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    Irish Freedom From Hunger Commemorative Plate 1964

    €60.00
    Christmas 1964 Irish Freedom from Hunger Arklow Pottery Plate. 25cm diametre
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  • National Irish Accordion Championship Winner’s Shield 1973

    €60.00
    27cm x 19cm. Kilrush Co Clare The accordion plays a major part in modern Irish music. The accordion spread to Ireland late in the 19th century. In its ten-key form (melodeon), it is claimed that it was popular across the island. It was recorded in the US by John Kimmel, The Flanagan Brothers, Eddie Herborn and Peter Conlon. While uncommon, the melodeon is still played in some parts of Ireland, in particular in Connemara by Johnny Connolly. Modern Irish accordion players generally prefer the 2 row button accordion. Unlike similar accordions used in other European and American music traditions, the rows are tuned a semi-tone apart. This allows the instrument to be played chromatically in melody. Currently accordions tuned to the keys of B/C and C#/D are by far the most popular systems. The B/C accordion lends itself to a flowing style; it was popularised by Paddy O'Brien of Tipperary in the late 1940s and 1950s, Joe Burke and Sonny Brogan in the 1950s and 60s. Dublin native James Keane brought the instrument to New York where he maintained an influential recording and performing career from the 1970s to the present. Other famous B/C players include Paddy O'Brien of County Offaly, Bobby Gardiner, Finbarr Dwyer, John Nolan, James Keane, and Billy McComiskey. The C#/D accordion lends itself to a punchier style and is particularly popular in the slides and polkas of Kerry Music. Notable players include Tony MacMahon, Máirtín O'Connor, Sharon Shannon, Charlie Piggott, Jackie Daly, Joe Cooley and Johnny O'Leary. The piano accordion became highly popular during the 1950s and has flourished to the present day in céilí bands and for old time Irish dance music. Their greater range, ease of changing key, more fluent action, along with their strong musette tuning blended seamlessly with the other instruments and were highly valued during this period. They are the mainstay of the top Irish and Scottish ceilidh bands, including the County Antrim-based Haste to the Wedding Celidh Band, the Gallowglass Céilí Band, the Fitzgerald Céilí Band, Dermot O'Brien, Malachy Doris, Sean Quinn and Mick Foster are well known Irish solo masters of this instrument and were well recorded. The latest revival of traditional music from the late 1970s also revived the interest in this versatile instrument. Like the button key accordion, a new playing style has emerged with a dry tuning, lighter style of playing and a more rhythmically varied bass. The most notable players of this modern style are Karen Tweed (England) and Alan Kelly (Roscommon).
    English concertina made by Wheatstone around 1920
    Concertinas are manufactured in several types, the most common in Irish traditional music being the Anglo system with a few musicians now playing the English system. Each differs from the other in construction and playing technique. The most distinctive characteristic of the Anglo system is that each button sounds a different note, depending on whether the bellows are compressed or expanded. Anglo concertinas typically have either two or three rows of buttons that sound notes, plus an "air button" located near the right thumb that allows the player to fill or empty the bellows without sounding a note. Two-row Anglo concertinas usually have 20 buttons that sound notes. Each row of 10 buttons comprises notes within a common key. The two primary rows thus contain the notes of two musical keys, such as C and G. Each row is divided in two with five buttons playing lower-pitched notes of the given key on the left-hand end of the instrument and five buttons playing the higher pitched notes on the right-hand end. The row of buttons in the higher key is closer to the wrist of each hand. 20 key concertinas have a limited use for Irish traditional music due to the limited range of accidentals available. Three-row concertinas add a third row of accidentals (i.e., sharps and flats not included in the keys represented by the two main rows) and redundant notes (i.e., notes that duplicate those in the main keys but are located in the third, outermost row) that enable the instrument to be played in virtually any key. A series of sequential notes can be played in the home-key rows by depressing a button, compressing the bellows, depressing the same button and extending the bellows, moving to the next button and repeating the process, and so on. A consequence of this arrangement is that the player often encounters occasions requiring a change in bellows direction, which produces a clear separation between the sounds of the two adjacent notes. This tends to give the music a more punctuated, bouncy sound that can be especially well suited to hornpipes or jigs. English concertinas, by contrast, sound the same note for any given button, irrespective of the direction of bellows travel. Thus, any note can be played while the bellows is either expanded or compressed. As a consequence, sequential notes can be played without altering the bellows direction. This allows sequences of notes to be played in a smooth, continuous stream without the interruption of changing bellows direction. Despite the inherent bounciness of the Anglo and the inherent smoothness of the English concertina systems, skilled players of Irish traditional music can achieve either effect on each type of instrument by adapting the playing style. On the Anglo, for example, the notes on various rows partially overlap and the third row contains additional redundant notes, so that the same note can be sounded with more than one button. Often, whereas one button will sound a given note on bellows compression, an alternative button in a different row will sound the same note on bellows expansion. Thus, by playing across the rows, the player can avoid changes in bellows direction from note to note where the musical objective is a smoother sound. Likewise, the English system accommodates playing styles that counteract its inherent smoothness and continuity between notes. Specifically, when the music calls for it, the player can choose to reverse bellows direction, causing sequential notes to be more distinctly articulated. Popular concertina players include Niall Vallely, Kitty Hayes, Mícheál Ó Raghallaigh, Tim Collins, Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin, Mary MacNamara, Noel Hill, Kate McNamara and Padraig Rynne. Liam Clancy (of The Clancy Brothers and Makem and Clancy) also played the concertina until his death in 2009. Origins : Co Clare Dimensions ;
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  • De Valera B&W Portrait

    €120.00
    e Valera was a near demagogue type politician who dominated Irish Political life from 1917 to 1973,whether as Prime Minister or President or as leader of the Opposition.Known as the Long Fella,Irish people either loved or hated him-there was simply no ambivalent feelings about this most polarising of politicians.This fine, original portrait of De Valera catches him perfectly and would make a superb addition to any Irish Pub ,both at home or abroad with a Fianna Fail or Republican bias or anyone from Clare,a county where he was always at his most popular. Eamon de Valera, first registered as George de Valero; changed some time before 1901 to Edward de Valera;14 October 1882 – 29 August 1975) was a prominent statesman and political leader in 20th-century Ireland. His political career spanned over half a century, from 1917 to 1973; he served several terms as head of government and head of state. He also led the introduction of the Constitution of Ireland. Prior to de Valera's political career, he was a Commandant at Boland's Mill during the 1916 Easter Rising, an Irish revolution that would eventually contribute to Irish independence. He was arrested, sentenced to death but released for a variety of reasons, including the public response to the British execution of Rising leaders. He returned to Ireland after being jailed in England and became one of the leading political figures of the War of Independence. After the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, de Valera served as the political leader of Anti-Treaty Sinn Fein until 1926, when he, along with many supporters, left the party to set up Fianna Fáil, a new political party which abandoned the policy of abstentionism from Dáil Éireann. From there, de Valera would go on to be at the forefront of Irish politics until the turn of the 1960s. He took over as President of the Executive Councilfrom W. T. Cosgrave and later Taoiseach, with the passing of Bunreacht Na hEireann (Irish constitution) in 1937. He would serve as Taoiseach on 3 occasions; from 1937 to 1948, from 1951 to 1954 and finally from 1957 to 1959. He remains the longest serving Taoiseach by total days served in the post. He resigned in 1959 upon his election as President of Ireland. By then, he had been Leader of Fianna Fáil for 33 years, and he, along with older founding members, began to take a less prominent role relative to newer ministers such as Jack Lynch, Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney. He would serve as President from 1959 to 1973, two full terms in office. De Valera's political beliefs evolved from militant Irish republicanism to strong social, cultural and economic conservatism.He has been characterised by a stern, unbending, devious demeanor. His roles in the Civil War have also portrayed him as a divisive figure in Irish history. Biographer Tim Pat Coogan sees his time in power as being characterised by economic and cultural stagnation, while Diarmaid Ferriter argues that the stereotype of de Valera as an austere, cold and even backward figure was largely manufactured in the 1960s and is misguided. Origins:Co Laois Dimensions :48cm x 35cm
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  • Bridget Breen’s Roscrea Old Guinness Label

    €100.00
    Bridget Breens was a renowned public house in the North Tipperary market town of Roscrea.Bridget had a grocery, wine and spirit store on Rosemary St in the town and bottled her own beers and whiskey. Origins ; Roscrea Co Tipperary.  Dimensions : 25cm x 35cm     Glazed Arthur Guinness started brewing ales in 1759 at the St James Gate Brewery,Dublin.On 31st December 1759 he signed a 9,000 year lease at £45 per annum for the unused brewery.Ten years later, on 19 May 1769, Guinness first exported his ale: he shipped six-and-a-half barrels to Great Britain before he started selling the dark beer porter in 1778. The first Guinness beers to use the term were Single Stout and Double Stout in the 1840s.Throughout the bulk of its history, Guinness produced only three variations of a single beer type: porter or single stout, double or extra and foreign stout for export. “Stout” originally referred to a beer’s strength, but eventually shifted meaning toward body and colour.Porter was also referred to as “plain”, as mentioned in the famous refrain of Flann O’Brien‘s poem “The Workman’s Friend”: “A pint of plain is your only man.” Already one of the top-three British and Irish brewers, Guinness’s sales soared from 350,000 barrels in 1868 to 779,000 barrels in 1876.In October 1886 Guinness became a public company, and was averaging sales of 1,138,000 barrels a year. This was despite the brewery’s refusal to either advertise or offer its beer at a discount. Even though Guinness owned no public houses, the company was valued at £6 million and shares were twenty times oversubscribed, with share prices rising to a 60 per cent premium on the first day of trading. The breweries pioneered several quality control efforts. The brewery hired the statistician William Sealy Gosset in 1899, who achieved lasting fame under the pseudonym “Student” for techniques developed for Guinness, particularly Student’s t-distribution and the even more commonly known Student’s t-test. By 1900 the brewery was operating unparalleled welfare schemes for its 5,000 employees. By 1907 the welfare schemes were costing the brewery £40,000 a year, which was one-fifth of the total wages bill. The improvements were suggested and supervised by Sir John Lumsden. By 1914, Guinness was producing 2,652,000 barrels of beer a year, which was more than double that of its nearest competitor Bass, and was supplying more than 10 per cent of the total UK beer market. In the 1930s, Guinness became the seventh largest company in the world. Before 1939, if a Guinness brewer wished to marry a Catholic, his resignation was requested. According to Thomas Molloy, writing in the Irish Independent, “It had no qualms about selling drink to Catholics but it did everything it could to avoid employing them until the 1960s.” Guinness thought they brewed their last porter in 1973. In the 1970s, following declining sales, the decision was taken to make Guinness Extra Stout more “drinkable”. The gravity was subsequently reduced, and the brand was relaunched in 1981. Pale malt was used for the first time, and isomerized hop extract began to be used. In 2014, two new porters were introduced: West Indies Porter and Dublin Porter. Guinness acquired the Distillers Company in 1986.This led to a scandal and criminal trialconcerning the artificial inflation of the Guinness share price during the takeover bid engineered by the chairman, Ernest Saunders. A subsequent £5.2 million success fee paid to an American lawyer and Guinness director, Tom Ward, was the subject of the case Guinness plc v Saunders, in which the House of Lords declared that the payment had been invalid. In the 1980s, as the IRA’s bombing campaign spread to London and the rest of Britain, Guinness considered scrapping the Harp as its logo. The company merged with Grand Metropolitan in 1997 to form Diageo. Due to controversy over the merger, the company was maintained as a separate entity within Diageo and has retained the rights to the product and all associated trademarks of Guinness.
    The Guinness Brewery Park Royal during demolition, at its peak the largest and most productive brewery in the world.
    The Guinness brewery in Park Royal, London closed in 2005. The production of all Guinness sold in the UK and Ireland was moved to St. James’s Gate Brewery, Dublin. Guinness has also been referred to as “that black stuff”. Guinness had a fleet of ships, barges and yachts. The Irish Sunday Independent newspaper reported on 17 June 2007 that Diageo intended to close the historic St James’s Gate plant in Dublin and move to a greenfield site on the outskirts of the city.This news caused some controversy when it was announced.The following day, the Irish Daily Mail ran a follow-up story with a double page spread complete with images and a history of the plant since 1759. Initially, Diageo said that talk of a move was pure speculation but in the face of mounting speculation in the wake of the Sunday Independent article, the company confirmed that it is undertaking a “significant review of its operations”. This review was largely due to the efforts of the company’s ongoing drive to reduce the environmental impact of brewing at the St James’s Gate plant. On 23 November 2007, an article appeared in the Evening Herald, a Dublin newspaper, stating that the Dublin City Council, in the best interests of the city of Dublin, had put forward a motion to prevent planning permission ever being granted for development of the site, thus making it very difficult for Diageo to sell off the site for residential development. On 9 May 2008, Diageo announced that the St James’s Gate brewery will remain open and undergo renovations, but that breweries in Kilkenny and Dundalk will be closed by 2013 when a new larger brewery is opened near Dublin. The result will be a loss of roughly 250 jobs across the entire Diageo/Guinness workforce in Ireland.Two days later, the Sunday Independent again reported that Diageo chiefs had met with Tánaiste Mary Coughlan, the deputy leader of the Government of Ireland, about moving operations to Ireland from the UK to benefit from its lower corporation tax rates. Several UK firms have made the move in order to pay Ireland’s 12.5 per cent rate rather than the UK’s 28 per cent rate. Diageo released a statement to the London stock exchange denying the report.Despite the merger that created Diageo plc in 1997, Guinness has retained its right to the Guinness brand and associated trademarks and thus continues to trade under the traditional Guinness name despite trading under the corporation name Diageo for a brief period in 1997. In November 2015 it was announced that Guinness are planning to make their beer suitable for consumption by vegetarians and vegans by the end of 2016 through the introduction of a new filtration process at their existing Guinness Brewery that avoids the need to use isinglass from fish bladders to filter out yeast particles.This went into effect in 2017, per the company’s FAQ webpage where they state: “Our new filtration process has removed the use of isinglass as a means of filtration and vegans can now enjoy a pint of Guinness. All Guinness Draught in keg format is brewed without using isinglass. Full distribution of bottle and can formats will be in place by the end of 2017, so until then, our advice to vegans is to consume the product from the keg format only for now. Guinness stout is made from water, barley, roast malt extract, hops, and brewer’s yeast. A portion of the barley is roasted to give Guinness its dark colour and characteristic taste. It is pasteurisedand filtered. Until the late 1950s Guinness was still racked into wooden casks. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Guinness ceased brewing cask-conditioned beers and developed a keg brewing system with aluminium kegs replacing the wooden casks; these were nicknamed “iron lungs”.Until 2016 the production of Guinness, as with many beers, involved the use of isinglass made from fish. Isinglass was used as a fining agent for settling out suspended matter in the vat. The isinglass was retained in the floor of the vat but it was possible that minute quantities might be carried over into the beer. Diageo announced in February 2018 that the use of isinglass in draught Guinness was to be discontinued and an alternative clarification agent would be used instead. This has made draught Guinness acceptable to vegans and vegetarians. Arguably its biggest change to date, in 1959 Guinness began using nitrogen, which changed the fundamental texture and flavour of the Guinness of the past as nitrogen bubbles are much smaller than CO2, giving a “creamier” and “smoother” consistency over a sharper and traditional CO2 taste. This step was taken after Michael Ash – a mathematician turned brewer – discovered the mechanism to make this possible. Nitrogen is less soluble than carbon dioxide, which allows the beer to be put under high pressure without making it fizzy. High pressure of the dissolved gas is required to enable very small bubbles to be formed by forcing the draught beer through fine holes in a plate in the tap, which causes the characteristic “surge” (the widget in cans and bottles achieves the same effect). This “widget” is a small plastic ball containing the nitrogen. The perceived smoothness of draught Guinness is due to its low level of carbon dioxide and the creaminess of the head caused by the very fine bubbles that arise from the use of nitrogen and the dispensing method described above. “Foreign Extra Stout” contains more carbon dioxide, causing a more acidic taste. Contemporary Guinness Draught and Extra Stout are weaker than they were in the 19th century, when they had an original gravity of over 1.070. Foreign Extra Stout and Special Export Stout, with abv of 7.5% and 9% respectively, are perhaps closest to the original in character.Although Guinness may appear to be black, it is officially a very dark shade of ruby. The most recent change in alcohol content from the Import Stout to the Extra Stout was due to a change in distribution through North American market. Consumer complaints have influenced recent distribution and bottle changes.
    Studies claim that Guinness can be beneficial to the heart. Researchers found that “‘antioxidantcompounds’ in the Guinness, similar to those found in certain fruits and vegetables, are responsible for the health benefits because they slow down the deposit of harmful cholesterol on the artery walls.”Guinness ran an advertising campaign in the 1920s which stemmed from market research – when people told the company that they felt good after their pint, the slogan, created by Dorothy L. Sayers–”Guinness is Good for You”. Advertising for alcoholic drinks that implies improved physical performance or enhanced personal qualities is now prohibited in Ireland.Diageo, the company that now manufactures Guinness, says: “We never make any medical claims for our drinks.”
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  • Castiron Croke Park Signpost

    €120.00
    Castiron replica of a signpost to Croke Park, the headquarters of the GAA and one of the most famous sporting venues in the world. Dimensions : 40cm x 10cm 1.25kg Croke Park (Irish: Páirc an Chrócaigh) is a Gaelic games stadium located in Dublin, Ireland. Named after Archbishop Thomas Croke, it is sometimes called Croker by GAA fans and locals. It serves as both the principal stadium and headquarters of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). Since 1891 the site has been used by the GAA to host Gaelic sports, including the annual All-Ireland in Gaelic football and hurling. A major expansion and redevelopment of the stadium ran from 1991–2005, raising capacity to its current 82,300 spectators. This makes Croke Park the third-largest stadium in Europe, and the largest not usually used for association football. Other events held at the stadium include the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2003 Special Olympics, and numerous musical concerts. In 2012, Irish pop group Westlife sold out the stadium in record-breaking time: less than 5 minutes. From 2007–10, Croke Park hosted home matches of the Ireland national rugby union team and the Republic of Ireland national football team, while their new Aviva Stadium was constructed. This use of Croke Park for non-Gaelic sports was controversial and required temporary changes to GAA rules. In June 2012, the stadium hosted the closing ceremony of the 50th International Eucharistic Congress during which Pope Benedict XVI gave an address over video link.

    City and Suburban Racecourse

    A fireworks and light display was held in Croke Park in front of 79,161 fans on Saturday 31 January 2009 to mark the GAA's 125th anniversary
    The area now known as Croke Park was owned in the 1880s by Maurice Butterly and known as the City and Suburban Racecourse, or Jones' Road sports ground. From 1890 it was also used by the Bohemian Football Club. In 1901 Jones' Road hosted the IFA Cup football final when Cliftonville defeated Freebooters.

    History

    Recognising the potential of the Jones' Road sports ground a journalist and GAA member, Frank Dineen, borrowed much of the £3,250 asking price and bought the ground in 1908. In 1913 the GAA came into exclusive ownership of the plot when they purchased it from Dineen for £3,500. The ground was then renamed Croke Park in honour of Archbishop Thomas Croke, one of the GAA's first patrons. In 1913, Croke Park had only two stands on what is now known as the Hogan stand side and grassy banks all round. In 1917, a grassy hill was constructed on the railway end of Croke Park to afford patrons a better view of the pitch. This terrace was known originally as Hill 60, later renamed Hill 16 in memory of the 1916 Easter Rising. It is erroneously believed to have been built from the ruins of the GPO, when it was constructed the previous year in 1915. In the 1920s, the GAA set out to create a high capacity stadium at Croke Park. Following the Hogan Stand, the Cusack Stand, named after Michael Cusack from Clare (who founded the GAA and served as its first secretary), was built in 1927. 1936 saw the first double-deck Cusack Stand open with 5,000 seats, and concrete terracing being constructed on Hill 16. In 1952 the Nally Stand was built in memorial of Pat Nally, another of the GAA founders. Seven years later, to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the GAA, the first cantilevered "New Hogan Stand" was opened. The highest attendance ever recorded at an All-Ireland Senior Football Championship Final was 90,556 for Offaly v Down in 1961. Since the introduction of seating to the Cusack stand in 1966, the largest crowd recorded has been 84,516.

    Bloody Sunday

    Bloody Sunday remembrance plaque
    During the Irish War of Independence on 21 November 1920 Croke Park was the scene of a massacre by the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC). The Police, supported by the British Auxiliary Division, entered the ground and began shooting into the crowd, killing or fatally wounding 14 civilians during a Dublin-Tipperary Gaelic football match. The dead included 13 spectators and Tipperary player Michael Hogan. Posthumously, the Hogan stand built in 1924 was named in his honour. These shootings, on the day which became known as Bloody Sunday, were a reprisal for the killing of 15 people associated with the Cairo Gang, a group of British Intelligence officers, by Michael Collins' 'squad' earlier that day.

    Dublin Rodeo

    In 1924, American rodeo promoter, Tex Austin, staged the Dublin Rodeo, Ireland's first professional rodeo at Croke Park Stadium. For seven days, with two shows each day from August 18 to August 24, sell out crowds saw cowboys and cowgirls from Canada, the United States, Mexico, Argentina and Australia compete for rodeo championship titles.Canadian bronc riders such as Andy Lund and his brother Art Lund, trick riders such as Ted Elder and Vera McGinnis were among the contestants. British Pathe filmed some of the rodeo events.

    Stadium design

    In 1984 the organisation decided to investigate ways to increase the capacity of the old stadium. The design for an 80,000 capacity stadium was completed in 1991. Gaelic sports have special requirements as they take place on a large field. A specific requirement was to ensure the spectators were not too far from the field of play. This resulted in the three-tier design from which viewing games is possible: the main concourse, a premium level incorporating hospitality facilities and an upper concourse. The premium level contains restaurants, bars and conference areas. The project was split into four phases over a 14-year period. Such was the importance of Croke Park to the GAA for hosting big games, the stadium did not close during redevelopment. During each phase different parts of the ground were redeveloped, while leaving the rest of the stadium open. Big games, including the annual All-Ireland Hurling and Football finals, were played in the stadium throughout the development.
    The outside of the Cusack Stand

    Phase one – New Cusack Stand

    The first phase of construction was to build a replacement for Croke Park's Cusack Stand. A lower deck opened for use in 1994. The upper deck opened in 1995. Completed at a cost of £35 million, the new stand is 180 metres long, 35 metres high, has a capacity for 27,000 people and contains 46 hospitality suites. The new Cusack Stand contains three tiers from which viewing games is possible: the main concourse, a premium level incorporating hospitality facilities and finally an upper concourse. One end of the pitch was closer to the stand after this phase, as the process of slightly re-aligning the pitch during the redevelopment of the stadium began. The works were carried out by Sisk Group.

