Irish Scene Jan/Feb 2021 Edition

IRISH

2021 • VOLUME 23 ISSUE 1 • FREE

SCENE

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A virtual choir – led by Dublin youngster Eva Norton (right) and with surprise video guest Gary Barlow – of Irish children from around the world including Australia, was featured on The Late Late Toy Show (Toy Story True Story, page 6)

WIN

THE COVER OF THE ST. PATRICK’S DAY EDITION OF IRISH SCENE! – See page 12 for details

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YOUR LOCAL SINCE 2006

THANK YOU FOR YOUR

SUPPORT

Thank you to our loyal customers who have supported us during the most difficult time we have ever faced as a local business. We are so happy to see your smiles again on the other side of the bar.

Thank you for continuing to show respect and understanding with the constant changes in regulations.

Our Paddy’s community is incredible and we are so grateful.

NOW LET ’S GET BACK TO ENJOYING SOME GOOD OLD PUB HOSPITALITY Follow us on Facebook & Instagram to keep up to date with our events and changes to restrictions.

We can’t wait to see you!

Business Contacts

Page Index

baggage & FREIGHT

87 AI Express........................................................9243 0808 75 Exportair.......................................Geoff/Tim 9477 1080

Butchers

96 McLoughlin’s Meats...................................... 9249 8039 27 Meat Connoisseur..........................................9309 9992

Entertainment & RADIO:

92 Frank Murphy Celtic Rambles............................107.9fm 90 Fiddlestick......................................David 0413 259 547 43 Kidogo Arthouse 47 Torc Ceili Club 13 The Journey

Funerals:

77 McKee Funerals............................................... 9401 1900

Immigration advice:

15 EasiVisa..........................Carol-Ann Lynch 9429 8860

30th Anniversary A Blast at Midwest Irish Club............................................50 Around the Irish Scene......................................13 Australian Irish Heritage Assoc.......................61 Australian Irish Dancing Assoc......................80 Book Reviews......................................................78 Childhood Heroes..............................................87 Claddagh Report............................................... 64 Cooking with Lee............................................... 86 Eireborne.............................................................82 Family History WA............................................72 From Home to Home: Oral Histories of Irish Seniors in Western Australia................. 66 GAA Junior Academy.......................................94 GAAWA...............................................................92 G’Day from Gary Gray...................................... 56 G’Day from Melbourne.....................................70 Giolla Aireagail.................................................. 68 Irish Choir Perth................................................. 84 Irish Golf Club of WA.......................................90 Irish Seniors Lunch............................................26 Irish Sports Stars Pull Out of 2021 AFL Season .........................................90 Isteach sa Teach.................................................28 Mass Murderer? The Bodkin Adams Enigma..................................................40 Matters of PUBlic Interest............................... 44 Meeja WAtch..................................................... 34 Minute with Synnott..........................................62 Paula from Tasmania.........................................74 Shamrock Rovers................................................91 St Patrick’s Day Parade.......................................4 The End of Innocence........................................59 The Gathering Christmas Lunch.................... 85 The Gathering Final Meeting Of 2020........ 43 The Glennons ‘As A Family We Have Chosen Not To Be Prisoners Of The Past’...............................................................52 Toy Story True Story.............................................6 Ulster Rambles..................................................60 Wingmen & Warriors.........................................14 Win the Cover of the Irish Scene.....................12

IRISH community groups: 58 Aust Irish Heritage Assoc...........................9345 3530 The Gathering............................................0431 018 388

69 Irish Families in Perth

64 The Claddagh Assoc.......................................9249 9213

23 IACC.............................................................. 1300 513 633 irish food:

53 Clonakilty

Mechanics:

1 Killarney Autos................................Neil 0439 996 764

MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT:

89 Stephen Dawson..............................................9172 2648

Property maintenance:

91 Integrity Property Solutions..................0423 618 506

Psychology:

49 General Psychology Services.................0414 251 967

Pubs, Clubs & restaurants:

5 Durty Nelly’s, Perth........................................9226 0233 5 Galway Hooker, Scarborough 49 Irish Club of WA, Subiaco..............................9381 5213 39 JB O’Reillys.......................................................9382 4555 2 Paddy Malone’s, Joondalup....................... 9300 9966 33 The National Hotel........................................9335 6688 55 Woodbridge Hotel, Guildford.......................9377 1199

Solicitors & Legal:

19 Kavanagh Lawyers..........................................9218 8422 63 Vibe Legal.......................................................... 6111 4890

Sport & SportING Clubs:

92 GAA............................................................0458 954 052 91 Shamrock Rovers......................................0410 081 386

Travel & Tourism:

35 British Travel.................................................... 9433 3288

tyres, batteries, brakes etc: 13 Tyrepower Perth City...........................Fiona 9322 2214

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Advertising: Imelda Gorman 0450 884 247

Editor:

Publisher:

Email: irishsceneperth@gmail.com Lloyd Gorman 0479 047 250 Email: irishsceneperth@gmail.com Canal Walk Media

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed by contributors in articles, reproduced articles, advertisements or any other printed material contained in Irish Scene magazine or on www.irishscene.com.au are those of the individual contributors or authors and as such are not necessarily those of Canal Walk Media. The publisher and editor reserve the right to accept, reject, edit or amend submitted material in order to make it appropriate or suitable for publication. Irish Scene welcomes submissions, ideas and suggestions for articles and features as well as photographs of events happening around and within the Irish community in Western Australia.

ST PATRICK’S DAY COMMITTEE

St Patrick’s Day parade TO MARCH ITS WAY BACK IN 2021

On behalf of the St Patrick’s Day Committee (Niamh, Steven, Rachel and Olan) we would like to thank all those that bought tickets to our Halloween Ball in October. The Ball sold out in two weeks and our committee was delighted with the response from the public and really enjoyed working with the Rose of Tralee Committee to host this event.

The 2020 Parade was one of the very first events cancelled in WA last year, and the committee lost a significant amount in unrecoverable expenditure.

Since then, the committee has worked hard to fundraise and have been very lucky in WA to be able to get together for the Race night and Ball to try and recover some of that loss in revenue.

We have been working with the City of Vincent in putting a COVID-19 safe plan together to allow us to host the parade and field festival on the 13th of March 2021. There will however be a few changes to this year’s format with the parade being moved to the inner perimeter of the Leederville Oval to meet the City of Vincent’s COVID-19 crowd control restrictions. The oval itself will remain much the same with music, dancing, family fun rides, games and of course a few pints in the mix. The committee will be charging a minimal entry fee to recoup some of the lost income from 2020, as well as to demonstrate crowd tracking and control.

Speaking with the other parade committees in Australia, they are all facing the same challenges and they are working hard to get the go-ahead.With the ever-changing conditions of COVID-19 outbreaks, we are cautiously optimistic that WA will be in a strong position to host one of the very few parades in the world with Mark McGowan steering the ship.

Currently, as I write this update on New Year’s Day 2021, Ireland moves into level 5 lockdown and we think of our families and friends back home, wish them a swift return to normality, and remember how lucky we are to be able to celebrate our culture and heritage and meet our friends on social occasions.

Once again this year we need the support of local businesses more than ever and if you would like to help out and sponsor the event in whatever capacity you can the committee and I would be most grateful.

Please feel free to contact us on 0479 061 147 or olanstpatsfestival@gmail.com niamhstpatsfestival@ gmail.com if you would like to know more.

Our next event is a race night coming up on January 22nd and we will keep you all updated through our social media pages and here in the Irish Scene on parade progress.

4 | THE IRISH SCENE

THE IRISH SCENE | 5

T O Y

S T O R Y

True Story

BY LLOYD GORMAN

A

recurring theme of family-friendly festive films is the need to save Christmas, often because the world is on the brink of losing its belief in the magic and meaning of Christmas. Against the odds the young heroes somehow find a way to reawaken and widely share the joy, thus saving the (very special) day.

‘The Late Late Toy Show’ – already a much loved institution in normal times – November 2020 was such a tonic and a reaffirmation of the innocence, beauty and importance of childhood and belief in something bigger than all of us, bigger even than a global pandemic. COVID defined every aspect of the RTE broadcast that was watched by an astonishing 1.7 million people, but it was the sentiment and care that went into making it happen that triumphed. Six year old Adam King’s virtual hug – a love heart he drew himself – proved to be an immediate and powerful symbol of hope and love for an entire nation on the night (and again on January 1 when the little Cork boy with brittle bones sent sent out this message: “Hello everyone, thank for you everything in 2020. Here is a virtual huge for everyone in 2021. Bye. Happy New Year.”)

Eight year old Saorise Ruane – who lost her leg last year following a cancer diagnosis – was equally inspirational and a big part of the special show being able to collect an incredible €6.6 million from for 6 | THE IRISH SCENE

three children’s charities (Barnardos, Children’s Health Foundation and Children’s Books Ireland) within the three hours the live show was on the box. Worth repeating too, that all the toys, books and play things in the studio also find their way to sick kids in hospitals around Ireland.

Being allowed to stay up late to watch the Toy Show has been a ritual for generations of excited Irish children, all of whom (and many of their parents as well) no doubt harboured dreams of appearing on the show. But however remote that possibility may have seemed to the children of Ireland it has always remained beyond the wildest expectation of kids living outside the country – at least until now.

Courtesy of COVID the producers came up with the idea of a virtual choir – led by Dublin youngster Eva Norton and with surprise video guest Gary Barlow – of Irish children from around the world as part of the format for the show. Late Late presenter Ryan Turbidy made the point well about families – who are ‘from’ Ireland and ‘of’ Ireland – being seperated by the virus but that things would improve. Introducing this novel segment Trubidy said: “[it] reminds us what the Toy Show and what Christmas is all about, tonight is the night that children, no matter where they are can do anything, and that includes Rule the World”.

TOY STORY TRUE STORY

Irish families everywhere – including many from Australia – seized the opportunity enthusiastically.

CARÁGH AND RÍAN MORGAN “My friend Ashleen back home rang me to tell me Ryan Turbidy had put out a call for the Irish children around the world to apply to be a part of this year’s Toy Show, the first time children from outside Ireland were invited to audition,” said Bronagh Morgan in Perth.

“The kids – Carágh and Rían – are very Irish at heart and know the lyrics to the usual Irish songs (I’ll tell me Ma, the Ratlin Bog, etc), they both can play the bodhran and other musical instruments and Carágh has been Irish dancing with the Celtic Academy School since the age of three so there was a few options for their audition! We wanted to pull out all the stops to catch the crew in RTÉ’s attention and decided upon the popular ‘I am Australian’ song where they both emphasised their CONTINUED ON PAGE 8

Right: Eight year old Saorise Ruane – who lost her leg last year following a cancer diagnosis – was able to raise an incredible €6.6 million during the course of the show. Below: Adam King’s virtual hug (a love heart he drew himself) proved to be an immediate and powerful symbol of hope and love for an entire nation.

THE IRISH SCENE | 7

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7

love for Irish culture throughout the song. I have worked for an Aboriginal organisation for the past 10 years, it is like an extended family rather than a work place.

“When I showed my boss Dennis the audition of the Australian song he cried. So there was definitely pressure for this audition to get over the line! I was at the altar every week praying the big man would intervene and make this dream come through!”

Their audition was successful but that was just the first step and they had to submit three more video clips. “This wasn’t easy to pull together in a short time frame for a four and six year old so they missed a full day and two half days from school to make it happen! I then got called out

by Carágh’s teacher asking was everything ok as I kept giving the same reason for them being absent, “family circumstances” (I didn’t even realise!) By this stage I knew the kids were going to be on the Toy Show so my response to the teacher was “yes everything is absolutely fantastic,” and when she learned the truth she was delighted for the kids! RTE made it clear we weren’t allowed to tell anyone and it must be kept a surprise. Because it was going to be very different the producers wanted to ensure it was all top secret. I was absolutely bursting to tell but I couldn’t! So I just rang my cousin Connor in Sydney and told him but apart from that no one else knew.”

