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Birth of George Noble Plunkett, Scholar & Revolutionary

George Noble Plunkett, scholar and revolutionary, is born on December 3, 1851, at 1 Aungier Street, Dublin, the youngest and only survivor from infancy of the three children of Patrick Joseph Plunkett (1817–1918), builder and politician, and his wife, Elizabeth (née Noble). The Plunketts are Catholic, claiming collateral descent from Archbishop of Armagh Oliver Plunkett, and nationalist: the two drummers from the republican army at Vinegar Hill in 1798 visit George’s cradle.

Plunkett is educated expensively: at a primary school in Nice, making him fluent in French and Italian, then at Clongowes Wood College, and, from 1872, at Trinity College Dublin (TCD), where his generous allowance allows him to study renaissance and medieval art. He enrolls at King’s Inns in 1870 and the Middle Temple in 1874, but is not called to the bar until 1886. While there he befriends Oscar Wilde and Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa. In 1877, he endows a university gold medal for Irish speakers and publishes a book of poems, God’s Chosen Festival, and the following year he issues a pamphlet, The Early Life of Henry Grattan. He also writes articles for magazines, editing a short-lived one, Hibernia, for eighteen months from 1882. In 1883, he donates funds and property to the nursing order of the Little Company of Mary (Blue Sisters), and on April 4, 1884, Pope Leo XIII makes him a count.

On June 26, 1884, Plunkett marries Mary Josephine Cranny (1858–1944). The couple has seven children: Philomena (Mimi) (b. 1886), Joseph (b. 1887), Mary Josephine (Moya) (b. 1889), Geraldine (b. 1891), George Oliver (b. 1894), Fiona (b. 1896), and Eoin (Jack) (b. 1897).

Plunkett surprises many in 1890 by declaring for Charles Stewart Parnell against the Catholic hierarchy. In the 1892 United Kingdom general election in Ireland he is a Parnellite candidate for Mid Tyrone but withdraws from a potential three-cornered fight lest he let in the unionist. He is sole nationalist candidate for Dublin St. Stephen’s Green in the 1895 United Kingdom general election in Ireland, and at an 1898 by-election there he cuts the unionist majority to 138 votes. The reunited Irish Party wins the seat in 1900.

In 1894, Plunkett part-edits Charles O’Kelly‘s memoir The Jacobite War in Ireland. By 1900, when he publishes the standard biography Sandro Botticelli, he is supplementing his income by renewed artistic studies, which until 1923 finances his lease of Kilternan Abbey, County Dublin. His Pinelli (1908) is followed by Architecture of Dublin, and, in 1911, by his revised edition of Margaret McNair Stokes‘s Early Christian Art in Ireland. In 1907, he becomes director of the National Museum of Ireland, where he increases annual visits from 100 to 3,000.

Joseph Plunkett swears his father into the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) in April 1916, sending him secretly to seek German aid and a papal blessing for the projected Easter rising. After its defeat, Plunkett is sacked by the National Museum of Ireland and deported with the countess to Oxford, and the following January he is expelled by the Royal Dublin Society (RDS). This earns him nomination as the surviving rebels’ candidate in the North Roscommon by-election. He returns to Ireland illegally on January 31, 1917, and wins the seat easily three days later. Pledging abstention from attendance at Westminster in accordance with Sinn Féin policy, he initiates a Republican Liberty League, which coalesces with similar groups such as Sinn Féin. In October this front becomes the new Sinn Féin, committed to Plunkett’s republic rather than to the “king, lords and commons“ of Arthur Griffith. Plunkett and Griffith become the new party’s vice-presidents, under Éamon de Valera.

On May 18, 1918, Plunkett is interned again. Released after Sinn Féin’s general election landslide (in which he is returned unopposed), he presides, Sinn Féin’s oldest MP, at the planning meeting for Dáil Éireann on January 17, 1919, and at its opening session on January 21. On the 22nd he is made foreign affairs minister by Cathal Brugha, an appointment reaffirmed by de Valera on April 10. He criticises his president for advocating a continuing Irish external relationship with Britain, and fails to organise an Irish foreign service. In February 1921, de Valera makes Robert Brennan his departmental secretary and a ministry takes shape, while Plunkett publishes a book of poems, Ariel. After uncontested “southern Irish“ elections to the Second Dáil, de Valera moves his implacable foreign minister from the cabinet to a tailor-made portfolio of fine arts. Plunkett’s Dante sexcentenary commemoration is overshadowed by news of the Anglo–Irish Treaty. Opposing this, Plunkett cites his oath to the republic and its martyrs including his son. He leaves his ministry on January 9, 1922.

Plunkett chairs the anti-treaty Cumann na Poblachta, which loses the June general election, though he is returned again unopposed. In the Irish Civil War the treatyites intern him and the republicans appoint him to their council of state. In the August 1923 Irish general election, his first electoral contest since 1917, the interned count tops the poll in County Roscommon. He is released in December.

When de Valera forms Fianna Fáil in 1926, Plunkett stays with Sinn Féin, and loses his deposit in the June 1927 Irish general election. A year later he publishes his last poetry collection, Eros. He runs for a new Cumann Poblachta na hÉireann in a County Galway by-election in 1936, but loses his deposit again. On December 8, 1938, with the other six surviving abstentionist Second Dáil TDs, he transfers republican sovereignty to the IRA Army Council.