    Phase two – Davin Stand

    Phase Two of the development started in late 1998 and involved extending the new Cusack Stand to replace the existing Canal End terrace. It involved reacquiring a rugby pitch that had been sold to Belvedere College in 1910 by Frank Dineen. In payment and part exchange, the college was given the nearby Distillery Road sportsgrounds.[19] It is now known as The Davin Stand (Irish: Ardán Dáimhím), after Maurice Davin, the first president of the GAA. This phase also saw the creation of a tunnel which was later named the Ali tunnel in honour of Muhammad Ali and his fight against Al Lewis in July 1972 in Croke Park.

    Phase three – Hogan Stand

    Phase Three saw the building of the new Hogan Stand. This required a greater variety of spectator categories to be accommodated including general spectators, corporate patrons, VIPs, broadcast and media services and operation staff. Extras included a fitted-out mezzanine level for VIP and Ard Comhairle (Where the dignitaries sit) along with a top-level press media facility. The end of Phase Three took the total spectator capacity of Croke Park to 82,000.

    Phase four – Nally Stand & Nally End/Dineen Hill 16 terrace

    After the 2003 Special Olympics, construction began in September 2003 on the final phase, Phase Four. This involved the redevelopment of the Nally Stand, named after the athlete Pat Nally, and Hill 16 into a new Nally End/Dineen Hill 16 terrace. While the name Nally had been used for the stand it replaced, the use of the name Dineen was new, and was in honour of Frank Dineen, who bought the original stadium for the GAA in 1908, giving it to them in 1913. The old Nally Stand was taken away and reassembled in Pairc Colmcille, home of Carrickmore GAA in County Tyrone. The phase four development was officially opened by the then GAA President Seán Kelly on 14 March 2005. For logistical reasons (and, to a degree, historical reasons), and also to provide cheaper high-capacity space, the area is a terrace rather than a seated stand, the only remaining standing-room in Croke Park. Unlike the previous Hill, the new terrace was divided into separate sections – Hill A (Cusack stand side), Hill B (behind the goals) and the Nally terrace (on the site of the old Nally Stand). The fully redeveloped Hill has a capacity of around 13,200, bringing the overall capacity of the stadium to 82,300. This made the stadium the second biggest in the EU after the Camp Nou, Barcelona. However, London's new Wembley stadium has since overtaken Croke Park in second place. The presence of terracing meant that for the brief period when Croke Park hosted international association football during 2007–2009, the capacity was reduced to approximately 73,500, due to FIFA's statutes stating that competitive games must be played in all-seater stadiums.

    Pitch

    Croke Park floodlights in use during Six Nations Championship match
    The pitch in Croke Park is a soil pitch that replaced the Desso GrassMaster pitch laid in 2002. This replacement was made after several complaints by players and managers that the pitch was excessively hard and far too slippery. Since January 2006, a special growth and lighting system called the SGL Concept has been used to assist grass growing conditions, even in the winter months. The system, created by Dutch company SGL (Stadium Grow Lighting), helps in controlling and managing all pitch growth factors, such as light, temperature, CO2, water, air and nutrients.

    Floodlighting

    With the 2007 Six Nations clash with France and possibly other matches in subsequent years requiring lighting the GAA installed floodlights in the stadium (after planning permission was granted). Indeed, many other GAA grounds around the country have started to erect floodlights as the organisation starts to hold games in the evenings, whereas traditionally major matches were played almost exclusively on Sunday afternoons. The first game to be played under these lights at Croke Park was a National Football League Division One match between Dublin and Tyrone on 3 February 2007 with Tyrone winning in front of a capacity crowd of over 81,000 – which remains a record attendance for a National League game, with Ireland's Six Nations match with France following on 11 February. Temporary floodlights were installed for the American Bowl game between Chicago Bears and Pittsburgh Steelers on the pitch in 1997, and again for the 2003 Special Olympics.

    Concert

    U2's Vertigo Tour at Croke Park in 2005
    U2's 360° Tour at Croke Park in 2009
    Date Performer(s) Opening act(s) Tour/Event Attendance Notes
    29 June 1985 U2 In Tua Nua, R.E.M., The Alarm, Squeeze The Unforgettable Fire Tour 57,000 First Irish act to have a headline concert. Part of the concert was filmed for the group's documentary Wide Awake in Dublin.
    28 June 1986 Simple Minds Once Upon A Time Tour Guest appearance by Bono
    27 June 1987 U2 Light A Big Fire, The Dubliners, The Pogues, Lou Reed The Joshua Tree Tour 114,000
    28 June 1987 Christy Moore, The Pretenders, Lou Reed, Hothouse Flowers
    28 June 1996 Tina Turner Brian Kennedy Wildest Dreams Tour 40,000/40,000
    16 May 1997 Garth Brooks World Tour II
    18 May 1997
    29 May 1998 Elton John & Billy Joel Face to Face 1998
    30 May 1998
    24 June 2005 U2 The Radiators from Space, The Thrills, The Bravery, Snow Patrol, Paddy Casey, Ash Vertigo Tour 246,743
    25 June 2005
    27 June 2005
    20 May 2006 Bon Jovi Nickelback Have a Nice Day Tour 81,327
    9 June 2006 Robbie Williams Basement Jaxx Close Encounters Tour
    6 October 2007 The Police Fiction Plane The Police Reunion Tour 81,640 Largest attendance of the tour.
    31 May 2008 Celine Dion Il Divo Taking Chances World Tour 69,725 Largest attendance for a solo female act
    1 June 2008 Westlife Shayne Ward Back Home Tour 85,000 Second Irish act to have a headline concert. Largest attendance of the tour. Part of the concert was filmed for the group's documentary and concert DVD 10 Years of Westlife - Live at Croke Park Stadium.
    14 June 2008 Neil Diamond
    13 June 2009 Take That The Script Take That Present: The Circus Live
    24 July 2009 U2 Glasvegas, Damien Dempsey U2 360° Tour 243,198
    25 July 2009 Kaiser Chiefs, Republic of Loose
    27 July 2009 Bell X1, The Script The performances of "New Year's Day" and "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" were recorded for the group's live album U22 and for the band's remix album Artificial Horizon and the live EP Wide Awake in Europe, respectively.
    5 June 2010 Westlife Wonderland, WOW, JLS, Jedward Where We Are Tour 86,500 Largest attendance of the tour.
    18 June 2011 Take That Pet Shop Boys Progress Live 154,828
    19 June 2011
    22 June 2012 Westlife Jedward, The Wanted, Lawson Greatest Hits Tour 187,808[24] The 23 June 2012 date broke the stadium record for selling out its tickets in four minutes. Eleventh largest attendance at an outdoor stadium worldwide. Largest attendance of the tour and the band's music career history. Part of the concert was filmed for the group's documentary and concert DVD The Farewell Tour - Live in Croke Park.
    23 June 2012
    26 June 2012 Red Hot Chili Peppers Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds, The Vaccines I'm with You World Tour
    23 May 2014 One Direction 5 Seconds of Summer Where We Are Tour 235,008
    24 May 2014
    25 May 2014
    20 June 2015 The Script & Pharrell Williams No Sound Without Silence Tour 74,635
    24 July 2015 Ed Sheeran x Tour 162,308
    25 July 2015
    27 May 2016 Bruce Springsteen The River Tour 2016 160,188
    29 May 2016
    9 July 2016 Beyoncé Chloe x Halle, Ingrid Burley The Formation World Tour 68,575
    8 July 2017 Coldplay AlunaGeorge, Tove Lo A Head Full of Dreams Tour[25] 80,398
    22 July 2017 U2 Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds The Joshua Tree Tour 2017 80,901
    17 May 2018 The Rolling Stones The Academic No Filter Tour 64,823
    15 June 2018 Taylor Swift Camila Cabello, Charli XCX Taylor Swift's Reputation Stadium Tour 136.000 Swift became the first woman headline two concerts in a row there.
    16 June 2018
    7 July 2018 Michael Bublé Emeli Sandé
    24 May 2019 Spice Girls Jess Glynne Spice World - 2019 UK Tour
    5 July 2019 Westlife James Arthur Wild Youth The 20 Touror The Twenty Tour The 5 July 2019 date sold out its tickets in six minutes. Second date released were also sold out in under forty-eight hours.
    6 July 2019

    Non-Gaelic games

    There was great debate in Ireland regarding the use of Croke Park for sports other than those of the GAA. As the GAA was founded as a nationalist organisation to maintain and promote indigenous Irish sport, it has felt honour-bound throughout its history to oppose other, foreign (in practice, British), sports. In turn, nationalist groups supported the GAA as the prime example of purely Irish sporting culture. Until its abolition in 1971, rule 27 of the GAA constitution stated that a member of the GAA could be banned from playing its games if found to be also playing association football, rugby or cricket. That rule was abolished but rule 42 still prohibited the use of GAA property for games with interests in conflict with the interests of the GAA. The belief was that rugby and association football were in competition with Gaelic football and hurling, and that if the GAA allowed these sports to use their ground it might be harmful to Gaelic games, while other sports, not seen as direct competitors with Gaelic football and hurling, were permitted, such as the two games of American football (Croke Park Classic college football game between The University of Central Florida and Penn State, and an American Bowl NFL preseason game between the Chicago Bears and the Pittsburgh Steelers) on the Croke Park pitch during the 1990s.[27] On 16 April 2005, a motion to temporarily relax rule No. 42 was passed at the GAA Annual Congress. The motion gives the GAA Central Council the power to authorise the renting or leasing of Croke Park for events other than those controlled by the Association, during a period when Lansdowne Road – the venue for international soccer and rugby matches – was closed for redevelopment. The final result was 227 in favour of the motion to 97 against, 11 votes more than the required two-thirds majority. In January 2006, it was announced that the GAA had reached agreement with the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) and Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU) to stage two Six Nations games and four soccer internationals at Croke Park in 2007 and in February 2007, use of the pitch by the FAI and the IRFU in 2008 was also agreed.These agreements were within the temporary relaxation terms, as Lansdowne Road was still under redevelopment until 2010. Although the GAA had said that hosted use of Croke Park would not extend beyond 2008, irrespective of the redevelopment progress, fixtures for the 2009 Six Nations rugby tournament saw the Irish rugby team using Croke park for a third season. 11 February 2007 saw the first rugby union international to be played there. Ireland were leading France in a Six Nations clash, but lost 17–20 after conceding a last minute (converted) try. Raphael Ibanez scored the first try in that match; Ronan O'Gara scored Ireland's first ever try in Croke Park. A second match between Ireland and England on 24 February 2007 was politically symbolic because of the events of Bloody Sunday in 1920.There was considerable concern as to what reaction there would be to the singing of the British national anthem "God Save the Queen". Ultimately the anthem was sung without interruption or incident, and applauded by both sets of supporters at the match, which Ireland won by 43–13 (their largest ever win over England in rugby). On 2 March 2010, Ireland played their final international rugby match against a Scotland team that was playing to avoid the wooden spoon and hadn't won a championship match against Ireland since 2001. Outside half, Dan Parks inspired the Scots to a 3-point victory and ended Irish Hopes of a triple crown. On 24 March 2007, the first association football match took place at Croke Park. The Republic of Ireland took on Wales in UEFA Euro 2008 qualifying Group D, with a Stephen Ireland goal securing a 1–0 victory for the Irish in front of a crowd of 72,500. Prior to this, the IFA Cup had been played at the then Jones' Road in 1901, but this was 12 years before the GAA took ownership. Negotiations took place for the NFL International Series's 2011 game to be held at Croke Park but the game was awarded to Wembley Stadium.

    World record attendance

    On 2 May 2009, Croke Park was the venue for a Heineken Cup rugby semi-final, in which Leinster defeated Munster 25–6. The attendance of 82,208 set a new world record attendance for a club rugby union game.[35] This record stood until 31 March 2012 when it was surpassed by an English Premiership game between Harlequins and Saracens at Wembley Stadium which hosted a crowd of 83,761.This was beaten again in 2016 in the Top 14 final at the Nou Camp which hosted a crowd of 99,124

    Skyline tour

    A walkway, known under a sponsorship deal as Etihad Skyline Croke Park, opened on 1 June 2012.From 44 metres above the ground, it offers views of Dublin city and the surrounding area.The Olympic Torch was brought to the stadium and along the walkway on 6 June 2012.

    GAA Hall of Fame

    Statue of Michael Cusack outside the Croke Park GAA Museum
    On 11 February 2013, the GAA opened the Hall of Fame section in the Croke Park museum. The foundation of the award scheme is the Teams of the Millennium the football team which was announced in 1999 and the hurling team in 2000 and all 30 players were inducted into the hall of fame along with Limerick hurler Eamonn Cregan and Offaly footballer Tony McTague who were chosen by a GAA sub-committee from the years 1970–74.New inductees will be chosen on an annual basis from the succeeding five-year intervals as well as from years preceding 1970. In April 2014, Kerry legend Mick O'Dwyer, Sligo footballer Micheál Kerins, along with hurlers Noel Skehan of Kilkenny and Pat McGrath of Waterford became the second group of former players to receive hall of fame awards.
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  • Paddy Old Irish Whiskey Enamel Art Advert

    €80.00
    Again a fine Paddy old Irish whiskey Retro advert fashioned from the blood, sweat,tears and spillage of a well used Irish Bar Trays & enamel signs..Using high quality reprographics we have brought every scratch,dent and mark back to life in the shape of this unique series of prints. Dimensions: 52cm x 37cm   Glazed
     
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    Paddy Whiskey.jpg
    Introduced 1879, renamed as Paddy in 1912
    Paddy is a brand of blended Irish whiskey produced by Irish Distillers, at the Midleton distillery in County Cork, on behalf of Sazerac, a privately held American company. Irish distillers owned the brand until its sale to Sazerac in 2016. As of 2016, Paddy is the fourth largest selling Irish whiskey in the WorldHistory The Cork Distilleries Company was founded in 1867 to merge four existing distilleries in Cork city (the North Mall, the Green, Watercourse Road, and Daly's) under the control of one group.A fifth distillery, the Midleton distillery, joined the group soon after in 1868. In 1882, the company hired a young Corkman called Paddy Flaherty as a salesman. Flaherty travelled the pubs of Cork marketing the company's unwieldy named "Cork Distilleries Company Old Irish Whiskey".His sales techniques (which including free rounds of drinks for customers) were so good, that when publicans ran low on stock they would write the distillery to reorder cases of "Paddy Flaherty's whiskey". In 1912, with his name having become synonymous with the whiskey, the distillery officially renamed the whiskey Paddy Irish Whiskey in his honour. In 1920s and 1930s in Ireland, whiskey was sold in casks from the distillery to wholesalers, who would in turn sell it on to publicans.To prevent fluctuations in quality due to middlemen diluting their casks, Cork Distilleries Company decided to bottle their own whiskey known as Paddy, becoming one of the first to do so. In 1988, following an unsolicited takeover offer by Grand Metropolitan, Irish Distillers approached Pernod Ricard and subsequently became a subsidiary of the French drinks conglomerate, following a friendly takeover bid. In 2016, Pernod Ricard sold the Paddy brand to Sazerac, a privately held American firm for an undisclosed fee. Pernod Ricard stated that the sale was in order "simplify" their portfolio, and allow for more targeted investment in their other Irish whiskey brands, such as Jameson and Powers. At the time of the sale, Paddy was the fourth largest selling Irish whiskey brand in the world, with sales of 200,000 9-litre cases per annum, across 28 countries worldwide. Paddy whiskey is distilled three times and matured in oak casks for up to seven years.Compared with other Irish whiskeys, Paddy has a comparatively low pot still content and a high malt content in its blend. Jim Murray, author of the Whiskey bible, has rated Paddy as "one of the softest of all Ireland's whiskeys".
      Origin:Co Tipperary Dimensions :25cm x 30cm  
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  • Guinness Hurling Championship Large Unframed Banner

