Archive News
March 3, 2011
Date Published: {J}
1911
Lazy horse
At a meeting of the Urban Council, Mr. Molloy reported that the black horse refused to work, and he suggested that he be sold.
Mr Costello: When did he develop this genius?
Mr. Crowley said the complaints about the horse were numerous. Mr. Griffin said he was awful.
Mr. Crowley: He does nothing except bite and eat grass.
Chairman (to the Press representatives): Gentlemen, don’t take that down; say that we have a most admirable horse for sale (laughter).
It was decided to sell the horse by public auction (or by any other way in which he can be disposed of).
Buy Irish
The Galway Industrial Development Association wrote asking if the Council had any resolution on the books with regard to supporting Irish goods. The query was prompted by the fact that in the Council’s advertisements there was no desire to acquire, or even to give preference to Irish goods. Several members said Irish goods always got preference in that Council.
Dogs, cats and rats
Arising out of a letter from the L.G. Board to Ballinasloe District Council on the subject of the rat destruction, Mr. Cahill said we must have some means of protecting the cat and dog if we want to put down the rat plague. How can it be put down when 5s is given for a dog’s tail and 1s for a cat’s. As far as I know, he said, vermin are accumulating to a great extent, because the cat and the dogs are murdered.
Mr. Cahill said parties were to be seen with three or four cat’s tails in their pockets. The Chairman told Mr. Gill to write to the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Society and say that it was stated at their meeting that money is being paid for the tails of dogs and cats by Lord Ashtown.
1936
Musical interlude
The proceedings at the special meeting of Galway County Council on Saturday were enlivenced by a verse of an Irish song sung by Tomas O’Niadh. The Council had decided to appoint twenty-three inspectors to enforce the terms of the Warble Fly (Treatment of Cattle Order), 1936, in the county and were considering the qualifications when Mr O’Niadh sang his verse.
Uneconomic proposition
At a County Council meeting, the secretary, Mr. C.I. O’Flynn, read a letter from the Office of Public Works stating that the scheme for the cleaning of the river from Pouladulla to Clifden for the purpose of reclaiming land had no economic justification and would not be included in any scheme of relief works. The cost of the reclaimed land, it was pointed out, would be about £300 per acre.
Unusual prosecution
An unusual prosecution was heard at Westport District Court when a number of people found dancing in an unlicensed dance hall were prosecuted. Supt. Glynn said the guards failed to find an owner, management committee or trustees to proceed against, and faced with such a position, a prosecution was ordered against the dancers.
The hall was built on “no man’s land” and was not in the County Council books for rating purposes. Mr. J.C. Garvey, defending, claimed that the superintendent not being a solicitor had no authority to represent the Attorney General.
The hall was rigidly restricted to the people of the chapel area, and the older inhabitants, feeling that it would be made a public amusement if a licence was taken out, declined to do so, as the place was reserved for games. The prosecution should fail as occupants could not be proved.
District Justice Coyne said he would adjourn to give these people a chance of taking out a licence. If they did not, he would hold the dancers were properly before the court.
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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