Plunkett is a big man with a black beard which whitens steadily after his fiftieth birthday. He is always formally pleasant and courteous. His oratory is described by M. J. MacManus as “level, cultured tones . . . [more] used to addressing the members of a learned society than to the rough and tumble of the hustings” (The Irish Press, March 15, 1948). Theoretically and practically, he is more scholar than politician. His portrait is on display at the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland (RSAI).

Plunkett dies from cancer on March 12, 1948, and is buried in Glasnevin Cemetery, survived by his children Geraldine (wife of Thomas Dillon), Fiona, and Jack. His grandson Joseph (1928–66), son of George Oliver Plunkett, inherits the title.

(From: “Plunkett, Count George Noble” by D. R. O’Connor Lysaght, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009)


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Birth of Harriet Kavanagh, Artist, Traveler & Antiquarian

Lady Harriet Kavanagh, Irish artist, traveler, and antiquarian, described as a “woman of high culture and of unusual artistic power,” is born Lady Harriet Margaret Le Poer Trench on October 13, 1799. She is believed to be the first Irish female traveler to Egypt.

Kavanagh is the second daughter of Richard Le Poer Trench and Henrietta Margaret Le Poer Trench (née Staples), with three brothers and three sisters. She marries Thomas Kavanagh of Borris House, County Carlow, on February 28, 1825, as his second wife. The couple has four children, three sons Charles, Thomas, Arthur, and one daughter, Harriet or “Hoddy.”

Kavanagh’s third son, Arthur MacMorrough Kavanagh, is born without fully formed limbs. Some attribute the disability to a peasant’s curse, while others speculate it is due to Lady Kavanagh taking laudanum during her pregnancy. She refuses to treat her son differently to his siblings, and with the help of local doctor Francis Boxwell, raises him as a normal child. During his initial education, she teaches Arthur herself, teaching him to paint and then write by holding brushes and pens in his mouth. With the help of the surgeon Sir Philip Crampton, she has a mechanical wheelchair constructed for Arthur, and also encourages him to ride horses and engage in other outdoor activities. Her husband dies after twelve years of marriage, in 1837.

In 1846, Kavanagh takes her children to learn French in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, later traveling to Rome. As an antiquarian, she also wants to visit Egypt and the Holy Land, setting off on the long journey from Marseille in October 1846. Accompanying her are her daughter, Harriet, her two sons, Thomas and Arthur, their tutor, the Rev. David Wood, and a maid, Miss Hudson. In Cairo, she hires two feluccas with Arab crews, and visits archaeological sites along the Nile, such as Thebes, Karnak, and the Nubia region. From there, she visits sites of biblical interest, including Tyre, Sidon, and Roda Island. She negotiates with Bedouin chiefs in Aqaba, hiring camels and Bedouin guides to travel to Hebron. She visits harems and a slave market and records the journey’s incidents in her diary, including her son Arthur’s accidental near drowning when he falls off their boat while fishing.

While in Cairo, Kavanagh becomes acquainted with a number of fellow Europeans, including Sir Charles Murray, Sophia Lane Poole, and Edward William Lane. Harriet Martineau travels with the party from Cairo to the Holy Land.

While visiting Jerusalem in Easter 1847, Kavanagh bears witness to a confrontation over the control of holy places between Roman and Orthodox Catholics priests. She goes on to visit Petra, the Sinai Peninsula, Beirut, Smyrna, and Constantinople. The group spends a second winter in Egypt before traveling to the Black Sea before returning to Marseilles in April 1848. Much of these journeys are conducted on horse or camel-back, with one desert crossing taking 36 days. She later comments on her travels as a woman, stating “quite enough danger to make it a very exciting business.”

In 1850 and 1852, Kavanagh travels to Corfu, returning to Borris with samples of Greek lace. She teaches a number of her tenants to copy these designs, which lead to the establishment of a local lace-making industry. She is elected to the Kilkenny Archaeological Society in 1851.

Kavanagh moves to Ballyragget Lodge, County Kilkenny, in 1860, dying there on July 14, 1885. She is buried in St. Mullin’s Abbey, Borris in County Carlow. She documented her travels in journals, with drawings and paintings of the sites she visited. These are held by the Kavanagh family, along with an oil portrait and a self-portrait. Her collection of roughly 300 Egyptian antiquities were donated to the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland after her death. These collections were later moved to the National Museum of Ireland and form a core element of the Museum’s Egyptian collection. Copies of two of her watercolours, a self-portrait, and a landscape are on display in the Museum.


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Birth of Irish Historian Gerard Anthony Hayes-McCoy

Gerard Anthony Hayes-McCoy, an Irish historian regarded as one of the leading Irish historians of his generation, is born in Galway, County Galway, on August 15, 1911.