    €80.00
    Huge Guinness All Ireland Hurling championship unframed advertisement from the first year of sponsorship in 1995. 38cm wide x 150cm long .   It was not until 1994 that the GAA decided that the football championship would benefit from bringing on a title sponsor in Bank of Ireland. Although an equivalent offer had been on the table for the hurling championship, Central Council pushed the plate away.Though the name of the potential sponsor wasn’t explicitly made public, everyone knew it was Guinness. More to the point, everyone knew why Central Council wouldn’t bite. As Mulvihill himself noted in his report to Congress, the offer was declined on the basis that “Central Council did not want an alcoholic drinks company associated with a major GAA competition”. As it turned out, Central Council had been deadlocked on the issue and it was the casting vote of then president Peter Quinn that put the kibosh on a deal with Guinness. Mulvihill’s disappointment was far from hidden, since he saw the wider damage caused by turning up the GAA nose at Guinness’s advances. “The unfortunate aspect of the situation,” he wrote, “is that hurling needs support on the promotion of the game much more than football.” Though it took the point of a bayonet to make them go for it, the GAA submitted in the end and on the day after the league final in 1995 , a three-year partnership with Guinness was announced. The deal would be worth £1 million a year, with half going to the sport and half going to the competition in the shape of marketing. That last bit was key. Guinness came up with a marketing campaign that fairly scorched across the general consciousness. Billboards screeched out slogans that feel almost corny at this remove but made a huge impact at the same time . This man can level whole counties in one second flat. This man can reach speeds of 100mph. This man can break hearts at 70 yards Its been Hell for Leather. Of course, all the marketing in the world can only do so much. Without a story to go alongside, the Guinness campaign might be forgotten now – or worse, remembered as an overblown blast of hot air dreamed up in some modish ad agency above in Dublin.Until the  Clare hurlers came along and changed everything." Malachy Clerkin Irish Times GAA Correspondent   The All Ireland Senior Hurling Championship, known simply as the All-Ireland Championship, is an annual inter-county hurling competition organised by the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). It is the highest inter-county hurling competition in Ireland, and has been contested every year except one since 1887. The final, currently held on the third Sunday in August, is the culmination of a series of games played during July and August, with the winning team receiving the Liam MacCarthy Cup. The All-Ireland Championship has always been played on a straight knockout basis whereby once a team loses they are eliminated from the championship. The qualification procedures for the championship have changed several times throughout its history. Currently, qualification is limited to teams competing in the Leinster Championship, the Munster Championship and the two finalists in the Joe McDonagh Cup. Twelve teams currently participate in the All-Ireland Championship, with the most successful teams coming from the provinces of Leinster and Munster. Kilkenny, Cork and Tipperary are considered "the big three" of hurling. They have won 94 championships between them. The title has been won by 13 different teams, 10 of whom have won the title more than once. The all-time record-holders are Kilkenny, who have won the championship on 36 occasions. Tipperary are the current champions. The All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship final was listed in second place by CNN in its "10 sporting events you have to see live", after the Olympic Games. After covering the 1959 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final between Kilkenny and Waterford for BBC Television, English commentator Kenneth Wolstenholme was moved to describe hurling as his second favourite sport in the world after his first love, soccer. Alex Ferguson used footage of an All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship final in an attempt to motivate his players during his time as manager of Premier League soccer outfit Manchester United; the players winced at the standard of physicality and intensity in which the hurlers were engaged. Since 1995 the All Ireland Hurling  Championship has been sponsored. The sponsor has usually been able to determine the championship's sponsorship name.
    Period Sponsor(s) Name
    1887−1994 No main sponsor The All-Ireland Championship
    1995−2007 Republic of Ireland Guinness The Guinness Hurling Championship
    2008−2009 Republic of Ireland RTÉ Sport, United Arab Emirates Etihad Airways, Republic of Ireland Guinness The GAA Hurling All-Ireland Championship
    2010−2012 Republic of Ireland Centra, United Arab Emirates Etihad Airways, Republic of Ireland Guinness The GAA Hurling All-Ireland Championship
    2013−2016 Republic of Ireland Centra, United Arab Emirates Etihad Airways, United States Liberty Insurance The GAA Hurling All-Ireland Championship
    2017−2019 Republic of Ireland Centra, Republic of Ireland Littlewoods Ireland, Republic of Ireland Bord Gáis Energy The GAA Hurling All-Ireland Championship
        Arthur Guinness started brewing ales in 1759 at the St James Gate Brewery,Dublin.On 31st December 1759 he signed a 9,000 year lease at £45 per annum for the unused brewery.Ten years later, on 19 May 1769, Guinness first exported his ale: he shipped six-and-a-half barrels to Great Britain before he started selling the dark beer porter in 1778. The first Guinness beers to use the term were Single Stout and Double Stout in the 1840s.Throughout the bulk of its history, Guinness produced only three variations of a single beer type: porter or single stout, double or extra and foreign stout for export. “Stout” originally referred to a beer’s strength, but eventually shifted meaning toward body and colour.Porter was also referred to as “plain”, as mentioned in the famous refrain of Flann O’Brien‘s poem “The Workman’s Friend”: “A pint of plain is your only man.” Already one of the top-three British and Irish brewers, Guinness’s sales soared from 350,000 barrels in 1868 to 779,000 barrels in 1876.In October 1886 Guinness became a public company, and was averaging sales of 1,138,000 barrels a year. This was despite the brewery’s refusal to either advertise or offer its beer at a discount. Even though Guinness owned no public houses, the company was valued at £6 million and shares were twenty times oversubscribed, with share prices rising to a 60 per cent premium on the first day of trading. The breweries pioneered several quality control efforts. The brewery hired the statistician William Sealy Gosset in 1899, who achieved lasting fame under the pseudonym “Student” for techniques developed for Guinness, particularly Student’s t-distribution and the even more commonly known Student’s t-test. By 1900 the brewery was operating unparalleled welfare schemes for its 5,000 employees. By 1907 the welfare schemes were costing the brewery £40,000 a year, which was one-fifth of the total wages bill. The improvements were suggested and supervised by Sir John Lumsden. By 1914, Guinness was producing 2,652,000 barrels of beer a year, which was more than double that of its nearest competitor Bass, and was supplying more than 10 per cent of the total UK beer market. In the 1930s, Guinness became the seventh largest company in the world. Before 1939, if a Guinness brewer wished to marry a Catholic, his resignation was requested. According to Thomas Molloy, writing in the Irish Independent, “It had no qualms about selling drink to Catholics but it did everything it could to avoid employing them until the 1960s.” Guinness thought they brewed their last porter in 1973. In the 1970s, following declining sales, the decision was taken to make Guinness Extra Stout more “drinkable”. The gravity was subsequently reduced, and the brand was relaunched in 1981. Pale malt was used for the first time, and isomerized hop extract began to be used. In 2014, two new porters were introduced: West Indies Porter and Dublin Porter. Guinness acquired the Distillers Company in 1986.This led to a scandal and criminal trialconcerning the artificial inflation of the Guinness share price during the takeover bid engineered by the chairman, Ernest Saunders. A subsequent £5.2 million success fee paid to an American lawyer and Guinness director, Tom Ward, was the subject of the case Guinness plc v Saunders, in which the House of Lords declared that the payment had been invalid. In the 1980s, as the IRA’s bombing campaign spread to London and the rest of Britain, Guinness considered scrapping the Harp as its logo. The company merged with Grand Metropolitan in 1997 to form Diageo. Due to controversy over the merger, the company was maintained as a separate entity within Diageo and has retained the rights to the product and all associated trademarks of Guinness.
    The Guinness Brewery Park Royal during demolition, at its peak the largest and most productive brewery in the world.
    The Guinness brewery in Park Royal, London closed in 2005. The production of all Guinness sold in the UK and Ireland was moved to St. James’s Gate Brewery, Dublin. Guinness has also been referred to as “that black stuff”. Guinness had a fleet of ships, barges and yachts. The Irish Sunday Independent newspaper reported on 17 June 2007 that Diageo intended to close the historic St James’s Gate plant in Dublin and move to a greenfield site on the outskirts of the city.This news caused some controversy when it was announced.The following day, the Irish Daily Mail ran a follow-up story with a double page spread complete with images and a history of the plant since 1759. Initially, Diageo said that talk of a move was pure speculation but in the face of mounting speculation in the wake of the Sunday Independent article, the company confirmed that it is undertaking a “significant review of its operations”. This review was largely due to the efforts of the company’s ongoing drive to reduce the environmental impact of brewing at the St James’s Gate plant. On 23 November 2007, an article appeared in the Evening Herald, a Dublin newspaper, stating that the Dublin City Council, in the best interests of the city of Dublin, had put forward a motion to prevent planning permission ever being granted for development of the site, thus making it very difficult for Diageo to sell off the site for residential development. On 9 May 2008, Diageo announced that the St James’s Gate brewery will remain open and undergo renovations, but that breweries in Kilkenny and Dundalk will be closed by 2013 when a new larger brewery is opened near Dublin. The result will be a loss of roughly 250 jobs across the entire Diageo/Guinness workforce in Ireland.Two days later, the Sunday Independent again reported that Diageo chiefs had met with Tánaiste Mary Coughlan, the deputy leader of the Government of Ireland, about moving operations to Ireland from the UK to benefit from its lower corporation tax rates. Several UK firms have made the move in order to pay Ireland’s 12.5 per cent rate rather than the UK’s 28 per cent rate. Diageo released a statement to the London stock exchange denying the report.Despite the merger that created Diageo plc in 1997, Guinness has retained its right to the Guinness brand and associated trademarks and thus continues to trade under the traditional Guinness name despite trading under the corporation name Diageo for a brief period in 1997. In November 2015 it was announced that Guinness are planning to make their beer suitable for consumption by vegetarians and vegans by the end of 2016 through the introduction of a new filtration process at their existing Guinness Brewery that avoids the need to use isinglass from fish bladders to filter out yeast particles.This went into effect in 2017, per the company’s FAQ webpage where they state: “Our new filtration process has removed the use of isinglass as a means of filtration and vegans can now enjoy a pint of Guinness. All Guinness Draught in keg format is brewed without using isinglass. Full distribution of bottle and can formats will be in place by the end of 2017, so until then, our advice to vegans is to consume the product from the keg format only for now. Guinness stout is made from water, barley, roast malt extract, hops, and brewer’s yeast. A portion of the barley is roasted to give Guinness its dark colour and characteristic taste. It is pasteurisedand filtered. Until the late 1950s Guinness was still racked into wooden casks. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Guinness ceased brewing cask-conditioned beers and developed a keg brewing system with aluminium kegs replacing the wooden casks; these were nicknamed “iron lungs”.Until 2016 the production of Guinness, as with many beers, involved the use of isinglass made from fish. Isinglass was used as a fining agent for settling out suspended matter in the vat. The isinglass was retained in the floor of the vat but it was possible that minute quantities might be carried over into the beer. Diageo announced in February 2018 that the use of isinglass in draught Guinness was to be discontinued and an alternative clarification agent would be used instead. This has made draught Guinness acceptable to vegans and vegetarians. Arguably its biggest change to date, in 1959 Guinness began using nitrogen, which changed the fundamental texture and flavour of the Guinness of the past as nitrogen bubbles are much smaller than CO2, giving a “creamier” and “smoother” consistency over a sharper and traditional CO2 taste. This step was taken after Michael Ash – a mathematician turned brewer – discovered the mechanism to make this possible. Nitrogen is less soluble than carbon dioxide, which allows the beer to be put under high pressure without making it fizzy. High pressure of the dissolved gas is required to enable very small bubbles to be formed by forcing the draught beer through fine holes in a plate in the tap, which causes the characteristic “surge” (the widget in cans and bottles achieves the same effect). This “widget” is a small plastic ball containing the nitrogen. The perceived smoothness of draught Guinness is due to its low level of carbon dioxide and the creaminess of the head caused by the very fine bubbles that arise from the use of nitrogen and the dispensing method described above. “Foreign Extra Stout” contains more carbon dioxide, causing a more acidic taste. Contemporary Guinness Draught and Extra Stout are weaker than they were in the 19th century, when they had an original gravity of over 1.070. Foreign Extra Stout and Special Export Stout, with abv of 7.5% and 9% respectively, are perhaps closest to the original in character.Although Guinness may appear to be black, it is officially a very dark shade of ruby. The most recent change in alcohol content from the Import Stout to the Extra Stout was due to a change in distribution through North American market. Consumer complaints have influenced recent distribution and bottle changes.
    Studies claim that Guinness can be beneficial to the heart. Researchers found that “‘antioxidantcompounds’ in the Guinness, similar to those found in certain fruits and vegetables, are responsible for the health benefits because they slow down the deposit of harmful cholesterol on the artery walls.”Guinness ran an advertising campaign in the 1920s which stemmed from market research – when people told the company that they felt good after their pint, the slogan, created by Dorothy L. Sayers–”Guinness is Good for You”. Advertising for alcoholic drinks that implies improved physical performance or enhanced personal qualities is now prohibited in Ireland.Diageo, the company that now manufactures Guinness, says: “We never make any medical claims for our drinks.” Origins : Dublin Dimensions : 43cm x 35cm
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  • Sweet Afton GAA Hurling & Football All Ireland Records Advert

    €200.00
    Fantastic original Sweet Afton Virginia Cigarettes Advertising print with beautiful images of the two holy grails in Irish Sport-The Sam Maguire Cup for the All Ireland Gaelic football Champions and the Liam McCarthy Cup for the All Ireland Hurling Champions.A footballer from Cork and a hurler from Kilkenny are featured in this charming print. Also the winners and shorelines from All Irelands from 1887 to 1963 are included underneath.Acharming addition to any wall space Dimensions: 75cm x 55cm   Origins;Aughrim Co Galway  Unglazed  
     
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    A 20-pack of Sweet Afton cigarettes with a text warning in both Irish and English stating "Smoking kills".
    Product type Cigarette
    Old Afton advertisement on a pub in Wexford
    Sweet Afton was an Irish brand of short, unfiltered cigarettes made with Virginia tobacco and produced by P.J. Carroll & Co., Dundalk, Ireland, now a subsidiary of British American Tobacco. The Sweet Afton brand was launched by Carroll's in 1919 to celebrate the link between Dundalk and the national poet of Scotland, Robert Burns. Burns' eldest sister, Agnes, lived in Dundalk from 1817 until her death in 1834 and was buried in the cemetery of St. Nicholas's Church in the town. Carroll's thought that the brand would only be successful in Scotland if the carton simply had an image of Burns, or Scottish name on the packet, so the people of Dundalk were canvassed and the name Sweet Afton was chosen. The name is taken from Burns' poem "Sweet Afton", which itself takes its title from the poem's first stanza: Flow gently, sweet Afton, amang thy green braes Flow gently, I’ll sing thee a song in thy praise My Mary’s asleep by they murmuring stream Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream. A larger version of the cigarette was also marketed under the brand name Afton Major. This name served as inspiration for Carroll's later Majorbrand of tipped cigarettes. As of Autumn 2011, British American Tobacco no longer manufactures Sweet Afton cigarettes. The text "Thank you for your loyalty, unfortunately Sweet Afton will not be available in the future. However Major, our other Irish brand with similar tobacco will still be widely available for purchase." was written on a sticker that was put on the last line of packs, before it went out of production. The brand proved particularly popular with post World War II Rive Gauche Paris. It was reputed to be Jean-Paul Sartre's preferred cigarette, and also featured prominently in Louis Malle's film Le Feu Follet, as well as a number of other Nouvelle Vague films.Margot Tenenbaum (played by Gwyneth Paltrow) from Wes Anderson's 2001 film The Royal Tenenbaums also smokes Sweet Aftons. Thomas Shelby, in Peaky Blinders, smokes Sweet Aftons. They are also the favoured brand of Gerhard Selb, the eponymous private investigator in the trilogy by Bernhard Schlink
    Origins : Co Kilkenny Dimensions : 48cm x 62cm
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  • Kerry 1986 All Ireland Football Champions (3 in a Row)

    €150.00
    Original,commemorative team photo of the 3 in a row winning Kerry Footballers as sponsored by the Kerry Eye Newspaper.As can be seen, some Kerry children had a bit of fun with it one the years in their classroom near Sneem Co Kerry Origins ; Sneem Co Kerry  Dimensions :52cm x 65cm.  Glazed  

    The 80s was a time when Ulster football was considered a distant cousin to the majesty of Kerry, even when the Kingdom's golden age was ending.

    But such was Tyrone's initial dominance of the 1986 All-Ireland final against Kerry by half-time their fans began to panic about not having accommodation in Dublin that night. They needn't have worried as a seven-point lead turned into an eight-point pounding in the final 20 minutes.

    The crucial moment was a Tyrone penalty, which was sent over the bar by Kevin McCabe. From the kick-out, Kerry whizzed downfield and Pat Spillane finished the move with a goal that reduced the arrears to four points. A Mikey Sheehy goal completed a nightmarish capitulation.

    It was the last hurrah from a great Kerry team who had taken Sam Maguire home eight times in 12 years. An 11-year drought followed.

    Moy's Plunkett Donaghy was Tyrone's class act back then but the loss of Eugene McKenna and John Lynch through injury coincided with the late collapse.

    Moy send another marauding midfielder out against Kerry on Sunday in Seán Cavanagh along with clubmates Philip Jordan and Ryan Mellon.

    KERRY: C Nelligan; P Ó Sé, S Walsh, M Spillane; T Doyle (captain), T Spillane, G Lynch; J O'Shea, A O'Donovan; W Maher, D Moran (0-2), P Spillane (1-4); M Sheehy (1-4, three points from frees), E Liston (0-2), G Power (0-1). Sub: T O'Dowd (0-2) for O'Donovan.

    TYRONE: A Skelton; J Mallon, K McGarvey, J Lynch; K McCabe (0-1, from a penalty), N McGinn, P Ball; P Donaghy, H McClure; M McClure (0-1), E McKenna, S McNally (0-2); M Mallon (0-4, three frees), D O'Hagan (0-1), P Quinn (1-1). Subs: S Conway for Lynch, S Rice for McKenna, A O'Hagan for M Mallon.

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  • 1995 Clare Munster Senior Hurling Champions Souvenir Clock

    €80.00
    Origins : Scarriff Co Clare     Dimensions: 32cm x 20cm
    Viewed from a distance of two decades, maybe the most remarkable thing about the hurling summer of 1995 is just how unpromising it was roundly agreed to be at the get-go. The previous year had been airily dismissed as something of a freak – never more freakish than in that harum-scarum end to the All-Ireland final when Offaly overturned Limerick with a quickfire 2-5 in the closing minutes.
    Put to the pin of their collars, most judges shrugged and presumed the Liam MacCarthy would find his way back around to the blue-bloods in the end – probably to Kilkenny who had just beaten Clare in the National League final, maybe to Tipperary if they got their act together. If there was going to be a yarn, Limerick might provide it. But nobody had an inkling of what was around the corner. Or if they did, they weren’t shouting about it. Nobody was shouting about very much of anything. Hurling was what it was – guarded like the family jewels in certain parts of the land, barely amounting to a rumour in others. Tipp, Kilkenny and Cork had split five of the previous six All-Irelands between them and in a given year, you could just about half-rely on Offaly or Galway to keep them honest. For everyone else, the door looked shut. For all the sweet words and paeans that followed the game around, the championship was reduced each year to four or five games. This was pre-qualifiers, pre-back door of any kind. Galway walked into the All-Ireland semi-final each year and Antrim did the same before providing whoever they met with more or less a bye into the final. The Munster championship had its adherents but they weren’t all just as committed as they let on – when Clare met Cork in Thurles in June 1995, they did so in front of just 14,101 paying guests. The game needed shaking up. If not everyone admitted as much at the time, it didn’t escape the notice of the association’s then general director Liam Mulvihill. In his report to Congress earlier that year, he had scratched an itch that had been bugging him for most of the previous 12 months. The 1994 football championship had been the first to benefit from bringing on a title sponsor in Bank of Ireland and though an equivalent offer had been on the table for the hurling championship, Central Council pushed the plate away. Though the name of the potential sponsor wasn’t explicitly made public, everyone knew it was Guinness. More to the point, everyone knew why Central Council wouldn’t bite. As Mulvihill himself noted in his report to Congress, the offer was declined on the basis that “Central Council did not want an alcoholic drinks company associated with a major GAA competition”. As it turned out, Central Council had been deadlocked on the issue and it was the casting vote of then president Peter Quinn that put the kibosh on a deal with Guinness. Mulvihill’s disappointment was far from hidden, since he saw the wider damage caused by turning up the GAA nose at Guinness’s advances. “The unfortunate aspect of the situation,” he wrote, “is that hurling needs support on the promotion of the game much more than football.” Though it took the point of a bayonet to make them go for it, the GAA submitted in the end and on the day after the league final, a three-year partnership with Guinness was announced. The deal would be worth £1 million a year, with half going to the sport and half going to the competition in the shape of marketing. That last bit was key. Guinness came up with a marketing campaign that fairly scorched across the general consciousness. Billboards screeched out slogans that feel almost corny at this remove but made a huge impact at the same time . This man can level whole counties in one second flat. This man can reach speeds of 100mph. This man can break hearts at 70 yards Of course, all the marketing in the world can only do so much. Without a story to go alongside, the Guinness campaign might be forgotten now – or worse, remembered as an overblown blast of hot air dreamed up in some modish ad agency above in Dublin. Instead, Clare came along and changed everything. In the spring of 1995, Clare were very easy to stereotype. These were the days when the league wrapped around Christmas and in the muck and the cold and the drudgery, Clare had a fierceness to them that took advantage of any opposition that fancied a handy afternoon with the summer well off in the distance. A pain in the neck if you met them on a going day in the league but not to be relied upon on the biggest days. They had a recent, ill-starred record in Munster finals to bear that out. Heavy beatings from Tipp and Limerick in 1993 and ’94 were bad enough on their own; piled on decades of hurt going all the way back to their last title in 1932, they were toxic. On the day before the league final, new manager Ger Loughnane outlined what the coming summer would mean to them. “I’d swap everything for a Munster title. The whole lot. My whole hurling life. These fellas today, they have the chance. They can get out there and realise that this is what it is all about, that this is what you play hurling for. They can build on that and win their Munster title. That means so much to us all. They won’t have to look back and regret.” When Clare promptly lost 2-12 to 0-9 to Kilkenny in that league final, you didn’t have many takers for Loughnane’s assertion that this could be the group to turn everything around. Loughnane had been involved in 12 Munster finals as a player and selector at various levels down the years and he’d lost them all. Big talk was fine and dandy but what was there to believe in? Come the Munster championship, Clare were quietly but firmly dismissed by all and sundry. Cashman’s bookies in Cork priced their championship opener thus: Cork 2/5, Clare 9/4. A bar in Ennis had sent the Clare squad a cheque for £250 so they could have a pre-championship drink together. Anthony Daly took it instead and slapped it down on Clare to win the Munster championship at odds of 7/1. Anyone with half an interest in the game knows the rest. Or at least knows bits and pieces of it. That summer was a blazing one, the hottest for decades, and in the mind’s eye Clare’s summer is a jigsaw of sun-scorched fables and legends. Seanie McMahon and his broken collarbone, playing out the last 15 minutes against Cork at corner-forward. Ollie Baker’s bundled goal to win that game in injury-time. Limerick swept aside in the second half of the Munster final. Bonfires across the county on the Monday night. Galway put to the sword in the All-Ireland semi-final. Offaly just squeezed out in the final. Eamonn Taaffe’s goal, whipped to the net with his only touch of the sliotar all summer. Daly’s 65, Johnny Pilkington’s reply just flicking the post and missing. A first Clare All-Ireland senior title since 1914. It was all just so unlikely. After the Cork game, the cars heading home for Clare were stuck in traffic. A group of Cork teenagers stood at the side of the road as they passed, chanting Tipp, Tipp, Tipp – presuming Clare would meet and be beaten by them next day out. The notion that this was the beginning of a golden era, or that these Claremen were about to popularise the sport as never before, would still have felt ludicrous And yet here they were, All-Ireland champions in a year when hurling caught the wider imagination in a way it rarely had up to that point. The Guinness campaign had made its mark and allied to Clare’s rise, the sport was grabbing people again. Not before time. “The game had gone stale,” wrote Jimmy Barry-Murphy in The Irish Times in the run-up to the final. “This All-Ireland was one that game needed very badly. Interest was waning and this was reflected in the attendances at finals. “There was no comparison to football where the arrival of the Ulster counties as major powers generated enormous interest and a new awareness of the game. Clare have had many setbacks but they have kept battling and are now being rewarded. They have done hurling a great service.” The depth and breadth of that service became more and more apparent as the decade wore on. Attendances at the hurling championship matches ballooned. From an aggregate total of 289,281 in 1994, they rose to 543,335 in 1999. There were plenty of factors, of course – more counties with more hope, more matches with the introduction of the back-door, a growing economy, those Guinness ads. But it was Clare’s summer of 1995 that sparked it all. They weren’t a pebble in a pond that caused a few ripples. They were a boulder that landed from the clear blue sky and left a crater on the landscape. Everything changed after ’95. Not forever, just for a while. But for long enough for the game to stretch itself and grab hold of imaginations outside the usual places of worship. On the Monday night they brought Liam MacCarthy home, one of the towns that got a good rattle was Newmarket-On-Fergus. In the bedlam, the home club put up a stage and stuck any living Newmarket man who ever put on a Clare jersey up there as the backdrop while Daly and Loughnane grabbed the mic out front. One unusual face cloistered at the back of the stage was then Wexford manager Liam Griffin. Of the multitude of stories excavated by Denis Walsh for his towering book Hurling: The Revolution Years, maybe that night in Newmarket captured the giddiness of the time the best. Griffin’s father was from Clare and he’d lived there for a time in his early 20s, long enough to play club hurling and get called up to the Clare under-21s. Thus were his bona fides established for an appearance – however reluctant – up on-stage. Griffin had been in charge of Wexford for a year at that point and their summer had ended with a limp exit against Offaly away back in June. By the skin of his teeth, Griffin had survived an attempted county board putsch in the meantime and was almost certainly the only man alive who thought that the riches showering down upon Clare heads could be Wexford’s 12 months later. “Clare came and I thought, ‘This is fantastic,’” Griffin told Walsh. “I thought, ‘Jesus, the team I have are as good as these,’ and I went through them man for man. There’s no way we’re not as good as these guys. Then Clare won the All-Ireland and I went straight to Clare the following morning because I wanted to see the homecoming and now I understand why. I wanted to drive it into my own psyche.” As the speeches finished and the stage began to clear, Loughnane turned and caught Griffin’s eye. “It could be you next year,” he said. Whether he meant it or not, Griffin’s mind was made up already. He drove home convinced that Wexford could reach out and grab some of that for themselves. The next day he rang around and organised training, 51-and-a-half weeks shy of the 1996 All-Ireland final. In a world of endless trees and branches and roots, it’s obviously simplistic to say that Clare’s All-Ireland begat Wexford’s which begat all the rest of it. But what is inarguable is this – in that sun-drenched summer of 1995, everything felt possible.
    he 1995 Munster Senior Hurling Championship Final was a hurling match played on 9 July 1995 at Semple Stadium, Thurles, County Tipperary. It was contested by Clare and Limerick. Clare claimed their first Munster Championship since 1932 and fourth ever after beating Limerick on a scoreline of 1-17 to 0-11. Clare were leading the game by 1-5 to 0-7 at half time. With the scores at 0-5 to 0-3 in Clare's favour in the first half, Davy Fitzgerald scored from a penalty five minutes before the break, crashing the ball high into the net at the town end before sprinting back to his goal-line. In 2005 this penalty goal came fifth in the Top 20 GAA Moments poll by the Irish public. Clare were captained by Anthony Daly and managed by Ger Loughnane in his first year. Clare had defeated Cork in the semi-final by 2-13 to 3-09 to reach the final, while Limerick had defeated Tipperary by 0-16 to 0-15 in their semi-final. The match was screened live by RTÉ as part of The Sunday Game programme with commentary by Ger Canning and analysis by Éamonn Cregan.
    July 9 Final
    Clare 1-17 – 0-11 Limerick
    J. O'Connor (0-6), P. J. Connell (0-4), D. FitzGerald (1-0), C. Clancy (0-2), S. McMahon (0-1), F. Tuohy (0-1), F. Hegarty (0-1), S. McNamara (0-1), G. O'Loughlin (0-1). Report G. Kirby (0-6), M. Galligan (0-3), P. Heffernan (0-1), F. Carroll (0-1).
    Referee: J. McDonnell (Tipperary)
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  • 1981 Offaly All Ireland Senior Hurling Champions

    €75.00
    Pre game team photo of the 1981 All Ireland Hurling Champions-Offaly 48cm x 59cm   Birr Co Offaly 1981 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final was the 94th All-Ireland Final and the culmination of the 1981 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship, an inter-county hurling tournament for the top teams in Ireland. The match was held at Croke Park, Dublin, on 6 September 1981, between Galway and Offaly. The reigning champions lost to their Leinster opponents, who won their first ever senior hurling title, on a score line of 2-12 to 0-15. Johnny Flaherty scored a handpassed goal in this game; this was before the handpassed goal was ruled out of the game as hurling's technical standards improved.
    1981-09-06 Final
    Offaly 2-12 – 0-15 Galway
    Attendance: 71,348
    Referee: F. Murphy (Cork)
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  • 1972 Kilkenny All Ireland Senior Hurling Champions

    €75.00
    48cm x 59cm Pre Match Team photo of the 1972 All Ireland hurling champions -Kilkenny

    Classic All-Ireland SHC finals - 1972: Kilkenny 3-24 Cork 5-11

    BRIAN CODY will have fond memories of All-Ireland hurling final day in 1972.

