Come Here To Me!

Edit: This is my final post on CHTM. Thanks for your readership of my posts over the last decade! Stay in touch! My new podcast, Three Castles Burning, is available on all podcast platforms.

CHTM was established in the winter of 2009. It is difficult to believe that a decade has passed. In signing off for the year personally, this post seeks to give a sense of some of what we published in 2019. While less busy than in previous years content wise, the quality was high! We thank readers for their continued support, their comments (which often really add to pieces) and their engagement with the blog across its various platforms.

Revolutionary period:

Much of our 2019 content focused on the revolutionary period. These posts included Surrey House, Rathmines (home of Constance Markievicz), food distribution during the revolution and the day the Volunteers stole pigs set for export, May Day during the War of Independence, the Munitions Strike (the centenary of which is fast approaching) and the Bachelors Walk massacre.

Music:

Some of the most interesting comments this year came on a piece exploring multiracial bands in Irish musical history, while other musical pieces focused on anniversaries, including the centenary of An Fear Ceoil, Seamus Ennis. Original Pirate Material explored the bootleg tapes of O’Connell Bridge, while there was also the great Earl Gill. There was the return of legendary Dublin band The Atrix to celebrate, too.

1928 coverage of the Liffey Swim, Irish Independent.

Architecture and Built Heritage:

Architecture was more prominent this year than before on the blog. Posts examined the George’s Street Arcade, Deirdre Kelly who fought so bravely for Dublin, the unlikely meeting place of the Dublin United Tramways Company and ALDI and the emergence of Lord Edward Street. Monuments remained a feature of the site, including Big Jim.

Public Houses, Social History and Gach Rud Éile.

A popular post from the start of the year concerned early houses (fewer, but still in existence), while there was also the curious tale of The Zodiac. It was goodbye to Hector Grey’s, a century of the Liffey Swim, and we remembered the Pike Theatre, a lost (and tiny) Dublin institution. We had migration, white horses and censorship in there too.

Thanks to all who engaged with the blog in 2019. Be sure to check out Three Castles Burning, a new Podcast I hope captures some of the spirit of CHTM, and remember CHTM books Volume 1 and 2 are available in all good bookshops now, and would look fantastic under any Christmas tree!