I met a wonderful Professor of Psychology, Grant Corser in Dublin when he brought a group of his students on the 1916 Walking Tour. With his colleague Professor Gene, we hung around after and chatted. We briefly talked about a number of colleges I had visited in the US over the years and Grant said he’d like to look into getting me over to his university in Utah to give a talk.

I mentioned that I might be in Las Vegas in September so we worked around that date. Grant’s colleague, Professor Ryan Paul made contact and explained that they have a monthly speaker through their Eccles APEX Program and before long I found myself hiring a car for a road trip from Vegas to Utah.

Before I tell you about that, Professor Ryan is a historian and expert on Irish Literature too. He’s also a book collector, and loves his films and I knew when we had our first Zoom meeting to talk about coming to Utah, I’d found a new friend in the US. Read more

By Lily Collins

Lorcan Collins spent  a few months this year writing a book on Mike Quill, the founder of the Transport Workers Union of America. Mike was a Kerryman, and fought for Irish freedom as an IRA Volunteer during the Tan War and Civil War.
Mike emigrated to New York on 16 March 1926 and in 1934 he co-founded a union amongst subway workers and named it in honour of Jim Larkin and James Connolly’s Irish Transport and General Workers Union.

Mike Quill not only fought for Ireland but fought against the bosses in the transport sector and supported the civil rights movement too. He counted amongst his friends Dr. King, Paul Robeson and Bobby Kennedy. Read more

I had the great pleasure of accepting an invitation to the New York St. Patrick’s Day celebration this year. Myself and Mick Lynch the Irish leader of the RMT in England, were guests of the Transport Worker’s Union of America thanks to International President, John Samuelsen.

I arrived a couple of days before St Patrick’s Day to get a rest before a busy week of talks. I’ve been to New York a good few times and I love nothing better than walking around looking at buildings and chatting with people. I don’t know why people say New Yorker’s don’t catch your eye or chat with strangers. I think it’s the opposite, they love a bit of conversation and they want to know where you’re from, what you’re doing etc. Read more

It was a great pleasure to be asked to speak in the National Library of Ireland on Tuesday 21 January 2020. This was the first lecture in a series of planned events that the NLI have for 2020 and the topic was the IRA’s Guerrilla Campaign 1919-21. Seven o’clock on a Tuesday, you wouldn’t expect many people to turn up but we had a full house of enthusiastic history lovers.

Using a power point with heaps of images from the NLI I worked my way from the Fenians up to 1916 and the development of the IRA. We examined all of the main events of the War of Independence and took a look at the Black and Tans, Auxiliaries and British Army too. We looked at the contribution women made, the tactics of the Flying Columns and the political efforts of Sinn Féin. We spoke about Tom Barry and Kilmichael and the battle of Clonmult when the Tans shot eight IRA Volunteers after they surrendered. One of those lads who was shot survived. Pat Higgins was his name. Then the British Army sentenced him to be executed but he was reprieved when the Truce came in July 1921.

Often missed in these talks is the events that were going on in the northern part of our nation so I explained the expulsions from the shipyards at the start of Belfast Pogroms, which saw 470 people killed between 1920 and 1922, the foundation of the hated A,B and C Ulster Special Constabulary and the effects of the Government of Ireland Act in 1920 which split our nation into two. Read more

On the 16th of October, 2016, I had the pleasure of bringing a large group of people from the International Brigade Memorial Trust on a tour of Dublin. The Trust is made up of relatives and friends of those who fought the good fight in Spain against Franco. The tour was organised by Manus O’Riordan and we focused on the role of the Irish Citizen Army in 1916.

Manus is the son of Michael O’Riordan (1917-2006) who fought in Spain as part of the XV (Fifteenth) International Brigade. Michael, a member of the IRA, went to Spain with Frank Ryan in 1937 as part of the Connolly Column. Michael was wounded in action on the Ebro Front. Michael was also a founder of the Communist Party of Ireland and a shop he founded, Connolly Books, can be found on Essex Street in Temple Bar and is well worth a visit.

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