    Brian Cody captained his county’s minor side to victory over Cork and later that afternoon those counties produced a classic encounter which ended in a spectacular victory for a Kilkenny team captained by goalkeeper Noel Skehan. Cork were firm favourites after hammering Clare in the Munster final (6-18 to 2-8), while Kilkenny had been taken to a replay by Wexford in the Leinster decider. The game was a thrilling contest. Cork dominated the early exchanges and went eight points clear after a long-range score from wing-back Con Roche in the 17th minute of the second half. Remarkably the Rebels didn’t score again. Kilkenny took control with Pat Henderson a key figure at centre-back and Eddie Keher cutting loose up front. They were level after Frank Cummins goal and went onto win by eight points. Scorers for Kilkenny: E Keher (2-9, 1-7 frees); L O’Brien (0-5, three frees); P Delaney (0-3); F Cummins (1-0); K Purcell (0-2); M Crotty (0-2); P Henderson (0-1, free); M Murphy (0-1); J Kinsella (0-1). Scorers for Cork: R Cummins (2-3); M Malone (2-1); C McCarthy (0-4, three frees); S O’Leary (1-1); C Roche (0-2, one free). KILKENNY: N Skehan (c); F Larkin, P Dillon, J Treacy; P Lawlor, P Henderson, E Morrissey; F Cummins, L O’Brien; M Crotty, P Delaney, J Kinsella; E Byrne, K Purcell, E Keher.
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  • 1962 Tipperary All Ireland Senior Hurling Champions

    €75.00
    48cm x 59cm. Borrisokane Co Tipperary

    Tom Moloughney: 'It was a great aul' Tipperary team, we should have won five-in-a-row'

    It was the first All-Ireland final to be shown live on Telifis Eireann and the cameras had barely started rolling when Tipperary's Tom Moloughney found the Wexford net. Brendan O'Brien rewinds the tape back to 1962 for our 'Moment In Time' series
    It was the first All-Ireland final to be shown live on Telifis Eireann and the cameras had barely started rolling when Tipperary's Tom Moloughney found the Wexford net. Brendan O'Brien rewinds the tape back to 1962 for our 'Moment In Time' series
    Tom Moloughney, Jimmy Doyle, and Kieran Carey relax in the dressing room after Tipperary’s victory over Dublin in the 1961 All-Ireland final, a success that was to be repeated the following year. Picture from ‘The GAA — A People’s History’Tom Moloughney, Jimmy Doyle, and Kieran Carey relax in the dressing room after Tipperary’s victory over Dublin in the 1961 All-Ireland final, a success that was to be repeated the following year. Picture from ‘The GAA — A People’s History’It seemed as if most of Croke Park had been caught on the hop. A cameraman was still scrambling for the sideline as the Archbishop of Cashel and Emly, Dr Morris, threw the ball in and the game was only clearing its throat when Wexford were hit with a pair of blows that would have felled a team buttressed by lesser men. “Two goals in eighty seconds set champions for victory,” was the sub-heading in the Cork Examiner the next day. The paper's correspondent detailed how reporters were still straightening their papers and spectators in the crowd of 75,039 were finding their seats, or a perch on the terracing, when the drama spilled over like a boiled kettle. Close to 58 years have passed since the two counties lit up what was a dull and sometimes wet September afternoon in the capital but the fog of time clears in an instant as Tom Moloughney recalls those opening credits. Both goals are broken down play by play. The only aspect that ever escapes him was his opening score's wider significance. “I never heard any talk of it really,” Moloughney explained yesterday. “One fella reminded me of the TV thing lately. I had forgotten.” Everything else? Crystal clear. His slice of history began with a sideline cut from Theo English that found its way to him after Liam Devaney tangled with an opponent. The finish was, by all accounts, a blistering one from a man whose superb second-half goal for Kilruane MacDonaghs against Thurles Sarsfields in the 1959 Tipperary North final had been one of the prompts for the county to turn to him in the first place. Wexford had more coming.
     
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  • 1938 Galway All Ireland Senior Football Final Team Photo

    €70.00
    32cm x 39cm  Cong Co Mayo
    The 1938 All-Ireland Football Final Replay on October 23rd, 1938 ended in the most bizarre fashion imaginable when with 2 minutes left to play, Galway supporters, mistakenly believing the referee had blown for full-time, invaded the pitch, causing a 20 minute delay before the final minutes could be played out. Even more dramatic was the fact that by the time the pitch was cleared, most of the Kerry players seemed to have disappeared. The confusion all began with a free awarded to Kerry by referee Peter Waters of Kildare with Galway leading the defending champions, by 2-4 to 0-6. The referee placed the ball and blew his whistle for the kick to be taken while running towards the Galway goals. He looked round just as Sean Brosnan was taking the kick and seeing a Galway player too close he blew for the kick to be retaken. Thinking that he had blown for full-time the jubilant Galway supporters invaded the pitch. It took all of twenty minutes to clear the pitch but only then did the real problems come to light. Jerry O’Leary Chairman of the Kerry Selection Committee outlined their dilemma. Somehow or other Kerry managed to re-field even if the team which played out the remaining minutes bore little resemblance to the starting fifteen. More remarkable again was the fact that Kerry went on to add another point to their total before the referee finally blew for full-time with Galway winners by 2-4 to 0-7. It was generally agreed that the confusion was of the crowd’s and not the referee’s making but questions remained about the total number of players Kerry had been permitted to use in those final few minutes. The National and Provincial papers and indeed all available Records to this day list only those 16 Kerry players who were involved prior to the 20 minute interruption but now (80 years on) for the first time all the players who played for Kerry in that October 23rd, 1938 All-Ireland Final Replay can be given their rightful place in the Record Books. KERRY’s 24:
    1. Dan O’Keeffe (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)
    2. Bill Kinnerk (Tralee, Boherbee John Mitchel’s)(Captain)
    3. Paddy ‘Bawn’ Brosnan (Dingle)
    4. Bill Myers (Killarney)
    5. Bill Dillon Dingle)
    6. Bill Casey (Dingle)
    7. Tom ‘Gega’ O’Connor (Dingle)
    8. Sean Brosnan (Dingle)
    9. Johnny Walsh (Ballylongford, North Kerry)
    10. Paddy Kennedy (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)(Annascaul native)
    11. Charlie O’Sullivan (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)(Camp native)
    12. Tony McAuliffe (Listowel, North Kerry)
    13. Martin Regan (Tralee Rock Street Austin Stacks)
    14. Michael ‘Miko’ Doyle ((Tralee Rock Street Austin Stacks)
    15. Timmy O’Leary (Killarney).
    16.  J.J. ‘Purty’ Landers (Tralee Rock Street Austin Stacks)(brother of Tim and Bill)(replaced Johnny Walsh – injured hip and dislocated collarbone)
    17. Joe Keohane (Geraldines, Dublin)(former Tralee Boherbee John Mitchel’s player)
    18. Michael ‘Murt’ Kelly (Geraldine’s, Dublin)(formerly Tralee O’Rahilly’s)
    19. J.Sheehy (Tralee Boherbee John Mitchel’s)
    20. Eddie Walsh (Knocknagoshel, North Kerry)
    21. Ger Teahan (Laune Rangers, Killorglin)
    22. Bob Murphy (Newtown, North Kerry)
    23. Con Gainey (Tralee Boherbee John Mitchel’s)(Castleisland native)
    24. M. Raymond (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)
    So in total and in contravention of the Rules Kerry used 24 players including 9 substitutes. Galway in contrast used a mere 17 players including 2 substitutes. GALWAY’S 17:
    1. Jimmy McGauran (University College Galway)(Roscommon native)
    2. Mick Raftery (University College Galway)(Mayo native)
    3. Mick Connaire (Beann Éadair, Dublin)(Ballinasloe native)
    4. Dinny Sullivan (Oughterard)
    5. Frank Cunniffe (Beann Éadair, Dublin)(Ballinasloe native)
    6. Bobby Beggs (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)(Dublin native)(former Skerries Harps player)
    7. Charlie Connolly (Ballinasloe Mental Hospital)
    8. John ‘Tull’ Dunne (Ballinasloe St. Grellan’s)(Captain)
    9. John Burke (Remore)(Clare native)
    10. Jackie Flavin (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)(Kerry native – Newtownsandes)(won 1937 All-Ireland with Kerry)
    11. Ralph Griffin (Ballinasloe St. Grellan’s)
    12. Mick Higgins (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)
    13. Ned Mulholland (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)(Westmeath native)
    14. Martin Kelly (Ardagh, Limerick)(Ahascragh native)
    15. Brendan Nestor (Geraldines, Dublin)(Dunmore native)
    16. Mick Ryder (Tuam Stars)
    17. Pat McDonagh
    It was almost as if Galway had won the All-Ireland twice in one day beating two different Kerry teams in the process. That night, in front of a 1,500 crowd, at a Gaelic League organised Siamsa Mór in the Mansion House in Dawson Street, Art McCann presented the Galway team with their winners’ medals. The Kerry players meanwhile joined 300 of their suppoeters at a Ceilidhe hosted by the Kerrymen’s Social Club in Rathmines Town Hall. The National Newspapers may not always have reported the facts to Galway’s satisfaction but there can be no questioning the support of Galway County Council. Needless to say the Galway players received an unprecedented welcome on their return to Galway having first been feted along the way in Mullingar, Streamstown, Moate and Athlone. GALWAY – 1938 ALL-IRELAND SENIOR FOOTBALL CHAMPIONS Back (L-R) Bobby Beggs, Ralph Griffin, John Burke, Jimmy McGauran, Charlie Connolly, Brendan Nestor, Dinny Sullivan, Mick Connaire, Martin Kelly. Front (L-R) Frank Cunniffe, Jackie Flavin, Mick Higgins, John ‘Tull’ Dunne (Capt), Ned Mulholland, Mick Raftery. Substitutes: (not in photograph) Mick Ryder and Pat McDonagh. TIME ADDED ON: Not far behind the controversy surrounding the last few minutes of 1938 All-Ireland Football Final Replay was the controversy surrounding the last few seconds of the drawn match played a month earlier. The sides were level, Kerry 2-06 Galway 3-03, when Kerry’s J.J. Landers sent the ball between the Galway uprights for what looked like the winning point. However the thousands of celebrating Kerry supporters making for the Croke Park exits were soon stopped in their tracks. It was cruel luck on Kerry and while there were many who criticised the referee, Tom Culhane from Glin, County Limerick, for blowing the final whistle while John Joe Landers was it the act of shooting, Kerry’s County Board Chairman Denis J. Bailey wasn’t among them. At the next Central Council meeting, in a remarkably generous response to the Referee’s Report being read he stated that ‘they in Kerry were quite satisfied with the result’ and ‘They wished to pay a tribute to Galway for their sporting spirit and also to the referee who, in their opinion, carried out his duties very well.’ The Central Council then awarded the two counties £300 each towards the costs of the two-week Collective Training Camps both counties had planned in the lead up to the Replay on October 23rd. Munster Council granted Kerry (pictured here in Collective Training) an additional £100. Prior to that Central Council meeting, General Secretary, Pádraig Ó’Caoimh, received a telephone call from the New York GAA suggesting the replay take place in New York but the request (which was successfully repeated nine years later in 1947) was on this occasion turned down. However doubts about the Replay even going ahead were immediately raised. Satisfactory transport arrangements were eventually agreed and the match went ahead although the Kerry supporters who left Tralee on the so-called ‘ghost’ train at 1am on the morning of the October 23rd may still have felt hard done by. In the lead-up to the game the Galway selectors expressed their delight at the success of their forwards short hand-passing game against the Kerry backs in the drawn match although there were some worries that not all their players had been able to attend the first week of Collective Training and of course there was Kerry’s Replay record to be considered. Kerry had previously played in 4 All-Ireland Replays and won them all, a great source of encouragement to the Kerry supporters. However amid some reports of disharmony within the Kerry camp, following a ‘trial match’ on the Sunday before the Replay, the Kerry selection Committee dropped a real bombshell. Joe Keohane (Dublin Geraldines) who had been Kerry’s regular full-back for the previous two years and was one of the stars of their 1937 All-Ireland win over Cavan was replaced by young Paddy ‘Bawn’ Brosnan a member of the 1938 Kerry Junior team. A back injury to Kerry’s best forward, J.J. Landers made him an extreme doubt for the Replay with Martin Regan on stand-by to take his place if required which is exactly what happened before that fateful free-kick, that infamous 20 minute delay and Kerry’s unprecedented use of 24 players. Most definitely an All-Ireland Final and Final Replay never to be forgotten. The Galway and Kerry players parade in front of the newly opened (1938) Cusack Stand  
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  • 1938 Kerry All Ireland Senior Football Final Team Photo

    €70.00
    32cm x 29cm  Killorglin Co Kerry
    The 1938 All-Ireland Football Final Replay on October 23rd, 1938 ended in the most bizarre fashion imaginable when with 2 minutes left to play, Galway supporters, mistakenly believing the referee had blown for full-time, invaded the pitch, causing a 20 minute delay before the final minutes could be played out. Even more dramatic was the fact that by the time the pitch was cleared, most of the Kerry players seemed to have disappeared. The confusion all began with a free awarded to Kerry by referee Peter Waters of Kildare with Galway leading the defending champions, by 2-4 to 0-6. The referee placed the ball and blew his whistle for the kick to be taken while running towards the Galway goals. He looked round just as Sean Brosnan was taking the kick and seeing a Galway player too close he blew for the kick to be retaken. Thinking that he had blown for full-time the jubilant Galway supporters invaded the pitch. It took all of twenty minutes to clear the pitch but only then did the real problems come to light. Jerry O’Leary Chairman of the Kerry Selection Committee outlined their dilemma. Somehow or other Kerry managed to re-field even if the team which played out the remaining minutes bore little resemblance to the starting fifteen. More remarkable again was the fact that Kerry went on to add another point to their total before the referee finally blew for full-time with Galway winners by 2-4 to 0-7. It was generally agreed that the confusion was of the crowd’s and not the referee’s making but questions remained about the total number of players Kerry had been permitted to use in those final few minutes. The National and Provincial papers and indeed all available Records to this day list only those 16 Kerry players who were involved prior to the 20 minute interruption but now (80 years on) for the first time all the players who played for Kerry in that October 23rd, 1938 All-Ireland Final Replay can be given their rightful place in the Record Books. KERRY’s 24:
    1. Dan O’Keeffe (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)
    2. Bill Kinnerk (Tralee, Boherbee John Mitchel’s)(Captain)
    3. Paddy ‘Bawn’ Brosnan (Dingle)
    4. Bill Myers (Killarney)
    5. Bill Dillon Dingle)
    6. Bill Casey (Dingle)
    7. Tom ‘Gega’ O’Connor (Dingle)
    8. Sean Brosnan (Dingle)
    9. Johnny Walsh (Ballylongford, North Kerry)
    10. Paddy Kennedy (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)(Annascaul native)
    11. Charlie O’Sullivan (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)(Camp native)
    12. Tony McAuliffe (Listowel, North Kerry)
    13. Martin Regan (Tralee Rock Street Austin Stacks)
    14. Michael ‘Miko’ Doyle ((Tralee Rock Street Austin Stacks)
    15. Timmy O’Leary (Killarney).
    16.  J.J. ‘Purty’ Landers (Tralee Rock Street Austin Stacks)(brother of Tim and Bill)(replaced Johnny Walsh – injured hip and dislocated collarbone)
    17. Joe Keohane (Geraldines, Dublin)(former Tralee Boherbee John Mitchel’s player)
    18. Michael ‘Murt’ Kelly (Geraldine’s, Dublin)(formerly Tralee O’Rahilly’s)
    19. J.Sheehy (Tralee Boherbee John Mitchel’s)
    20. Eddie Walsh (Knocknagoshel, North Kerry)
    21. Ger Teahan (Laune Rangers, Killorglin)
    22. Bob Murphy (Newtown, North Kerry)
    23. Con Gainey (Tralee Boherbee John Mitchel’s)(Castleisland native)
    24. M. Raymond (Tralee O’Rahilly’s)
    So in total and in contravention of the Rules Kerry used 24 players including 9 substitutes. Galway in contrast used a mere 17 players including 2 substitutes. GALWAY’S 17:
    1. Jimmy McGauran (University College Galway)(Roscommon native)
    2. Mick Raftery (University College Galway)(Mayo native)
    3. Mick Connaire (Beann Éadair, Dublin)(Ballinasloe native)
    4. Dinny Sullivan (Oughterard)
    5. Frank Cunniffe (Beann Éadair, Dublin)(Ballinasloe native)
    6. Bobby Beggs (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)(Dublin native)(former Skerries Harps player)
    7. Charlie Connolly (Ballinasloe Mental Hospital)
    8. John ‘Tull’ Dunne (Ballinasloe St. Grellan’s)(Captain)
    9. John Burke (Remore)(Clare native)
    10. Jackie Flavin (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)(Kerry native – Newtownsandes)(won 1937 All-Ireland with Kerry)
    11. Ralph Griffin (Ballinasloe St. Grellan’s)
    12. Mick Higgins (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)
    13. Ned Mulholland (Wolfe Tones, Galway City)(Westmeath native)
    14. Martin Kelly (Ardagh, Limerick)(Ahascragh native)
    15. Brendan Nestor (Geraldines, Dublin)(Dunmore native)
    16. Mick Ryder (Tuam Stars)
    17. Pat McDonagh
    It was almost as if Galway had won the All-Ireland twice in one day beating two different Kerry teams in the process. That night, in front of a 1,500 crowd, at a Gaelic League organised Siamsa Mór in the Mansion House in Dawson Street, Art McCann presented the Galway team with their winners’ medals. The Kerry players meanwhile joined 300 of their suppoeters at a Ceilidhe hosted by the Kerrymen’s Social Club in Rathmines Town Hall. The National Newspapers may not always have reported the facts to Galway’s satisfaction but there can be no questioning the support of Galway County Council. Needless to say the Galway players received an unprecedented welcome on their return to Galway having first been feted along the way in Mullingar, Streamstown, Moate and Athlone. GALWAY – 1938 ALL-IRELAND SENIOR FOOTBALL CHAMPIONS Back (L-R) Bobby Beggs, Ralph Griffin, John Burke, Jimmy McGauran, Charlie Connolly, Brendan Nestor, Dinny Sullivan, Mick Connaire, Martin Kelly. Front (L-R) Frank Cunniffe, Jackie Flavin, Mick Higgins, John ‘Tull’ Dunne (Capt), Ned Mulholland, Mick Raftery. Substitutes: (not in photograph) Mick Ryder and Pat McDonagh. TIME ADDED ON: Not far behind the controversy surrounding the last few minutes of 1938 All-Ireland Football Final Replay was the controversy surrounding the last few seconds of the drawn match played a month earlier. The sides were level, Kerry 2-06 Galway 3-03, when Kerry’s J.J. Landers sent the ball between the Galway uprights for what looked like the winning point. However the thousands of celebrating Kerry supporters making for the Croke Park exits were soon stopped in their tracks. It was cruel luck on Kerry and while there were many who criticised the referee, Tom Culhane from Glin, County Limerick, for blowing the final whistle while John Joe Landers was it the act of shooting, Kerry’s County Board Chairman Denis J. Bailey wasn’t among them. At the next Central Council meeting, in a remarkably generous response to the Referee’s Report being read he stated that ‘they in Kerry were quite satisfied with the result’ and ‘They wished to pay a tribute to Galway for their sporting spirit and also to the referee who, in their opinion, carried out his duties very well.’ The Central Council then awarded the two counties £300 each towards the costs of the two-week Collective Training Camps both counties had planned in the lead up to the Replay on October 23rd. Munster Council granted Kerry (pictured here in Collective Training) an additional £100. Prior to that Central Council meeting, General Secretary, Pádraig Ó’Caoimh, received a telephone call from the New York GAA suggesting the replay take place in New York but the request (which was successfully repeated nine years later in 1947) was on this occasion turned down. However doubts about the Replay even going ahead were immediately raised. Satisfactory transport arrangements were eventually agreed and the match went ahead although the Kerry supporters who left Tralee on the so-called ‘ghost’ train at 1am on the morning of the October 23rd may still have felt hard done by. In the lead-up to the game the Galway selectors expressed their delight at the success of their forwards short hand-passing game against the Kerry backs in the drawn match although there were some worries that not all their players had been able to attend the first week of Collective Training and of course there was Kerry’s Replay record to be considered. Kerry had previously played in 4 All-Ireland Replays and won them all, a great source of encouragement to the Kerry supporters. However amid some reports of disharmony within the Kerry camp, following a ‘trial match’ on the Sunday before the Replay, the Kerry selection Committee dropped a real bombshell. Joe Keohane (Dublin Geraldines) who had been Kerry’s regular full-back for the previous two years and was one of the stars of their 1937 All-Ireland win over Cavan was replaced by young Paddy ‘Bawn’ Brosnan a member of the 1938 Kerry Junior team. A back injury to Kerry’s best forward, J.J. Landers made him an extreme doubt for the Replay with Martin Regan on stand-by to take his place if required which is exactly what happened before that fateful free-kick, that infamous 20 minute delay and Kerry’s unprecedented use of 24 players. Most definitely an All-Ireland Final and Final Replay never to be forgotten. The Galway and Kerry players parade in front of the newly opened (1938) Cusack Stand  
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  • 1977 Clare National Hurling League Champions

    €80.00
    Great collectors item here - a picture of the 1977 Clare Hurling Team which won the National Hurling league Title.Note a young Ger Loughnane present in the front row and the later addition of a not exactly to scale man in the back row! 34cm x 40cm  Kilmaley Co Clare (From the Examiner Newspaper) One of the 1970s’ great hurling forces was the Clare team of 1976 to 1978. They made three NHL Finals in a row, winning in 1977 and 1978. Their brand of play lit up many matches, leaving indelible memories for supporters and spectators. They reached the 1977 and 1978 Munster Finals, losing on both occasions to Cork. Next Monday evening, Councillor Tom McNamara, Chairman of Clare County Council, will host a Civic Reception to honour these players and their mentors. Fr Harry Bohan was manager, with Justin McCarthy acting as coach for the 1977 and 1978 seasons. Among the players, Séamus Durack (Feakle/Éire Óg) and Jackie O’Gorman (Cratloe) were mainstays during this period. Born in June 1951, Durack won three All Stars as goalkeeper (1977, 1978, 1981). He was first choice for Munster in the Railway Cup between 1973 and 1979, when they won the competition twice (1976, 1978). Born in October 1943, O’Gorman offered a powerful presence at wing back and corner back, appearing for Munster in 1972 and 1973. They spoke this week to PM O’Sullivan about their careers. PMO’S: It is 40 years ago, just about, since the 1978 Munster Final in Thurles. What do ye remember about the build-up, the day itself? SD: The build-up was unbelievable. There was no other topic of conversation in Clare. The level of expectation, especially after losing the Munster Final in 1977, jumped right off the charts. A massive crowd went to Thurles. 54,000 was the official attendance, and I think 5,000 people weren’t even let into the ground. We couldn’t get in the gate when we arrived at Semple [Stadium]. There was a lad inside and he wouldn’t let us in. I remember saying to him at one stage, and it coming close to the game: “Look, after another minute, we’ll make a decision and we’ll be gone back down that road and there’ll be no game here today, and it’ll be you who has the problem then.”
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  • Gaelic Football Team of the Millennium Print

    €70.00
    Framed copy of the An Post sponsored Gaelic football Team of the Millennium in the form of commemorative postage stamps of each of the nominees. Dimensions: 36cm x 29cm      Glazed

    "The An Post-GAA Team of the Millennium was unveiled at Croke Park yesterday. The selection which serves as the first 15 inductions into the GAA's new Hall of Fame has also been marked by an issue of 15 commemorative stamps by An Post. The stamps will be available in a variety of combinations from today. Next year, a similar exercise will take place to honour 15 hurlers.

