Thursday sees Hannover 96 come to Dublin to take on Saint Patrick’s Athletic in Tallaght Stadium. It’s almost surreal, with Hannover boasting a stadium with a capacity of almost 50,000, and Saint Patrick’s Athletic’s Richmond Park home, which is hidden behind a row of terraced houses in Inchicore, not being deemed up to scratch for this level of European football. Classic underdog stuff. If Pats have shown anything in Europe in recent years, it’s that they quite like that label, underdog.
Ticket information is in the poster above, and they go on sale tomorrow. I’d encourage League of Ireland fans to get along, as well as those with just a passing interest in the beautiful game. Magic European nights do happen on occasion, who knows?
(Currently putting the finishing touches on a thesis, so my posts are a bit sporadic and shorter than is the norm. Normality returns for me on Wednesday)
It looks like the folks at Dalymount Park are miles ahead of the competition with this offer for the upcoming Euro 2012 competition. Dalymount of course was once the home of the national side, and saw some hugely important moments in Irish football history. It’s current condition is a national disgrace. There’s more information on the deal at bohemians.ie
A Come Here To Me classic, Paul (or eh…Phil) McGrath and his first appearance in a Saint Patrick’s Atheltic match programme.
The Irish Football Programme Club are holding their Annual Programme Fair this Sunday. It will be held in St Andrews Resource Centre, Pearse Street, Dublin 2, running from 10am to 2pm. There will be a large selection of programmes, tickets, books, badges and other football memorabilia on sale. It’s always a good day out, and features plenty of League of Ireland programmes which should keep many CHTM readers happy.
But times, we are told, have changed. We must live in the present; not in the past. That of course, is right – unquestionably so, but my contention is that the changes that we see in the political situation since Connolly’s day are very superficial changes.
George Gilmore in ‘The Relevance of James Connolly in Ireland Today’
The Cowgate slums of Edinburgh, home to James Connolly in his youth.
Writing in 1898 in the pages of The Workers Republic newspaper, James Connolly outlined his belief that “apostles of freedom are ever idolised when dead, but crucified when living.” The centenary of the Easter Rising being upon us, the men and women of that April week remain idolised, but in many cases stripped of their complexities and character. James Connolly in particular, who left a great collection of work behind him, is a figure who has suffered greatly in the watering down of Ireland’s revolutionary past.
A member of the Industrial Workers of the World trade union during his time in the United States, Connolly’s socialism came from the shocking poverty he knew as a boy, in the slums of Cowgate in Edinburgh, refereed to as ‘Little Ireland’ by those unfortunate enough to call it home. Connolly’s militant beliefs, not least with regards to issues like gender equality and the roots of poverty, are often overlooked by those who ‘celebrate’ his legacy today. Standing at the grave of Connolly only weeks ago, Eamon Gilmore outlined his vision and ambition “to restore Ireland’s reputation as a good and stable place in which to invest and do business.”
The upcoming Dublin Writers Festival contains many interesting talks and discussions, but one that caught my eye is titled ‘James Connolly: Life & Legacy’. It contains an interesting panel, with Lorcan Collins, Catherine Morris and Richard Boyd Barrett attending.
The three of us behind CHTM! will be speaking at the seventh annual Dublin Anarchist Bookfair this Saturday, May 26th. This will be the first time we have spoken as CHTM! in public, so its exciting stuff for us. JayCarax will be speaking on his research of Norwich-born Arthur Wickss, an interesting character, and member of the IWW who died fighting alongside the ICA in Easter week, 1916. DFallon will talk on the difficulty of recounting “history from below” while I will speak briefly on Dan Donnelly, who was born around the corner from where our meeting takes place, in the Dark Horse Inn, Georges Quay.
Meeting poster, courtesy of LukeF comics!
So, spread the word, if you’d like to hear a little bit about Dublin’s other history, or to see the three of us in the flesh, and maybe pose us a question or two!
An interesting upcoming symposium, with free admission, looking at a wide variety of aspects of the economic and financial history of the capital.
