Galway in Days Gone By
Galway In Days Gone By
1918
Scandalous streets
Whilst the roads of Co. Galway have shown a very marked and welcome improvement in every direction, the condition of the streets within the borough boundary is truly scandalous.
At the Urban Council meeting yesterday, the Chairman (Mr. Young) questioned Mr. Binns in regard to the quarry, but beyond a vague statement about the railway there, difficulties of weighing etc., little information was vouchsafed.
The Chairman hoped a start would be made next week. The ratepayers are entitled to hope that some effort will be made – even though this is the wrong time of the year for road-making – to set their house in order.
The Council was persistently warned last winter that if something were not done, the borough roads would get into a starved condition, and that it would take hundreds of pounds to put them into decent repair again. Yet nothing was done, and to-day it is easier to cycle or drive down a Connemara boreen than through the principal streets of the city.
Distressing find
The dead body of a male infant was found on Tuesday at the foreshore, Salthill, by Constable Hanley, of that station. The body, which was wrapped in a white garment, and bore superficial marks of violence, was removed to the morgue. There was a mark as if a cord or string had been tied around its neck. Great violence must have been used in the tying of the cord to cause the wound in the chin. At the inquest, the opinion was formed that death was due to strangulation.
A woman was admitted to the workhouse hospital on Wednesday. In consequence of statements made by her, and information derived from other source, police patrols are on duty in close proximity to the workhouse since her admission.
1943
Shameful women drinkers
The Rev. P. Prendergast, D.D., St. Jarlath’s College, in an address to the Tuam Pioneer Total Abstinence Association at their half-yearly meeting, said that statistics show that the consumption of strong drink had been steadily on the increase for a number of years past.
The most alarming aspect of this increase was that it applied chiefly to young people and, most shameful of all, to women. The drink habit among women, like most of their habits, was governed largely by fashion.
There was a time when no respectable woman in this country would dream of taking a drink. The only women who were ever drunk were those of the itinerant class in the country or of the slums in big cities. But nowadays, alas, it had become the fashion for ladies (if indeed one could call them ladies) who consider themselves as belonging to the better classes, to take their cocktails to excess and that not merely in private, but at public functions such as dances and parties.
These women would probably despise a poor woman in a shawl who would go into a public house and take a bottle of stout. But she, at least, if her action was not very edifying, was straightforward and honest. She had no pretensions about herself and would probably readily admit that the drink was her ruination. This drinking among women was only one aspect of a wider movement among them to imitate men in all things. It was a pity that if they want to imitate men at all, they would not imitate their good qualities.
One factor which had greatly contributed to the increase in drinking was the increase in the number of dance halls, with the consequent increase in the drinking that had come to be associated with them.
This was so well known that there was no need for him to dwell on it. Nor was it necessary for him to point out the serious effects which the taking of drink was known to have on the morals and proper conduct associated with such halls.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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.
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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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