#OTD in 1809 – Opening of Nelson’s Pillar in the middle of O’Connell Street (formerly Sackville Street) in Dublin.

21/10/2018.Reading time 5 minutes.

It was built in 1808–1809, and was among the first and grandest monuments erected in memory of Nelson in the ‘THEN’ United Kingdom. It surprisingly survived until March 1966, when it was destroyed by a bomb planted by Irish republicans. Today the Spire of Dublin stands on its former ground. It was opened to the […]

#OTD in 1803 – Execution of Thomas Paliser Russell in Downpatrick for ‘high treason’.

21/10/2018.Reading time 8 minutes.

Born in Dromahane, Co Cork to an Anglican family, Thomas Russell joined the British army in 1783 and served in India. He returned to Ireland in 1786 and commenced studies in science, philosophy and politics. in July 1790 he met Theobald Wolfe Tone in the visitor’s gallery in the Irish House of Commons and they […]

#OTD in 1854 – Birth of playwright, novelist, essayist, and poet, Oscar Wilde, in Dublin.

16/10/2018.Reading time 2 minutes.

Oscar Wilde was an Irish author, playwright and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular playwrights in the early 1890s. He is remembered for his epigrams, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, his plays, as well as the circumstances of his imprisonment and early death. […]

#OTD in 1920 – Peter O’Carroll (actor, Brendan O’Carroll’s grandfather) was shot dead in Manor Street, Dublin.

16/10/2018.Reading time 3 minutes.

Actor, Brendan O’Carroll (Mrs Brown’s Boys) is the youngest of eleven children. He was born in 1955 in Finglas, Co Dublin to parents Gerard Francis O’Carroll and Maureen McHugh. Gerard was a cabinet-maker and Maureen a secondary school teacher and the first Irish Member of Parliament. They were married in 1936 in Dublin but both […]

#OTD in 2001 – The first multiple State funeral is held in honour of ten IRA Volunteers, including Kevin Barry, who were executed for their role in the War of Independence.

14/10/2018.Reading time 3 minutes.

More than 80 years after they were buried in the grounds of Mountjoy Gaol, the bodies of the ten men were exhumed and reinterred in a special new plot at Glasnevin Cemetery. They were executed in Mountjoy Gaol by British forces following courts-martial from 1920–21 during the Irish War of Independence. Based upon military law […]

#OTD in 1814 – Birth of Irish writer, who was the chief organiser and poet of the Young Ireland movement, Thomas Osborne Davis in Mallow, Co Cork.

14/10/2018.Reading time 5 minutes.

Thomas Osborn Davis was born in the town of Mallow, Co Cork, the son of a Welsh father, a surgeon in the Royal Artillery, and an Irish mother. Through his mother he was descended from the Gaelic noble family of O’Sullivan Beare. His father died one month after his birth and his mother moved to […]

Gaelic Football and the Civil War

13/10/2018.Reading time 4 minutes.

Kerry’s dominance in Gaelic football over the past century is a testament to the county’s passion for the sport — a passion that was forged by the bitterness of the Civil War. The worst atrocities occurred in Kerry. In retaliation for the killing of five Free State soldiers (including two members of the Dublin Brigade) […]

#OTD in 1790 – Birth of “The Apostle of Temperance” and campaigner against alcohol, Fr Theobald Mathew, in Co Tipperary.

10/10/2018.Reading time 5 minutes.

Theobald Mathew, founder of the The Total Abstinence Association is born at Thomastown, near Golden, Co Tipperary. He received his schooling in Kilkenny, then moved for a short time to Maynooth. From 1808 to 1814 he studied in Dublin, where in the latter year he was ordained to the priesthood. Having entered the Capuchin order, […]

#OTD in 1965 – Birth of comedian and actor, Ardal O’Hanlon, in Co Monaghan.

08/10/2018.Reading time 6 minutes.

Ardal O’Hanlon was born in 1965 in Carrickmacross, Co Monaghan, the son of Rory O’Hanlon, a politician and doctor, and has five siblings. RTÉ’s Who do you think you are? programme on Monday 6 October 2008 examined Ardal’s family tree. He discovered that his paternal grandfather, Michael O’Hanlon, a UCD medicine student, had joined the […]

#OTD in 1959 – Birth of musician, Gavin Friday, in Dublin.

08/10/2018.Reading time 4 minutes.

Birth of Gavin Friday (born Fionán Martin Hanvey) in Dublin. He is a singer and songwriter, composer, actor and painter and founder of post-punk band The Virgin Prunes. Friday was born in Dublin and grew up in Ballygall a neighbourhood located on Dublin’s Northside located between Finglas and Glasnevin where he went to school. When […]

Stair na hÉireann/History of Ireland

Tag: Dublin