Archive News
August 2, 2012
Date Published: 01-Aug-2012
1912
Titanic tragedy
Judgement was given on Tuesday by Lord Mersey, Chairman of the British Commission, into the loss of the Titanic.
The court found that the loss of the vessel was due to a collision with an iceberg, brought about by the excessive speed at which the ship was navigated at the time. It was probable that the life of the ship would have been lengthened somewhat if the watertight doors had been left open, for water would have flown through them.
Lord Mersey stated that if the California, when she saw the rockets, pushed through the ice to the open water, as she could have done without serious risk, she could have given assistance to the Titanic, and might have saved many, if not all the lives that were lost.
With regard to Captain Smith, the President said, in maintaining speed and trusting to a sharp look out he made a very grievous mistake, but one which, in face of practice and past experience, negligence cannot be said to have had any part and in the absence of negligence, it was impossible, in his opinion, to fix Captain Smith with blame.
Canal rescue
On Wednesday, a woman of the tramp class, hailing from Waterford, attempted to commit suicide by throwing herself into the canal at Raven Terrace off Dominick Street. She was shortly after rescued by a visitor named Glennon who is at present staying at Mr. Cloherty’s private hotel. Mr. Glennon divested himself of his clothing and pluckily jumped in after the woman, whom he rescued with much difficulty.
When brought to the bank, the woman appeared to have suffered little as a result of her immersion. She was subsequently placed under arrest by the Dominick Street Police, brought before Mr. J.S Young, J.P., and remanded on the charge of attempted suicide for seven days.
Bazaar
The final arrangements preparatory to the opening of the Bazaar in aid of the Abbey Church have been completed and the Square, where the Bazaar will be held, should be a magnetic centre of attraction to the citizens and visitors who will throng through the city for the races.
1937
Sunshine
While ‘bus, boat and motor took hundreds of people away from Galway for the August bank holiday week-end, train, ‘bus, and motor brought a huge influx of visitors from all parts of Ireland for a holiday in the West. A broiling sun shone down on Sunday morning on streams of privately owned cars purring along all main roads leading into the city, while trains from a number of towns and cities flew over the rails to the western capital.
Race Week arrests
There was a general round up of vagrants in Galway City on the eve of the races. In parts of the city where they had already begun their Race Week “celebrations” several arrests were made.
Scenes of rowdyism broke out in a few places on Tuesday night, but the guards stepped in and put an end to affairs. While a number of men were detained pending a special district court on Friday morning, the feminine element was removed beyond the outskirts of the city.
Salthill diving accident
A large crowd witnessed a thrilling rescue at Blackrock, Galway, on Saturday evening, when James Cranny, an employee of the Jesuit Fathers, Sea Road, Galway, who was injured when he dived off the spring board and struck the bottom, was brought safely ashore by Tom Lynskey and Eddie Lee.
Mr Cranny was unconscious when taken from the water, and was immediately rushed by car to Seamount Hospital, Salthill. He was later removed to the Central Hospital, Galway where his neck was found to be badly fractured.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
People’s living conditions less than 100 years ago were frightening. We have come a long way. We talk about water charges today, but back then the local District Councils were erecting pumps for local communities and the lovely town of Mountbellew, according to Council minutes, had open sewers,” says Galway County Council archivist Patria McWalter.
Patria believes we “need to take pride in our history, and we should take the same pride in our historical records as we do in our built heritage”. When you see the wealth of material in her care, this belief makes sense.
She is in charge of caring for the rich collection of administrative records owned by Galway County Council and says “these records are as much part of our history as the Rock of Cashel is. They document our lives and our ancestors’ lives. And nobody can plan for the future unless you learn from the past, what worked and what didn’t”.
Archivists and librarians are often unfairly regarded as being dry, academic types, but that’s certainly not true of Patria. Her enthusiasm is infectious as she turns the pages of several minute books from Galway’s Rural District Councils, all of them at least 100 years old.
