensely popular across all parties and, of course, he had a deep commitment to Cork city and its heritage.”
Some of the fifty people at the luncheon, most of them Irish American members of Congress, think Clinton might forgo a handshake because he is under tremendous pressure from Britain’s Prime MinisterJohn Major not to give Adams a warm embrace. But Clinton does not hesitate although the handshake comes after photographers have left the room.
“Gerry was concerned about the protocol of how he should go up to the President, but when he walked up, the President gave him a very big handshake,” says RepresentativePeter T. King, a Republican from Seaford, Long Island, who sits to the right of Adams at the lunch. After an awkward moment of silence, the room explodes with applause.
The President and the Sinn Féin leader speak for five minutes. Later Adams says, “The engagement was positive, was cordial.”
According to Rep. King, Clinton says he is committed to making the Irish peace effort succeed and, while talking to Adams, puts his fist in front of him and says, “This is going to work.” Adams says Clinton does not urge him to make sure the IRA disarms, something Major asked the President to do. Clinton invites Adams to a White House reception scheduled for the following day and, according to his aides, plans to speak to Major over the weekend in an effort to patch up their differences.
The tone at the luncheon is often light. Clinton jokes that finally he is at a place where people will not criticize him for taking a drink of Guinness. Also, Bruton hails Gingrich as an honorary Irishman, noting that his mother apparently descended from the Doherty clan of County Donegal.
Wearing a white carnation tinged with green, Gingrich gives the Taoiseach a bowl of Georgia peanuts and a book on the history of the United States Capitol. Telling Gingrich that he is not the first person to consider overhauling welfare, Bruton gives him an 1840’s book about welfare reform in Ireland.
Coveney is interested in yachting throughout most of his adult life. His yacht Golden Apple of The Sun, designed by Cork-based designer Ron Holland, is a successful competitor in the Admiral’s Cup in the 1970s. A later 50-foot yacht, Golden Apple, is used by the family for the “Sail Chernobyl” project. The family sails around the world to raise €650,000 for Chernobyl Children’s Project International, a charity which offers assistance to children affected by the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
In March 1998 it becomes publicly known that the Moriarty Tribunal has questioned Coveney about whether he had a secret offshore account with Ansbacher Bank, a bank which had become notorious for facilitating tax evasion. Ten days later, on March 13, 1998, Coveney visits his solicitor to change his will. The following day, he dies in a fall from a seaside cliff while out walking alone. His son, Simon Coveney, insists that his father had never held an Ansbacher account. It later emerges that Hugh Coveney had $175,000 on deposit in the secret Cayman Islands-based bank. The account was closed in 1979.
The funeral of Hugh Coveney takes place at St. Michael’s Church in Blackrock, Cork on March 18, 1998. Simon Coveney is later elected to succeed his father in the resulting by-election on November 3, 1998.
Jack Lynch, in full John Mary Lynch, is born on August 15, 1917, in Cork, County Cork. He serves as Taoiseach of Ireland from 1966 to 1973 and from 1977 to 1979.
Lynch studies law and enters the civil service with the Department of Justice in 1936. He eventually decides on a legal career, is called to the bar in 1945, resigns from the civil service, and practices on the Cork circuit. He already enjoys a national reputation as a sports hero as he had won five All-Ireland medals as a Cork hurler and another as a footballer.
Lemass’s retirement in 1966 causes an internal party conflict over the succession that leads to Lynch’s selection as a compromise candidate, a position he reluctantly accepts. In November 1966 he becomes leader of Fianna Fáil and Taoiseach. In June 1969 he becomes the only Fianna Fáil leader other than de Valera to win an overall majority in a general election.
In 1969–1973 Lynch plays an important role when civil unrest leads to the collapse of the government of Northern Ireland and poses a threat to the stability of the Irish state. He fires two cabinet ministers who are suspected of involvement in smuggling arms to the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). He also creates a consensus in Irish party politics on a policy of conciliation and cooperation with the British government in seeking a solution to the Northern Ireland problem based on establishing power-sharing between the unionist majority and the Roman Catholic minority.