As the November 27 broadcast loomed large, the Morgan family got even more reason to be excited and sworn to secrecy. “A week out of the show we got chosen for a reaction video of the grandparents so that was an even bigger secret to keep! Maeve from RTE Player 8 | THE IRISH SCENE

rang me one night to go through it all and I was on the phone for about an hour chatting away. She then became my new BFF on Whatsapp! I knew the family would all be watching but the week of the show I was chatting to my Ma and she said to me “did you see that Ryan Turbidy thinks this year’s Toy Show is going to be bigger and better that ever, sure how does he think that will happen with no audience”. I was panicking in case she didn’t watch it so I had to ask her and thank god she said “Oh Jesus aye, sure we wouldn’t miss it”. Talk about relief! The only worry I had on the night was that my Da would fall asleep during the show but my brother kept him on the whiskeys so it was all good.”

The Morgans were due to travel back home to Down for Christmas to celebrate Granda Quinn’s 60th birthday but of course that could not happen. “This made Ryan Tubridy and the Toy Show team more determined than ever to make the global Irish family part of this year’s spectacular show. It was great to see Perth being represented!

During the stunning performance of Rule the World a clip of Carágh and Rían from Kings Park appeared on the screen. With the help of their uncles Shane and Keith, RTÉ Player caught the grandparents reaction as the Morgans appeared on screen!”

Above: Carágh and Rían from Perth participated in the show, surprising their grandparents in a secret reaction video. Opposite: Perth girl Lili Kelly in a clip from the show, and with her Irish grandfather The family were overwhelmed by the response from people at home and even here in Australia.

“We couldn’t believe the amount of people that watched the show and spotted the Morgans,” she added... Rían was wearing our club’s jersey from home so a lot of people spotted the Atticall shirt and soon realised it was Carágh and Rían. My ma works in the local shop and customers have been asking for her autograph all week! There are seven Irish kids in Carágh’s class at school and three in Rían’s class, they went to school the following Monday and everyone surrounded them saying “we saw you on TV”, for a four and six year old that was big! The teachers then got the clip and it was shown to both their classes. So the post buzz for us here and at home has been unreal. ”

TOY STORY TRUE STORY

LILI KELLY When she was just five, Lili Kelly from Perth told her mum Tamara and dad Timothy Ryan that she would be on her favourite TV programme ‘in the whole wide word’, the Late Late Toy Show one day. “Of course, every year we would break it to her gently that as we don’t live in Ireland, it would be impossible for her to go on the Late Late Toy Show,” Tamara said.

Back in April the Kellys had planned to take a holiday back to Ireland and Tim’s home of Annacarty, Co. Tipperary for his 40th birthday, to see their cousins, aunties and grandad. Another trip scuppered by COVID.

it after the Late Late Toy Show.

While watching, Tim heard Ryan Tubridy talking about family at Christmas, he began to tear up and said, Lili would have loved to be part of this, as he said it, Lili’s face popped up on screen and he burst into tears. We then ‘found’ Tim’s phone and began to receive calls from family and friends in Ireland who could not believe that they has just seen Lili singing as part of a world choir on the Late Late Toy show. Lili has many more dreams and says she will be back on the Late Late Toy show as a famous singer one day, she said she wants to donate money to all the children’s hospitals around the world as she remembers how kind the doctors and nurses were to her when she got sick.”

RYAN TILLMAN Then in September Lili’s Irish auntie Louise Ryan sent them the link for the auditions. Lili wasted no time and put together an audition tape and submitted it.

“Lili has always loved music and after she was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes aged 10, Lili wanted to be known as the girl who sings, not the girl with diabetes,” said Tamara.

“After she sent her audition tape off we heard nothing for a few weeks until we got an email that Lili had made it through to second round auditions. The catch was that she had to learn the song Rule the World

by Take That (Gary Barlow). Lili decided not to tell anyone and spent the next few weeks practicing in secret, and submitted a final video of her singing at Alkimos Beach. You can imagine the joy and tears to hear she had been selected from thousands of auditions around the world, one of 20 children selected to be in a special performance in a way to reunite families across the world at Christmas.”

Lili wanted to give her dad a big surprise so decided not to tell him anything about it. “On the day of the Toy Show, we got up early and hid Tim’s phone in case anyone was to see it before and message him,” said Tamara. “Tim was frantically trying to find his phone and even looked through the bins for it. We told him we would help him to find

Twelve year old Ryan Tillman told Irish Scene about his family and experience with the toy show.

“My family moved to Adelaide four years ago from Galway,” he said.

“My brother’s names are Aaron (10), Warrick (8) and Leon (5).

My dad was born in Newcastle, Australia and my mother is from Galway. On my dad’s side of the family, we have four other cousins around our ages living in Willunga, SA and the rest of my dad’s family are spread across Australia. On my mother’s side of the family, we have lots of family living in Galway. Our cousin’s names in Ireland are Abi, Noah, Adam and Alanna. They were all very supportive and excited for me being on the Late Late Toy Show and cheered me all the way, CONTINUED ON PAGE 10

THE IRISH SCENE | 9

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 9

especially my Nana Christina Glennon. During the audition process, we didn’t tell them when I had made it into the second round but once I received the news that I would be on it we told them straight away. We were meant to be going to Ireland this Christmas but obviously, we weren’t able to. We keep in close contact with family in Ireland and hope to visit them as soon as we can.”

Right & below: Ryan Tillman and his family in Adelaide. Opposite right: the Ginnity, Kelly and Carrey children also featured Adelaide in their clip

“The third family are from Galway. Deborah Lenihan moved to Scotland when she fell in love with her now husband Chris Carrey and they then moved to Adelaide in 2010 with their daughter Emma who is now 12 and Rohan who is seven was also born in 2013 in Adelaide.

THE GINNITYS, THE KELLYS AND THE CARREYS Also in Adelaide, three Irish families put on a united front for their performance as they do every other day.

“Myself and my husband Declan Ginnity moved from Kells, Co. Meath to Adelaide in 2012 with our then two year old son Rían while Ross was born here in Adelaide in 2013,” explained mum Niamh Melady.

“The second family involved are the Kelly’s from Kildare. Rachel & Paul Kelly moved to Adelaide with their then two year old son Alex in 2012 and the following year James was born. Alex is now 10 and James is 7. Rachel actually appeared on the Late Late Toy Show herself in 1990 with a group of dancers from Kildare in the opening sequence.

10 | THE IRISH SCENE

“We did not know each other before we came out here but we have grown so close we are like our own little Irish family! We help each other, we rely on each other and most importantly we all love each other like our own! We have a unique bond and we feel incredibly lucky to have found each other here!

All our children are in the same school and the three seven year old boys have been in the same class since starting kindy.”

When family in Kells told her about the auditions Niamh did not hesitate to share the news. “I told my two best friends, Debs and Rachel who are also avid Toy Show fans and we were so excited. It went without saying that all the children would do it together! So after three takes (two at the beach and one at the lake), multiple bags of Tayto and cans of Club Orange (Woolworths made a pretty penny from us) we got word we were chosen! To say we were beyond excited is an understatement!

“We all got together on the morning of the Toy Show (six adults and six children) and we all sat around the telly giddy like we were kids ourselves! We had pancakes, mince pies and one or two Irish coffees (for the adults obviously). We weren’t entirely sure how it was going to be done but when we saw how it was

TOY STORY TRUE STORY

all put together we were blown away! It was incredibly special.

It was also such excitement for all our families in the three counties and beyond. They had something to look forward to with the awful year they’ve had back home! It also felt so special how Ryan spoke about everyone that is away, it really made us feel loved and missed. I’ll be honest, myself, Debs & Rachel were all bawling. Sadly Debs was due to fly home for her Dad Michael’s 80th in December but unfortunately that was not possible due to COVID. Its brought us closer again I feel and we are so incredibly grateful to have been chosen to say happy Christmas to our families at home. They’ve had a tough year and it brought a smile to everyone’s face.”

KIERA ARTHUR Representing Canberra was eleven year old Kiera Arthur.

“Kiera was born in Canberra and has always lived here,” said mum Margaret Evers, a native of Sutton, Dublin, who travelled to the capital city (and landed a job in PJ O’Reillys Irish pub) in 1998 for a years trip but ended up meeting her Aussie husband (from Melbourne) and finding a science job with the CSIRO. “Kiera, and her sister Alannah, have visited Ireland a number of times, are proud of their Irishness and refer to themselves as half Irish. They have watched the Toy Show several times and absolutely loved it. As Kiera says, she never imagined that she could ever be on it. She was thrilled to have been chosen to be included. She sang solo for the first time the month before the Late Late, when she auditioned for the school talent show and was selected from her grade to sing in front of the school. Before that she only sang at home, she has never had a singing lesson.”

Kiera Arthur showcased her hometown of Canberra

Not every family involved in the virtual choir however were happy with their experience.

One dad – who we won’t identify – did not feel they were the best people to talk to about the Toy Show. “We were quite disappointed about the outcome, we were led to believe the kids would feature more prominently, a view shared by a few other participants,” he said. For what its worth, this writer thought the entire show was an outstanding TV event and resounding success, but after watching the ‘Rule the World’ section again I think I can see why not quite everyone who took part was blown away. Some of the many clips of the children singing or speaking were almost lost in the background, while others seemed to feature more prominently. As seen left, all the families had to work hard and even make sacrifices to get through the audition process and expectations would have been sky high.

Perhaps the format just needs a bit of a tweak.

This was the first time the virtual choir was pulled together (no doubt after much hard work as well on the RTE side of things) but hopefully it will not be the last. Maybe it could even become a standard fixture of future Toy Shows and a way to connect and interact with the global Irish community. Thousands of children from around the world auditioned and people from more than 110 countries streamed the Toy Show on the RTE Player.

The Late Late Toy Show Assistant Producer Kate Olohan said: “We have been overwhelmed with the standard of entries coming in from around the world. It’s great to see how far the Toy Show roots have spread.

There is something extra special about watching an audition from the beaches of Australia or the under the city lights of New York, it really proves that wherever we are, we are all connected!”.

Irish Scene would like to thank the producers of the Late Late Toy Show for their help to reach out to families involved for this article.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 12

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11

‘IN THE HONOUR OF CHRISTMAS’ It might be bigger than Ben-Hur now but the Late Late Toy Show had very humble origins.

Several years ago on the Saturday morning Irish show A Song For Ireland (now called Celtic Rambles) which he produces with Gerry Grogan, Frank Murphy (top right) had the original Late Late Show host Gay ‘Gaybo’ Byrne (bottom right) on as a guest for a special Christmas show. Inevitably the discussion turned to the Toy Show.

“It all started when the only researcher on the LLS Pan Collins bought a few toys and encouraged Gay to embrace the idea,” Frank recalled. “He was totally dependent on her to push the envelope with audience reaction, which drove the project a tad further. This was in the days of black and white television.

Colour TV allowed the toys to gleam as he immersed himself in it all and ditched the suit in favour of very bright – now trademark – Christmas jumpers. Gay himself admitted that it was ‘only a filler for about twenty minutes’. It had very small beginnings. The idea caught on and the next year we spent an hour on the show. By the following year – about 1976 – we were able to devote a whole show to toys. Merchandising came into the whole equation so we had to reconsider when to air the Toy Show to considerably earlier than close to Christmas to allow suppliers time to order and bring in the toys. Every year it reaps in the biggest audience of the year as Gaybo said: “because mums and dads and kids can all sit down together and enjoy the family friendly Late Late Toy Show”.

Successive hosts of the Late Late Show – the longest continuous running TV talk show in the world – have continued the tradition of wearing (multiple) cheesy Christmas jumpers and allowing themselves to look silly in the spirit of the show.

Frank Murphy started his broadcasting life back in September 1965 from a tiny RTE radio studio perched high above the iconic columns of the GPO in O’Connell Street, Dublin. It was here that Frank first met Byrne, who presented a night time jazz programme from there.