    There was some comment on the absence of Dublin's Brian Mullins and Jack O'Shea from Kerry but it seemed generally appreciated that there were only two centrefield slots on the team and someone had to lose out. Tommy Murphy, the Boy Wonder of the 1930s Laois team which won three Leinster titles in a row, who was included ahead of Mullins and O'Shea had the added distinction of being the only player honoured who had not won an All-Ireland medal.

    Not surprisingly, Kerry - who top the All-Ireland roll of honour with 31 titles - lead the way on the team with six selections. Despite being clearly second behind Kerry with 22 All-Irelands, Dublin provide only one player, Kevin Heffernan at left corner forward. Galway and Mayo have two players each with one from Cavan, Down, Meath and Laois making up the balance.

    Joe McDonagh, President of the GAA, described the project as a reflection "on the history and evolution of our association, its games and its central characters, the players who have left such giant footprints in the sands that is the chronicle of the GAA".

    The Hall of Fame which is inaugurated by this team will be represented all through Croke Park, according the GAA director general Liam Mulvihill. He said that the Hall will be added to with a small number of inductions on an annual basis.

    "We decided that this team would be the initial members of the Hall of Fame and we were planning to honour those selected around the main areas of the concourse of the re-developed stadium, in the bottom tier and the upper tier. We wanted those ordinary tiers where ordinary supporters gather as the most appropriate place to honour those players.

    "The inductions will be in very small numbers, we're probably talking about two a year. Two footballers, two hurlers or one footballer and one hurler. It has to be made very, very special."

    Paddy Downey, formerly GAA correspondent of The Irish Times, was one of the adjudicators and confirmed the widespread feeling that the task of selecting such a team wasn't an enviable one.

    "It's nearly impossible because there's so many players, particularly in what you might call the big, central positions: midfield, centre-back, full back. Already people are saying to me: `why isn't Brian Mullins on, why isn't Paddy Kennedy of Kerry, Jack O'Shea - above all at the present time' and so on.

    "We also had the problem of not picking a half-century team of people we had seen ourselves. You could also argue how could we pick someone we hadn't seen - Dick Fitzgerald, apparently one of the greatest players of all time, Paul Russell of Kerry, Jack Higgins of Kildare, from the earlier part of the century.

    "I was conscious that we could have gone further back and taken the word of our predecessors in journalism who had praised these players and done so in print. Inevitably it came to be more a team of the second half of the century than the early years."

    Martin O'Connell of Meath was the only player of what might roughly be called contemporary times - one whose career was largely after the selection of the 1984 Centenary Team - to earn a place.

    "I was surprised," he said. "I didn't even know until I came up here. I arrived a bit late and Micheal O Muircheartaigh was just reading out the names. I was absolutely delighted."

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  • Wincarnis Prevents Depression Retro Advert

    €80.00
    Cool retro ad from the 1970s with a bold and to the point message! Origins : Cork City      Dimensions; 21cm x 32cm      Glazed First produced in 1887, Wincarnis Tonic Wine is a natural tonic incorporating a unique infusion of herbs and spices. It’s also rich in vitamins, especially energy-giving Vitamin B complex. Usually enjoyed straight, Wincarnis Tonic Wine can also be mixed with gin to make a ‘Gin and Win’. Already a firm favourite in the United Kingdom, its export business continues to grow in Singapore, Malaysia, USA, West Indies and the UAE amongst many other markets.
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  • Original JKF Election Poster

    €250.00
    Superb,original JFK Election poster/flyer from 1960.Kennedy for President.(Citizens for Kennedy & Johnson 261 Constitution Ave NW Washington D.C Such was the love and affection for President John F Kennedy in the country of his ancestors, that numerous Irish homes, businesses and pubs displayed  photographs, portraits and other memorabilia relating to the Kennedy and Fitzgerald families. Origins :Co Kerry.   Dimensions :23cm x 37cm.     Glazed
    President Kennedy greeting Irish crowds while on a state visit to the country in 1963.

    55 years ago, President John F. Kennedy visited Ireland, his ancestral home, assuming that his family had mostly come from County Wexford, but new research shows us that JFK had links to many other Irish counties as well.

    The President’s family tree, however, indicates that he has the most links to County Limerick, but also has connections to Limerick, Clare, Cork, and Fermanagh as research from Ancestry.com shed light onRussell James, a spokesperson for Ancestry Ireland, commented on how there is a great deal of discussion and research still ongoing about JFK’s roots to Ireland. “President John F. Kennedy’s family history has been a much-discussed topic over the years with his Irish roots being something that was extremely important to him. Traditionally JFK’s heritage has been closely linked with Wexford but we’re delighted to find records on Ancestry which show he had strong links to other counties across Ireland,” James said. “These findings will hopefully allow other counties across Ireland to further celebrate the life of the former American President, on the 55th anniversary of his visit to Ireland.” Limerick, as opposed to Wexford, had the most number of Kennedy’s great-grandparents, with three in total from his mother’s side: Mary Ann Fitzgerald, Michael Hannon, and Thomas Fitzgerald. The Fitzgeralds had come from a small town called Bruff in the eastern part of Limerick, but Hannon had come from Lough Gur. His great-grandfather, Thomas Fitzgerald, emigrated to the United States in the midst of the Irish famine of 1848 and eventually settled in Boston, Massachusetts. His Wexford connection is not as strong, given that only two of his great-grandparents came from the county. They were Patrick Kennedy of Dunganstown and Bridget Murphy from Owenduff. Patrick, when he arrived in the U.S in April 1849, was found to be a minor as shown on his American naturalization papers and had become a citizen three years later. He worked as a cooper in Boston until he died almost 10 years later in 1858. JFK had visited Dunganstown because his relatives had shared the Kennedy name there, but ultimately his roots lie deeper in Limerick through his mother’s side. The rest of his great-grandparents are from all over Ireland, with James Hickey from Newcastle-upon-Fergus, County Clare, Margaret M. Field from Rosscarbery, Cork, and Rosa Anna Cox from Tomregan in Fermanagh. Every one of them, though, had eventually emigrated and settled in Massachusetts. On Wednesday, June 26, 1963, Kennedy had arrived in Ireland, but on the second day, he made the journey to his ancestral home in Wexford, where he spent time with his relatives there and gave speeches in the surrounding area. While there, America’s first Irish Catholic President took a trip to Dunganstown, Wexford, where he met his extended family at the Kennedy homestead. It was there he made a toast to “all those Kennedys who went and all those Kennedys who stayed.”
    The homestead, now a visitor center, is where his great-grandfather lived and is still maintained by the current-day Kennedy family. This land itself was included in a land survey of Wexford in 1853, which shows that John Kennedy, JFK’s two-times great uncle, occupied the property described as having a ‘house, offices, and land’.
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  • 1949 Meath Captain Brian Smyth receiving Sam Maguire

    €70.00
    Great piece of Gaelic football Nostalgia here as Meath captain lifts the Sam Maguire on the occasion of the Royal county's first All Ireland Football success in 1949. Origins: Dunboyne Co Meath  Dimensions :26cm x 32cm.  Glazed  

    All-Ireland football final day, 1949. Meath fans are en route to Croke Park by steam train, and will see their county win its first championship. They stop at Dunboyne. He hears their cheers fall through the billowing steam from the railway bridge. Five-year-old Seán Boylan knows something big is stirring.

    Then he was simply a small boy kicking a ball around the family garden. The green and gold throng roared encouragement through fellowship and goodwill, buoyed by the occasion.

    In later years he would give them good cause to cheer. Just a snapshot, but the moment seems to have acquired a near-cinematic resonance through what it prefigured. That railway bridge is now known locally as Boylan's bridge.

    Around Dunboyne, there were local heroes to fire the imagination. His neighbours included Meath players like Jimmy Reilly, Bobby Ruske and 1949 All-Ireland-winning captain Brian Smyth.

    "Brian Smyth was a great friend of my father's. I have a memory of kicking a ball around with him in the run-up to the 1954 All-Ireland final.

    "He'd call out to the house on a Wednesday night to Daddy, getting the brews. Brian had a very famous dummy and he showed me how to do it. Of course, I practised it and used it all my life after."

    He drew inspiration, too, from further afield. The great Gaelic names of his childhood were lent further mystique by Micheál O'Hehir's radio commentaries, which painted bold pictures in his head.

    The legends were remote yet vividly present through the voice piercing the static.

    "When he was doing matches you'd swear you were at the game. You were trying to be a John Dowling or a Seán Purcell or a Bobby or Nicky Rackard, a Christy Ring when you heard the way he described it."

    Not that Gaelic games alone dominated his formative years. Motor races held in Dunboyne thrilled him as a youngster. Even now, his heart quickens a little at the vroom-vrooming of racing engines.

    "I was always mad into motorsport, but most kids around Dunboyne were, because you had the racing which started in the '50s.

    "It was outside your door so you followed the motorbikes and the cars. Of course, the only thing you could afford to do yourself was the go-karting. You'd go across to Monasterboice, where there was a track, or down to Askeaton in Limerick. The bug is still there."

    At the age of nine, he was sent to Belvedere College. Rugby, of course, was on the sporting curriculum and he played with enthusiasm, once certain positional difficulties had been resolved.

    "At the time the Ban was in but I played for a few years. In the first match I played I was put in the secondrow. At my height! I ended up in the backs afterwards, but it was very funny."

    He chuckles at the thought of himself as a secondrow forward. In later years he was to meet Peter Stringer after an Ireland international. The scrumhalf greeted him warmly, announcing he was delighted to meet someone even smaller than himself.

    His participation in rugby at Belvedere was never questioned, despite his GAA and republican family background. He was left to find his own course.

    "My father, Lord be good to him, never tried to influence me in any way with regard to what I would play or what I became involved in. He wasn't that sort of man. And, well, in Belvedere, you're talking about the place where Kevin Barry went to school."

    He took two of his boys in to see the old alma mater a few years back and was touched at the reception he received.

    "I said I'd see if the then headmaster, Fr Leonard Moloney, was around. I hadn't been back in the place much but he invited us into his office. He went over to the press and took out two Club Lemons and two Mars bars for the lads. From then on that was the only school they wanted to go to and they're there now."

    He hurled too at Belvedere, but his education in Gaelic games was to be furthered at Clogher Road Vocational School in Crumlin, which he attended after leaving Belvedere at 15. Moving from the privileged halls of Belvedere to the earthier environment of his new school was a jolt, but football and hurling helped smooth the transition.

    In Crumlin, he would learn how to use his hands, within and without the classroom.

    "The big thing there was the sport end of it. It was Gaelic and soccer we played. The PE instructor was Jim McCabe, who played centre-half back on the Cavan team that won the All-Ireland in 1952. He was still playing for Cavan at this stage. He was a lovely man and a terrific shooter."

    He found himself spending Wednesday afternoons kicking a ball around with McCabe and another Cavan player, Charlie Gallagher. The latter's patiently rigorous application to practising his free-taking left a deep impression on the manager of the future.

    While at Clogher Road, he represented Dublin Vocational Schools at centre-half back in both hurling and football. The goalkeeper on the football team was Pat Dunne, who would later play with Manchester United and Ireland.

    He was on the move again at 16, switching to Warrenstown Agricultural College near Trim. His family background working with the land made the choice seem logical. Besides, the college did a nice sideline in cultivating footballers and hurlers. Again, he found an All-Ireland-winner circling prominently within his youthful orbit, foreshadowing his own relationship with Sam Maguire.

    "The man who taught us veterinary was Séamus Murphy, who won five All-Irelands with Kerry in five different positions, an extraordinary record, from corner back to wing-half back to midfield to wing-half forward to corner forward. He brought a few of us from the college to Meath minor football trials."

    Hurling, though, was the game at which he was most successful as a player. He broke into the Meath minor hurling panel while at Warrenstown. One day shortly after beginning there, he had another chance encounter which was to echo into the future. He was thumbing a lift home to Dunboyne, hurl slung over a shoulder, only to see a fawn-coloured Ford Anglia pull up. Its driver was Des "Snitchy" Ferguson. Thus began a long association. In later years, his two sons would win All-Irelands with Meath under Boylan's tutelage.

    Back in his school days, though, nothing could top the feeling of making the Meath minor hurling panel. "The man who brought me for trials was the famous Brian Smyth. I'll never forget him coming to collect me for the trials. Here I was with Brian Smyth! Then when I got picked for Meath, it was just clover."

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  • 1963 Original JKF Tribute (Historian Brendan O’Shea)

    €250.00
    Original JFK Tribute written by historian Brendan O'Shea on November 27th 1963,only 5 days after the assassination of the President in Dallas,Texas.It is a beautifully written and poignant tribute to the grandson of an emigrant who represented the hopes and dreams of the entire Irish Nation Such was the love and affection for President John F Kennedy in the country of his ancestors, that numerous Irish homes, businesses and pubs displayed  photographs, portraits and other memorabilia relating to the Kennedy and Fitzgerald families. Origins :Co Limerick   Dimensions :55 x 43cm.     Glazed
    President Kennedy greeting Irish crowds while on a state visit to the country in 1963.

    55 years ago, President John F. Kennedy visited Ireland, his ancestral home, assuming that his family had mostly come from County Wexford, but new research shows us that JFK had links to many other Irish counties as well.

    The President’s family tree, however, indicates that he has the most links to County Limerick, but also has connections to Limerick, Clare, Cork, and Fermanagh as research from Ancestry.com shed light onRussell James, a spokesperson for Ancestry Ireland, commented on how there is a great deal of discussion and research still ongoing about JFK’s roots to Ireland. “President John F. Kennedy’s family history has been a much-discussed topic over the years with his Irish roots being something that was extremely important to him. Traditionally JFK’s heritage has been closely linked with Wexford but we’re delighted to find records on Ancestry which show he had strong links to other counties across Ireland,” James said. “These findings will hopefully allow other counties across Ireland to further celebrate the life of the former American President, on the 55th anniversary of his visit to Ireland.” Limerick, as opposed to Wexford, had the most number of Kennedy’s great-grandparents, with three in total from his mother’s side: Mary Ann Fitzgerald, Michael Hannon, and Thomas Fitzgerald. The Fitzgeralds had come from a small town called Bruff in the eastern part of Limerick, but Hannon had come from Lough Gur. His great-grandfather, Thomas Fitzgerald, emigrated to the United States in the midst of the Irish famine of 1848 and eventually settled in Boston, Massachusetts. His Wexford connection is not as strong, given that only two of his great-grandparents came from the county. They were Patrick Kennedy of Dunganstown and Bridget Murphy from Owenduff. Patrick, when he arrived in the U.S in April 1849, was found to be a minor as shown on his American naturalization papers and had become a citizen three years later. He worked as a cooper in Boston until he died almost 10 years later in 1858. JFK had visited Dunganstown because his relatives had shared the Kennedy name there, but ultimately his roots lie deeper in Limerick through his mother’s side. The rest of his great-grandparents are from all over Ireland, with James Hickey from Newcastle-upon-Fergus, County Clare, Margaret M. Field from Rosscarbery, Cork, and Rosa Anna Cox from Tomregan in Fermanagh. Every one of them, though, had eventually emigrated and settled in Massachusetts. On Wednesday, June 26, 1963, Kennedy had arrived in Ireland, but on the second day, he made the journey to his ancestral home in Wexford, where he spent time with his relatives there and gave speeches in the surrounding area. While there, America’s first Irish Catholic President took a trip to Dunganstown, Wexford, where he met his extended family at the Kennedy homestead. It was there he made a toast to “all those Kennedys who went and all those Kennedys who stayed.”
    The homestead, now a visitor center, is where his great-grandfather lived and is still maintained by the current-day Kennedy family. This land itself was included in a land survey of Wexford in 1853, which shows that John Kennedy, JFK’s two-times great uncle, occupied the property described as having a ‘house, offices, and land’.
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  • 1993 Guinness Cork Jazz Festival Sign

    €150.00

    Really cool Guinness advert from the 1993 Cork Jazz Festival mounted and framed.70cm x 60cm

    Origins : Cork
    Cork Jazz Festival
    Festival logo (2010)
    Genre Jazz
    Dates Late October
    Location(s) Cork, Ireland
    Years active 1978-present (42 years)
    Website GuinnessJazzFestival.com
    The Cork Jazz Festival is an annual music festival held in Cork City, Ireland in late October. The first festival began on Friday 27 October 1978, and has been held every year since. The festival is Ireland's biggest jazz event and attracts hundreds of musicians and thousands of music fans to the city each year. Jim Mountjoy founded the festival in October 1978. Mountjoy was a marketing manager of the Metropole Hotel in the city at the time, and, faced with filling his property for the weekend, scheduled the first jazz festival to coincide with the newly instituted October bank holiday. A small committee was formed and obtained sponsorship from John Player & Sons. The country's first jazz festival successfully attracted thousands of jazz fans. Guinness became the major sponsor in the 1980s. As festival director between 1978 and 1986, Mountjoy also introduced a Pub Trail, a Jazz Boat (from the UK) and a Jazz Train (from Dublin) to expand the festival. He also travelled to the UK, mainland Europe, Canada and the United States to promote the festival. Non-jazz artists also play at the festival - for example the 2015 line-up included Gary Numan, The Boomtown Rats, and The Coronas. The inclusion of non-jazz performers prompted some analysts to query whether the "festival has strayed from its roots". Since the 1990s, average annual festival visitor numbers have exceeded 40,000 - with visitors travelling from many parts of the world. In 2016, over 1,000 musicians from 20 countries were scheduled to perform to more than 40,000 visitors. To date, over one million jazz fans have visited Cork to hear noted jazz musicians such as: Ella Fitzgerald, George Shearing, Mel Torme, Wynton Marsalis, Buddy Rich, Herbie Hancock, Oscar Peterson, Billy Eckstine, Dizzy Gillespie, Lionel Hampton, Cleo Laine, Dave Brubeck, Chick Corea, Gerry Mulligan, Stéphane Grappelli, Sonny Rollins, Esbjorn Svensson Trio, Al Di Meola, John McLaughlin, Gregory Porter, Billy Cobham, Damon Albarn and others.
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  • The Treaty Stone & King John’s Castle Limerick Original Artwork

    €350.00
    Stunning original oil painting depicting two  iconic Limerick landmarks,King Johns Castle & The Treaty Stone.The artists signature is difficult to decipher but this is still an exquisite piece of art. 56cm x 50cm      Clarenbridge Co Galway King John's Castle (Irish: Caisleán Luimnigh) is a 13th-century castle located on King's Island in Limerick, Ireland, next to the River Shannon.Although the site dates back to 922 when the Vikings lived on the Island, the castle itself was built on the orders of King John in 1200. One of the best preserved Norman castles in Europe, the walls, towers and fortifications remain today and are visitor attractions. The remains of a Viking settlement were uncovered during archaeological excavations at the site in 1900.
    The Treaty Stone is the rock that the Treaty of Limerick was signed in 1691, marking the surrender of the city to William of Orange.
    Limerick is known as the Treaty City, so called after the Treaty of Limerick signed on the 3rd of October 1691 after the war between William III of England (known as William of Orange) and his Father in Law King James II. Limericks role in the successful accession of William of Orange and his wife Mary Stuart, daughter of King James II to the throne of England cannot be understated. The Treaty, according to tradition was signed on a stone in the sight of both armies at the Clare end of Thomond Bridge on the 3rd of October 1691. The stone was for some years resting on the ground opposite its present location, where the old Ennis mail coach left to travel from the Clare end of Thomond Bridge, through Cratloe woods en route to Ennis. The Treaty stone of Limerick has rested on a plinth since 1865, at the Clare end of Thomond Bridge. The pedestal was erected in May 1865 by John Richard Tinsley, mayor of the city.
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  • 1978 Munster v All Blacks Post Match Celebrations Print