In 1972 Lynch wins an 83% majority in a referendum on Ireland’s entry into the European Economic Community and, on January 1, 1973, Ireland becomes a member. Although he is defeated in the 1973 Irish general election, he again demonstrates his remarkable popularity at the polls in 1977 when Fianna Fáil wins their largest and their last overall majority. In December 1979, however, discouraged by challenges to his authority from party colleagues, he resigns his leadership and soon after retires from politics. He serves on a number of corporate boards after his retirement.
Lynch dies in the Royal Hospital, Donnybrook, Dublin on October 20, 1999 at the age of 82. He is honoured with a state funeral which is attended by the President Mary McAleese, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, former Taoisigh John Bruton, Albert Reynolds and Charles Haughey, and various political persons from all parties. The coffin is then flown from Dublin to Cork where a procession through the streets of the city draw some of the biggest crowds in the city’s history. Following the Requiem Mass celebrated in his home parish of the Cathedral of St. Mary and St. Anne, his friend and political ally, Desmond O’Malley, delivers the graveside oration, paying tribute to Lynch’s sense of decency. He is buried in St. Finbarr’s Cemetery, Cork.
As a boy Patterson performs with his local parish choir and is involved in maintaining the annual tradition of singing with the “Wrenboys.” He sings in the local St. Mary’s Choral Society and at a production of The Pirates of Penzance performed with both his parents. His interests extend beyond music and as a boy he represents Marlfield GAAhurling club, plays tennis at Hillview and golf at the Mountain Road course. He quits school at an early stage to work in the printing business of his mother’s family. He moves to Dublin in 1961 to enroll at the National Academy of Theatre and Allied Arts where he studies acting while at the same time receiving vocal training from Hans Waldemar Rosen. In 1964, he enters the Feis Ceoil, a nationwide music competition, in which he wins several sections including oratorio, lieder and the German Gold Cup.
Patterson gives classical recitals around Ireland and wins scholarships to study in London, Paris and in the Netherlands. While in Paris, he signs a contract with Philips Records and releases his first record, My Dear Native Land. He works with conductors and some of the most prestigious orchestras in Europe including the London Symphony Orchestra and Orchestre de Paris. He also gains a reputation as a singer of Handel, Mozart, and Bach oratorios and German, Italian and French song. He has a long-running programme on RTÉ titled For Your Pleasure.
Patterson is equally at home in more intimate settings. His singing in the role of the Evangelist in Bach’s St. John Passion is given fine reviews. Further recordings follow, of Beethoven arrangements, Irish songs, Berlioz songs, Purcell songs and others, all on the Philips label.
Patterson performs sold-out concerts from London’s Royal Albert Hall to New York’s Carnegie Hall, and with his family he presents two concerts at the White House, for presidents Ronald Reagan in 1982 and Bill Clinton in 1995. He records over thirty albums in six languages, wins silver, gold and platinum discs and is the first Irish singer to host his own show in Radio City Music Hall in New York.
Rising to greater prominence with the new popularity of Celtic music in the 1990s, Patterson sees many of his past recordings reissued for American audiences, and in 1998 he stars in the PBS special Ireland in Song. His last album outsells Pavarotti.
In 1999, Patterson learns he has a brain tumour. He has several operations in the following year and his condition appears to stabilise. He is diagnosed with a recurrence of his illness on May 7, 2000. He briefly recuperates and resumes performing. His last performance is on June 4, 2000 at Regis College in the Boston suburb of Weston, Massachusetts. Shortly thereafter he is admitted to the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York where he lapses into a coma and dies on June 10, 2000 at the age of 61.
After she graduates, her father employs her at his company but, following his death three years later, she changes professions and starts a public relations firm in 1983, which she runs for seven years. In 1983–84, she serves as secretary to the Fianna Fáil group at the New Ireland Forum. She serves as Charles Haughey‘s personal assistant, and becomes a family friend, taking holidays with his children. In 1987 she serves as election agent and party treasurer in Dublin North for Seán Haughey.
In 1990, she changes careers again, switching to journalism as a reporter with The Sunday Business Post and Sunday Tribune, working under editor Damien Kiberd. Craving first-hand information, she pursues a story directly to the source with little regard for her personal safety, to engage those she deems central to a story. This allows her to build close relationships with both the legitimate authorities, such as the Garda Síochána, and the criminals, with both sides respecting her diligence by providing highly detailed information. She also reports on Irish Republican Army activities in the Republic of Ireland.