“In time I got to know Gaybo, researched and produced his radio show right through the eighties and one of the highlights was to get with him to Grafton Street for the Christmas special,” Frank added.

“He would be inundated with crowds but I suspect he really enjoyed talking to his fellow Dubliners in the streets.”

12 | THE IRISH SCENE

COMPETITION

Your chance to

win the front cover of Irish Scene

Irish Scene is offering the chance to win the cover of the upcoming St. Patrick’s edition.

The rules are simple. We want you (individuals, families, sports, schools or cultural groups or club, pubs or advertisers can take part in the competition) to send us a new or recently taken photograph or image (drawings/paintings etc will be considered) that you think is fun or a good representation of the Irish community in Western Australia – or even Australia – today. Family and friends back in Ireland are also welcome to try, but there must be an Australian element to their picture.

Please include some details about the photograph, when and where it was taken, by whom and what it about. More than one entry from the same applicant will be considered.

Finally, entries will need to be submitted to irishsceneperth@ gmail.com by 5pm Friday February 19th at the latest. Queries can be made at the same address.

The best photo or image wins. In the case of a close call a professional practicing photographer will be asked to be the final arbitrator. The clock is ticking so get in early....

GOOD LUCK!

AROUND THE IRISH SCENE Heart felt performance

Happy as Larry! Kildare man Larry O’Connor (right) thought someone was pulling his leg when he got a phone call to say he’d won the top prize of $15,000 in the 2020 Irish Club raffle. His number was the one pulled out of the 670 tickets in the mix, but he wasn’t in the Club on the night of the draw. The man who sold him the winning ticket was there and gave his phone number to the committee members who pulled the ticket. “My friend Gerry Murphy from South Armagh asked me if I wanted to buy a [$100] ticket for the Irish Club raffle,” Larry said. “So I said give me a ticket with an eight in it and he said I have one with 418, so I bought that.”

When it set in that he had won, Larry – who considers himself to be bit of a lucky sod – was happy to share the love. “I was grinning like a rat with a gold tooth for a week afterwards,” he added. Larry shared the windfall with his family and even helped two sisters and a friend to get back to Ireland for a trip.

Gillian Forde from the IC committee congratulated Larry and thanked everyone who bought a ticket and supported the venture. “It was a huge effort which raised $52,000 to help to secure the Irish Club’s future. We are incredibly grateful to the many members and supporters who got out there selling tickets and to the many individuals, groups and businesses who purchased tickets. The club had great feedback on the raffle and will be looking to run another (with some improvements!), in 2021.”

Those lucky eough to be there on the night were treated to an unforgettable concert by Fiona Rea and Nigel Healy who performed songs from the still hugely popular 1992 ‘A Woman’s Heart’ album and other songs by Mary and Francis Black. All of this in the stunning setting of the al fresco bar area at the beautiful Kidogo Arthouse, Bathers Beach, Fremantle (above right).

Happy Birthdays boys!

Many happy returns to Niall O’Toole (below middle) who our spies tell us very recently celebrated his 80th birthday.

Meanwhile, Terry O’Leary in Lesmurdie, pictured here with wife Jan (left), is about to become an octogenarian himself in February. And last but not least Sean MacDonagh (below right) – who is about to take over the running of the monthly Irish Seniors Lunch in the Irish Club – has turned 70! Sean is also an organiser for The Gathering Northern Suburbs social group which meets monthly in St. Anthony’s Church parish hall in Dundebar Road, Wanneroo for live music and sing along, games and a professional speaker.

The Gathering is scheduled to meet on February 18th and again on March 18th. Call Sean (0431 018 388) or Jim Egan (0413 866 320) for further information.

Scamper for hamper crisps:

Congratulations to Annmarie and Nick Shanaghy (above), winners of the Irish Scene Christmas hamper.

The lucky couple are from Carlow and both work as nurses at Perth hospitals and are very worthy recipients! Nick joked he would have to hide the Tayto from the kids! Many a true word spoke in jest!

CONTINUED ON PAGE 77

If you would like to be featured in the next issue, please email irishsceneperth@gmail.com

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THE IRISH SCENE | 13

Wingmen and warriors

BY LLOYD GORMAN

FLIGHT OF THE WILD GEESE Two pilots from the Irish Air Corps have been learning on the job and doing their part for #OpCOVID19Assist with the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF).

Lieutenants Joseph Ward and Dave Finnegan have been transporting personnel and cargo around the country as part of the nation’s campaign to control the virus.

Before they left for Australia at the start of 2020 the two men flew CASA CN235 planes with 101 Squadron (SQN) in the Irish Air Corps. Since their arrival they have been in the cockpit of the KA350 King Air, a modern twin engine turboprop, operating out of the military base and training school at RAAF Base East Sale, Victoria.

It doesn’t necessarily look like much from the outside but the 12 strong fleet of King Air planes – which belongs to 32 Squadron – packs a punch without firing a weapon. It can be used for a wide variety of operations, including air logistic support, near-region international engagement, imagery acquisition, base station relay, detect illegal fishing, intelligence surveillance targeting acquisition reconnaissance and electronic warfare. It can also carry eight people and has a range of about 3,400km.

14 | THE IRISH SCENE

Top: Lt Joseph Ward (r) and Lt Dave Finnegan. Above: With RAAF pilots The Irish pair are on deployment for a total of 18 months for what is basically an “accelerated training programme”, so they will be more than half way through their stint Down Under already. We first met them 12 months ago in the January 2020 edition of Irish Scene (Irish Air Corps Meets RAAF), before any of us knew what the year ahead would hold. The Irish Defence Forces press office said they plan to release some more details in the next few months. If the Irish fly boys turn up in Perth or Western Australia and we get wind of it we will be sure to let you know.

WINGMEN AND WARRIORS

Right: L-R Bluey Truscott, Brendan Finucane and R.E Thorold-Smith on 3 June 1941.

WINGMEN AND WARRIORS While this is the first time that pilots from the Air Corps have officially been deployed with the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) – or any foreign airforce for that matter – it is not the first time that pilots from Ireland and Australia have flown together.

Eighty years ago a young Dubliner and a Melbourne man became the best of friends and renowned Spitfire pilots and fighter aces. In 1941, aged 25, having trained as a pilot in Canada Keith ‘Bluey’ Truscott went to England where he was one of the original members of

“

the toughest, ice-cold fighter partnership in the RAAF”

No. 452 Squadron RAAF, the first Australian air unit set up in WWII. For several months No. 452 was the top scoring fighter squadron in Britain, racking up kills on convoy patrols, bomber escorts and fighter sweeps over occupied France.

For his own part, Truscott was recognised and decorated for destroying 14 enemy aircraft.

Truscott’s exploits were reported widely back in Australia where he was a national hero. He would go on to become the RAAF’s highest scoring ace.

No. 452 was led by another legend, battle of Britain veteran, Flight Lieutenant Bernard ‘Paddy’ CONTINUED ON PAGE 16

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Finucane, from Rathmines, Dublin. Having trained to be a pilot in 1932 with the fledgling air force Finucane went on to join the RAF in 1938 and two years later he was flying Spitfires with 65 Squadron. In April 1941, aged just 21 he was transferred to No. 452 where he had seventeen combat victories between July and October.

The well known writer of the time Ivan Southall – and himself a decorated Spitfire pilot – described them as “the toughest, ice-cold fighter partnership in the RAF” that helped the unit become one of the best in Fighter Command. Certainly Truscott – known as Bluey because of his bright red hair – credited his friend for helping him to become the pilot he was. When they were not flying or on duty the pair socialised together.

The war would drag the two close friends in different directions but to a similar fate.

In January 1942 the young Irish man was promoted to squadron leader in No. 602 Squadron and just six months later he became the RAF’s youngest ever wing commander. In July 1942 Finucane was

16 | THE IRISH SCENE

Above: Wing Commander Brendan ‘Paddy’ Finucane. Bottom: The Spitfire flown by Truscott.

Opposite right: Truscott and Finucane dining out flying a mission over France when his Spitfire was hit and damaged by ground fire. He tried to fly back to England but was forced to ditch his plane in the English channel, with no trace of it ever found again.

At the time of his death, Finucane is thought to have shot down about 30 enemy aircraft. To be considered a fighter ace, a pilot needed to destroy five airplanes.

“I owe a great deal to Paddy Finucane,” Bluey said of his friend. “He coached me in air fighting and taught me everything I needed to know, both before and after we started ops.”

Truscott himself was promoted to the rank of Commanding Officer in Jun2 1942 and a short time later he was posted back to the RAAF after the Bombing of Darwin by Japanese forces. He went from flying Spitfires to Kittyhawks with No. 76 Squadron. His squadron played a decisive factor in the Battle of Milne Bay and through his bravery in this campaign Truscott cemented his reputation and respect amongst his crew and other pilots. During one operation in a Kittyhawk Truscott shot down a Japanese bomber.

Tragically Truscott was killed in March 1943 when he crashed into the sea during a training exercise with the US Navy off Exmouth, Western Australia. His body was buried at Karrakatta Cemetery with full military honours. The Melbourne Football Club

WINGMEN AND WARRIORS

continue to honour Truscott’s memory, with the annual trophy in his name, which this year was awarded at a COVID safe ceremony.

Finucane is less well known in Ireland but recognition of his contribution is there if you know where to look. A rose garden was planted in Baldonnel where Brendan and his brother Ray first learned to fly. Finucane’s name is also inscribed on the Air Forces Memorial at Runnymede. The memorial commemorates airmen lost in the Second World War with no known grave. His flying logbook can be viewed in the Soldiers and Chief’s exhibition in the National Museum of Ireland at Collins Barracks.

NORTHERN IRELAND RESTING PLACE FOR 39 RAAF MEN we received a diversionary message from Ramsay instructing us to land at Bishop Court. The Pilot and Nav(igator) were informed, and QDM’s were obtained from Bishop Court H/F D/F Station.

A short time after that one of the engines cut, I think it was the starboard. The Pilot increased power from the other one, but a few seconds later that one failed. The Pilot ordered abandon aircraft at a height of about 2,500 feet. The 2nd WOP was first to leave followed by the Nav and then myself. On the way down I saw the aircraft with its landing lights on and guessed the Pilot was looking for a place to force land.”

An Inquiry into the accident found that “Both outboard cocks were in the “ON” position, both outboard fuel tanks were empty. Both Inboard tanks contained at least 15 gallons of fuel. Both cocks were OFF. It was considered that the engines failed because of shortage of fuel.”

This example shows that training was commonplace and could be just as dangerous as combat missions. Indeed most of the Australians who lost their lives in Northern Ireland died in accidental circumstances or because the weather turned nasty.

Sometimes they came down in the Irish Free State/Eire, which was technically neutral in World War II. On March 15 1942, a Liberator (heavy bomber) left Egypt bound for RAF Station Hurn, near Dundalk. Not long into the flight the CONTINUED ON PAGE 18

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Pilots and aircrews faced the highest risk of being killed in action of any of the armed services. During WWII, Allied Bomber Command was made up of 125,000 aircrew. Of these 57,205 were killed, 8403 were wounded and 9838 were shot down and became prisoners of war. In total, these 75,446 airmen – about sixty percent of the Command’s strength – were killed, wounded or POW. The dangers they faced are apparent in Northern Ireland where about 300 Australian airmen are thought to have been stationed.

Bases in Northern Ireland and Scotland would provide vital cover and reach over the mid Atlantic Ocean where convoys carrying badly needed supplies between England and America were vulnerable to attack from German submarines.

Some 39 Australians – all RAAF casualties – are buried in eleven graveyards in Antrim, Down, Fermanagh and Derry. A West Australian man from Manjimup is amongst them. The grave of Sergeant Richard Henry Sproge is in the killed Presbyterian Churchyard. He was the only member of a five man crew to be killed in the crash, which was described by wireless operator Sgt Britt who escaped uninjured.