    €90.00
    There are many chapters in Munster’s storied rugby journey but pride of place remains the game against the otherwise unbeaten New Zealanders on October 31, 1978.This is a great photo taken during the legendary celebrations which took place after that epic victory .Taken around a piano in the famous Ted's Bar & Nightclub in O'Connell St Limerick,it features Greg Barrett on the keyboard while Brendan Foley(father of the late, much lamented Anthony ),Colm Tucker & Tony Ward join in the sing song. 30cm x 39cm Limerick City There were some mighty matches between the Kiwis and Munster, most notably at the Mardyke in 1954 when the tourists edged home by 6-3 and again by the same margin at Thomond Park in 1963 while the teams also played a 3-3 draw at Musgrave Park in 1973. During that time, they resisted the best that Ireland, Ulster and Leinster (admittedly with fewer opportunities) could throw at them so this country was still waiting for any team to put one over on the All Blacks when Graham Mourie’s men arrived in Limerick on October 31st, 1978. There is always hope but in truth Munster supporters had little else to encourage them as the fateful day dawned. Whereas the New Zealanders had disposed of Cambridge University, Cardiff, West Wales and London Counties with comparative ease, Munster’s preparations had been confined to a couple of games in London where their level of performance, to put it mildly, was a long way short of what would be required to enjoy even a degree of respectability against the All Blacks. They were hammered by Middlesex County and scraped a draw with London Irish. Ever before those two games, things hadn’t been going according to plan. Tom Kiernan had coached Munster for three seasons in the mid-70s before being appointed Branch President, a role he duly completed at the end of the 1977/78 season.
    EA OF EMOTION: Munster’s players and supporters celebrate a famous victory.
    SEA OF EMOTION: Munster’s players and supporters celebrate a famous victory.
    However, when coach Des Barry resigned for personal reasons, Munster turned once again to Kiernan. Being the great Munster man that he was and remains, Tom was happy to oblige although as an extremely shrewd observer of the game, one also suspected that he spotted something special in this group of players that had escaped most peoples’ attention. He refused to be dismayed by what he saw in the games in London, instead regarding them as crucial in the build-up to the All Blacks encounter. He was, in fact, ahead of his time, as he laid his hands on video footage of the All Blacks games, something unheard of back in those days, nor was he averse to the idea of making changes in key positions. A major case in point was the introduction of London Irish loose-head prop Les White of whom little was known in Munster rugby circles but who convinced the coaching team he was the ideal man to fill a troublesome position. Kiernan was also being confronted by many other difficult issues. The team he envisaged taking the field against the tourists was composed of six players (Larry Moloney, Seamus Dennison, Gerry McLoughlin, Pat Whelan, Brendan Foley and Colm Tucker) based in Limerick, four (Greg Barrett, Jimmy Bowen, Moss Finn and Christy Cantillon) in Cork, four more (Donal Canniffe, Tony Ward, Moss Keane and Donal Spring) in Dublin and Les White who, according to Keane, “hailed from somewhere in England, at that time nobody knew where”.   Always bearing in mind that the game then was totally amateur and these guys worked for a living, for most people it would have been impossible to bring them all together on a regular basis for six weeks before the match. But the level of respect for Kiernan was so immense that the group would have walked on the proverbial bed of nails for him if he so requested. So they turned up every Wednesday in Fermoy — a kind of halfway house for the guys travelling from three different locations and over appreciable distances. Those sessions helped to forge a wonderful team spirit. After all, guys who had been slogging away at work only a short few hours previously would hardly make that kind of sacrifice unless they meant business. October 31, 1978 dawned wet and windy, prompting hope among the faithful that the conditions would suit Munster who could indulge in their traditional approach sometimes described rather vulgarly as “boot, bite and bollock” and, who knows, with the fanatical Thomond Park crowd cheering them on, anything could happen. Ironically, though, the wind and rain had given way to a clear, blue sky and altogether perfect conditions in good time for the kick-off. Surely, now, that was Munster’s last hope gone — but that didn’t deter more than 12,000 fans from making their way to Thomond Park and somehow finding a spot to view the action. The vantage points included hundreds seated on the 20-foot high boundary wall, others perched on the towering trees immediately outside the ground and some even watched from the windows of houses at the Ballynanty end that have since been demolished. The atmosphere was absolutely electric as the teams took the field, the All Blacks performed the Haka and the Welsh referee Corris Thomas got things under way. The first few skirmishes saw the teams sizing each other up before an incident that was to be recorded in song and story occurred, described here — with just the slightest touch of hyperbole! — by Terry McLean in his book ‘Mourie’s All Blacks’. “In only the fifth minute, Seamus Dennison, him the fellow that bore the number 13 jersey in the centre, was knocked down in a tackle. He came from the Garryowen club which might explain his subsequent actions — to join that club, so it has been said, one must walk barefooted over broken glass, charge naked through searing fires, run the severest gauntlets and, as a final test of manhood, prepare with unfaltering gaze to make a catch of the highest ball ever kicked while aware that at least eight thundering members of your own team are about to knock you down, trample all over you and into the bargain hiss nasty words at you because you forgot to cry out ‘Mark’. Moss Keane recalled the incident: “It was the hardest tackle I have ever seen and lifted the whole team. That was the moment we knew we could win the game.” Kiernan also acknowledged the importance of “The Tackle”.
    He said: “Tackling is as integral a part of rugby as is a majestic centre three-quarter break. There were two noteworthy tackles during the match by Seamus Dennison. He was injured in the first and I thought he might have to come off. But he repeated the tackle some minutes later.”
    Munster v All Blacks 1978: ‘We were facing a team of kamikaze tacklers’ Many years on, Stuart Wilson vividly recalled the Dennison tackles and spoke about them in remarkable detail and with commendable honesty: “The move involved me coming in from the blind side wing and it had been working very well on tour. It was a workable move and it was paying off so we just kept rolling it out. Against Munster, the gap opened up brilliantly as it was supposed to except that there was this little guy called Seamus Dennison sitting there in front of me. “He just basically smacked the living daylights out of me. I dusted myself off and thought, I don’t want to have to do that again. Ten minutes later, we called the same move again thinking we’d change it slightly but, no, it didn’t work and I got hammered again.” The game was 11 minutes old when the most famous try in the history of Munster rugby was scored. Tom Kiernan recalled: “It came from a great piece of anticipation by Bowen who in the first place had to run around his man to get to Ward’s kick ahead. He then beat two men and when finally tackled, managed to keep his balance and deliver the ball to Cantillon who went on to score. All of this was evidence of sharpness on Bowen’s part.” Very soon it would be 9-0. In the first five minutes, a towering garryowen by skipper Canniffe had exposed the vulnerability of the New Zealand rearguard under the high ball. They were to be examined once or twice more but it was from a long range but badly struck penalty attempt by Ward that full-back Brian McKechnie knocked on some 15 yards from his line and close to where Cantillon had touched down a few minutes earlier. You could sense White, Whelan, McLoughlin and co in the front five of the Munster scrum smacking their lips as they settled for the scrum. A quick, straight put-in by Canniffe, a well controlled heel, a smart pass by the scrum-half to Ward and the inevitability of a drop goal. And that’s exactly what happened. The All Blacks enjoyed the majority of forward possession but the harder they tried, the more they fell into the trap set by the wily Kiernan and so brilliantly carried out by every member of the Munster team. The tourists might have edged the line-out contest through Andy Haden and Frank Oliver but scrum-half Mark Donaldson endured a miserable afternoon as the Munster forwards poured through and buried him in the Thomond Park turf. As the minutes passed and the All Blacks became more and more unsure as to what to try next, the Thomond Park hordes chanted “Munster-Munster–Munster” to an ever increasing crescendo until with 12 minutes to go, the noise levels reached deafening proportions. And then ... a deep, probing kick by Ward put Wilson under further pressure. Eventually, he stumbled over the ball as it crossed the line and nervously conceded a five-metre scrum. The Munster heel was disrupted but the ruck was won, Tucker gained possession and slipped a lovely little pass to Ward whose gifted feet and speed of thought enabled him in a twinkle to drop a goal although surrounded by a swarm of black jerseys. So the game entered its final 10 minutes with the All Blacks needing three scores to win and, of course, that was never going to happen. Munster knew this, so, too, did the All Blacks. Stu Wilson admitted as much as he explained his part in Wardy’s second drop goal: “Tony Ward banged it down, it bounced a little bit, jigged here, jigged there, and I stumbled, fell over, and all of a sudden the heat was on me. They were good chasers. A kick is a kick — but if you have lots of good chasers on it, they make bad kicks look good. I looked up and realised — I’m not going to run out of here so I just dotted it down. I wasn’t going to run that ball back out at them because five of those mad guys were coming down the track at me and I’m thinking, I’m being hit by these guys all day and I’m looking after my body, thank you. Of course it was a five-yard scrum and Ward banged over another drop goal. That was it, there was the game”. The final whistle duly sounded with Munster 12 points ahead but the heroes of the hour still had to get off the field and reach the safety of the dressing room. Bodies were embraced, faces were kissed, backs were pummelled, you name it, the gauntlet had to be walked. Even the All Blacks seemed impressed with the sense of joy being released all about them. Andy Haden recalled “the sea of red supporters all over the pitch after the game, you could hardly get off for the wave of celebration that was going on. The whole of Thomond Park glowed in the warmth that someone had put one over on the Blacks.” Controversially, the All Blacks coach, Jack Gleeson (usually a man capable of accepting the good with the bad and who passed away of cancer within 12 months of the tour), in an unguarded (although possibly misunderstood) moment on the following day, let slip his innermost thoughts on the game. “We were up against a team of kamikaze tacklers,” he lamented. “We set out on this tour to play 15-man rugby but if teams were to adopt the Munster approach and do all they could to stop the All Blacks from playing an attacking game, then the tour and the game would suffer.” It was interpreted by the majority of observers as a rare piece of sour grapes from a group who had accepted the defeat in good spirit and it certainly did nothing to diminish Munster respect for the All Blacks and their proud rugby tradition.
    And Tom Kiernan and Andy Haden, rugby standard bearers of which their respective countries were justifiably proud, saw things in a similar light.
    “Jack’s comment was made in the context of the game and meant as a compliment,” Haden maintained. “Indeed, it was probably a little suggestion to his own side that perhaps we should imitate their efforts and emulate them in that department.” Tom Kiernan went along with this line of thought: “I thought he was actually paying a compliment to the Munster spirit. Kamikaze pilots were very brave men. That’s what I took out of that. I didn’t think it was a criticism of Munster.” And Stuart Wilson? “It was meant purely as a compliment. We had been travelling through the UK and winning all our games. We were playing a nice, open style. But we had never met a team that could get up in our faces and tackle us off the field. Every time you got the ball, you didn’t get one player tackling you, you got four. Kamikaze means people are willing to die for the cause and that was the way with every Munster man that day. Their strengths were that they were playing for Munster, that they had a home Thomond Park crowd and they took strength from the fact they were playing one of the best teams in the world.” You could rely on Terry McLean (famed New Zealand journalist) to be fair and sporting in his reaction to the Thomond Park defeat. Unlike Kiernan and Haden, he scorned Jack Gleeson’s “kamikaze” comment, stating that “it was a stern, severe criticism which wanted in fairness on two grounds. It did not sufficiently praise the spirit of Munster or the presence within the one team of 15 men who each emerged from the match much larger than life-size. Secondly, it was disingenuous or, more accurately, naive.” “Gleeson thought it sinful that Ward had not once passed the ball. It was worse, he said, that Munster had made aggressive defence the only arm of their attack. Now, what on earth, it could be asked, was Kiernan to do with his team? He held a fine hand with top trumps in Spring, Cantillon, Foley and Whelan in the forwards and Canniffe, Ward, Dennison, Bowen and Moloney in the backs. Tommy Kiernan wasn’t born yesterday. He played to the strength of his team and upon the suspected weaknesses of the All Blacks.” You could hardly be fairer than that – even if Graham Mourie himself in his 1983 autobiography wasn’t far behind when observing: “Munster were just too good. From the first time Stu Wilson was crashed to the ground as he entered the back line to the last time Mark Donaldson was thrown backwards as he ducked around the side of a maul. They were too good.” One of the nicest tributes of all came from a famous New Zealand photographer, Peter Bush. He covered numerous All Black tours, was close friends with most of their players and a canny one when it came to finding the ideal position from which to snap his pictures. He was the guy perched precariously on the pillars at the entrance to the pitch as the celebrations went on and which he described 20 years later in his book ‘Who Said It’s Only a Game?’
    “I climbed up on a gate at the end of the game to get this photo and in the middle of it all is Moss Keane, one of the great characters of Irish rugby, with an expression of absolute elation. The All Blacks lost 12-0 to a side that played with as much passion as I have ever seen on a rugby field. The great New Zealand prop Gary Knight said to me later: ‘We could have played them for a fortnight and we still wouldn’t have won’. I was doing a little radio piece after the game and got hold of Moss Keane and said ‘Moss, I wonder if ...’ and he said, ‘ho, ho, we beat you bastards’.
    “With that, he flung his arms around me and dragged me with him into the shower. I finally managed to disentangle myself and killed the tape. I didn’t mind really because it had been a wonderful day.” Dimensions :47cm x 57cm
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  • Vintage It’s a Long Long Way to Tipperary WW1 Poster

    €150.00
    Superb vintage poster advertising the famous WW1 era music hall song of 'Its a long long way to Tipperary". 60cm x 45cm   London United Kingdom Long Way to Tipperary" (or "It's a Long, Long Way to Tipperary") is a British music hall song first performed in 1912 by Jack Judge, and written by Judge and Harry Williams though authorship of the song has long been disputed. It was recorded in 1914 by Irish tenor John McCormack. It became popular as a marching song among soldiers in the First World War and is remembered as a song of that war. Welcoming signs in the referenced county of Tipperary, Ireland, humorously declare, "You've come a long long way..." in reference to the song.

    Authorship

    Jack Judge's parents were Irish, and his grandparents came from Tipperary. Judge met Harry Williams (Henry James Williams, 23 September 1873 – 21 February 1924) in Oldbury, Worcestershire at the Malt Shovel public house, where Williams's brother Ben was the licensee. Williams was severely disabled, having fallen down cellar steps as a child and badly broken both legs. He had developed a talent for writing verse and songs, and played the piano and mandolin, often in public. Judge and Williams began a long-term writing partnership that resulted in 32 music hall songs published by Bert Feldman. Many of the songs were composed by Williams and Judge at Williams's home, The Plough Inn (later renamed The Tipperary Inn), in Balsall Common. Because Judge could not read or write music, Williams taught them to Judge by ear. Judge was a popular semi-professional performer in music halls. In January 1912, he was performing at the Grand Theatre in Stalybridge, and accepted a 5-shilling bet that he could compose and sing a new song by the next night. The following evening, 31 January, Judge performed "It's a Long Way to Tipperary" for the first time, and it immediately became a great success. The song was originally written and performed as a sentimental ballad, to be enjoyed by Irish expatriates living in London.Judge sold the rights to the song to Bert Feldman in London, who agreed to publish it and other songs written by Judge with Williams. Feldman published the song as "It's a Long, Long Way to Tipperary" in October 1912, and promoted it as a march.

    Dispute

    Feldman paid royalties to both Judge and Williams, but after Williams' death in 1924, Judge claimed sole credit for writing the song, saying that he had agreed to Williams being co-credited as recompense for a debt that Judge owed. However, Williams' family showed that the tune and most of the lyrics to the song already existed in the form of a manuscript, "It's A Long Way to Connemara", co-written by Williams and Judge back in 1909, and Judge had used this, just changing some words, including changing "Connemara" to "Tipperary" Judge said: "I was the sole composer of 'Tipperary', and all other songs published in our names jointly. They were all 95% my work, as Mr Williams made only slight alterations to the work he wrote down from my singing the compositions. He would write it down on music-lined paper and play it back, then I'd work on the music a little more ... I have sworn affidavits in my possession by Bert Feldman, the late Harry Williams and myself confirming that I am the composer ...". In a 1933 interview, he added: "The words and music of the song were written in the Newmarket Tavern, Corporation Street, Stalybridge on 31st January 1912, during my engagement at the Grand Theatre after a bet had been made that a song could not be written and sung the next evening ... Harry was very good to me and used to assist me financially, and I made a promise to him that if I ever wrote a song and published it, I would put his name on the copies and share the proceeds with him. Not only did I generously fulfil that promise, but I placed his name with mine on many more of my own published contributions. During Mr Williams' lifetime (as far as I know) he never claimed to be the writer of the song ...". Williams's family campaigned in 2012 to have Harry Williams officially re-credited with the song, and shared their archives with the Imperial War Museums. The family estate still receives royalties from the song.

    Other claims

    In 1917, Alice Smyth Burton Jay sued song publishers Chappell & Co. for $100,000, alleging she wrote the tune in 1908 for a song played at the Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition promoting the Washington apple industry. The chorus began "I'm on my way to Yakima". The court appointed Victor Herbert to act as expert advisor and dismissed the suit in 1920, since the authors of "Tipperary" had never been to Seattle and Victor Herbert testified the two songs were not similar enough to suggest plagiarism.

    Content

    The song was originally written as a lament from an Irish worker in London, missing his homeland, before it became a popular soldiers' marching song. One of the most popular hits of the time, the song is atypical in that it is not a warlike song that incites the soldiers to glorious deeds. Popular songs in previous wars (such as the Boer Wars) frequently did this. In the First World War, however, the most popular songs, like this one and "Keep the Home Fires Burning", concentrated on the longing for home.

    Reception

    Feldman persuaded Florrie Forde to perform the song in 1913, but she disliked it and dropped it from her act. However, it became widely known. During the First World War, Daily Mailcorrespondent George Curnock saw the Irish regiment the Connaught Rangers singing this song as they marched through Boulogne on 13 August 1914, and reported it on 18 August 1914. The song was quickly picked up by other units of the British Army. In November 1914, it was recorded by Irish tenor John McCormack, which helped its worldwide popularity. Other popular versions in the USA in 1915 were by the American Quartet, Prince's Orchestra, and Albert Farrington. The popularity of the song among soldiers, despite (or because of) its irreverent and non-military theme, was noted at the time, and was contrasted with the military and patriotic songs favoured by enemy troops. Commentators considered that the song's appeal revealed characteristically British qualities of being cheerful in the face of hardship. The Times suggested that "'Tipperary' may be less dignified, but it, and whatever else our soldiers may choose to sing will be dignified by their bravery, their gay patience, and their long suffering kindness... We would rather have their deeds than all the German songs in the world."

    Later performances

    Early recording star Billy Murray, with the American Quartet, sang "It's A Long Way To Tipperary" as a straightforward march, complete with brass, drums and cymbals, with a quick bar of "Rule, Britannia!" thrown into the instrumental interlude between the first and second verse-chorus combination. The song was featured as one of the songs in the 1951 film On Moonlight Bay, the 1960s stage musical and film Oh! What a Lovely War and the 1970 musical Darling Lili, sung by Julie Andrews. It was also sung by the prisoners of war in Jean Renoir's film La Grande Illusion (1937) and as background music in The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966). It is also the second part (the other two being Hanging on the Old Barbed Wire and Mademoiselle from Armentières) of the regimental march of Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry. Mystery Science Theater 3000 used it twice, sung by Crow T. Robot in Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie (1996), then sung again for the final television episode. It is also sung by British soldiers in the film The Travelling Players (1975) directed by Theo Angelopoulos, and by Czechoslovak soldiers in the movie Černí baroni (1992). The song is often cited when documentary footage of the First World War is presented. One example of its use is in the annual television special It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966). Snoopy—who fancies himself as a First World War flying ace—dances to a medley of First World War-era songs played by Schroeder. This song is included, and at that point Snoopy falls into a left-right-left marching pace. Schroeder also played this song in Snoopy, Come Home (1972) at Snoopy's send-off party. Also, Snoopy was seen singing the song out loud in a series of strips about his going to the 1968 Winter Olympics. In another strip, Snoopy is walking so long a distance to Tipperary that he lies down exhausted and notes, "They're right, it is a long way to Tipperary." On a different occasion, Snoopy walks along and begins to sing the song, only to meet a sign that reads, "Tipperary: One Block." In a Sunday strip wherein Snoopy, in his World War I fantasy state, walks into Marcie's home, thinking it a French café, and falls asleep after drinking all her root beer, she rousts him awake by loudly singing the song. It is also featured in For Me and My Gal (1942) starring Judy Garland and Gene Kelly and Gallipoli (1981) starring Mel Gibson. The cast of The Mary Tyler Moore Show march off screen singing the song at the conclusion of the series’ final episode, after news anchor Ted Baxter (played by Ted Knight) had inexplicably recited some of the lyrics on that evening's news broadcast. It was sung by the crew of U-96 in Wolfgang Petersen's 1981 film Das Boot (that particular arrangement was performed by the Red Army Choir). Morale is boosted in the submarine when the German crew sings the song as they begin patrolling in the North Atlantic Ocean. The crew sings it a second time as they cruise toward home port after near disaster. When the hellship SS Lisbon Maru was sinking, the Royal Artillery POWS trapped in the vessel are reported to have sung this song. Survivors of the sinking of HMS Tipperary in the Battle of Jutland (1916) were identified by their rescuers on HMS Sparrowhawk because they were singing "It's a Long Way to Tipperary" in their lifeboat. In Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie (1996), based on the popular cable series Mystery Science Theater 3000, robot character Crow T. Robot sings a version of the song while wearing a World War I British Army helmet, and declaring "We must confound Gerry (the Germans) at every turn!"