From 1994 onwards, she begins to write about criminals for the Sunday Independent. Using her accountancy knowledge to trace the proceeds of illegal activity, she uses street names or pseudonyms for organized crime figures to avoid Irish libel laws.
When she begins to cover drug dealers, and gains information from convicted drugs criminal John Traynor, she receives numerous death threats. The first violence against her occurs in October 1994, when two shots are fired into her home after her story on murdered crime kingpin Martin Cahill is published. Guerin dismisses the “warning.” The day after writing an article on Gerry “The Monk” Hutch, on January 30, 1995, she answers her doorbell to a man pointing a revolver at her head. The gunman misses and shoots her in the leg. Regardless, she vows to continue her investigations.
On September 13, 1995, convicted criminal John Gilligan, Traynor’s boss, attacks her when she confronts him about his lavish lifestyle with no source of income. He later calls her at home and threatens to kidnap and rape her son, and kill her if she writes anything about him.
On the evening of June 25, 1996, Gilligan drug gang members Charles Bowden, Brian Meehan, Kieran ‘Muscles’ Concannon, Peter Mitchell and Paul Ward meet at their distribution premises on the Greenmount Industrial Estate. The following day, while driving her red Opel Calibra, Guerin stops at a red traffic light on the Naas Dual Carriageway near Newlands Cross, on the outskirts of Dublin, unaware she is being followed. She is shot six times, fatally, by one of two men sitting on a motorcycle.
About an hour after Guerin is murdered, a meeting takes place in Moore Street, Dublin, between Bowden, Meehan, and Mitchell. Bowden later denies under oath in court that the purpose of the meeting is the disposal of the weapon but rather that it was an excuse to appear in a public setting to place them away from the incident.
At the time of her murder, Traynor is seeking a High Court order against Guerin to prevent her from publishing a book about his involvement in organised crime. Guerin is killed two days before she is due to speak at a Freedom Forum conference in London.
Guerin’s funeral is attended by Ireland’s TaoiseachJohn Bruton, and the head of the armed forces. It is covered live by Raidió Teilifís Éireann. On July 4, labour unions across Ireland call for a moment of silence in her memory, which is duly observed by people around the country. Guerin is buried in Dardistown Cemetery, County Dublin.
Kenny turns to politics in 1975 upon the death of his father, Henry Kenny, a long-serving member of the Dáil Éireann, representing Mayo. He wins a comfortable victory in a special election to fill his father’s seat, and at age 24 he is the youngest member of the Dáil. He spends much of his early political career on the backbench, focusing on local issues. In 1994 he is appointed Minister for Tourism and Trade in the “rainbow coalition” government of Fine Gael Taoiseach John Bruton.
With the collapse of Bruton’s coalition in 1997, Kenny loses his portfolio, but his stature rises as the party itself declines. Weeks after the 2002 Irish general election, which sees Fine Gael win just 31 seats, he is elected party leader. He immediately sets to restoring the party’s fortunes, and Fine Gael makes an impressive showing in the 2007 Irish general election, capturing 51 seats.
Fine Gael’s momentum continues to build as Fianna Fáil Taoiseach Brian Cowen, beset with a banking crisis and a soaring national deficit, is obliged to accept a bailout package of more than $100 billion from the International Monetary Fund and the European Union. The Green Party withdraws from Cowen’s coalition, and the government collapses, forcing early elections in February 2011. Capitalizing on widespread voter dissatisfaction, Fine Gael wins more than 70 seats, ending 14 years of Fianna Fáil rule, and Kenny begins discussions with the Labour Party about the formation of a coalition government. After more than a week of negotiations, the details of the coalition are settled and Kenny is formally elected Taoiseach by the Dáil on March 9, 2011, by an unprecedented 90 votes.