“On the 27th March 1944, Anson MG385 on a night nonoperational navigation flight, crashed at 0120 hours at Bowhill Farm, County Antrim Northern Ireland,” the account, posted on the forum WW2Talk states. Sgt Sproge was killed in the crash. Flt Sgt Britt who was uninjured in the crash, later reported; “At 0021

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pilot received orders to return to Egypt because of bad weather over the British Isles but the plane – already west of its due course – crashed high ground at Jenanstown, Kilkenny. The crew of six and nine passengers were killed immediately while four passengers were badly hurt.

In early November 1943, a large four engine Handley Page Halifax bomber left an RAF base in Yorkshire to carry out a routine night

training flight to Norwich. They never arrived at their destination having become lost. They were first spotted by a look out at Flat Head, Co. Cork and tracked travelling northwards by other observers. Just before midnight it came down in a ball of fire into farmland in the Townland of Ryehill, in Co. Galway.

The bodies of the seven personnel on board – three of who were Australian – were handed over to authorities in Northern Ireland.

FROM FATHER TED TO CAMP COLDITZ Following on from the success of Father Ted, Dermot Morgan knew what he wanted to do next: a comedy about an Irish prisoner of war camp during WWII, called The Emergency in Ireland. Curragh Colditz would be based on the Curragh Camp in Co. Kildare, 30 miles west of Dublin, the country’s largest military installation. The wartime history of the camp was rich for the picking.

One story goes that in the early 1940s, a Canadian airplane crash landed in the area but its two crew were able to walk away from the wreck. Believing they had come down in Scotland near their base, the airmen - trying to make their way back by foot - came across a pub and decided to go in to toast their survival and maybe get word back to their comrades. The story goes that they walked into the bar only to be confronted by the unexpected sight of German officers in Nazi uniforms who bizarrely shouted at them to get a drink in their own bar. In another part of the pub a group of English and American service personnel were bunched together drinking. According to this yarn the Canadians had inadvertently wandered into the Curragh Camp.

I can’t vouch for that story but I do know this type of scene was true 18 | THE IRISH SCENE

to life and typical of daily life for the POW’s interned there. Ireland/Eire was a neutral country in WWII, but - at least in the early stages of the conflict - if British or Allied fliers or sailors were picked up in Irish waters or territory they were allowed to sympathetically slip back to the war effort through Northern Ireland. But when wayward German air and ship crews turned up and were captured in Ireland, the Irish government was forced to detain them, and other foreign fighters on equal terms and an agreement was reached with the British and German sides.

The Curragh had been built by the British but was taken over by the Irish army in 1922 but turned out to be a very cushy place for these airmen and sailors to see out the war as ‘guests’ of the Irish government. If there were dozens of Allied men there were hundreds of Germans but they seem to have co-existed in an uneasy peace. There are reports of Germans singing Nazi songs to annoy their ‘enemies’ who no doubt found ways to irritate them back. The Allied POW’s continued to receive their pay, were well fed, could get their hands on duty-free alcohol and had access to a radio and newspapers from home. They even had a laundry service and could borrow bikes if they wanted to leave the camp.

WINGMEN AND WARRIORS

Left: German POWs drinking in a local Irish pub camp, nicknamed ‘tin town’ by the Republican inmates. They could only have dreamed about such luxuries and liberties.

Whereas the airmen and sailors of foreign powers were treated like tourists – including being able to live in local houses – the Irish prisoners were held under armed guard, behind barbed wire and in accommodations that were basic at best.

The Germans enjoyed similar liberties and activities and none of the hardships of their counterparts in other POW camps. But they were obliged to follow an honour system not to escape and were able to go to dances in local halls on Saturday nights and play golf, go fishing or play other sports, including soccer matches and boxing rounds against each other.

Indeed, their conditions and quality of life was much better than that of the Irish soldiers who were their guards, a point my late grandfather, who was one of them, would remind me of in his many stories about that time in his life.

The POW’s were not the only prisoners to be found at the Curragh. Large numbers of ‘subversives’ – mainly IRA men, that included the writer Brendan Behan for a while – were also held there in much less salubrious surroundings at the

As kids we used to play in ‘Black Huts’ where these men were incarcerated and I clearly remember them as being every bit every bit the typical elongated wooden shed like ‘block’ you see in every war movie, long open rooms with rows of beds, a pot belly stove and wooden floors.

Life was so cushy that some men felt guilty and obligated to try and escape and get back into the war effort. Allied POWs who did manage to escape the laid back captivity and evade capture on the run to Northern Ireland would have faced the unexpected situation where they would have CONTINUED ON PAGE 20

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Above: Irish actor Dermot Morgan (far right) in an episode of Father Ted featuring a Nazi storyline. been handed back to the Irish authorities who would have sent them back to the Curragh, because of the agreement to respect Ireland’s neutrality.

Military history expert and TV presenter Dan Snow once said the juxtaposition of the two sides in the peculiar circumstances of the Curragh was ripe for “surreal drama.”

No doubt these kind of stories and experiences would have appealed to Morgan’s creative and comic instincts but it was not to be.

On February 28 1998, just one day after filming for the third and final episode of Father Ted had finished, the Dublin born comedy star died from a heart attack. He was just 46 years old.

But we do get a glimpse of how he might have approached Curragh Colditz in the ‘Are You Right There Father Ted’ episode in which the feckless cleric is mistaken as a racist. Ted’s curiosity about a locked room 20 | THE IRISH SCENE

in the house of another priest sees Father Seamus Fitzpatrick show him around his secret stash of Nazi and Third Reich artefacts, including the last photo ever taken of Hitler: “signing a few death warrants”.

Even though he is shocked Ted does not want to be rude to his fellow priest and feigns an interest when asked if he likes it, a white lie which – combined with Ted briefly taking on a Hitler like appearance – seals his fate as a would be fascist.

Another Irish TV comedy success is working on a new project along similar lines for the BBC. Brendan O’Carroll, creator of the hit show Mrs Browns Boys, is reported to be turning his attentions to a comedy drama about Irish soldiers serving as UN Peacekeepers in the Lebanon in the 1980’s (below).

“I want to portray the hardship these young men went through and what it was like for these volunteers being so far away from home,” O’Carroll told the Irish Sun. He also sees the potential for humour and satire in the ‘Leb' which has seen more than 30,000 Irish men

WINGMEN AND WARRIORS

British POWs (left) and German POWs (above) in Curragh and women serve as Peackeepers since the 1970’s.

“I’ve spoken to so many guys who were in the Lebanon and everyone of them had a funny story and I loved hearing them,” he added.

“If the Irish Defence Forces guys got fired on, they had to ring up HQ to find out if they could fire back.

Sometimes HQ had to ring up Geneva in Switzerland to return fire.”

CAMP FRIESACK NOT WHAT YOU MIGHT HAVE EXPECTED BRYLCREEM BOYS WERE SLICK Dermot Morgan – who also created the hilarious political satire show ‘Scrap Saturday’ – was not the only one to recognise the potential of the Curragh for a great yarn. In the same year Morgan died, ‘The Brylcreem Boys’ – a reference to the hair product commonly used by flyers at the time, as well as their slick nature – was released. Set (but not filmed*) in 1941 in the Curragh, this romantic comedy is the story of a Royal Canadian Air Force and Luftwaffe pilot who shot each other down over Ireland and their battle for the affections of a local beauty, played by Jean Butler, the original lead performer from Riverdance making her film debut. The film also had well known Irish actor Gabriel Byrne – of Usual Suspects fame – as camp Commandant.

While it had a lot going for it and was liked by many of those that saw it, the film was not commercially successful. Critics slammed it as fanciful and far fetched, what they might call in West Australia a Furphy. “One wonders if The Brylcreem Boys bears any resemblance to its historical roots whatsoever,” one reviewer jeered. British film maker Terence Ryan wrote and produced Brylcreem Boys. In his research for the movie project Ryan travelled to the Curragh to see the place firsthand. While Ryan was there he ran into my father, who was able to tell him about and then introduce the filmmaker to his own father who had been a soldier at the camp during that incredible time. While Ryan had been able to dig into records about the camp conditions, I seem to recall it being the best chance he had to speak to an eye witness and get good first hand information about it. What he produced was a distinctly Irish anti-war movie. *The Irish film sector was so busy at that time that the production had to leave Irish shores for the Isle of Man where it was made.

As unique as it was the Curragh was not the only unlikely Irish POW camp of WWII. Between 1940 and 1943 Friesack Camp (Stalag XX-A (301) in Brandernburg, Germany had an unusual mission – to recruit Irishmen from amongst Allied POW’s to fight against the British.

The same idea had been tried during WWI, with very limited success. Despite the hands on attempts by Irish patriot Roger Casement, with the full support of German authorities, just 52 Irish men volunteered to join an “Irish Brigade” under a German flag.

Galway man William Joyce had proved himself to be a loyal and effective disciple of Hitler and the Reich early into WWII, perhaps more would follow his example. In 1940 German intelligence – assisted by the IRA – set out to create a new Irish Brigade from POWs. Conditions at Friesack were much better than a normal camp for the inmates who could be given special training.

The concept behind the Brigade was that in the event of a British invasion of Ireland its members – who would be familiar with the landscape, conditions and people – could operate as what we might now call insurgents against British forces. At its height some 100 soldiers – and five officers – stepped forward to join the Brigade but in the end – their numbers were whittled down to about ten men who the Germans believed were sincere in their desire to fight for Germany in Ireland and who were taken to Berlin for further training.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 22

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HELMETS MADE IRISH SOLDIERS A TARGET FOR SCORN Ironically, thanks to what you might call a wardrobe malfunction, the Free State army at the time was vulnerable to ridicule from the British for looking like it was attached to the Wehrmacht.

In 1934 – as the Nazi’s were on the rise in Germany – an Irish government recruitment poster for a volunteer force shows amongst other things a soldier in a uniform – not widely worn – that closely resembled a German one. Whatever about that, the main problem was that the helmets worn by every Irish soldier were very close in style to those issued to the German army. There was a good reason for this. Newly formed in the early 1920’s the Irish army needed – amongst other things – a metal helmet, which was the standard of the time. Irish authorities first looked to a French design but in the end opted for the German helmet used in WWI. Under the punishing terms of the Versailles Treaty, Germany was prevented from producing even helmets as part of the bid to suppress the once powerful nation’s ability to create an army. In the end some 5,000 of them were made by British firm Vickers & Co in London, based on the German design but slightly different. For example, the sides of the Irish helmet were more gently sloped and it was painted a dark shade of green.

As war broke out and the Nazi’s appeared to easily conquer Europe, the embarrassment of the similarity to the distinctive headgear saw the Irish army go with a British style helmet.

Their predecessors were handed down to members of the Civil Defence and fire brigades by an embarrassed and cash strapped Irish government trying to make the most of a bad situation.

22 | THE IRISH SCENE

PLAYING TO A CAPTIVE AUDIENCE Someone at Fremantle Prison has an eye for a great gimmick. The idea to screen a series of classic prison movies at the historic gaol in January 2021 is an inspired marriage of concept and location. Built by basically the slave labour of the prisoners – more than a few Irish amongst their number – the purpose built prison has a history of incarceration dating back to 1850 and as recent 1991 (when it was decommissioned as a maximum security facility). In that time there have been several – sometimes grisly – escape attempts with most ending in recapture or death for the escapees. The most famous and perhaps daring prison break from Fremantle involved the initial escape of Irish patriot John Boyle O’Reilly who helped mastermind the busting out his six fellow Fenians (who had also been on the Hougoumont, the last convict ship to West Australia, that arrived into Freo on January 10, 1858) after his own dramatic escape several years earlier. It gets continually said – and I will repeat it here for emphasis – that the story of their escape is one that is begging to be picked up and turned into a Hollywood or Australian blockbuster.