Hayes-McCoy is born to Thomas Hayes-McCoy and Mary Kathleen Hayes-McCoy (née Wallace). His grandfather, Thomas Hayes-McCoy, is a Dubliner who as a child came to Galway in 1834 and is later a well-known Parnellite. His maternal grandfather, Thomas Burke, is a Galway artist. He grows up on Eyre Square where his father runs a gentleman’s hairdressing business. His two older siblings are Ignatius and Marguerite. The latter receives a PhD-degree in History at University College Galway (UCG), and later teaches at the Galway Technical School.

Hayes-McCoy receives his early education from the Patrician Brothers, Galway. His earliest notebook of 1927 and a manuscript history of Poland of the same year, now at the National Library of Ireland (NLI), testify to an early interest in history and heritage. From 1928 to 1932 he is a student scholarship holder at University College Galway, graduating in 1932 with a Bachelor of Commerce, and a Bachelor of Arts, with first-class honours in both, and a specialisation in “History, Ethics, Politics” for the latter. Mary Donovan O’Sullivan is one of his professors of history, and Liam Ó Briain, professor of Romance languages, is a stimulating influence. At this time, Hayes-McCoy is a member of the Republican Club, a committee member of the Literary and Debating Society, and in 1931 he is one of the founding members of a new Irish Students’ Association.

Hayes-McCoy pursues his PhD at the University of Edinburgh, and then spends two years at the Institute of Historical Research, London, in the Tudor seminar of J. E. Neale, rewriting his PhD and eventually publishing it as Scots mercenary forces in Ireland, 1565–1603 (Dublin and London, 1937), with a foreword by Eoin MacNeill. This is characterised by meticulous archival research, and it anticipates by sixty years the much-vaunted New British History of the late twentieth century by tracing the interconnections between events in England, Ireland, and Scotland.

In the absence of an academic post, Hayes-McCoy becomes an assistant keeper in the Art and Industrial Division at the National Museum of Ireland (1939–1959), with a responsibility for the Military History, and the Irish War of Independence collections. One of his first tasks is to prepare a standing exhibition on Irish history before 1916. His research, long-standing personal interest in the military, and his curatorial experience, helps form an expert knowledge of historical Irish warfare. This leads to his role in co-founding The Military History Society of Ireland in 1949 whose journal, The Irish Sword, he edits. He describes the vagaries of setting up such a body, its reception, and the historiographical considerations attendant on it, in a paper published posthumously in The Irish Sword.

On August 19, 1941, Hayes-McCoy marries Mary Margaret “May” O’Connor, daughter of C.J. and M.B. O’Connor of New Ross/Enniscorthy. They have three daughters and two sons: Mary, Ann, Ian, Robert, Felicity. The family home is in Dublin.

Earning high reputation by continued research and by publishing leads to Hayes-McCoy’s receipt of the D.Litt. degree from the National University, and to his membership in the Royal Irish Academy in 1950. In his professional career, apart from the broad spectrum of press publications, he publishes prolifically. The works that are judged most influential, are his Scots mercenary forces in Ireland 1565–1603 (1937), the papers “The early history of guns in Ireland” (1938–1939), “Strategy and tactics in Irish warfare, 1593–1601” (1941), “The army of Ulster, 1593–1601” (1951), the controversial “Gaelic society in Ireland in the late sixteenth century” (1963), and the monographs “Irish battles” (London 1969), and “A history of Irish flags from earliest times” (Dublin 1979). A member of the Irish Manuscripts Commission, his most notable contribution is the publication “Ulster and other Irish maps, c.1600” (Dublin 1964).

In 1946, Hayes-McCoy is appointed to a committee of eight historians to advise on setting up the Bureau of Military History, a body established for the creation and compilation of material on the history of the Irish movements for independence, 1913–1921, specifically from witness statements. The committee is also to further offer guidance and oversee progress of the Bureau in coordination with the Ministry of Defence. It subsequently expresses concerns about the state’s role and methods in the collection of statements.

Having begun writing for the press at an early stage, Hayes-McCoy’s public position at the Museum encourages him to go further. He has broad involvement with local history groups to whom he presents papers, and also works for newspapers and for radio and television. To the national and Galway press he usually contributes articles on military aspects of Irish history, as well as book reviews, but he also uses them as a platform to engage with what he sees are flaws in the education of history in Ireland which during his lifetime is constrained by a certain degree of political and cultural state control.

During the 1940s and 1950s, Hayes-McCoy becomes involved in a number of paratheatrical events of national significance one of which – the “Pageant of St.Patrick” for which he writes the script (An Tóstal 1954) – is realised on an immense scale. He scripts these works to begin with and is later principally engaged as historical consultant. In that capacity, he collaborates in 1955 and 1956 with Micheál Mac Liammóir and Denis Johnston on their scripts for pageants on St. Patrick and on the Táin Bó Cuailgne, at times finding it difficult to square the historical liberties taken by these artists with his own role.

On Irish radio and television Hayes-McCoy is most active in the mid-1960s, editing and contributing to Thomas Davis lectures series, writing scripts for a series of thirty children’s programmes on all aspects of Irish history, and preparing/contributing on air to the television series “Irish battles” and “The long winter.” As well as writing for RTÉ, Ireland’s national broadcaster, he contributes scripts to BBC Northern Ireland‘s schools radio programmes.

