Galway in Days Gone By
Days Gone By – 1965 – Bomb shelter proposal for new school
Days Gone By – Stories from our archives 100, 75, 50 and 25 years ago
1965 – Females needed to ‘decorate the mahogany’
Dear Sir,
It must be a source of consolation to the ratepayers of Galway that the are offered the privilege to ensure the survival of their top executives in the event of a nuclear bomb attack by subsidising a shelter incorporated in the plan for a new vocational school in the city.
They can assuredly also take pride in being allowed to carry a bigger burden for similar protection inconsistently for the brass hats in Renmore Barracks who might otherwise be expected to become similarly involved in their own preserves on a lunatic ‘white elephant’ effort of this nature.
I suggest that somewhere along the line there must have been loose thinking by the egg heads responsible for conceiving such a fantastic brainwave without sufficient concentration on details overlooked in the planning stage.
I’m fully convinced that the accommodation of the shelter should at least cater for a small group of substantial ratepayers and similar facilities should also be available for a few members of the female sex in a certain category.
This is necessary as an essential guarantee that the “mahogany can be decorated” to keep the machinery functioning if the emergency should arise and it might also be as well to try and preserve a few taxpayers for good measure for the benefit of the army personnel.
Naturally I’m not suggesting that these inferior second-class citizens should be allowed to associate with their superiors in such a dire calamity as envisaged, but with a proper layout it is easy enough to guard against such danger and at the same time provide for the future development of the human race.
Nevertheless, as far as I’m concerned and, as I see it, all categories of citizens in this country are being protected from nuclear bomb attack by United States military power in South Vietnam and elsewhere without any thanks or appreciation from ingrates in high places in this country who have lost trace of our friends by fostering an Afro-Asian axis that is a positive menace to the welfare of this ancient nation.
Yours,
Peter O’Farrell.
For more from the archives: See this week’s Tribune
1915 – Bombardment in Kilnadeema
1940 – Fracas in Bohermore laneway
1990 – Great Southern takeover and European flights for Galway?
1923
Gloom after war
The special correspondent of the “Independent”, who has been writing of the aftermath of civil war in the West, notes that a feeling of apathy, due to the uncertainty of events, exists amongst the sorely-tried people of Connemara; that politics are referred to only with disgust and that not more than fifty per cent. of the people would vote at a general election; that poverty and unemployment are rife, and there is a growing tendency towards emigration; and that there are bitter complaints of the huge impost of rates and taxes.
It is only too true that there is enough of material for the pessimist to brood over, and that a feeling of gloom permeates country towns. But it is a poor tribute to patriotism that has survived such horrors to encourage this gloom.
It is the duty of all of us to get this pessimism out of the national body and to rid ourselves of the notion that we have not enough Christianity and moral sense left to restore our people to cheerful and ordered progress and industry.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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1923
Peace negotiations
As we go to press, An Dáil is discussing the Peace negotiations between the Government and Mr. de Valera. It was announced on Wednesday for the first time that such negotiations were begun following Mr. de Valera’s “cease fire” proclamation of April 27, and that by the 30th of the month Senators Andrew Jameson and James Douglas were asked by him to discuss proposals.
They said it was for the Government to discuss; they could only confer. Into the ensuring conferences the Government declined to enter personally, but on May 3 the senators placed before Mr. de Valera the Cabinet’s terms, which were that future issues should be decided by the majority vote of the elected representatives of the people, and that as a corollary and a preliminary to the release of prisoners, all lethal weapons should be in the custody and control of the Executive Government.
Mr. de Valera relied to this on May 7 with a document in which he agreed to majority rule and control of arms, but added that arms should be stored in a suitable building in each province under armed Republican guard until after the elections in September, that the oath should not be made a test in the councils of the nation, and that all political prisoners should be released immediately on the signing of this agreement.
“You have brought back to us,” wrote President Cosgrave, “not an acceptance of our conditions, but a long and wordy document inviting debate where none is possible”.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
1923
State of the parties
Speculation as to parties after the next Irish elections is exceedingly interesting, especially in view of the enlarged franchise.
In Dublin, the view appears to be held by a number of people that Labour will make a great bid for power.
Dublin, however, has a curiously insular habit of thought where matters that concern all Ireland and in which Ireland has a say are concerned. We hope this insularity will rapidly disappear under the new conditions.
The country as a whole is backing the Farmers’ Party, and has not the smallest doubt that it will be the strongest combination in the next Dáil, and that it will oust the purely political parties, the one because it has resorted to force, the other because it has been compelled to use force to supress force, and the Labour Party because Ireland feels that at the back of its policy lurks the danger of Communism.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
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