Part of her role involved cataloguing all the records of the Councils – Ballinasloe, Clifden, Galway, Gort, Loughrea, Mountbellew, Portumna and Tuam. These records mostly consisted of minutes of various meetings.
When she was cataloguing them she realised their worth to local historians and researchers, so she decided to compile a guide to their content. The result is For the Record: The Archives of Galway’s Rural District Councils, which will be a valuable asset to anybody with an interest in history.
Many representatives on these Councils were local personalities and several were arrested during the political upheaval of the era, she explains.
And, ushering in a new era in history, women were allowed to sit on these Rural District Councils – at the time they were not allowed to sit on County Councils.
All of this information is included in Patria’s introductory essay to the attractively produced A4 size guide, which gives a glimpse into how these Rural Councils operated and the way political thinking changed in Ireland during a short 26-year period. In the early 1900s, these Councils supported Home Rule, but by 1920, they were calling for full independence and refusing to recognise the British administration.
“I love the tone,” says Patria of the minutes from meetings. “The language was very emotive.”
That was certainly true of the Gort Rural District Council. At a meeting in 1907, following riots in Dublin at the premiere of JM Synge’s play, The Playboy of the Western World the councillors’ response was vehement. They recorded their decision to “protest most emphatically against the libellous comedy, The Playboy of the Western World, that was belched forth during the past week in the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, under the fostering care of Lady Gregory and Mr Yeats. We congratulate the good people of Dublin in howling down the gross buffoonery and immoral suggestions that are scattered throughout this scandalous performance.
For more from the archives see this week’s Tribunes here
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
SLIGO 0-9
GALWAY 1-4
FRANK FARRAGHER IN ENNISCRONE
GALWAY’S first serious examination of the 2013 season rather disturbingly ended with a rating well below the 40% pass mark at the idyllic, if rather Siberian, seaside setting of Enniscrone on Sunday last.
The defeat cost Galway a place in the FBD League Final against Leitrim and also put a fair dent on their confidence shield for the bigger tests that lie ahead in February.
There was no fluke element in this success by an understrength Sligo side and by the time Leitrim referee, Frank Flynn, sounded the final whistle, there wasn’t a perished soul in the crowd of about 500 who could question the justice of the outcome.
It is only pre-season and last Sunday’s blast of dry polar winds did remind everyone that this is far from summer football, but make no mistake about it, the match did lay down some very worrying markers for Galway following a couple of victories over below par third level college teams.
Galway did start the game quite positively, leading by four points at the end of a first quarter when they missed as much more, but when Sligo stepped up the tempo of the game in the 10 minutes before half-time, the maroon resistance crumbled with frightening rapidity.
Some of the statistics of the match make for grim perusal. Over the course of the hour, Galway only scored two points from play and they went through a 52 minute period of the match, without raising a white flag – admittedly a late rally did bring them close to a draw but that would have been very rough justice on Sligo.
Sligo were backable at 9/4 coming into this match, the odds being stretched with the ‘missing list’ on Kevin Walsh’s team sheet – Adrian Marren, Stephen Coen, Tony Taylor, Ross Donovan, David Kelly, David Maye, Johnny Davey and Eamon O’Hara, were all marked absent for a variety of reasons.
Walsh has his Sligo side well schooled in the high intensity, close quarters type of football, and the harder Galway tried to go through the short game channels, the more the home side bottled them up.
Galway badly needed to find some variety in their attacking strategy and maybe there is a lot to be said for the traditional Meath style of giving long, quick ball to a full forward line with a big target man on the edge of the square – given Paul Conroy’s prowess close to goal last season, maybe it is time to ‘settle’ on a few basics.
Defensively, Galway were reasonably solid with Gary Sice at centre back probably their best player – he was one of the few men in maroon to deliver decent long ball deep into the attacking zone – while Finian Hanley, Conor Costello and Gary O’Donnell also kept things tight.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
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