In 1959, Hayes-McCoy succeeds to the chair of his former history professor at UCG with the full remit of lecturing, administering examinations to undergraduates, and supervising postgraduate theses. Among his students who continue in the field of history are Nicholas Canny, Martin Coen, Patrick Melvin, Peter Toner, Tony Claffey, and Breandán Ó Bric. After his appointment to UCG, the family home remains in Dublin, and he commutes to Galway weekly during term time.

In the early 1960s, Hayes-McCoy becomes a spokesperson for the movement rekindled by the Old Galway Society to preserve the landmark “Lion’s Tower” in the city. The ultimate failure of the campaign informs his regret, expressed a year later, that Ireland is forgetful about its past and that “we don’t bother to find out about it or to maintain our ancient heritage,” and, on a perceived spirit of conformity, “take my own city of Galway, it is now more prosperous than it was, but it is no longer distinctive. I do not believe that it is essential for progress that we should lose our heritage.”

While at one time member and secretary of the London Sinn Féin office and informed by a pride of country and place, Hayes-McCoy’s professional and private outlook are marked by a distrust of nationalism or of any antagonising national agendas compromising genuine scholarship. In a paper drafted on tendencies in modern historical studies, he criticises the two historiographical extremes, each to be avoided, each unfortunately characteristic of the moment – extreme de-bunking and extreme “adding for effect.” “A history is a record of fact; to add pseudo-facts is as grave a sin as to leave out real facts that may change the colour of the whole.”

Hayes-McCoy’s abiding pastime is drawing. Among his papers in the James Hardiman Library, NUI Galway are approximately 40 items with predominantly maritime subjects, and he has a special regard for the history of ships, and a romantic liking of the sea. He also has a lifelong interest in Robert Louis Stevenson, Sir Walter Scott, and their works, and in the Pre-Raphaelite movement.

Hayes-McCoy’s middle age is marked by intermittent ill health. He dies on November 27, 1975, in his room at the Great Southern Hotel, Eyre Square, Galway.

Hayes-McCoy’s papers are held at the James Hardiman Library, National University of Ireland, Galway.


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Birth of Archaeologist Etienne Andrew Rynne

Etienne Andrew Rynne, archaeologist, is born on September 11, 1932, at 20 Upper Pembroke Street, Dublin.

Rynne is one of six children (five boys and a girl) of Dr. Michael Rynne, a civil servant and diplomat, and Nathalie Rynne (née Fournier), from Auvergne, France. He has a twin brother, Michael, and is a nephew of the writer and broadcaster Stephen Rynne. He receives his early education in a number of institutions in Ireland and abroad, including Terenure College in Dublin, Clongowes Wood College in County Kildare, Coláiste na Rinne in County Waterford and École des Roches in Normandy. He then attends University College Dublin (UCD), where he graduates BA in archaeology and French (1953) and MA in archaeology (1955). He wins the prestigious National University of Ireland (NUI) travelling studentship for his thesis on Iron Age weapons.

After spending a year on the continent, Rynne returns to Ireland in 1957 to join the antiquities division of the National Museum of Ireland (NMI) in Kildare Street. One of his first assignments is to participate in the excavations at the Hill of Tara, previously headed by his old mentor at UCD, the recently deceased Professor Seán P. Ó Ríordáin. Already an expert on the Iron Age, he expands his expertise to cover Irish Celtic and early Christian art. He becomes an influential figure at the museum, remaining until 1967 and gaining much valuable experience in archaeological research, cataloguing and display, and is once described as the “true master of the Kildare Street crypt.” Intimately acquainted with the museum’s early Christian artefacts, he is particularly drawn to the eighth-century Ardagh chalice, on which he compiles extensive research notes relating to its dismantling and conservation. Although he is recognised as a leading authority on the chalice, his workload at the NMI and various academic commitments, not least his thirty-five years as editor of the North Munster Antiquarian Journal (NMAJ), prevent publication of his great work on the treasure.

During Rynne’s time at the NMI, he develops a close friendship with its director, Dr. Anthony T. Lucas, and on April 1, 1967 marries his daughter Aideen in the Church of the Miraculous Medal, Clonskeagh, Dublin. That year, he leaves the museum to take up a lectureship in archaeology at University College Galway (UCG), remaining there for thirty-one years until his retirement as professor of Celtic archaeology in 1998. During his professorship, he introduces many innovative changes at UCG, placing great emphasis on the value of well-planned field trips to historical monuments and archaeological sites around Connacht and north Clare, including Poulnabrone in his beloved Burren and Dún Aonghasa on Inishmore, which in 1991 he is first to suggest was built for ceremonial rather than defensive purposes. He often ventures further afield to sites such as the Jorvik Viking Centre, York, and the West Kennet Long Barrow in Wiltshire. Many local expeditions include small excavations, which he continues to conduct on behalf of the NMI.

