Search Results for 'Eamon de Valera'

Patrick Ganly was born in the parish of Kilcleagh near Moate in 1857. At just 18 years of age, like thousands of others from Westmeath and Longford, he left for Argentina. In 1899 Patrick Ganly and his wife Mary (nee McGeoy) returned to Ireland and took up residence at Aghanagrit near Moate. During this time their daughter Ellen was born. In 1901 the family returned to Argentina, where they remained.

Today June 16 marks the centenary anniversary of the general election in which Irish voters had the opportunity to vote for candidates who supported or rejected the Anglo-Irish Treaty, which granted Dominion Status, similar to that of Canada and South Africa, to 26 of the 32 counties of Ireland.

Voices of the Free State — an impressive book faturing selected essays from WG Fitzgerald’s The Voice of Ireland almost a century ago will be launched in the city next week.

Tomás Bán Concannon was born on Inis Meáin 150 years ago on November 16, 1870, the son of Páidin Concannon and Annie Faherty. He was called ‘bán’ because of his blond hair and to differentiate him from other neighbours of the same name. He was educated on the island and, unusually for an islander, in the Monastery School in Galway. When he was 15 his brother brought him to America where he went to a number of colleges and attended Eastman College in New York where he graduated with an MA in accountancy. He spent some time working in a business selling rubber stamps, then in his brother’s vineyard in California, and he later set up a business in Mexico. It was there he came across a journal called Gaodhal published by Conradh na Gaeilge in the US. So he learned to read and write in Irish in Mexico.

On December 7 1922, Pádraic Ó Máille TD and his friend Sean Hales TD of Cork, walked out of a hotel on Ormonde Quay, by Dublin’s river Liffy. They just had lunch, and were on their way back to the Dáil in Leinster House, a short drive away. Ó Máille, Galway city and Connemara’s first TD, had been appointed Leas Ceann Comhairle (deputy speaker). As they reached their car a gunman stepped forward and opened fire. Both men were hit, but Hales was bleeding profusely. Although seriously injured Ó Máille managed to get Hales into the car and drove to the nearest hospital, where he collapsed, and died.

Insider has been a keen observer of the political scene for well over 40 years, and, up until recently, thought he had seen and heard it all. There were many contenders for the ‘Brass Neck’ award over the years - from Charlie Haughey’s ‘doing the State some service’ to Ray Burke’s ‘line in the sand’ to Bertie Aherne's ‘won it on the horses’.

It comes as little surprise that Michael D Higgins has declared his intention to contest the presidency of Ireland for a second term - some 52 years since the incumbent Eamon de Valera won a second term before leaving leaving office at 90 years of age.

After the enthusiastic reception at New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel on June 23 1919, Eamon de Valera was deluged with invitations. For the next 18 months he kept the cause of Ireland before the American public. Criss-crossing the country he addressed public meetings, and state legislatures, receiving on the way a plethora of honorary doctorates, including being adopted as a chief of the Indian Chippewa nation. He quickly won the goodwill of William Randolph Hearst and his chain of newspapers. He was given maximum publicity wherever he appeared, which proved to be an effective answer to British propaganda.

It is perhaps an indication of how Ireland was cut off from the rest of the world that no one here knew about the painting of the Virgin and Child, and its miraculous ’tears of blood’, that Bishop Walter Lynch brought with him to Gyor* in Hungary, in the middle of the 17th century.

Coláiste Gaeilge Inis Meáin is enrolling Irish language students, both children and adults, this summer.