WINGMEN AND WARRIORS

A film like that would be worth watching anyhow, but watching it in the open courtyard of where O’Reilly and his comrades would have once stood would have the power to connect the past and present.

The prison movie genre has many standouts so there is no shortage of choice

for what to show. The line up includes one of the best POW and escape films ever made, The Great Escape (1963). German POW camp Stalag Luft III in Poland was designed specifically to hold troublesome Allied servicemen who had proved to be handy at breaking out of other POW camps. It depicts the personalities, planning and preparation that went into a mass break that was intended to release hundreds of English, American, Canadian and soldiers and officers who would attempt to get back into the war by meeting up with resistance fighters or by making their way back to a neutral or friendly country. In the process, hundreds if not thousands of German soldiers would be diverted from other duties and being a fighting force while they tried track them down. Of the 76 who escaped, 73 were recaptured and 23 were returned to the camp. But 50 of the men rounded up were gunned down on the direct orders of Hitler. One of the 50 was 26-year-old Michael “Mike” James Casey. Casey was born in India to Irish parents, his father was the inspector general of police for the province of Uttar Pradesh. He was educated in Clongowes Wood College, just outside Dublin. The pilot of a Blenheim bomber with 57 Squadron, Casey and his crew were shot down over France in 1939.

Another of the 76 was Perth man Flight Lieutenant Paul Gordon Royle, who was lucky to be amongst those who were recaptured but not shot by the Gestapo as punishment for the break out. (He was less lucky of course when his plane was attacked and shot down by Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighters and being captured immediately by German soldiers on the ground.)

CONTINUED ON PAGE 24

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It is speculated that the pilot’s surname may have saved his life (as a possible connection to the Royal family - another prisoner with the name Churchill was also spared) or it could be that on his two day escapade to Switzerland he remained at large long enough not to be included in the quota of 50 to be shot. In any case he was liberated from the camp at the end of the war and he returned to his native Western Australia and the mining sector, which had been his occupation before the war. I had the pleasure of interviewing Mr Royle twice in his later life and this fine gentleman had many interesting insights into that period, including the fact he did not like The Great Escape depiction and glamorisation of the event, particularly the fictionalised adventures played

by Steve McQueen. Mr Royle died in August 2015, aged 101, at his nursing home in Nedlands. One of his prized possessions was an old black and white album of photographs of life inside the camp, all made possible by a kind German soldier/officer who was a photography enthusiast.

Flight Lieutenant Paul Gordon Royle.

Image: Gordon Royle/AP

24 | THE IRISH SCENE

LOST LANDMARKS While great advances were made in navigational techniques and equipment, as the war rolled on it was still not uncommon for air crews from every side to lose their bearings or get hopelessly lost during missions, particularly at night time. Irish authorities came up with a simple way to make itself known to passing pilots. The name Éire – Ireland in the Irish language – was spelt out in large letters (and a number to denote which one it was) made from whitewashed rocks and stone at distinctive spots dotted around the Irish coastline that would be easily visible to overhead aircraft. Many of these (particularly on the west coast of Ireland) are in windswept and barren places and have remained well known local landmarks even to this day.

But a couple of years ago a massive gorse fire on Bray Head, Co. Wicklow, exposed the scorched but largely intact site of one of these Éire signs that had become overgrown and lost from memory (above).

It was rediscovered about seventy years later by the joint efforts of the Irish Air Corps who were fighting the fire and the Garda helicopter.

WA’S POWS Australia and of course Western Australia were not devoid of their own POW experiences. In and around Perth camps were set up at Fremantle Prison, Woodmans Point, Rottnest (for civilians who were nationals of enemy countries living in WA) and slightly further afield in Northam and Harvey. The main camp was at Marrinup, in the Shire of Murray, about 60kms southeast of Perth. All up about 1200 German and Italian POWS were detained. These men were generally put to work on local farms and were paid in tokens they could swap for things like tobacco and chocolates.

According to the Heritage Council of WA the Marrinup POW camp – officially called No. 16 POW Camp – is the only example of a permanent purpose built WWII camp in WA. It was closed and disassembled in 1946 and none of the watch towers, accommodation blocks or other buildings have survived but their foundations and evidence of other features such as latrines, garden terraces and gardens, paths and drains can still be found there. While detention could no doubt be hard and prone to long bouts of boredom for the inmates life there was not without its highlights. “The prisoners were popular with the local people, and it has been said that some of the ‘enemy’ could be found drinking with at the Dwellingup Hotel,” the Heritage Council

WINGMEN AND WARRIORS

states in its assessment report for the historic site.

Life at Marrinup got a little more interesting after September 1943 when Italy surrendered to the Allies and joined their side. The Italian POWs were not released but now the situation became even more complicated when they split into two opposing hostile groups, Royalists and Fascists, and the camp

had to be expanded to keep the two rival factions apart. When Merrinup was closed Italian POWs were transferred to Northam. Soldiers who had been masons before the war used their skills to build two monuments to their experience at Northam. It is believed these POW built monuments are the only ones of their kind still standing in Australia.

‘BUTTER GUN’ WEAPON OF CHOICE FOR IRISH ARMY The Steyr AUG (Army Universal Rifle) is the standard service weapon used by Irish soldiers and sailors. The semi-automatic assault rifle is common to various armies – including Australia – but the arms deal that put it into their hands must be unique to Ireland and one of the most unusual in modern military history.

The Steyr entered service with the Irish Defence Forces in 1988. At that time the Irish economy was in bad shape, unemployment was high and the dole queues or lines of people trying to get out of the country were long. Only a few short years later the bleak Irish situation would be transformed into the ‘Celtic Tiger’ or ‘Champagne’ economy, but at the time it was just a question of survival.

The Irish government might have been cash strapped but one thing it did have a lot of was butter, indeed there were ‘mountains’ of the stuff in storage in giant European warehouses. This was the era of wine lakes and grain mountains, where the surplus agricultural produce was put into storage until it could be decided what to do with it all.

The Irish government proposed using some of the millions of pounds of Irish butter to trade for the new service weapons needed to equip the defence forces.

On the other side of the equation, Steyr Daimler

Puch – the Austrian weapons makers – saw some benefit in the exchange and the deal was done. It is speculated that the Austrians – who would not become a member state of the European Union for another seven years – sold on the butter at a tidy profit to Eastern European countries who were hungry for the dairy commodity and who would soon shake off the shackles of Communism and the Soviet Union. In honour of the horse trading that got the Steyr into service with the Irish military the weapon was nicknamed ‘The Butter Gun’ (thanks to my friend from Galway Ian Jordan for telling me about the origins of this story).

In theory, the Irish butter business could bankroll the Irish army, Air Corps and Navy. In Budget 2020 the Department of Defence was allocated more than a billion euro to carry out its operations. According to the 2019/20 Bord Bia (Irish Food Board) annual report, Ireland’s dairy sector is the strongest performer in terms of food and drink exports, worth about €4.4bn in 2019, of which butter alone was worth €1.1bn, up by 13% on the previous years figure.

If packaged into standard eight-ounce blocks and put end to end, Irish exports of butter could stretch around the globe three times. That’s one form of global domination!

THE IRISH SCENE | 25

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BY LLOYD GORMAN

‘LIFE IS JUST A SERIES OF NEGOTIATIONS’ Member of Parliament for the WA electorate of Cowan in the House of Representatives Anne Aly, is also an expert on the subject of terrorism. Speaking in the House last October (22nd) she spoke at length about a research trip to the UK in 2015, which gave her some deep and lasting insights into the Troubles in Northern Ireland and in life generally.

“I was looking at the motivations and the mobilisers of terrorism,” she told the chamber. “I went on Anne Aly this research trip specifically to speak to former terrorist operatives, and I stress the word ‘former’. It was around this time of year that I met a fellow by the name of Sean O’Callaghan. In the 1970s, O’Callaghan was just a teenager when he joined the ranks of the IRA and became a fairly senior operative in part of the conflict in Northern Ireland. By the time he turned 20, O’Callaghan was already an experienced terrorist.

But, in November 1988, O’Callaghan walked into a police station at Tunbridge Wells and handed himself in, confessing to his involvement in the murder of a Special Branch detective inspector in Northern Ireland in 1974. He pleaded guilty to a whole range of charges and, for his part in the IRA conflict, he was sentenced to 539 years—a pretty big sentence.

O’Callaghan only served eight of those 539 years.

He was granted a royal prerogative. The reason that he was handed this royal prerogative is that, before handing himself in, he had spent around 14 years as an undercover informant with the Garda, the Irish police force.

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“When I went to the UK, I wanted to meet with Sean O’Callaghan. He had had several death threats and evaded attempts on his life by the IRA when his role as an informant came out. I was told that I had 15 minutes with him. I met him in a public cafe in Soho.

Those 15 minutes turned into five hours, sitting there, drinking coffee and talking with a man who had spent a good part of his teenage years as a high-level terrorist operative involved in a very well-known conflict. When I first approached Sean, he looked me up and down and said, ‘You’re an academic.’ I said, ‘Yes; I am.’ He said, ‘I suppose you want to know

Sean O’Callaghan why I joined the IRA and why I left the IRA?’ I looked at him and I said, ‘No, Mr O’Callaghan, I don’t want to know that, because I’ve read your book.’ He had written a book called The Informer, which was on The New York Times bestseller list, by the way. He said, ‘Well, why are you here and why do you want to meet me?’ and I said, ‘Because I want to know why it is that you do what you do now,’ because for the last 10 years of his life, Sean O’Callaghan had devoted all his time to working with young violent offenders—getting

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them off the streets, getting them into employment and getting them onto a positive pathway of life.

“Anyway, Sean and I sat there for five hours, and in the middle of all this he turned to me and said, ‘You know, Anne’ — because he was Irish – ‘life is just a series of negotiations, isn’t it?’ I looked at him and said, ‘What do you mean by that, Sean — life is just a series of negotiations?’ and he said: ‘Well, you get up in the morning, you decide whether you’re going to get in there, have a shower, get out there, go to work—do something positive—or whether you’re going to stay in bed, whether you’re going to drink, whether you’re going to watch TV. You make choices. That’s what life is. Life is about choices.’ Then he said to me, ‘But what if you never had a choice, or what if you never felt like you had a choice?’ He said, ‘It’s not rocket science. All you need to do for these kids’ — because he was talking about the young people that he worked with — ‘is give them a choice, give them an opportunity.’

“That phrase, ‘Life is just a series of negotiations’, has stuck with me, and not just in my personal life. You know those days, when you’re all frustrated and you’d just like to sit there? I just go: ‘Life is just a series of negotiations, Anne.

Life is just a series of negotiations.’

It stuck with me, and not just for its personal relevance. It became the underlying philosophy for my charitable work and for the charity that I set up, working with young people: the idea that, if there’s somebody who doesn’t feel like they have an opportunity, if you show them that they do have choices, that they do have opportunities, and you guide them into making the right choice, you can change their lives—and not just their lives but the lives

nurses at the JHC are thousands of their families, the lives of their community and ultimately the of hardworking people who keep lives of an entire society, for the our hospital running and provide betterment of our nation. Indeed, us with world-class health care I would say that that close to home. I phrase, ‘Life is just a thank each and every series of negotiations’, one of those people drives what I do here at the Joondalup today. When I think of Health Campus—all that phrase and I hear 3,473 of them—for the Prime Minister say their service to our the phrase, ‘Those who community. An have a go get a go’, it important individual makes me think about staff member is what Sean O’Callaghan disaster management said.” Mr O’Callaghan Mary McConnell coordinator, Mary died three years ago, McConnell. A aged 62. seasoned nurse who worked in

IRISH WOMEN RECOGNISED IN PARLIAMENT FOR ACHIEVEMENTS Joondalup MP Emily Hamilton paid tribute to the hard work and commitment of medicos in the fights against COVID-19 – highlighting the role of one Irish nurse in particular.

“This year has been a year like no other for locals living in Joondalup, Western Australia and the world more broadly as we tackle the challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic,” the Labor MP said in parliament on November 18.