Despite his heavy workload, Rynne writes close to one hundred academic papers in local and international journals, his expansive subject matter including not only archaeology but also folklore and Irish War of Independence history, the latter interest stemming from his father’s involvement in the formation of the Irish state (1917–23). His editorial tenure at the NMAJ includes the publication in 1975 and 1978 of dedicated issues on Edward MacLysaght and John Hunt respectively, and he is editor of Figures from the Past (1987), the Festschrift for Helen Maybury Roe. He also uses the national press to express his sometimes-eccentric views on various subjects, such as Irish neutrality, the American justice system and running the M3 motorway through Tara. A highly engaging and entertaining speaker, he thrives in front of an audience, be it a small group of students standing in a muddy field or an official address to the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, of which he serves as president from 1985 to 1989. His lectures are marked by his erudite and characteristically passionate delivery, complete with subtle intonation, and he is as comfortable speaking French as he is English or Irish.

Rynne’s legacy cannot be fairly assessed without reference to his largely unpopular stance in the Wood Quay controversy of the late 1970s. When Dublin’s original Viking settlement at Wood Quay is unearthed by archaeologists, he sides with the NMI, which, under the directorship of Joseph Raftery, decides to excavate only a small section of the site before handing it over to developers. This results in the destruction of much unexcavated archaeology. The NMI’s decision results in serious damage to its reputation, with Rynne one of the few archaeologists publicly supporting its unpopular stance. His loyalty to the NMI administration, which includes his father-in-law Lucas, alienates many fellow archaeologists, and is described by Patrick Wallace, then director of excavations at Wood Quay and among the many scholars who campaign to save the site, as “excessive, unnecessary and so unquestioning that it led to his being on the … wrong side during the Wood Quay court case.”

Rynne’s contribution to the history and heritage of his adopted province of Connacht and city of Galway is, however, widely acknowledged as immense. Once settled in UCG, he makes his home in the medieval town of Athenry, where he engages enthusiastically with the local community via lectures, walks and talks on the town’s famous walls and castle. Although Dublin-born, he becomes firmly entrenched in Galway’s colourful past and is instrumental in the founding of the city’s first municipal museum in Comerford House, adjacent to the Spanish Arch, in 1971. Drawing on his considerable NMI experience, he acts as honorary curator for the Galway museum for over a decade, before its move to the present purpose-built building in 2007. Ever willing to disseminate the story of Galway’s past beyond the twin towers of its university, to its citizens and the wider public, he compiles the Tourist Trail of Old Galway (1977). This signposted walking tour of Galway communicates the city’s importance in the medieval world, not only from an Irish, but also from a European and global perspective, and represents an enduring legacy to the self-styled promoter and protector of the city’s heritage.

Elected a member of the Royal Irish Academy (RIA) in 1966, Rynne is a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London (1975), and president of both the Cambrian Society of Wales (1999) and the Galway Archaeological and Historical Society (1989–94). Although diagnosed with heart disease in 1991, he remains active long after his retirement in 1998, continuing to publish papers on aspects of Irish archaeology up to his death.

In the summer of 2012 Rynne suffers a stroke and dies at the age of 79 on June 22, 2012, at University Hospital Galway. He is survived by Aideen, his wife of forty-five years, and their four sons and one daughter. A fifth son pre-deceases him. He is buried in the New Cemetery, Athenry.

(From: “Rynne, Etienne Andrew” by Frank Cullen, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, June 2018)


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Birth of John Bowman, Broadcaster & Presenter

John Bowman, Irish historian and a long-standing broadcaster and presenter of current affairs and political programmes with Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ), is born in Dublin on July 28, 1942. He chairs the audience-participation political programme Questions and Answers on RTÉ One for 21 years.

Bowman is brought up in Ballsbridge in south Dublin. His father works for Great Southern Railways (later CIÉ) and his mother is a nurse, originally from County Monaghan. He is educated at Belvedere College and Trinity College Dublin where he receives a bachelor’s degree in history and political science in 1970 and a PhD in political science in 1980. He joins Radio Éireann in 1962, later becoming the presenter and commentator on numerous current affairs programmes, as well as an analyst of political developments and interviewer of politicians on radio and later on television. In the 1980s, he presents the current affairs programme Today Tonight, the precursor to Prime Time.

Bowman wins Jacob’s Awards in 2013 and 2016 for his radio broadcasting, the former for his presentation of the current affairs programme, Day by Day. In April 2008, he comments on RTÉ television coverage of the state funeral of Patrick Hillery, a former President of Ireland.

Bowman chairs the audience-participation political programme Questions and Answers on RTÉ One television for 21 years, the final edition airing on June 29, 2009. He is the presenter of Bowman: Sunday: 8.30 (previously Bowman Saturday) on radio, a weekly compilation of material from broadcasting archives at home and abroad.

In May 2011, Bowman fronts RTÉ television coverage of Queen Elizabeth II’s visit to the Republic of Ireland.

Bowman writes a history of RTÉ Television called Window and Mirror. RTÉ Television: 1961-2011. It is launched by Taoiseach Enda Kenny at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin on November 23, 2011.

In January 2019, Bowman is awarded the Freedom of the City of Cork.

Bowman serves a two-year term as president of The Irish Association for Cultural, Economic and Social Relations from 1991 and of Comhar, an environmental pressure group, from 1999 until 2004.