For centuries Dublin has been the dominant location for making money in Ireland. Locals and new arrivals worked in an array of trades, businesses and professions – earning and spending, investing and losing money. As a capital city, Dublin was also home to lawyers, engineers and administrators attracted by the chance of a government job. Dubliners have lived and worked outside these approved (and taxed) workplaces too. Crime pays, and the pickpocket, fraudster and corrupt official are bound up with urban life. The world of work also involves social and political networks, fraternal organisations and strategic marriages.
Established academics and new researchers will examine the lives of people who made their living in Dublin from the Early Modern period to the late twentieth century. How did locals, rural migrants and immigrants succeed, scrape by or fail in the harsh world of commerce? What was their contribution to the evolution of the city? A wide range of papers will deal with topics including banking, architecture, women in business, printing, the professions and the technology boom of the 1980s.
To reserve a place please email: dublincityresearchgroup@gmail.com
Up to five hundred people on Saturday took over, the once grassy mound, beside City Hall on Dame Street for a 3.5 hour street party.
The event was organised by Reclaim the Streets to mark the 10th anniversary of when police attacked partygoers at a similar event on Dame Street in 2002.
Here are some pictures and videos from the day:
Crowd making their way down Parliament Street. They had met originally at 2pm at the spire.
Seventeen years since the first Reclaim the Streets in London, seven years since the last RTS in Dublin, and, most importantly, ten years since the RTS in our city that was attacked by police on Dame Street – Dublin is set to see one again.
Reclaim the Streets, which came about when the British anti-Motorway and anti-Criminal Justice Bill rave scenes hooked up together, is about reclaiming public space temporarily for a street party.
Reclaim the Streets poster (1)
I reckon I might wander down on Saturday for a look.
For more info check out the FB event or the FB page.
Join Rabble and the legendary Munchi this Saturday for a night of heavy ‘ass’ shaking. Help them get the pennies they need to print issue 4. Without you, it won’t happen.
Independents Day is a great idea worthy of supporting, as it grants a platform to small independently released publications and zines. While blogging is our passion, we've always had a love of the printed word and for that reason are always more than eager to contribute to or support publications like Rabble for example, which jaycarax promoted on the site yesterday. Independents Day is non-profit and offers a cheap space for independent magazines, record labels and the like to promote themselves. Rabble, the Irish Labour History Society and Loserdom are among the names on the list already.
Would I have enjoyed Keith Fahey’s absolute screamer in Dalymount Park back in 2008 if it had happened at half four on a Sunday instead of the usual Friday night? Of course. No doubt, there wouldn’t have been as many of us able to claim to have witnessed it in the flesh afterwards though.
League of Ireland fans and the telly, it’s a troubled relationship. Naturally and logically, fans want more exposure for the game as what’s really needed is more bums on seats. Still, a 4PM kick off on Sunday to facilitate the televising of the Bohs and Pats derby is fairly annoying for most who plan on attending.
Pats go into the game quite strongly. With seven points from three games, we’ve performed well to date and the team are playing a very different and refreshing kind of football. It’s a bit surreal seeing Liam Buckley back in the managers job, as Liam was Pats manager when we began going to watch the club as a family. All has changed, changed utterly since, and football is a different affair now. I probably know less about football now than I did as a child. I have friends who have genuinely had to check Teletext the following day to know if we won the night before. Sunday football isn’t ideal then.
For Bohs fans, there seems to be a certain jubilation in, well….. just existing. They’re still there. To rob a line from the blue half of Glasgow, “If they play on the streets, we’ll cheer from the sidewalks” seems fitting in this league where near financial ruin is something almost every club has experienced. TBWRA, or The Bohs Will Rise Again, has become the mantra of the last block of the Jodi.
With Shelbourne in the top flight again Dublin derbies are more frequent than before. It might not be a quarter to eight on a Friday, but a good northside/southside derby is a derby all the same and I’d hope for a good one. Following the game, Bohs continue to show their far superior taste in music to just about everyone with Rob Smith in the Phoenix Bar performing the music of The Stone Roses and Oasis.The event page is here.
Click on the book for more.
Click on the book for more.
Donal
Ciarán
Sam
Come Here To Me! 