“Every Western Australian should be proud that together we have been able to stop the spread of COVID-19 and keep our state safe and strong. Behind our frontline Emily Hamilton (left) doctors and

Ireland during the IRA bombings, Mary has spent years helping at the JHC training for situations just like the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, in November last year, she ran a pandemic-scenario training session involving the JHC infection control team and other staff.

When the pandemic was declared just a few months later, the JHC employees were well and truly ready and that was in no small way thanks to Mary!”*.

Another Irishwoman came in for special mention for her contribution to the community

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during the same debate, this time

by Lisa Loraine Barker, member for Maylands.

“This morning, I was very privileged to host an event outside the Aboriginal People’s Room to launch the reimagining homes

Lisa Barker innovation project, which has been developed by researcher Liz Lennon and supported by Shelter WA and Connect Victoria Park. I am very proud to have been part of that,” Ms Barker said. “Liz developed the document titled ‘Reimagining Homes Innovation Project’. Liz’s presentation, which is funded and supported by Connect Victoria Park and Shelter WA, tells a story of citizens in Australia, specifically in Western Australia, who are invisible, silent and well-behaved, despite the fact that they are often lowly paid or unpaid. They are patient, persistent and remarkably resilient. They never feel quite safe or secure in housing because it does not feel like a home. They do not look too far into the future because they see despair. They will become the unpaid carers for adult children, grandparents, parents 30 | THE IRISH SCENE

and friends. They will be the first to volunteer in their communities and they have great stories to tell.

These citizens are older women, specifically older single women, on low incomes, who number in the hundreds of thousands across Australia, living in housing stress and at risk of homelessness.

“This framework was created by Liz from her own experience of housing stress and homelessness in Ireland and Western Australia through her 50s, and now into her 60s. When Liz returned to WA in 2015 after living in Ireland for more than 20 years—the last six years in Ireland were a mix of housesitting and living in fairly poor housing conditions as a result of the global financial crisis decimating the country and her consultancy—she decided that she would rather be poor in a warm country than in a cold one, so she returned to Australia! I am very glad that she has done that.

“Liz has produced the reimagining homes innovation project and a “lookbook”, as she calls it, which provides more than 40 Liz Lennon examples of affordable social housing led by or focused on older single women on low incomes, older people, other people on low incomes, and a range of communities of identity who may also be on lower incomes.

This lookbook is exactly what members might think it is. It is a book depicting the incredible talent and creativity that architects from all over the world have brought when building homes

for older single women, which create a community and meet their expectation and lifestyle needs.” *In her role as Disaster Management Coordinator at Joondalup Mary McConnell is interviewed for the Out of Touch: COVID Stories from WA by the Centre for Stories in Northbridge, which is easy to find online – https://centreforstories.com/ story/mary-mcconnell/ – and is well worth listening to. Mary speaks clearly and gives a unique perspective on the preparations and first responses to the health crisis and her own differing encounters with the virus in Australia and Ireland.

“I think we first heard a mention of COVID in January and it was a case of dust off the plans, see what we’ve got but you know what we’ll probably not need it,” Mary says in the online piece which runs for just over 12 minutes. “And then it went to February and it was really starting to heat up. I had booked a flight to go home to Ireland on February 14, so I thought, I’m going, if I end up in quarantine I end up in quarantine. So I went back. Australia was all over COVID. They were advertising what you needed to look out for.

Arrived into Ireland and there was African swine flu was the only advertisement I’d seen. Not a mention of COVID anywhere, I wasn’t asked where I’d been, where I came from, had I worn a mask. It was like put your blinkers on and don’t worry about it, which was frightening.”

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VALE DAME MARGARET GUILFOYLE A daughter of Belfast was honoured in the Australian parliament in December.

“Dame Margaret Guilfoyle, AC, DBE, will be remembered as one of Australia’s most significant women,” said Victorian Margaret Guilfoyle Senator Sarah Henderson on December 1, one of a number of politicians in the chamber to pay tribute. “She was committed to her family and she was committed to her country.

Dame Margaret was elected as a senator for Victoria in 1970, commencing her term in July 1971. After serving as opposition spokesperson for education and the media, Dame Margaret served as a cabinet minister for much of the Fraser government, commencing in 1975. Born in Belfast in Northern Ireland in 1926, Dame Margaret’s family migrated to Melbourne shortly after that.

Tragically, her father died when she was just 10 years old. With her mother now raising three children alone, Dame Margaret said later that she learned that, at any time, a woman must be capable of independence.”

RIGHT TIME TO END 100 YEAR WRONG A move is underway to correct the record on a rare political oddity in the history of the Australian parliamentary system involving an Irish born West Australian politician.

Graham Perrett, member for and was a strong supporter of Irish Moreton, Queensland, who is self-government. As it turned out, behind the bid, was not going to he was on the right side of history. let the centennial anniversary of Mahon attended a public meeting the event go unnoticed. in his capacity as President of the Irish-Ireland League following “In this House, 100 years the death in a London prison ago today, a grave injustice of the Sinn Fein Lord Mayor of occurred,” Mr Perrett said Cork. Hugh Mahon’s statement at on November 12, 2020. that meeting led to the motion to “At 5 am on this day in remove him from the House for 1920, debate concluded on sedition and disloyalty. the motion proposed by the Prime Minister Billy The democratic foundation of this Hughes to expel the Labor institution is that the members member for Kalgoorlie, of this House are democratically Hugh Mahon, from this elected by their constituents.

House. The member for Voters, not the executive Kalgoorlie was sick government, and not present are our bosses. when this debate Executive and vote occurred. The vote government divided on party lines and should never resulted in the democratical get to decide ly elected member for who sits in this Kalgoorlie being expelled House. That from the Parliament of is going down Australia. What a way to the road that treat a founding member leads towards of the federal parliament! fascism. We Hugh Mahon is the only Hugh Mahon need to make member ever to be expelled right what from federal parliament. happened to Hugh Mahon, and The member for Fremantle and I I’m glad the member for Fremantle know that he, like most founding and others are taking up this members of the Australian cause.” parliament, was not born in Josh Wilson, who represents Australia. He was born in Ireland Fremantle, also spoke about the issue shortly after Mr Perrett.

“The partisan expulsion of Hugh Mahon from the Australian parliament 100 years ago was a serious injustice and it was a dangerous misstep in the early life of this parliament,” he said.

“It’s a reminder that we should consider our parliamentary system, its procedures and culture very carefully. Essentially, Hugh Mahon was expelled for daring to criticise the British Empire and its conduct in Ireland. It was a time when the issue carried a feverish charge and there Graham Perrett CONTINUED ON PAGE 32

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 31

was in Australia a transplanted sectarian divide between different parts of the Christian faith. Now that prejudice has significantly abated, but there will always be new forms of misunderstanding and prejudice. Indeed, in the last month, we have seen prejudicial and frankly ridiculous conduct

Josh Wilson (right) within a parliamentary inquiry process towards Australian citizens who happen to have Chinese heritage. I reflect that in 2019 the members for Pearce and Aston—oddly enough—called for my resignation from parliament for having the temerity to observe that checkpoints in Israel could be gravely dangerous for Palestinians.

I waited to hear protests from the great champions of free speech on that side of the House—the great champions of the need for Australian parliamentarians to speak freely about conflict resolution and human rights in other parts of the world. Do you know what? I did not hear a single squeak. The expulsion of Hugh Mahon was wrong and we should acknowledge it in an appropriate way, but the enduring lesson of the Hugh Mahon debacle is that we must protect and improve our democratic institutions and culture at every opportunity.”

Tony Burke, member for Watson, said the example – the 32 | THE IRISH SCENE

only example of its kind – of should be allowed to speak.”

Mahon being expelled from the On November 30 under ‘private parliament was an attack on members business’ Mr Perrett democracy and was something launched an attempt to have that could never happen again the federal parliament officially thanks to the Parliamentary recognise and overturn the Privileges Act. injustice against Mahon. There are “A motion was moved on 11 very good reasons why it should November to expel him from the happen he argued. parliament,” said Mr “The Joint Select Committee Burke. “He got notification on Parliamentary Privilege from [Prime Minister] Billy Hughes that it was going to reviewed Mahon’s expulsion happen while he was in his back in 1984 and concluded electorate on the 10th. So it that the government majority in the House of Representatives was impossible for him to had demonstrably misused its make it to the parliament. powers,” Mr Perrett explained.

They started the debate.

“The Mahon family have lived Effectively, he was too prowith this injustice for 100 years.

Irish and not pro-English enough for the day. Having I first spoke about Hugh Mahon’s expulsion in 2016 in this House. I been democratically asked at the time that the House elected, he was expelled recognise it was unjust and a from the House of Representatives misuse of power. Not only has on a vote along party lines, on the there been no recognition of this basis of what he was said to have said in documents that were never injustice but, in 2018, then Prime disclosed but which Billy Hughes Minister Malcolm Turnbull, once claimed to have— documents that a Republican, publicly referred he referred to as affidavits to Mahon having that were written by been ‘convicted of journalists who alleged treason’. Now two to have heard what had prime ministers been said. In noting have wrongly it now, we should just stated that Hugh note how wrong it Mahon was guilty was. Similarly, what of treason— happened at the end of Hughes and the debate is that the Turnbull. government of the day Anne Stanley, moved a gag motion and Tony Burke the member for gagged the debate. For Werriwa in NSW those of us who actually and oppositiion support freedom of whip, supported speech, it’s an important Perrett’s motion, 100th anniversary to and the matter is acknowledge that part to be debated by of that means, when the parliamentarians public vote for someone, at a future date. they should be able to Irish Scene will serve their term here. report back on the And, when something is Anne Stanley being debated, people issue.

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BY LLOYD GORMAN

Western Australia, and the rest of the country, are never far from the hearts and minds of many in Ireland, particularly those who have lived and worked here or amongst those still with family still here. Interest in WA in particular is high if this sample of news and feature articles amongst some of Ireland’s traditional print media are anything to go by....

PATIENT A MARKS D-DAY A photograph of Margaret Kennan, a grandmother from Northern Ireland, dominated the front page of the West Australian – and many other newspapers and news outlets around the world – on December 9 when the grandmother became ‘patient A’, the first person in the UK – or anywhere – to be given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. The 90 year old woman – who turned 91 the following week – described the jab as “the best early birthday present”.

WAToday was quick off the mark on December 29 and one of the first to report that Ireland had started COVID-19 vaccinations. 79 year old Dublin woman Annie Lynch was first in line at St James’s Hospital, where she is a resident in the hospitals’ Mercer’s Institute for Successful Ageing (right).

“I feel very privileged to be the first person in Ireland to receive the vaccine,” Annie, a native of Drimnagh, said. “Like everyone else I have been waiting for the vaccine and I really feel like there is a bit of hope there now. It’s brilliant that it’s here. Everything was explained very clearly to me beforehand.”

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Health minister Stephen Donnelly said: “Today is a ray of light after what has been a trying year in our country. It is testament to the work of the medical and scientific communities that we now have safe and effective vaccines to help to protect us against the devastating effects of COVID-19”.

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A VERY GUILTY CHRISTMAS Just two days before December 25 Irish Times (IT) journalist Frank McNally made a confession about a ‘guilty’ Christmas he experienced in ‘a sweltering Perth’.

Then a younger man in his twenties, McNally flew (on a whopping £1,200 plane ticket to Perth – the cheapest option at the time) in October, expecting it to be the launching pad for a 12 month national tour as a backpacker. But he soon found his hopes for carefree adventures got bogged down in work. Young, free and single McNally found Perth to be a nice place but a bit quiet so he eventually booked a Greyhound bus to Adelaide for St. Stephens Day. The only hitch was how to break the news to his boss – a builder from Armagh – that he was going. While he had never intended to stay for long McNally found that he and his ‘employer’ had: “bonded quickly, as fellow Border men, and I suspect he was starting to see me as the son he didn’t have. He certainly had longerterm plans. Surveying my weedy frame on one occasion, he said: “We must get you into a gym after Christmas.”