Bowman is married to psychiatrist Eimer Philbin Bowman and they have have four children: Jonathan, Emma, Abie and Daniel. His eldest son, Jonathan Philbin Bowman, a journalist, television and radio presenter, dies in an accident in March 2000. His daughter, Emma Philbin Bowman, works in Dublin as a psychotherapist. His middle son, Abie Philbin Bowman, is a columnist for The Dubliner magazine and a stand-up comedian, while in 2005 his youngest son, Daniel, initiates Be Not Afraid, a charity wristband campaign which raises over €80,000 in aid of Turning the Tide of Suicide and the Irish Red Cross and later sets up a youth marketing firm, Spark.


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Birth of Kathleen Cox, Artist, Sculptor & Mystic

Kathleen Cox, Irish artist, sculptor, and mystic, is born Christina Mary Kathleen Cox in Wo-Sung, China, on July 2, 1904. Cox is considered a pioneer of contemporary Irish pottery.

Cox is the eldest daughter of Dr. R. H. Cox, originally from Dundalk, County Louth, and the port health officer in Shanghai. He is also an amateur geologist and models in clay. In his retirement, he invents a periscope later used during World War I by the Royal Navy. The years living in China leave an impression on the young Cox, visually and culturally. The family returns to Ireland in 1911, first moving to Listowel, County Kerry, and later to Howth, County Dublin. She attends Alexandra College, and later the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art in 1921. While there she studies sculpture under Oliver Sheppard and is considered one of his most talented students, winning the Royal Dublin Society Taylor prize for modelling in 1925, 1926, and 1927. The money from these prizes allows Cox to travel to Paris in 1929.

Cox exhibits in 1924 at the Tailteann exhibitions, and in 1925 submits textile designs to the Arts and Crafts Society of Ireland. She establishes a pottery studio at 7 Schoolhouse Lane, Dublin, with college friend Stella Rayner in 1929. The studio has the first electric kiln in Ireland. The first exhibited piece by Cox shown by the Royal Hibernian Academy (RHA) is in 1930, with a pair of Madonna bookends, and portrait masks of the daughter of Dermod O’Brien, Brigid O’Brien, and writer Norris Davidson. Davidson is a friend and neighbour, who commissions her to design the poster for his 1929 film, Suicide. She exhibits with the RHA from 1931 to 1933, and the Tailteann 1932, while also holding exhibitions in her studio. During this period Hilda Roberts paints her portrait, Strange Spirit. Kathleen Cox in her studio. The theme of womanhood is prominent in her work, including in the sign of her studio.

In 1932, Cox begins producing a line of more commercial figurines, drawing influence from the Royal Doulton Burslem factory, where she works for a time. One such figurine is The Lavender Man (pictured), modelled on Michael Clifford, a Dublin street trader. In the mid 1930s, she develops a frustration with her work and with her lack of impact on the wider world. In attending the Chinese exhibition in London in 1935, it is confirmed to her that pottery should be practical rather than ornamental. It spurs her to destroy all her moulds and sell her kiln upon her return to Dublin.

Cox marries Alan Palmer in 1937, the couple has two daughters and relocate to England. Palmer is a conscientious objector during World War II, with the couple running a farm at Meopham, Kent, returning to London after the war.

Cox dies in early September 1972 in London. Some of her work is held in the collections of the National Museum of Ireland and with four works featured in the exhibition Not Just Pots: Contemporary Irish Ceramics of the 21st Century.

It is during the 1920s that Cox begins to question mainstream religion and becomes a vegetarian. Finding that her personal philosophy is similar to that of theosophy, she joins the movement and speaks at meetings. She is heavily influenced by the founder of the Order of the Great Companions, the Rev. William Hayes, who is living in Dublin in the 1930s. She writes and illustrates a children’s book on world religions, A story of stories, which she publishes under the pseudonym C.M. Kay in 1970.


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Birth of Evelyn Gleeson, Designer & Co-founder of Dun Emer Press

Evelyn Gleeson, English embroidery, carpet, and tapestry designer, is born on May 15, 1855, in Knutsford, Cheshire, England. Along with Elizabeth and Lily Yeats, she establishes the Dun Emer Press.

Gleeson is the daughter of Irish-born Edward Moloney Gleeson, a medical doctor, and Harriet (née Simpson), from Bolton, Lancashire. Her father has a practice in Knutsford but on a trip to Ireland he is struck by the poverty and unemployment and, with the advice of his brother-in-law, a textile manufacturer in Lancashire, he founds the Athlone Woollen Mills in 1859, investing all his money in the project. The family moves to Athlone in 1863, but Gleeson is educated in England, where she trains as a teacher. She later studies portraiture in London at the Atelier Ludovici from 1890–92. She goes on to study design with Alexander Millar, a follower of William Morris, who believes she has an exceptional aptitude for colour-blending. Many of her designs are bought by the exclusive Templeton Carpets of Glasgow.

Gleeson takes a keen interest in Irish affairs and, as a member of the Gaelic League and the Irish Literary Society, mixes with the Yeats family and the Irish artistic circle in London and is inspired by the Gaelic revival in art and literature. She is also involved in the suffrage movement and is chairwoman of the Pioneer Club, a women’s club in London. In 1900, an opportunity arises to make a practical contribution to the Irish renaissance and the emancipation of Irish women. She is suffering from ill-health, but her friend Augustine Henry, botanist and linguist, suggests she move away from the London smog to Ireland and open a craft centre with his financial assistance. She seizes the opportunity and discusses her plans with her friends the Yeats sisters, Elizabeth and Lily, who are talented craftswomen and have direct contact with William Morris and his followers. They have no money to contribute to the venture but are enthusiastic and can offer their skills and provide contacts. She seeks advice from W. B. and Jack Yeats, from Henry, who loans her £500, and from her cousin, T. P. Gill, secretary of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction.

