William Murphy

BACK IN JULY 2022 THIS PUB HAD TO CLOSE BECAUSE OF A FIRE

July 6, 2023 by infomatique

DROP DEAD TWICE ON FRANCIS STREET

Kelly O’Malley, one of the co-founders of Drop Dead Twice, has launched a Go Fund Me campaign in order to rebuild and reopen the popular Dublin bar, following a very destructive fire. Now a year later the pub is still closed. My understanding was that they needed to raise €10,000 and they manage to raise more than €5,000 within a week.

AND A GOOD TIME WAS HAD BY ALL

July 4, 2023 by infomatique

NEAR THE OLD CENTRAL BANK NOW RENAMED THE CENTRAL PLAZA

The plaza contains the sculpture Crann an Oir (tree of gold) by Derry sculptor Éamonn O’Doherty, which became a symbol of the Central Bank, Irish Banking, and the Celtic Tiger boom and bust. When I was younger I thought that it was named “The Money Tree”.

According to the developers: “Central Plaza’s crowning glory is its spectacular 15,500 sq ft rooftop venue and visitor viewing experience. Soaring ten-storeys above the city, this will be a magical place to socialise amid awe-inspiring vistas of Dublin.”. Anyway, as you can see there is much action at street level especially as the complex is an important part of Temple Bar. Dublinbikes Docking Station 14 is located on Upper Fownes Street which is home to a number of unique small clothes shops.

The Foggy Dew is a famous pub on Fownes Street. The building was constructed as part of the rebuilding of the area which took place in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The influence of John Ruskin’s fashionable architectural theory is evident in the elaborately carved dressings. A well-executed plaque to the tympanum of the central first floor window records the initials of vintner John J. Corry, owner from 1885. The interior was remodelled 1995 by Frank Ennis and Associates. Fownes Street was named after Sir William Fownes, Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1708. While the street was unnamed on Charles Brookings map of Dublin dating to 1728, a number of large houses are depicted on the west side of Fownes Street on John Rocque’s map of Dublin dating to 1756.

Central Plaza, also known as the Central Bank of Ireland Building for its former tenant, is an office building on Dame Street in Temple Bar, Dublin. It was the headquarters of the Central Bank of Ireland from 1979 to 2017. It is Ireland’s only suspended structure building, with its 8 floors hanging from central concrete cores. Each floor was built on the ground and then raised into place. It was controversial for being out of scale with its surroundings and for being constructed 30 feet (9.1 m) taller than approved.

KING GEORGE WALL MOUNTED LETTER BOX

July 3, 2023 by infomatique

SILCHESTER ROAD IN GLENAGEARY

This may have been modified as it does not look as it should.

You can tell that a “GR” post box was put up during the era of King George V, from 1910 to 1936, while “GR VI” boxes were from the reign of George VI, from 1936 to 1952.

Following the creation of the Irish Free State in 1922, almost all United Kingdom-era pillar boxes and wall boxes were retained, but painted green. Hundreds of these are extant around Ireland, still bearing the cypher of the reigning monarch at the time of the box’s manufacture. All are now protected structures. The Department of Posts and Telegraphs continued installing similar pillar boxes and wall boxes, but with the initials SÉ (for Saorstát Éireann), a harp or the Department of Posts and Telegraphs P ⁊ T logo, instead of a monarchical cypher. Since 1984 An Post, the current Irish postal administration, has used their logo to adorn its pillar boxes. All Irish counties, such as County Wicklow, have placed their extant United Kingdom-era pillar boxes on their lists of protected structures, meaning they may not be replaced without special planning permission having first been obtained.

A BEAUTIFUL DAY IN STEPHEN’S GREEN

June 28, 2023 by infomatique

PHOTOGRAPHED 28 OCTOBER 2022 PUBLISHED 28 JUNE 2023

I purchased a Sony FX30 as soon as it became available but when I first used it I discovered that the RAW files could not be processed and had to wait for months for updates to Lightroom and Photoshop. I did find some work-arounds but the work-flow was complicated and tedious and the result was not always consistent or usable. I am now in the process of reviewing images from October 2022.

St Stephen’s Green Park is a historical park and garden, located in the centre of Dublin city. Cared for by the Office of Public Works, the park is an important public resource in the area, and provides an oasis of green calm in the middle of a bustling city. Its four centuries of history are eventful and complex, involving such important figures as Arthur Guinness, 1st Baron Ardilaun, and Countess Constance Markievicz. The park itself hosts a large number of important sculptural monuments to Irish history. Many species of birds and plants also call the park their home. Public facilities at St Stephen’s Green Park include a playground and a garden for the visually impaired.

TOM KETTLE MEMORIAL

June 28, 2023 by infomatique

ST STEPHEN’S GREEN IN DUBLIN

Thomas Michael Kettle (9 February 1880 – 9 September 1916) was an Irish economist, journalist, barrister, writer, war poet, soldier and Home Rule politician. As a member of the Irish Parliamentary Party, he was Member of Parliament (MP) for East Tyrone from 1906 to 1910 at Westminster. He joined the Irish Volunteers in 1913, then on the outbreak of World War I in 1914 enlisted for service in the British Army, with which he was killed in action on the Western Front in the Autumn of 1916. He was a much admired old comrade of James Joyce, who considered him to be his best friend in Ireland, as well as the likes of Francis Sheehy-Skeffington, Oliver St. John Gogarty and Robert Wilson Lynd.

He was one of the leading figures of the generation who at the turn of the twentieth century gave new intellectual life to Irish party politics, and to the constitutional movement towards All-Ireland Home Rule. A gifted speaker with an incisive mind and devastating wit, his death was regarded as a great loss to Ireland’s political and intellectual life.

As G. K. Chesterton surmised, “Thomas Michael Kettle was perhaps the greatest example of that greatness of spirit which was so ill rewarded on both sides of the channel […] He was a wit, a scholar, an orator, a man ambitious in all the arts of peace; and he fell fighting the barbarians because he was too good a European to use the barbarians against England, as England a hundred years before has used the barbarians against Ireland”.

Kettle was killed in action with ‘B’ Company of the 9th Battalion of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers in an attack on German lines on 9 September 1916, near the village of Ginchy during the Battle of the Somme. During the advance Kettle was felled when the Dublin Fusiliers were ‘struck with a tempest of fire’, and having risen from the initial blow, he was struck again and killed outright. His body was buried in a battlefield grave by the Welsh Guards, but the grave was subsequently lost trace of. His name is etched on the monumental arched gateway for the missing of the Somme at Thiepval. He was 36-years old.

The poet George William Russell wrote about Kettle, comparing his sacrifice with those who led the 1916 Easter Rising:

You proved by death as true as they,
In mightier conflicts played your part,
Equal your sacrifice may weigh
Dear Kettle of the generous heart.