He also mentioned me joining the GAA club.” Even as he shared Christmas dinner and drinks with the Armagh man and his wife McNally tried to scrap up the courage to tell them he was leaving. You can find out what happened at: irishtimes.com/ opinion/down-under-and-out-frankmcnally-on-guilty-memories-of-anaustralian-christmas-1.4444853 Angst of different kind about travel restrictions on Irish people in Australia was also evident in another IT article, headed “Home now a no-go for Irish in Australia: “knowing you can’t is really hard”, just the day before.

Journalist Kate Nic Dhomhnaill reported about the plight of four Irish families in Australia, including two in Western Australia.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 36

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“Nick Carrigan is a psychiatrist from Clara in Co. Kilkenny. He lives in Bunbury in regional Western Australia with his wife, Allison, from Kilbeggan, in Westmeath, who is also a psychiatrist, and their three children,” the article stated.

“Usually, the Carrigans return to Kilkenny or Westmeath, or have family travel for Christmas. “Its been tough, we haven’t seen any of them for over a year now. My parents are a bit older and they’re not so good with technology. We phone as often as we can, but it’s not the same. We’re lucky here, we don’t have serious restrictions on how many people can gather, so it’ll be normal but without family.”

Edwina King, from Tramore in Waterford “really” wanted to spend Christmas at home because her partner’s sister is having a baby.

“With her business in Perth, King, 10 years in Australia, has no plans to go back to Ireland,” Nic Dhomhnaill reported. “However, many Irish friends have returned.

“COVID has been the driving factor for people to move home.

I’ve never been homesick ever, I love it in Australia, but I think it’s the fact that you’re not allowed to go home that makes you want to go more. It’s just the uncertainty and feeling restricted because before now you could just jump on a plane.”

The article also included input from Ciara Newport, from New Ross, Co. Wexford who now lives on the Central Coast of New South Wales with her fiance and two children as well as Sarah Whelan, from Swords, Co. Dublin, a social worker (runs Irish Women Abroad) who lives in New South Wales.

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ROB KEARNEY TACKLES QUARANTINE IN AUSTRALIA Irish rugby legend Rob Kearney and his fiancée Jess Redden packed their bags and left Ireland shortly after Christmas to come to Perth for his new club the Western Force, we learned from an Irish Independent article by Ciara O’Loughlin on December 30. Their arrival into Australia saw them make their first stop at Brisbane where the couple had to go into mandatory hotel quarantine – an unsettling experience all round.

Kearney’s 26 year old fitness model partner took to Instagram to document and share their 14 day experience.

"It was the oddest experience I felt like we had the plague or something!!” she wrote about arriving into Brisbane. “We were all transported by bus and escorted by officers (who are lovely!) they bring you to your room and guard your floor each day and night. It’s all very well organised over here.”

Squashed into what looks like a modest sized hotel room with windows that can’t be opened, the couple are using the time (and confinement) as best they can to keep fit.

“I’m sure some days will get tough, I’ll really miss fresh air and exercise but we can’t leave the room at all or open a window - but the view is pretty,” she said. “We were assigned a hotel in the airport so only found out once we landed. I cannot wait to breathe fresh air again in 13 days' time.”

No doubt they were glad to reach Perth eventually where hopefully for their sake they didn’t have to go through the same ordeal again. independent.ie/style/celebrity/we-cant-even-open-a-windowrob-kearneys-fiancee-documents-their-14-day-hotel-quarantinein-australia-39909827.html

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A MINE OF INFORMATION James Donnelly, originally from Brocagh, Co. Tyrone, wrote an interesting piece for the Irish News on November 23, 2020 about his experience as a diesel mechanic at a mine in WA and the impact of the virus on the job and his own personal plans.

“I had been working 12-hour days for two weeks on and then a week off,” James wrote. “When the pandemic came, we were shifted to two weeks on and two weeks off, which was alright but sure you could do nothing on your two weeks off only go for a walk. They set up a testing centre at the domestic terminal two which is for chartered flights for Fly In Fly Out

(Fifo) workers and now when we go to work we get our temperature taken. Until very recently we then got a finger prick blood sample test for the antibodies that fight COVID. If the result came back positive, you had to go for a proper COVID test. They also closed the bar and gym on the mine site and brought social distancing and a one-way system into the food hall. It was pretty tough on men because when the bar and gym were closed we didn't really have anything to do in the evening, except get a few take away beers and sit socially distanced outside our rooms and chat. That didn't really last very long though, as WA started to remove the lockdown phases on May 10. Overall it's pretty much back to normal work-wise.”

The restrictions played havoc with the Fly in Fly out system, with workers getting stuck in WA or going home to find work locally.

As a result there was a labour CONTINUED ON PAGE 38

Padraig Flanagan, a native of Dromahair, Co. Leitrim, found a way to help out on the family farm while in Perth. Reported first by the Irish Farmers Journal (November 11) and then picked up by the Roscommon Herald (November 14), Padraig bought three cattle at home by getting up early and going through Martbids from Perth, where he lives and works.

The heifers were sold at 9.30pm Irish time/5.30am Australian time. “We need a few replacement heifers at home and my father wouldn’t be that good on computers so I logged on and bid away until we got what we wanted,” Padraig told the Irish Farmers Journal.

After that he called the mart and paid for the livestock with his card. His father was then able to pick them up and take them away. “I’m not sure what the lady in the mart office thought and I was going to have a bit of fun with her and ask her were the heifers export tested and would there be a trailer going for my wife,” Padraig added. roscommonherald.ie/2020/11/14/buying-cattle-in-elphinfrom-a-desk-in-australia/ THE IRISH SCENE | 37

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shortage and wages went through the roof.

“As for myself, it's been tough,” he added. “I had planned on going home to help my father on the farm and see everyone this summer, but that didn't happen because I wouldn't get back into Australia as I'm not a permanent resident or a citizen. All being well hopefully I'll get home next summer for a couple of

weeks, if they have started international travel again and a vaccine is available. I miss everyone at home a whole lot, but at the same time, I think I'm in the best place in the world I could be for this pandemic.” irishnews.com/news/worldnews/2020/11/23/ news/coronavirus-what-does-the-new-normallook-like-around-the-world-2118451/

PARTING IS SUCH SWEET SORROW A four page property feature in the Irish Independent on September 26, 2020 hinted at the departure of another couple from Irish shores. The ‘Parting is such sweet sorrow’ article looked at the sale of No.8 Cúil Chluthair in Hermitage, Co. Cork. The owners built it in the heady days of the Celtic Tiger as their dream home, but have now decided to move to Portugal where the husband is from.

His wife hails from Perth.

They met in the early 1990’s at Isaac’s Hostel where she was on a backpackers tour of the world and he was a mechanic. When they were able to build their dream home in the mid 2000’s they knew what they

38 | THE IRISH SCENE

wanted from it. “No.8’s an impressive and airy home of 4,3200 sq ft, with an integrated 500sq ft garage, which they say was deliberately designed to be very open plan, in a contemporary style, reflecting the look of places they liked as far away as Australia, and as near as Portugal. But now, after a quarter of a century in Cork, as well as spells living and working abroad in other countries and cultures they are off, having secured a site near the Atlantic coast with views, a short distance north of Lisbon.”

The Australian lady in question is the daughter of one Judy O’Brien, a lovely woman who volunteers weekly at the Vinnies op shop in Cambridge Street, Wembley.

Judy – who has been to the Cork house and Ireland several times – often wears a beautiful Celtic broach which is what sparked our first conversation.

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MASS MURDERER? THE BODKIN ADAMS ENIGMA

BY JOHN HAGAN

It was a wintry evening in late January 1957.

I was crouched in the corner of the Prefect’s Room at Coleraine Inst (CAI) patiently trying to heat up my last packet of Cuppa Soup on the room’s wheezing bunsen burner.

Suddenly, the door opened and my English teacher entered. ‘Ah, Hagan, there you are.

I have a job for you’, he intoned. ‘What’s that sir?’ I enquired, glancing up. ‘Well, the Headmaster has been contacted by the press to see if we can provide some information on a former pupil. As you are a member of the school magazine committee you will be able to consult back copies and archives to discover something about him. His name is ----‘. Unfortunately at that moment my soup came to the boil and I missed the vital moniker. ‘What was that again sir?’

I enquired, while hastily reducing the gas.

With some exasperation, he strode over to the prefect’s roster board, picked up a piece of chalk and inscribed, in capitals, the name ‘JOHN BODKIN ADAMS’. Little did I know it then, but that simple task would introduce me to a monster.

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EARLY DAYS John Bodkin Adams was born in Randalstown (Co Antrim) on 21 January, 1899. His father, Samuel, was a watchmaker and preacher at the village Plymouth Brethren hall, while Adams’ mother was reputed to be, ‘The holiest woman in Ireland’. In 1910, Adams was sent to CAI where, like me, he boarded. The one remarkable thing I discovered about Adams’ time at the school was how unremarkable he was. His name did not appear in school society minutes nor was there a record as to sporting prowess. However, he must have worked diligently, as in 1916 he was admitted to study medicine at Queen’s University, Belfast. During his time at Queen’s, he joined the Officer Training Corps, but seemingly made few friends and was described by his lecturers as being ‘socially awkward’ and something of ‘a plodder’.

In 1921, Adams graduated choosing to accept an internship at Bristol Infirmary. Unfortunately, he seemingly lacked the necessary acumen and fortitude for hospital medicine, so he was encouraged by his superiors to join a Christian general practice in Eastbourne (Sussex), which he did in 1922.

EASTBOURNE In those days, Eastbourne, a pleasant and prosperous south coast seaside town was home to many of England’s retired and wealthy. It was colloquially

MASS MURDERER? THE BODKIN ADAMS ENIGMA Left: Dr. Adams cultivated a practice consisting of wealthy elderly patients with high social standing. referred to as ‘God’s waiting room’ because of the large numbers of elderly persons who lived there. Throughout his university career Adams had coped with his lack of talent through hard work, a trait which soon gained him a high reputation and status. He was prepared to make house calls at any hour of the day or night, and this devotion soon delivered him many of Eastbourne’s wealthy and influential patients. Recognised as being kind and compassionate, Adams continued to prosper during the 1920s, and by 1928 his financial status was such that he could afford to employ a chauffeur to drive him about in his two prestige cars, one of which was a Rolls Royce.

Such ostentatious prosperity soon aroused widespread scuttlebutt amongst Eastbourne’s chattering classes, especially when it became known that many of Adams’ elderly patients who passed away left the physician substantial bequests in their wills.

SUSPICIONS One such patient was Matilda Whitton, a frail, elderly and wealthy widow. During her final weeks of life, Mrs. Whitton altered her will to disinherit her children in favour of Adams, to whom she bequeathed her fortune. One of the nurses, who visited Matilda at the hotel in which she resided, raised suspicions, believing that Adams was overmedicating his patient with large amounts of barbiturates and morphine.

Her concerns however, fell on deaf ears. Nonetheless, unease spread rapidly through the community with Adams being the recipient of many threatening letters warning him not to ‘bump off any more wealthy widows’.

During World War II and beyond, Adams’ wealth continued to grow and by 1946 he was considered to be the richest general practitioner in England, as increasingly more vociferous gossip escalated about how the ‘pink, beefy, spectacled doctor’ practiced medicine. Like Matilda Whitton, numerous of his patients lingered in a semi-comatose state for weeks, or even months, though many had been in apparent good health before consulting Adams.

It was the death and autopsy of wealthy widow, Bobbie Hutton in 1956 that finally caught the

attention of the police. At Ms Hutton’s inquest Adams insinuated that she was suicidal, having never fully recovered from the death of her second husband.

However, a post mortem revealed she had died from pneumonia as a result of barbiturate poisoning. In her will, Hutton had bequeathed Adams £1,000.

