Come Here To Me!

This Sunday, I’m happy to be taking part in a discussion at the History Festival of Ireland. This is the second year of the event, and it is taking place “amidst the ruins and walled gardens of Ducketts Grove in Co. Carlow.” There is a great line up of events for the weekend, with Saturday and Sunday both seeing discussions on everything from the Bronze Age to the 1913 Lockout. The full programme is available to read here.

The discussion I’m taking part in is on history in the 21st century, and I’m sharing the panel with people who I think are doing very interesting things as far as bringing history to a mainstream audience is concerned.

Sunday – 1.15pm A Future for Our Past: History in the 21st Century – Roisin Higgins (chair & author of ‘Transforming 1916′), Donal Fallon (co-founder of the Come Here to Me blog), Tommy Graham (founder of History Ireland magazine) and Neil Jackman (founder of Abarta Audioguides) on the way in which our understanding of history is being honed by technology.

The event is being organised by Turtle Bunbury, who also runs the brilliant Wistorical page on Facebook. It has posted a few Dublin gems in recent times, including a brilliant little tidbit on the 1911 Census Form of 1916 leader Seán Mac Diarmada.

Seán enjoyed filling out the census form in April 1911. Under “Marriage”, the 26-year-old remarked “Single, but not for long” and under “Disabilities” he wrote “heart-broken from being single”.

Under “Religion”, he entered “Náisiuntacht na h-Eireann”, meaning “The Nationhood of Ireland”. This was helpfully, but erroneously, translated by the enumerator as “Church of Ireland”.

At the time Seán was living at 15 Russell Place, Dublin…