    Lyrics

    Up to mighty London Came an Irishman one day. As the streets are paved with gold Sure, everyone was gay, Singing songs of Piccadilly, Strand and Leicester Square, Till Paddy got excited, Then he shouted to them there: Chorus It's a long way to Tipperary, It's a long way to go. It's a long way to Tipperary, To the sweetest girl I know! Goodbye, Piccadilly, Farewell, Leicester Square! It's a long long way to Tipperary, But my heart's right there. Paddy wrote a letter To his Irish Molly-O, Saying, "Should you not receive it, Write and let me know!" "If I make mistakes in spelling, Molly, dear," said he, "Remember, it's the pen that's bad, Don't lay the blame on me!" Chorus Molly wrote a neat reply To Irish Paddy-O, Saying "Mike Maloney Wants to marry me, and so Leave the Strand and Piccadilly Or you'll be to blame, For love has fairly drove me silly: Hoping you're the same!" Chorus
    An alternative bawdy concluding chorus:
    That's the wrong way to tickle Mary, That's the wrong way to kiss. Don't you know that over here, lad They like it best like this. Hoo-ray pour les français, Farewell Angleterre. We didn't know how to tickle Mary, But we learnt how over there.
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  • Picture of Beamish & Crawford Delivery Truck (Artist O’Neill)

    €80.00
    40cm x 60cm  Nenagh Co Tipperary Beamish and Crawford operated until 2009 and had a number of owners, including Carling O'Keefe, Elders IXL, Scottish & Newcastle and, most recently, Heineken International. While the Beamish and Crawford brewery closed in 2009, Beamish stout is still brewed in the city, at a nearby Heineken operated facility.
    The Counting House, part of the brewery complex in central Cork, Ireland
    The Beamish and Crawford brewery was founded in 1792, when two merchants, William Beamish and William Crawford, went into partnership with two brewers, Richard Barrett and Digby O’Brien. They purchased an existing brewery (from Edward Allen) on a site in Cramer's Lane that had been used for brewing since at least 1650 (and possibly as early as 1500). Beamish and Crawford's Cork Porter Brewery prospered, and by 1805 it had become the largest brewery in Ireland and the third largest in the then United Kingdom as a whole. In 1805, its output was 100,000 barrels per annum – up from 12,000 barrels in 1792. It remained the largest brewery in Ireland until overtaken by Guinness in 1833.
    Beamish Stout, 1919 advert for the noted Cork brewers
    In 1865, the brewery underwent a modernisation programme and was completely revamped at a cost of £100,000. Alfred Barnard, a noted brewing and distilling historian, remarked in his book Noted Breweries of Great Britain & Ireland in 1889 that:
    "The business of Beamish & Crawford in Cork is a very old one dating as far back as the seventeenth century and it is said to be the most ancient porter brewery in Ireland."
    The company went public in 1901, issuing a share capital of £480,000. Further expansion was aided by the acquisition of a number of local breweries in the early 1900s. In 1962, it was purchased by the Canadian brewing firm Carling-O'Keefe Ltd, who embarked on a modernisation programme at the brewery. In 1987, Elders IXL purchased Canadian Breweries (incorporating Carling-O'Keefe). In 1995, Elders sold the brewery to Scottish & Newcastle. With the 2008 takeover of Scottish & Newcastle, the brewery passed into the hands of its main Cork-based rival Heineken International. In December 2008, it was announced that the Beamish and Crawford brewery was to close in March 2009 with the loss of 120 jobs. Production was moved to the nearby Heineken Brewery (previously Murphy's), with about forty of the Beamish staff moved to Heineken. The brewery buildings (including the Tudor fronted "counting house") are still in the heart of Cork's medieval city, close to the South Gate. The original brewery facilities are subject to planning permission for use as a visitor and events centre. Before the takeover and closure of the brewery, beers included:
    • Beamish stout, Beamish and Crawford's flagship product, now brewed by Heineken at the Murphy's brewery.
    • Beamish Red, a sweetish Irish red ale, made to resemble Kilkenny or Murphy's Irish Red. Production ceased immediately following the takeover. Several Cork pubs which once stocked Beamish Red replaced it with Franciscan Well Rebel Red.
    In addition to their own beers, Beamish and Crawford brewed and distributed a number of internationally known brands of beer, with the Irish franchises for Fosters, Kronenbourg 1664 and Miller. Fosters has remained with the new owners, while Miller was transferred to a new distributor, importing the beer from SABMiller's Netherlands brewery.In 2009, after just over two years of being reintroduced to the US market, owners Heineken decided to stop distribution of Beamish products outside Ireland.  
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  • Rock of Cashel Print

    €80.00
    Superb print depicting the spectacular and historic Rock of Cashel in the heart of Co Tipperary. 25cm x 35cm      Killenaule Co Tipperary   The Rock of Cashel , also known as Cashel of the Kings and St. Patrick's Rock, is a historic site located at Cashel, County Tipperary, Ireland

    History

    Aerial view of the Rock of Cashel, circa 1970, prior to any modern work
    According to local legends, the Rock of Cashel originated in the Devil's Bit, a mountain 20 miles (30 km) north of Cashel when St. Patrick banished Satan from a cave, resulting in the Rock's landing in Cashel.[1] Cashel is reputed to be the site of the conversion of the King of Munster by St. Patrick in the 5th century. The Rock of Cashel was the traditional seat of the kings of Munster for several hundred years prior to the Norman invasion. In 1101, the King of Munster, Muirchertach Ua Briain, donated his fortress on the Rock to the Church. The picturesque complex has a character of its own and is one of the most remarkable collections of Celtic art and medieval architecture to be found anywhere in Europe.Few remnants of the early structures survive; the majority of buildings on the current site date from the 12th and 13th centuries.

    Buildings on the Rock

    The Round Tower
    The oldest and tallest of the buildings is the well preserved round tower (28 metres, or 90 feet), dating from c.1100. Its entrance is 12 feet (3.7 m) from the ground, necessitated by a shallow foundation (about 3 feet) typical of round towers. The tower was built using the dry stone method. Modern conservationists have filled in some of the tower with mortar for safety reasons.
    Cormac's Chapel with parts of the cathedral on either side
    Cormac's Chapel, the chapel of King Cormac Mac Carthaigh, was begun in 1127 and consecrated in 1134. It is a sophisticated structure, with vaulted ceilings and wide arches, drawing on contemporary European architecture and infusing unique native elements. The Irish Abbot of Regensburg, Dirmicius of Regensburg, sent two of his carpenters to help in the work and the twin towers on either side of the junction of the nave and chancel are strongly suggestive of their Germanic influence, as this feature is otherwise unknown in Ireland. Other notable features of the building include interior and exterior arcading, a barrel-vaulted roof, a carved tympanum over both doorways, the magnificent north doorway and chancel arch and the oldest stairs in Ireland. It contains one of the best-preserved Irish frescoes from this time period. The Chapel was constructed primarily of sandstone which has become waterlogged over the centuries, significantly damaging the interior frescoes. Restoration and preservation required the chapel be completely enclosed in a rain-proof structure with interior dehumidifiers to dry out the stone. It is now open for limited tours to the public.
    Irish High Cross at the Rock of Cashel
    The Cathedral, built between 1235 and 1270, is an aisleless building of cruciform plan, having a central tower and terminating westwards in a massive residential castle. The Hall of the Vicars Choral was built in the 15th century. The vicars choral were laymen (sometimes minor canons) appointed to assist in chanting the cathedral services. At Cashel, there were originally eight vicars choral with their own seal. This was later reduced to five honorary vicars choral who appointed singing-men as their deputies, a practice which continued until 1836. The restoration of the Hall was undertaken by the Office of Public Works as a project in connection with the European Architectural Heritage Year, 1975. Through it visitors now enter the site. In 1647, during the Irish Confederate Wars, Cashel was sacked by English Parliamentarian troops under Murrough O'Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin. The Irish Confederate troops there were massacred, as were the Catholic clergy, including Theobald Stapleton. Inchiquin's troops looted or destroyed many important religious artefacts. In 1749, the main cathedral roof was removed by Arthur Price, the Anglican Archbishop of Cashel.] Today, what remains of the Rock of Cashel has become a tourist attraction. Price's decision to remove the roof on what had been called the jewel among Irish church buildings was criticised before and since. Queen Elizabeth II visited the Rock of Cashel during her 2011 visit to Ireland.

    View from the bottom
    Graves on the northern side of the ruins
    The entire plateau on which the buildings and graveyard lie is walled. In the grounds around the buildings an extensive graveyard includes a number of high crosses. Scully's Cross, one of the largest and most famous high crosses here, originally constructed in 1867 to commemorate the Scully family, was destroyed in 1976 when lightning struck a metal rod that ran the length of the cross. The remains of the top of the cross now lie at the base of the cross adjacent to the rock wall.

    Burials

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  • Legendary Kerry Footballer Pat Spillane

    €70.00
    28cm x 34cm Great portrait of the legendary Kerry Gaelic Footballer,Pat Spillane Patrick Gerard Spillane (born 1 December 1955), better known as Pat Spillane, is an Irish Gaelic football pundit and former player. His leagueand championship career with the Kerry senior team spanned seventeen years from 1974 to 1991. Spillane is widely regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of the game. Born in Templenoe, County Kerry, Spillane was born into a strong Gaelic football family. His father, Tom, and his uncle, Jerome, both played with Kerry and won All-Ireland medals in the junior grade. His maternal uncles, Jackie, Dinny, Mickey, and Teddy Lyne, all won All-Ireland medals at various grades with Kerry throughout the 1940s and 1950s. Spillane played competitive Gaelic football as a boarder at St Brendan's College. Here he won back-to-back Corn Uí Mhuirí medals, however, an All-Ireland medal remained elusive. Spillane first appeared for the Templenoe club at underage levels, before winning a county novice championship medal in 1973. With the amalgamated Kenmare District team he won two county senior championship medals in 1974 and 1987. While studying at Thomond College Spillane won an All-Ireland medal in the club championship in 1978. He also won one Munster medal and a county senior championship medal in Limerick. Spillane made his debut on the inter-county scene at the age of sixteen when he was picked on the Kerry minor team. He enjoyed two championship seasons with the minor team, however, he was a Munster runner-up on both occasions. Spillane subsequently joined the Kerry under-21 team, winning back-to-back All-Ireland medal in 1975 and 1976. By this stage he had also joined the Kerry senior team, making his debut during the 1973–74 league. Over the course of the next seventeen years, Spillane won eight All-Ireland medals, beginning with a lone triumph in 1975, a record-equalling four championships in-a-row from 1978 to 1981 and three championships in-a-row from 1984 to 1986. He also won twelve Munster medals, two National Football League medals and was named Footballer of the Year in 1978 and 1986. He played his last game for Kerry in August 1991. Spillane was joined on the Kerry team by his two brothers, Mick and Tom, and together won a total of 19 All-Ireland medals – a record for a set of brothers.[1] After being chosen on the Munster inter-provincial team for the first time in 1976, Spillane was an automatic choice on the starting fifteen for the following six years. During that time he won four Railway Cup medals. In retirement from playing Spillane combined his teaching career with a new position as a sports broadcaster. His media career began with RTÉ in 1992, where he started as a co-commentator before progressing to the role of studio analyst with the flagship programme The Sunday Game. He also enjoyed a four-year tenure as host of the evening highlights edition of the programme. Spillane also writes a weekly column for the Sunday World. Even during his playing days Spillane came to be recognised as one of the greatest players of all time. After fighting his way back from a potentially career-ending anterior cruciate ligament injury, he was named in the right wing-forward position on the Football Team of the Century in 1984. Spillane was one of only two players from the modern era to be named on that team. He switched to the left-wing forward position when he was named on the Football Team of the Millennium in 1999. Spillane's collection of nine All-Stars is a record for a Gaelic footballer, while his tally of eight All-Ireland medals is also a record which he shares with fellow Kerry players Páidí Ó Sé, Mikey Sheehy, Denis "Ógie" Moran and Ger Power
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  • 1914 Clare All Ireland Hurling Champions Team Selectors

    €70.00
    25cm x 25cm  Tulla Co Clare Framed newspaper cutting off the 1914 Clare Hurling Selectors . t was a very different world then.   In European terms, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand lit the fuse that plunged the continent into the Great War in August 1914.  Women didn’t have the vote and Emily Parkhurst, pioneer of women’s emancipation, was jailed for protesting outside Buckingham Palace, and not for the first time.  In Ireland, we still lived under British Rule.  Independence was on many people’s minds and life was a struggle. In hurling terms, life and work impacted on training and opportunity.  These days, the All-Ireland championship is a sophisticated journey involving coaches, motivators, nutritionists and media appearances.  In 1914, it was a different.  This was illustrated by Tom McInerney, younger brother of Pat ‘Fowler’ McInerney (1914 medal winner) speaking to Liam Ryan of The Irish Times newspaper on August 28, 1995.  Tom spoke of the difficulties his brother encountered before the 1914 final.   Apparently, young Pat’s labour was so badly needed on the family farm that his father didn’t want him to play hurling. So, when Pat  ‘Fowler’ was called up for All-Ireland pre-match training, he was unable to tell his father.  One day after dinner, he left home without telling anyone and joined the team for two weeks collective training. He came home with an All-Ireland medal. The Clare season had begun long before All-Ireland day – October 18, 1914. It began in May of that year with a series of divisional games involving East, South and Mid Clare.  These games, the brainchild of Amby Power, were designed to allow the best hurling talent to emerge. And they did, producing much needed young blood, including John Fox, Brendan Considine, Sham Spellissy, Jim Guerin and Fowler McInerney for the senior county side. Clare started with a decisive 7-3 to 4-1 win over a strong Kerry team.  Goals were prolific in hurling at this time because of the abundance of first-time ground striking.   Clare went on to conquer Limerick, who had earlier beaten Tipperary by 14 points.   A delayed Munster final meant that Cork were nominated to represent Munster in the All-Ireland semi-final and they easily overcame the challenge of Galway, but subsequently lost to Clare in the Munster final. In Leinster, an exciting and dashing Laois team became the provincial champions for the first time. Along the way, the Midlanders defeated Wexford, Dublin and All-Ireland champions Kilkenny.  Laois were the team who would now meet Clare in the All-Ireland final.
    Players only, from left: Extreme back row wearing dark jerseys are John Rodgers; Patrick McDermott and Patrick Moloney. Standing l/r: Tom McGrath; John Fox; Rob Doherty; Michael Flanagan; Jim Clancy; Joe Power. Seated: Jim Guerin; Patrick ‘Fowler’ McInerney; Willie ‘Dodger’ Considine; Amby Power; Martin Moloney; Ned Grace; John Shalloo. Front seated: Brendan Considine; James ‘Sham’ Spellissy. Also in the photograph are Dr. T.P. Fitzgerald (team doctor); James O’Regan (chairman of Clare County Council); Jim O’Hehir (team trainer) and Stephen Clune (chairman of the Clare County Board).
    Players only, from left: Extreme back row wearing dark jerseys are John Rodgers; Patrick McDermott and Patrick Moloney. Standing l/r: Tom McGrath; John Fox; Rob Doherty; Michael Flanagan; Jim Clancy; Joe Power. Seated: Jim Guerin; Patrick ‘Fowler’ McInerney; Willie ‘Dodger’ Considine; Amby Power; Martin Moloney; Ned Grace; John Shalloo. Front seated: Brendan Considine; James ‘Sham’ Spellissy. Also in the photograph are Dr. T.P. Fitzgerald (team doctor); James O’Regan (chairman of Clare County Council); Jim O’Hehir (team trainer) and Stephen Clune (chairman of the Clare County Board).
    On All-Ireland day itself, the Clare team came on to the pitch, accompanied by William Redmond, MP for East Clare.   Croke Park was then a smaller venue that had been purchased by the GAA in 1913.  The team was greeted by terrific cheering from the estimated attendance of 15,000, who had paid a total of £475 at the gate. Cars were scarce and many people would have travelled to Dublin by train.  One of those was Elizabeth Cremins, then an 18-year-old girl from Newmarket-on-Fergus.  Speaking me in 1995, when she was then almost 100 years old, she said,   “I went to every hurling match, especially when Newmarket were playing.  Newmarket and Ennis were great rivals.  I knew John Fox, Jim Clancy, Jim Guerin and Rob Doherty.  Rob Doherty was very stylish.  He used to thrill the crowds when he’d race along the wing. I remember the newspapers describing his dramatic sprints.  Newmarket had great hurlers. We went by train from Ballycar to Dublin.  Many of us had never been on a train before.  Mike, my brother, was with me and I remember him singing The Croppy Boy on the journey.  We got out at Kingsbridge, as it was then and we got on the first tram and got off when it stopped.  We thought we were in Jones’ Road (Croke Park). In the Clare dressing room before the throw in, then as now, switches were made.  Management decided to play Jim Guerin instead of the selected Paddy McDermott. Clare got off to a terrific start building up an interval lead of 10 points, 3-1 to Nil with a goal from Jim Clancy after seven minutes and two from Jim Guerin. Laois, who were never let play with their usual dash, fought back with an early second half goal, but with the Clare backs playing soundly, the forwards went on to score two more goals to leave Clare comfortable winners by 5-1 to 1-0 against a disappointing Laois team. Clare’s win was reported in the following day’s Irish Independent.  “They excelled in both science and dash.  Not only in attack did they demonstrate marked superiority, but their backs gave a grand display, which was generally admired. The victorious Clare team collected the Great Southern Challenge Cup and the aftermath celebrations took place in Wynne’s Hotel, Lower Abbey Street.  They returned home the following day to a hero’s welcome.” To day, the All-Ireland final is an extraordinary spectacle, with attendances of over 82,000 and transmitted to millions of people all over the world.  In 1914, the attendance was smaller and word of the Clare win filtered slowly back to the county. But, the honour, pride and sense of achievement were exactly the same. The Team. The Clare senior team of 1914 sported a white jersey with green sash, while Laois togged in amber jerseys with black bars.  The Clare senior team was:  Pat ‘Fowler’ McInerney (O’Callaghan’s. Mills); John Shalloo (O’Callaghan’s Mills); William ‘Dodger’ Considine (Ennis Dalcassians); Amby Power (Quin), captain; John Fox (Newmarket); Rob Doherty (Newmarket); Joe Power (Quin); Tom McGrath (O’Callaghan’s Mills Mills); Edward ‘Ned’ Grace (O’Callaghan’s Mills); Michael Flanagan (Quin); Brendan Considine (Ennis Dalcassians); Martin ‘Handsome’ Moloney (Ennis Dalcassians); James ‘Sham’ Spellissy (Ennis Dalcassians); Jim Guerin (Newmarket); Jim ‘Bawn’ Clancy (Newmarket).  Subs:  John ‘Landger’ Rodgers (Tulla); Patrick ‘Bucky’ Moloney (Killanena) both used.  Also Paddy Kenny (Ennis Dalcassians) and F. Brady played in the game against Limerick. Paddy McDermott (Whitegate) and Patrick ‘Bucky’ Moloney played in the Munster final. Trainer:  Jim O’Hehir.   Referee:   Mr. John Lawlor (Kilkenny) Juniors make it a double CLARE was the first county to win the senior and junior double in 1914.  In the junior championship, the Banner County defeated Kerry, Tipperary, Cork and Laois in the final by 6-5 to 1-1.  The final wasn’t played until March 1915.    Match reports in the newspapers of the day were short and erratic.  Only four of Clare’s six goals were accounted for.  Two are credited to Dan Minogue and the other two to Ted Lucid. The junior team that defeated Laois at Croke Park was: – Dan Minogue (captain), James Marrinan, Paddy Gordon, Edward (Ted) Lucid, Jack Spellissy, Michael J. Baker, Tommy Daly (goal), Paddy Quinn, Jim Quinn, Michael Bolton, Dan Flannery, Pat Hannon, Atty Gleeson, Simon Minogue, Dan Crowe.  Others to play in the championship included John Cody and Charlie Stewart from Ogonnelloe, Freddie Garrihy, Johnny ‘Joker’ Coote, Paddy Connell, P. Rodgers and others.  It is important to note that the Clare junior team that defeated Kerry by 6-1 to 1-1 on 21st June 1914 at the Ennis show grounds bore little resemblance to the team that finally won the championship.
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  • 1914 Clare All Ireland Hurling Champions