Kenny oversees a strong rebound by the Irish economy over the next five years, but the perception by many that the recovery has not been shared equally is reflected in the results of the 2016 Irish general election, when the electorate punishes the ruling coalition by ending its majority. In particular, voters appear to be disenchanted by the government’s pledge to end the Universal Social Charge — a graduated tax on all income over €13,000 — despite austerity-mandated cuts to social services. In the event, Fine Gael remains the largest party in the Dáil, but its share of the seats falls from the 76 it ultimately had secured in 2011 to 50, while coalition partner Labour plummets from 37 seats to seven. Meanwhile, Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael’s traditional rival for power, which had appeared politically moribund after the last general election, bounces back forcefully to add 24 seats to its 2011 count, reaching a total of 44 deputies.
With no party holding a majority and no quick path to coalition rule evident, a hung parliament ensues. Ten weeks of negotiations follow as Kenny seeks to form a government. Even the unheard of possibility of grand coalition rule with Fianna Fáil is on the table. Finally, in early May, after much policy-related horse trading, an agreement is reached whereby Kenny and Fine Gael will continue to lead the government, supported by independent deputies and with a promise by Fianna Fáil that it will abstain on key votes until 2018. With Fianna Fáil abstaining, Kenny captures 59 votes on May 6, 2016, enough to return to power. In the process he becomes the first Fine Gael Taoiseach to be reelected.
A scandal involving the public smearing of a police whistleblower nearly topples the government in February 2017, and Kenny narrowly survives a vote of confidence, 57 to 52, with Fianna Fáil abstaining. Under pressure from the opposition as well as from members of his own party, Kenny stands down as Fine Gael leader in May 2017. The following month the party chooses Kenny’s Minister for Social Protection, Leo Varadkar, to succeed him as leader of Fine Gael. Kenny resigns as Taoiseach on June 13, 2017, and Varadkar is elected Taoiseach the following day.
Lynch is born on August 15, 1917, in Blackpool, on the north side of Cork, County Cork. He is educated at St. Vincent’s Convent on Peacock Lane, and later at the North MonasteryChristian Brothers School. He sits his Leaving Certificate in 1936, after which he moves to Dublin and works with the Dublin District Milk Board, before returning to Cork to take up a position in the Circuit Court Office.
Lemass’s retirement in 1966 causes an internal party conflict over the succession that leads to Lynch’s selection as a compromise candidate, a position he reluctantly accepts. In November of that year he becomes leader of Fianna Fáil and Taoiseach. In June 1969 he becomes the only Fianna Fáil leader other than de Valera to win an overall majority in a general election. In 1969–1973 Lynch plays an important role when civil unrest leads to the collapse of the government of Northern Ireland and poses a threat to the stability of the Irish state. He fires two cabinet ministers who are suspected of involvement in smuggling arms to the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). He also creates a consensus in Irish party politics on a policy of conciliation and cooperation with the British government in seeking a solution to the Northern Ireland problem based on establishing power-sharing between the unionist majority and the Roman Catholic minority.
In 1972 Lynch wins an 83 percent majority in a referendum on Ireland’s entry into the European Economic Community. On January 1, 1973, Ireland becomes a member. Although he is defeated in the 1973 elections, he again demonstrates his remarkable popularity at the polls in 1977 when Fianna Fáil wins their largest and their last overall majority. In December 1979, however, discouraged by challenges to his authority from party colleagues, he resigns his leadership and soon after retires from politics. He serves on a number of corporate boards after his retirement.
In 1992 Lynch suffers a severe health setback, and in 1993 suffers a stroke in which he nearly loses his sight. Following this he withdraws from public life, preferring to remain at his home with his wife Máirín where he continues to be dogged by ill-health.
Lynch dies in the Royal Hospital, Donnybrook, Dublin on October 20, 1999 at the age of 82. He is honoured with a state funeral which is attended by the President of IrelandMary McAleese, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, former Taoisigh John Bruton, Albert Reynolds and Charles Haughey, and various political persons from all parties. The coffin is then flown from Dublin to Cork where a procession through the streets of the city draw some of the biggest crowds in the city’s history. After the Requiem Mass celebrated in his home parish of the Cathedral of St. Mary and St. Anne, Lynch’s friend and political ally, Desmond O’Malley, delivers the graveside oration, paying tribute to Lynch’s sense of decency. He is buried in St. Finbarr’s Cemetery in Cork.
seamus dubhghaill 