During the summer of 1902 Gleeson finds a suitable house in Dundrum, County Dublin, ten minutes from the railway station. The house, originally called Runnymede, is renamed Dun Emer, after the wife of Cú-Chulainn, renowned for her craft skills. The printing press arrives in November 1902, and soon three craft industries are in operation. Lily Yeats runs the embroidery section, since she had trained with Morris’s daughter May. Elizabeth Yeats operates the press, having learned printing at the Women’s Printing Society in London. Gleeson manages the weaving and tapestry and looks after the financial affairs of the industries. W. B. Yeats acts as literary adviser, an arrangement that often causes friction, and Gleeson’s sister, Constance McCormack, is also involved.

Local girls are employed and trained, and the industries seek to use the best of Irish materials to make beautiful, high-quality, lasting products of original design. Church patronage accounts for most of their orders and, in 1902–03, Loughrea cathedral commissions twenty-four embroidered banners portraying Irish saints. They also make vestments, traditional dresses, drapes, cushions and other items, all beautifully crafted and mostly employing Celtic design. The first book published is In the Seven Woods (1903), by W. B. Yeats, cased in full Irish linen.

Gleeson is in demand as an adjudicator in craft competitions around the country and at Feis na nGleann in 1904 she praises the workmanship of the entries but is critical of the lack of teaching in design. She gives lectures and tries to raise the status of craftwork from household occupation to competitive industry. There are tensions with the Yeats sisters, who complain that she is bad-tempered and arrogant. In truth she had taken on too much of a financial burden, even with the support of grants, and she is anxious to repay her debt to Augustine Henry, which he is prepared to forego. The sisters snub her and omit her name in an interview about Dun Emer in the magazine House Beautiful. Millar, her design teacher in London, likens the omission to Hamlet without the prince. In 1904, it is decided to split the industries on a cooperative basis: Dun Emer Guild Ltd. under Gleeson and Dun Emer Industries Ltd. under the Yeats sisters.

Work continues, and the guild and industries exhibit separately at the Royal Dublin Society (RDS) and other craft competitions. In 1907, the National Museum of Ireland commissions a copy of a Flemish tapestry. It takes far longer than anticipated to complete, but the result is beautiful and is exhibited at the Arts and Crafts Society of Ireland in 1910. The guild wins a silver medal at the Milan International exhibition in 1906. The guild and industries both show work at the New York exhibition of 1908. The guild alone shows work in Boston. By now cooperation has turned to rivalry, and there is a final split as the Yeats sisters leave, taking the printing press with them to their house in Churchtown, Dublin. Gleeson writes off a debt of £185 owed to her, on condition that they do not use the name Dun Emer.

The business thrives at Dundrum, with her niece Katherine (Kitty) MacCormack and Augustine Henry’s niece, May Kerley, assisting with design. Later they move the workshops to Hardwicke Street, Dublin. In 1909, Gleeson becomes one of the first members of the Guild of Irish Art Workers and is made master in 1917. The Irish Women Workers’ Union commissions a banner from her about 1919, and, among numerous other notable successes, a Dun Emer carpet is presented to Pope Pius XI in 1932, the year of the Eucharistic Congress of Dublin.

Gleeson dies at the age of 89 at Dun Emer on February 20, 1944, with Kitty carrying on the Guild after her death. The final home of Dun Emer is a shop on Harcourt Street, Dublin, which finally closes in 1964.

(From: “Gleeson, Evelyn” by Ruth Devine, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009)


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Birth of Architect Sir Thomas Newenham Deane

Sir Thomas Newenham Deane, Irish architect, is born in Dundanion, County Cork on June 15, 1828. He is the son of Sir Thomas Deane and Eliza Newenham, and the father of Sir Thomas Manly Deane. His father and son are also architects.

Deane is educated at Trinity College, Dublin, from 1845 to 1849. On January 29, 1850, he marries Henrietta Manly, daughter of Joseph H. Manly of Ferney, County Cork. He and his wife have several children.

Deane joins his father’s architecture practice in 1850, and in 1851, he becomes a partner along with Benjamin Woodward. Their work is primarily a Gothic style influenced by the principles of John Ruskin, and include the museum at Trinity College, Dublin, the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, the Pitt Rivers Museum, the Kildare Street Club in Dublin, and Queen’s College Cork, now University College Cork. He is known as a conservation architect, involved in the restoration, including the incorporation of the original twelfth-century Romanesque chancel, of St. Mary’s Cathedral, Tuam.

Deane’s work on the conservation of St. Canice’s Cathedral, Kilkenny, is less successful and brings him into conflict with the dean and chapter, and in particular with the treasurer James Graves. It is possibly his interest in the restoration of medieval buildings which leads to his appointment as the first Inspector of National Monuments under the Irish Board of Works after the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland brought ruined buildings under their care. His work includes St. Cronan’s Church, Roscrea, County Tipperary.