    €65.00
    23cm x 26cm  Tulla Co Clare Life in Ireland in 1914 was a very different world . In European terms, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand lit the fuse that plunged the continent into the Great War in August 1914.  Women didn’t have the vote and Emily Parkhurst, pioneer of women’s emancipation, was jailed for protesting outside Buckingham Palace, and not for the first time.  In Ireland, we still lived under British Rule.  Independence was on many people’s minds and life was a struggle. In hurling terms, life and work impacted on training and opportunity.  These days, the All-Ireland championship is a sophisticated journey involving coaches, motivators, nutritionists and media appearances.  In 1914, it was a different.  This was illustrated by Tom McInerney, younger brother of Pat ‘Fowler’ McInerney (1914 medal winner) speaking to Liam Ryan of The Irish Times newspaper on August 28, 1995.  Tom spoke of the difficulties his brother encountered before the 1914 final.   Apparently, young Pat’s labour was so badly needed on the family farm that his father didn’t want him to play hurling. So, when Pat  ‘Fowler’ was called up for All-Ireland pre-match training, he was unable to tell his father.  One day after dinner, he left home without telling anyone and joined the team for two weeks collective training. He came home with an All-Ireland medal. The Clare season had begun long before All-Ireland day – October 18, 1914. It began in May of that year with a series of divisional games involving East, South and Mid Clare.  These games, the brainchild of Amby Power, were designed to allow the best hurling talent to emerge. And they did, producing much needed young blood, including John Fox, Brendan Considine, Sham Spellissy, Jim Guerin and Fowler McInerney for the senior county side. Clare started with a decisive 7-3 to 4-1 win over a strong Kerry team.  Goals were prolific in hurling at this time because of the abundance of first-time ground striking.   Clare went on to conquer Limerick, who had earlier beaten Tipperary by 14 points.   A delayed Munster final meant that Cork were nominated to represent Munster in the All-Ireland semi-final and they easily overcame the challenge of Galway, but subsequently lost to Clare in the Munster final. In Leinster, an exciting and dashing Laois team became the provincial champions for the first time. Along the way, the Midlanders defeated Wexford, Dublin and All-Ireland champions Kilkenny.  Laois were the team who would now meet Clare in the All-Ireland final.
    Players only, from left: Extreme back row wearing dark jerseys are John Rodgers; Patrick McDermott and Patrick Moloney. Standing l/r: Tom McGrath; John Fox; Rob Doherty; Michael Flanagan; Jim Clancy; Joe Power. Seated: Jim Guerin; Patrick ‘Fowler’ McInerney; Willie ‘Dodger’ Considine; Amby Power; Martin Moloney; Ned Grace; John Shalloo. Front seated: Brendan Considine; James ‘Sham’ Spellissy. Also in the photograph are Dr. T.P. Fitzgerald (team doctor); James O’Regan (chairman of Clare County Council); Jim O’Hehir (team trainer) and Stephen Clune (chairman of the Clare County Board).
    Players only, from left: Extreme back row wearing dark jerseys are John Rodgers; Patrick McDermott and Patrick Moloney. Standing l/r: Tom McGrath; John Fox; Rob Doherty; Michael Flanagan; Jim Clancy; Joe Power. Seated: Jim Guerin; Patrick ‘Fowler’ McInerney; Willie ‘Dodger’ Considine; Amby Power; Martin Moloney; Ned Grace; John Shalloo. Front seated: Brendan Considine; James ‘Sham’ Spellissy. Also in the photograph are Dr. T.P. Fitzgerald (team doctor); James O’Regan (chairman of Clare County Council); Jim O’Hehir (team trainer) and Stephen Clune (chairman of the Clare County Board).
    On All-Ireland day itself, the Clare team came on to the pitch, accompanied by William Redmond, MP for East Clare.   Croke Park was then a smaller venue that had been purchased by the GAA in 1913.  The team was greeted by terrific cheering from the estimated attendance of 15,000, who had paid a total of £475 at the gate. Cars were scarce and many people would have travelled to Dublin by train.  One of those was Elizabeth Cremins, then an 18-year-old girl from Newmarket-on-Fergus.  Speaking me in 1995, when she was then almost 100 years old, she said,   “I went to every hurling match, especially when Newmarket were playing.  Newmarket and Ennis were great rivals.  I knew John Fox, Jim Clancy, Jim Guerin and Rob Doherty.  Rob Doherty was very stylish.  He used to thrill the crowds when he’d race along the wing. I remember the newspapers describing his dramatic sprints.  Newmarket had great hurlers. We went by train from Ballycar to Dublin.  Many of us had never been on a train before.  Mike, my brother, was with me and I remember him singing The Croppy Boy on the journey.  We got out at Kingsbridge, as it was then and we got on the first tram and got off when it stopped.  We thought we were in Jones’ Road (Croke Park). In the Clare dressing room before the throw in, then as now, switches were made.  Management decided to play Jim Guerin instead of the selected Paddy McDermott. Clare got off to a terrific start building up an interval lead of 10 points, 3-1 to Nil with a goal from Jim Clancy after seven minutes and two from Jim Guerin. Laois, who were never let play with their usual dash, fought back with an early second half goal, but with the Clare backs playing soundly, the forwards went on to score two more goals to leave Clare comfortable winners by 5-1 to 1-0 against a disappointing Laois team. Clare’s win was reported in the following day’s Irish Independent.  “They excelled in both science and dash.  Not only in attack did they demonstrate marked superiority, but their backs gave a grand display, which was generally admired. The victorious Clare team collected the Great Southern Challenge Cup and the aftermath celebrations took place in Wynne’s Hotel, Lower Abbey Street.  They returned home the following day to a hero’s welcome.” To day, the All-Ireland final is an extraordinary spectacle, with attendances of over 82,000 and transmitted to millions of people all over the world.  In 1914, the attendance was smaller and word of the Clare win filtered slowly back to the county. But, the honour, pride and sense of achievement were exactly the same. The Team. The Clare senior team of 1914 sported a white jersey with green sash, while Laois togged in amber jerseys with black bars.  The Clare senior team was:  Pat ‘Fowler’ McInerney (O’Callaghan’s. Mills); John Shalloo (O’Callaghan’s Mills); William ‘Dodger’ Considine (Ennis Dalcassians); Amby Power (Quin), captain; John Fox (Newmarket); Rob Doherty (Newmarket); Joe Power (Quin); Tom McGrath (O’Callaghan’s Mills Mills); Edward ‘Ned’ Grace (O’Callaghan’s Mills); Michael Flanagan (Quin); Brendan Considine (Ennis Dalcassians); Martin ‘Handsome’ Moloney (Ennis Dalcassians); James ‘Sham’ Spellissy (Ennis Dalcassians); Jim Guerin (Newmarket); Jim ‘Bawn’ Clancy (Newmarket).  Subs:  John ‘Landger’ Rodgers (Tulla); Patrick ‘Bucky’ Moloney (Killanena) both used.  Also Paddy Kenny (Ennis Dalcassians) and F. Brady played in the game against Limerick. Paddy McDermott (Whitegate) and Patrick ‘Bucky’ Moloney played in the Munster final. Trainer:  Jim O’Hehir.   Referee:   Mr. John Lawlor (Kilkenny) Juniors make it a double CLARE was the first county to win the senior and junior double in 1914.  In the junior championship, the Banner County defeated Kerry, Tipperary, Cork and Laois in the final by 6-5 to 1-1.  The final wasn’t played until March 1915.    Match reports in the newspapers of the day were short and erratic.  Only four of Clare’s six goals were accounted for.  Two are credited to Dan Minogue and the other two to Ted Lucid. The junior team that defeated Laois at Croke Park was: – Dan Minogue (captain), James Marrinan, Paddy Gordon, Edward (Ted) Lucid, Jack Spellissy, Michael J. Baker, Tommy Daly (goal), Paddy Quinn, Jim Quinn, Michael Bolton, Dan Flannery, Pat Hannon, Atty Gleeson, Simon Minogue, Dan Crowe.  Others to play in the championship included John Cody and Charlie Stewart from Ogonnelloe, Freddie Garrihy, Johnny ‘Joker’ Coote, Paddy Connell, P. Rodgers and others.  It is important to note that the Clare junior team that defeated Kerry by 6-1 to 1-1 on 21st June 1914 at the Ennis show grounds bore little resemblance to the team that finally won the championship.
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  • 1995 Clare All Ireland Senior Hurling Champions Tribute Clock

    €80.00
    Vintage wooden clock from 1995 commissioned to mark Clare's historic All Ireland win in 1995.
    cm x cm    Scarriff Co Clare
    Viewed from a distance of two decades, maybe the most remarkable thing about the hurling summer of 1995 is just how unpromising it was roundly agreed to be at the get-go. The previous year had been airily dismissed as something of a freak – never more freakish than in that harum-scarum end to the All-Ireland final when Offaly overturned Limerick with a quickfire 2-5 in the closing minutes.
    Put to the pin of their collars, most judges shrugged and presumed the Liam MacCarthy would find his way back around to the blue-bloods in the end – probably to Kilkenny who had just beaten Clare in the National League final, maybe to Tipperary if they got their act together. If there was going to be a yarn, Limerick might provide it. But nobody had an inkling of what was around the corner. Or if they did, they weren’t shouting about it. Nobody was shouting about very much of anything. Hurling was what it was – guarded like the family jewels in certain parts of the land, barely amounting to a rumour in others. Tipp, Kilkenny and Cork had split five of the previous six All-Irelands between them and in a given year, you could just about half-rely on Offaly or Galway to keep them honest. For everyone else, the door looked shut. For all the sweet words and paeans that followed the game around, the championship was reduced each year to four or five games. This was pre-qualifiers, pre-back door of any kind. Galway walked into the All-Ireland semi-final each year and Antrim did the same before providing whoever they met with more or less a bye into the final. The Munster championship had its adherents but they weren’t all just as committed as they let on – when Clare met Cork in Thurles in June 1995, they did so in front of just 14,101 paying guests. The game needed shaking up. If not everyone admitted as much at the time, it didn’t escape the notice of the association’s then general director Liam Mulvihill. In his report to Congress earlier that year, he had scratched an itch that had been bugging him for most of the previous 12 months. The 1994 football championship had been the first to benefit from bringing on a title sponsor in Bank of Ireland and though an equivalent offer had been on the table for the hurling championship, Central Council pushed the plate away. Though the name of the potential sponsor wasn’t explicitly made public, everyone knew it was Guinness. More to the point, everyone knew why Central Council wouldn’t bite. As Mulvihill himself noted in his report to Congress, the offer was declined on the basis that “Central Council did not want an alcoholic drinks company associated with a major GAA competition”. As it turned out, Central Council had been deadlocked on the issue and it was the casting vote of then president Peter Quinn that put the kibosh on a deal with Guinness. Mulvihill’s disappointment was far from hidden, since he saw the wider damage caused by turning up the GAA nose at Guinness’s advances. “The unfortunate aspect of the situation,” he wrote, “is that hurling needs support on the promotion of the game much more than football.” Though it took the point of a bayonet to make them go for it, the GAA submitted in the end and on the day after the league final, a three-year partnership with Guinness was announced. The deal would be worth £1 million a year, with half going to the sport and half going to the competition in the shape of marketing. That last bit was key. Guinness came up with a marketing campaign that fairly scorched across the general consciousness. Billboards screeched out slogans that feel almost corny at this remove but made a huge impact at the same time . This man can level whole counties in one second flat. This man can reach speeds of 100mph. This man can break hearts at 70 yards Of course, all the marketing in the world can only do so much. Without a story to go alongside, the Guinness campaign might be forgotten now – or worse, remembered as an overblown blast of hot air dreamed up in some modish ad agency above in Dublin. Instead, Clare came along and changed everything. In the spring of 1995, Clare were very easy to stereotype. These were the days when the league wrapped around Christmas and in the muck and the cold and the drudgery, Clare had a fierceness to them that took advantage of any opposition that fancied a handy afternoon with the summer well off in the distance. A pain in the neck if you met them on a going day in the league but not to be relied upon on the biggest days. They had a recent, ill-starred record in Munster finals to bear that out. Heavy beatings from Tipp and Limerick in 1993 and ’94 were bad enough on their own; piled on decades of hurt going all the way back to their last title in 1932, they were toxic. On the day before the league final, new manager Ger Loughnane outlined what the coming summer would mean to them. “I’d swap everything for a Munster title. The whole lot. My whole hurling life. These fellas today, they have the chance. They can get out there and realise that this is what it is all about, that this is what you play hurling for. They can build on that and win their Munster title. That means so much to us all. They won’t have to look back and regret.” When Clare promptly lost 2-12 to 0-9 to Kilkenny in that league final, you didn’t have many takers for Loughnane’s assertion that this could be the group to turn everything around. Loughnane had been involved in 12 Munster finals as a player and selector at various levels down the years and he’d lost them all. Big talk was fine and dandy but what was there to believe in? Come the Munster championship, Clare were quietly but firmly dismissed by all and sundry. Cashman’s bookies in Cork priced their championship opener thus: Cork 2/5, Clare 9/4. A bar in Ennis had sent the Clare squad a cheque for £250 so they could have a pre-championship drink together. Anthony Daly took it instead and slapped it down on Clare to win the Munster championship at odds of 7/1. Anyone with half an interest in the game knows the rest. Or at least knows bits and pieces of it. That summer was a blazing one, the hottest for decades, and in the mind’s eye Clare’s summer is a jigsaw of sun-scorched fables and legends. Seanie McMahon and his broken collarbone, playing out the last 15 minutes against Cork at corner-forward. Ollie Baker’s bundled goal to win that game in injury-time. Limerick swept aside in the second half of the Munster final. Bonfires across the county on the Monday night. Galway put to the sword in the All-Ireland semi-final. Offaly just squeezed out in the final. Eamonn Taaffe’s goal, whipped to the net with his only touch of the sliotar all summer. Daly’s 65, Johnny Pilkington’s reply just flicking the post and missing. A first Clare All-Ireland senior title since 1914. It was all just so unlikely. After the Cork game, the cars heading home for Clare were stuck in traffic. A group of Cork teenagers stood at the side of the road as they passed, chanting Tipp, Tipp, Tipp – presuming Clare would meet and be beaten by them next day out. The notion that this was the beginning of a golden era, or that these Claremen were about to popularise the sport as never before, would still have felt ludicrous And yet here they were, All-Ireland champions in a year when hurling caught the wider imagination in a way it rarely had up to that point. The Guinness campaign had made its mark and allied to Clare’s rise, the sport was grabbing people again. Not before time. “The game had gone stale,” wrote Jimmy Barry-Murphy in The Irish Times in the run-up to the final. “This All-Ireland was one that game needed very badly. Interest was waning and this was reflected in the attendances at finals. “There was no comparison to football where the arrival of the Ulster counties as major powers generated enormous interest and a new awareness of the game. Clare have had many setbacks but they have kept battling and are now being rewarded. They have done hurling a great service.” The depth and breadth of that service became more and more apparent as the decade wore on. Attendances at the hurling championship matches ballooned. From an aggregate total of 289,281 in 1994, they rose to 543,335 in 1999. There were plenty of factors, of course – more counties with more hope, more matches with the introduction of the back-door, a growing economy, those Guinness ads. But it was Clare’s summer of 1995 that sparked it all. They weren’t a pebble in a pond that caused a few ripples. They were a boulder that landed from the clear blue sky and left a crater on the landscape. Everything changed after ’95. Not forever, just for a while. But for long enough for the game to stretch itself and grab hold of imaginations outside the usual places of worship. On the Monday night they brought Liam MacCarthy home, one of the towns that got a good rattle was Newmarket-On-Fergus. In the bedlam, the home club put up a stage and stuck any living Newmarket man who ever put on a Clare jersey up there as the backdrop while Daly and Loughnane grabbed the mic out front. One unusual face cloistered at the back of the stage was then Wexford manager Liam Griffin. Of the multitude of stories excavated by Denis Walsh for his towering book Hurling: The Revolution Years, maybe that night in Newmarket captured the giddiness of the time the best. Griffin’s father was from Clare and he’d lived there for a time in his early 20s, long enough to play club hurling and get called up to the Clare under-21s. Thus were his bona fides established for an appearance – however reluctant – up on-stage. Griffin had been in charge of Wexford for a year at that point and their summer had ended with a limp exit against Offaly away back in June. By the skin of his teeth, Griffin had survived an attempted county board putsch in the meantime and was almost certainly the only man alive who thought that the riches showering down upon Clare heads could be Wexford’s 12 months later. “Clare came and I thought, ‘This is fantastic,’” Griffin told Walsh. “I thought, ‘Jesus, the team I have are as good as these,’ and I went through them man for man. There’s no way we’re not as good as these guys. Then Clare won the All-Ireland and I went straight to Clare the following morning because I wanted to see the homecoming and now I understand why. I wanted to drive it into my own psyche.” As the speeches finished and the stage began to clear, Loughnane turned and caught Griffin’s eye. “It could be you next year,” he said. Whether he meant it or not, Griffin’s mind was made up already. He drove home convinced that Wexford could reach out and grab some of that for themselves. The next day he rang around and organised training, 51-and-a-half weeks shy of the 1996 All-Ireland final. In a world of endless trees and branches and roots, it’s obviously simplistic to say that Clare’s All-Ireland begat Wexford’s which begat all the rest of it. But what is inarguable is this – in that sun-drenched summer of 1995, everything felt possible.
     
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  • 1997 Clare All Ireland Senior Hurling Champions Commemoration Plaque

    €120.00
    Splendid wooden plaque commemorating the 1997 Clare Hurlers All Ireland success. 41cm x 38cm  Scarriff Co Clare The 1997 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Final was held on 14 September 1997 and contested between Clare and Tipperary. It was a historic occasion in the history of the championship as it was the first time that two counties from the same province were appearing in the championship decider. Both sides had already met during the year in the Munster final when Clare defeated Tipperary. Clare had last won the All-Ireland title two years earlier in 1995 when they defeated Offaly while Tipperary last claimed the championship title in 1991 when they beat Kilkenny.

    Match

    Officials

    On 26 August 1997 the officials were chosen for the final by the GAA, led by Wexford referee Dickie Murphy. The linesmen for the match were Pat Delaney (Laois) and Tom McIntyre (Antrim). Murphy was one of the most highly regarded match officials and had already taken charge of the 1992and 1995 All-Ireland deciders.

      At 3:30pm Dickie Murphy of Wexford threw in the sliotar and a much talked about game got under way. In fact, the game turned out to be one of the best of the decade. Tipperary had a good breeze behind them for the opening thirty-five minutes; however, they struggled to find their feet. After a tough opening quarter Tipp’s wind advantage only resulted in a 0-3 to 0-2 lead. The Tipperary team eventually found their groove as Declan Ryan and John Leahy fired over some more points and by the twenty-fifth minute they were five points ahead. Tipp forged ahead and looked towards building a match-winning lead by half-time. Clare rallied and a brilliant two-minute spell yielded three unanswered points, two of which came from All-Ireland debutante Niall Gilligan. He was giving star defender Paul Shelly an unexpected torrid time during the first half. At half-time Tipperary were ahead by 0-10 to 0-6, however, Clare were in the ascendancy. Within fifteen seconds of the restart Liam Doyle, one of Clare’s unsung heroes, sent over another great point. Three Clare points followed in quick succession over the next six minutes before a Colin Lynch effort leveled the game at 0-11 apiece. The Clare management then brought on David Forde in a move that would prove most beneficial. He entered the game as a right corner-forward; however, he proceeded to roam all over the forward line. The decision by his marker, Michael Ryan, not to follow him proved costly as Forde quickly sent over two quick points before setting up a third to give Clare a 0-17 to 0-12 lead with ten minutes left in the game. It looked as if Clare were going to run away with the title, however, there were a few more twists in store. Substitute Liam Cahill put Tipp back in the game with an opportunist goal, kicking the ball to the net after catching a high ball. With four minutes left in the match teenager Eugene O’Neill doubled on a free that had come back off the crossbar and sent the sliotar into the net. Tipp had taken a 2-13 to 0-18 lead as the game entered the dying minutes. Ollie Baker leveled the scores after landing a huge point before Colin Lynch found Jamesie O'Connor on the right-hand side and fifty yards out from goal. O’Connor’s effort flew straight over the bar and landed in the hand of team manager Ger Loughnane who was standing behind the goalposts. With seconds remaining in the game Tipperary launched one final attack. A great pass from Brian O'Meara found John Leahy in front of the Clare goal. A point would have resulted in a draw; however, Leahy went for broke and sent a low shot in towards the bottom of the net. Goalkeeper Davy FitzGerald saved the shot and cleared the sliotar. With that the full-time whistle was blown and Clare were the champions with a 0-20 to 2-13 victory.
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  • Vintage Lawrence Lahinch Co Clare Postcard

    €50.00
      Lawrence postcard of the famous Beach at Lahinch Co Clare.  16cm x 20cm The Lawrence Collection is the single most significant collection in the early development of postcards in Ireland. Named after William Lawrence who opened a photographic studio and fancy goods shop in Sackville Street (now O'Connell Street) in 1865, the venture was well-timed to capitalise on the popularity of the postcard. The Collection eventually comprised 40,000 negatives. Robert French (1841-1917) was employed as chief photographer and he along with others travelled the length of the country over a period of more than 20 years. Killarney was the principal attraction in Kerry and all the beauty spots are well represented. However, the photographs of towns and villages are of most historical interest. In many cases they are the only visual records for the turn of the 19th century. Local people were often included in street scenes and it is clear from their fascination with the process that photography was still very much a novelty.
    While Lawrence's business flourished for nearly fifty years, it declined in the second decade of the 20th century due to the more widespread availability of photographs and the advent of the "Brownie" camera. Gallery
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  • Vintage O’Connell St Dublin Miniature Print

    €50.00
    Original Lawrence postcard of O'Connell Bridge 18cm x 23cm
    e Lawrence Collection is the single most significant collection in the early development of postcards in Ireland. Named after William Lawrence who opened a photographic studio and fancy goods shop in Sackville Street (now O'Connell Street) in 1865, the venture was well-timed to capitalise on the popularity of the postcard. The Collection eventually comprised 40,000 negatives. Robert French (1841-1917) was employed as chief photographer and he along with others travelled the length of the country over a period of more than 20 years. Killarney was the principal attraction in Kerry and all the beauty spots are well represented. However, the photographs of towns and villages are of most historical interest. In many cases they are the only visual records for the turn of the 19th century. Local people were often included in street scenes and it is clear from their fascination with the process that photography was still very much a novelty.
    While Lawrence's business flourished for nearly fifty years, it declined in the second decade of the 20th century due to the more widespread availability of photographs and the advent of the "Brownie" camera.

    Gallery

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  • Vintage Derry Miniature Print

    €50.00
    Original vintage postcard depicting Derry,photograph taken by William Lawrence the famous photographer. 18cm x 23cm
    The Lawrence Collection is the single most significant collection in the early development of postcards in Ireland. Named after William Lawrence who opened a photographic studio and fancy goods shop in Sackville Street (now O'Connell Street) in 1865, the venture was well-timed to capitalise on the popularity of the postcard. The Collection eventually comprised 40,000 negatives. Robert French (1841-1917) was employed as chief photographer and he along with others travelled the length of the country over a period of more than 20 years. Killarney was the principal attraction in Kerry and all the beauty spots are well represented. However, the photographs of towns and villages are of most historical interest. In many cases they are the only visual records for the turn of the 19th century. Local people were often included in street scenes and it is clear from their fascination with the process that photography was still very much a novelty.While Lawrence's business flourished for nearly fifty years, it declined in the second decade of the 20th century due to the more widespread availability of photographs and the advent of the "Brownie" camera Gallery
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  • Classic Limerick Print -King Johns Castle & Thomondgate Bridge

    €250.00
    Stunning medieval era print depicting there majesty of King Johns Castle & St Marys Cathedral from the upriver aspect of the Thomondgate Bridge with the Shannon River flowing past all the famous landmarks. King John's Castle  is a 13th-century castle located on King's Island in Limerick, Ireland, next to the River Shannon.Although the site dates back to 922 when the Vikings lived on the Island, the castle itself was built on the orders of King John in 1200. One of the best preserved Norman castles in Europe, the walls, towers and fortifications remain today and are visitor attractions. The remains of a Viking settlement were uncovered during archaeological excavations at the site in 1900. Thomondgate was part of the “Northern” Liberties granted to Limerick in 1216. This area was the border between Munster and Connacht until County Clare, which was created in 1565, was annexed by Munster in 1602. TheThomondgate bridge was originally built in 1185 on the orders of King John and is said to have cost the hefty sum of £30. As a result of poor workmanship the bridge collapsed in 1292 causing the deaths of 80 people. Soon after, the bridge was rebuilt with the addition of two gate towers, one at each end. It partially collapsed in 1833 as a result of bad weather and was replaced with a bridge designed by brothers James and George Pain at a cost of £10,000. 0071 0071 52cm x 60cm  Coonagh Co Limerick
     
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