In contemporary circles, Deane’s partner Woodward is seen as the creative influence behind the business, and their practice suffers after his early death on May 15, 1861. Nevertheless, Deane continues to work with his son, Thomas Manly Deane, designing the National Museum of Ireland and National Library of Ireland in Kildare Street, Dublin. He is knighted in 1890.

On November 8, 1899, Deane dies suddenly in his office on St. Stephen’s Green, into which he had only just moved. He is buried in Deans Grange Cemetery, where his son Thomas designs and erects a cross in his memory.


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Birth of Peadar Ó Dubhda, Translator & Teacher of Irish Language

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Peadar Ó Dubhda, novelist, playwright, musician, teacher and translator of the Irish language, is born in Dundalk, County Louth on June 29, 1881. He is the author of many plays, stories and manuscripts over the years and in his youth is a noted high jumper competing at local events.

Ó Dubhda leaves the local primary school at the age of twelve with only the most basic of an education, but when he goes to work as a delivery boy driving around the roads of North Louth on his horse and cart, he always has his O’Growney grammar book at his side, perfecting his knowledge of the Irish language. As a youth he joins the local brass band, where he is taught the cornet, but such is the depth of his intellect and his love for music he is an accomplished violinist, flautist and pianist in a very short time.

From his youth stretching into early manhood Ó Dubhda’s love of the Irish language is evident. He helps found a Gaelic League branch in Dundalk and perfects his use of the language by visiting Gaeltacht areas in the west of Ireland and Omeath. He is awarded a certificate to teach Irish by the Patrick Pearse and is a teacher in St. Mary’s College in Dundalk for over 20 years from 1915.

Ó Dubhda leaves teaching when he is offered his own children’s hour on Radio Éireann, a programme that lasts for over 30 years and through which a generation of Irish youth come to know and love his stories.

Ó Dubhda’s major work is the translation of the entire Douay version of the bible into Irish. The work takes twelve years and involves the deciphering of over three million words. The work is presented to the Irish nation in 1955 and is held in the National Museum of Ireland.

In 1950 Ó Dubhda is presented with the Papal medal, Pro Ecclessia el Pontifice by Pope Pius XII, to mark his 50th year as a member of his St. Malachy’s choir and one of his most prized possessions is a personal letter from Pope John XXIII praising him for his work for the church.

Peadar Ó Dubhda is just a month shy of his 90th birthday when he passes away in the loving care of his nieces in their Park Drive home on May 26, 1971. He is buried in Dundalk and his funeral is attended by President Éamon De Valera.


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Irish Protests of the War in Iraq

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On the evening of March 20, 2003, up to 2,000 people take part in a protest outside the United States Embassy at Ballsbridge in Dublin to voice their opposition to the war in Iraq. This is one of numerous protests held in response to the Irish Anti-War Movement‘s call on Irish citizens to mount mass protests against the U.S.-led war in Iraq. The group says thousands of workers, students and school pupils had taken part in stoppages and walk-outs throughout the day.

Richard Boyd Barrett, the chairman of the IAWM, says, “The complicity of the Irish government in this murderous war through providing facilities for the U.S. military at Shannon Airport is an absolute disgrace. “This war has little support among ordinary people and has provoked a wave of anger and revulsion. We call on the people of Ireland to come out in their thousands at 6:00 PM tonight to their town centre demonstrations to show this carnage is not being mounted in our names.”

Earlier in the day, several hundred protesters gather outside Dáil Éireann to protest the Irish Government‘s decision to continue allowing U.S. military aircraft use Shannon Airport. The Dáil is holding a six-hour debate on a Government motion which, among other topics, contains a clause permitting U.S. forces continued use of Irish airspace and facilities.

A 10-minute work stoppage at noon is observed by thousands of people, the IAWM claims. They say hundreds of students in University College Dublin, Dublin City University, University of Limerick and the Waterford Institute of Technology walked out, as did secondary school students in several schools in Dublin. Up to 1,000 students from second level colleges in Derry take part in an hour-long city centre protest. Around 50 health workers at Connolly Hospital Blanchardstown, staff at the National Museum of Ireland in Kildare Street and Collins Barracks and workers at the Motor Taxation office in Cork also stop work.

The NGO Peace Alliance says it is “extremely disappointed” at the Government’s refusal to condemn the attack on Iraq. “We call upon thousands of Irish people to reject this shameful position by thronging the streets of Dublin and other cities and towns next Saturday” said the alliance’s co-ordinator, Brendan Butler.

SIPTU‘s National Executive Council also interrupts their monthly meeting. “This war is not only unnecessary but illegitimate in the context of international law”, says Joe O’Flynn, SIPTU General Secretary.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions organises peace vigils on March 21 at the Spire of Dublin and other locations in various town and cities. Weekend anti-war protests take place in Dublin, Cork, Derry, Belfast, Galway, Sligo and Waterford.

(From: “Thousands protest against war at US Embassy” by Kilian Doyle, The Irish Times, March 20, 2003)