ARREST Despite Adams’ social status and his leadership of the Young Crusader Bible Group, the Chief Constable of Sussex felt the damaging tittle-tattle could no longer be ignored, given that over 130 of Adams’ deceased patients had bestowed on him an array of gifts and legacies. Scotland Yard, was called in, and despite the widespread rumours that police were investigating as many as 300 suspicious deaths related to Adams, he was eventually charged, on 19 December 1956, with only one – that of Edith Morrell, a widow who died in 1950 after a long ‘illness’. During his treatment of Morrell, three nurses stated that they had witnessed Adams administer large quantities of morphine and heroin. The doctor recorded Morrell’s cause of death as ‘cerebral hemorrhage’ an explanation he had cited many times previously following the demise of a patient. In addition to this, Adams lied on her cremation form, denying that he had substantially benefitted from her passing.

TRIAL Adams was committed for the murder of Edith Morrell. His trial at the Old Bailey, which commenced in March 1957, proved to be one of the most dramatic, plot-twisting court cases in British legal history.

Two expert witnesses, on whom the prosecution depended, were unanimous in their opinion that Adams’ treatment had been designed to kill Mrs. Morrell. Nevertheless, both these testimonies were demolished by the defence team, led by Sir Geoffrey Lawrence QC. Despite the evidence of other witnesses who attested to Adams administering dangerous doses of narcotics, his legal team picked holes in what the prosecution thought to be a strong case.

This outcome arose as the defence obtained inside information on the police case, and also from the fact that Adams was in a homosexual relationship with the Deputy Chief Constable of Eastbourne. Adams’ cause was also enhanced because Lawrence chose not to put his client in the witness box. This decision CONTINUED ON PAGE 42

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MASS MURDERER? THE BODKIN ADAMS ENIGMA CONTINUED FROM PAGE 41

was prompted by Lawrence’s fear that Adams, known to be a colossal windbag, might incriminate himself under cross-examination. When the judge summed up in favour of the defence, it wasn’t surprising that the jury agreed, acquitting Adams of murder, and the hangman’s noose, in just 45 minutes.

AFTERMATH Despite the not guilty verdict, the police, together with most of Britain, believed Adams guilty, not just of one murder, but of many. The national press too shared this view, with one Fleet Street journalist stating that in order to spare the lives of other patients, the police had been obliged to mount a hasty prosecution even though their case was ‘not quite ready’. On hearing the verdict, Adams celebrated his acquittal by arranging a slap-up dinner with friends, although he could find no room at the table for his barrister, Geoffrey Lawrence.

Despite his trial exoneration, Adams did suffer some consequences. Based on evidence uncovered during the trial, he was charged with forging prescriptions and lying on cremation forms, leading him to fined £2,400, and suffer the indignity of being struck off the Medical Register, apparently ending his career as a physician.

Adams retired to his comfortable life in Eastbourne where he used his enforced leisure to successfully sue several newspapers for libel, as well as selling his ‘exclusive story’ to the Daily Express for £10,000. After two unsuccessful applications to be reinstated as a doctor, he was allowed to resume his medical career in 1961, and subsequently was elected President (and honorary Medical Officer) of the British Clay Pigeon Shooting Association. It was while indulging in clay pigeon shooting that, on 3 June 1983, he fell and injured his hip. He was admitted to Eastbourne Hospital (where he had previously administered copious drafts of barbiturates) and, aged 84, died on 4 July 1983 of ‘ventricular failure’. He left an estate worth £402,970 (about AUD$3 million in today’s value), which was divided amongst 20 lady friends, his chauffeur, his housekeeper, his clay pigeon shooting chums, and his grocer. Commenting on the trial many years later, Lord Chief Justice Devlin was of the opinion that Adams was probably ‘a mercenary mercy killer’.

Since his death, a number of books and TV documentaries have been produced examining the Adams case. The general conclusion of these is that John Bodkin Adams conspired in the deaths of about 300 of his patients, earning him the dubious title of being Britain’s ‘most successful serial killer’.

42 | THE IRISH SCENE

FOOTNOTE: Adams ceased paying his subscription to the Coleraine Old Boys Association at the end of 1956, a mere few months before he was charged.

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THE IRISH SCENE | 43

MATTERS OF PUB-LIC INTEREST

BY LLOYD GORMAN

PINTS AND TRIBUTES FLOWED FOR THE CLOSURE OF ONE OF PERTH’S BEST KNOWN AND MUCH LOVED IRISH PUBS LATE LAST YEAR. Having recently weathered the pandemic after three decades of screening GAA and rugby games, busy St. Patrick’s Days and great nights out and being a great place to work or find work as well as staging visiting Irish acts as well as local talent, Rosie O’Grady’s ceased to be at the end of November 2020. “It’s sad to say that our time here at Rosies is coming to an end,� Scott and Annie (Frazer) said in a message on the pub’s Facebook site on November 24. “We would like to say thank you to all our beautiful family members who have worked for us over the years. Sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, nieces, and nephews. You all know who you are. To staff past and present who are now also part of our family, thank you for all your fun and hardwork. You are all amazing!

To our regulars and our customers, it has been an absolute pleasure getting to know you all. Here’s to all the memories!

The closure had a big impact on another nearby Irish pub. “On Saturday just gone we bid farewell to our neighbours... Rosies closed their doors after 30 years. We had the pleasure of being part of the last 6 of those years. What started out as neighbours quickly turned to friendship & a sense of unity between us both We have had 6 years of laughs & we became part of each other’s lives even if it was just at times Annie feeding us or Scott’s hilarious wit & banter

Last drinks this Saturday! All our love, Scott and Annie x.�

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John Allen said: “All the best for the future Scott and Annmarie we have some great memories over the years in Rosie’s.�

44 | THE IRISH SCENE

đ&#x;’“

đ&#x;˜‚

đ&#x;?ť

We have shared staff & stories. They became a place of solace for us when we just needed 10 mins or a quick pint We have seen each other through mental days & sometimes disasters. We have remained friends & always felt apart of a team..

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To all the staff... Gavin, Clint, Mark, Tayla, Cam, Katie, Michelle, Reece, Tyler, the list goes on... Thanks for the smiles & shots To Scott & Annie, we thank you for all you have done for us and cannot express the gratitude we have for the last 6 years letting us

MATTERS OF PUB-LIC INTEREST

Left: The team from Rosie O’Grady’s.

Above: Scott with Tay and Annie be part of your lives... We wish you the utmost happiness and hope to see you soon on the right side of the bar

đ&#x;˜‰đ&#x;’?

All our love, The Girls from An Sibin.�

Customers and staff, including those who worked at the James Street venue over the years and many people back in Ireland, Scotland and elsewhere, all posted comments remembering fun and friendships.

There were even video messages for the occasion from some of the musicians who performed at the popular pub’s Cab Bar. Glasgow-born folk rock singer Gary Og said it felt like a death in the family. “It’s the only venue in Australia that I’ve played every single time, every tour, it’s one of those venues, I’m going to miss it and I’m going to miss the people there - John, Scott and everybody else, thanks for always looking

after us, for always making us feel very welcome.�

Dublin folk legend Damien Dempsey also posted a ‘big shout out’ to Rosies. “Some great nights there, some great sing songs,� the Apple of My Eye singer said. “Thanks John and Scotty and all the staff for the memories, I’ll see you somewhere along the rocky road for another sing song, maybe another venue.�

As soon as he heard about the closure of what he said was one of their favourite venues, Billy McGuinness from Aslan recorded a message – and song – to pay homage. “It was run by John and Scott, two gentlemen, they really really looked after us as they did with all the other Irish bands that played there,�

Billy said. “Its the end of an era, its like the Baggot Inn in Dublin closing down, Rosie O’Grady’s every Irish band has played there including us, we have some great memories of our nights there, especially one were we did an after party show for the staff and it was just amazing, we CONTINUED ON PAGE 46

THE IRISH SCENE | 45

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 45

still talk about it to this day. Listen John and Scott, from everyone in Aslan, the crew, the band we wish you all the best. If you’re opening another venue please consider bringing us over because we had a great time over there with youse, nothing was a problem for youse, you really really looked after us big time and I’ve been thinking of a song as a farewell”. Billy then strummed his guitar for a happy little version of Skippy, The Bush Kangaroo.

Meanwhile, the WA Glasgow Celtic Support Club – which had its own dedicated space at Rosies – are also happily settling into their new lodgings at the Irish Club.

IRISH CLUB FINDS ITS NEW MANAGER Tay & Annie

ROSIES REBORN There is a flip side to Rosie’s closing down in that it will reopen as another Irish bar!

Indeed, it’s new name tips it’s cap to a tourist mecca and one of the most famous pubs in Ireland, Johnnie Fox’s in Glencullen, Co. Dublin.

The owners Clint Nolan and Paul Moloney got the keys to the establishment on New Years Day and plan to reopen the rebranded pub in time for the 2021 Fringe World Festival, starting on January 15.

“It’s a great spot and a great opportunity,” Mr Nolan was quoted in the West Australian.

“We want to retain what’s been built over the years... and give the place a spruce up.”

Clint and his business partner are veteran operators whose hospitality empire includes such places as Alabama Song, La Cholita, Joe’s Juice Joint and Sneaky Tony’s.

46 | THE IRISH SCENE

January 1 was the official start date for the Irish Club’s recently appointed manager, but Alison Russell has already had a running start at the Townsend Road venue.

Alison started pulling the odd weekend shift about three years ago when people were needed to help out. “I said why not come down, I love the Irish,” she said.

Since then she has been a regular fixture on the catering side of the Club for meals and functions, including the monthly seniors lunch.

With a background as a wedding organiser, Alison Allison Russell (right) said she lost her job as a venue manager at the Joondalup Golf Resort when COVID hit and closed down the hospitality sector.

When the Club advertised for a manager last year she decided to have a crack.

She now plans to bring her business experience into play for the Club and to keep existing customers happy and attract new trade.

Alison is an Australian of Irish extraction, her maiden name is Kearns. Her great grandfather left Ireland to come to Australia for the gold rush era. “I have been to Ireland and did find a pub with our name on it,” she added.

SHEBEENS MUSHROOM ACROSS IRELAND Raiding illegal drinking dens has become a major task for Gardai.

As licensed public houses which pay taxes and wages remain in shut down because of yet another lockdown, shebeens are popping up left, right and centre across Ireland.

Members of the Irish police force (Gardai Siochana) stormed a packed shebeen in Co. Mayo on Sunday January 4, catching several locals red handed in the home made pub.

“People were found on the premises & a fully equipped bar was located,” Gardai said. “A significant amount of alcohol, glasses, beer taps, and a cooling unit were seized. A full investigation is now underway into this matter and files will be prepared for the Director of Public Prosecutions. An Garda Síochána would appeal to anyone with information about the operation of illegal Shebeen’s to contact their local Garda Station.”

MATTERS OF PUB-LIC INTEREST

Above: Some of the illegal shebeens found in Mayo, Rathkeale and Kildare Acting on a tip off, Gardai pounced on another suspected shebeen “with all the trappings of a traditional pub”, in Kildare town.

CÉILÍ AND SET DANCING IN PERTH!

Fifteen ‘punters’ were found at 8.30pm on New Years Eve, as were a pool table and gambling machine.

Not all shebeens are domestic operations. Gardai in Limerick are investigating allegations that one was set up in a former pub in Rathkeale, Co. Limerick, that even had an open fire burning to keep patrons comfy and warm.

A police patrol got information about unusual activity at the back of a former licensed premises.

“While conducting further inquiries, a number of persons were seen fleeing the area, through a private dwelling, on foot,” a Garda spokesperson said.

“Gardaí entered the premises and discovered a number of individuals socialising inside with large amounts of alcohol, playing cards with two open fires lit. The premises is not licensed to trade alcohol.”

Shebeens are not a new phenonemon. The word itself can be traced back to about 1780/90 and spread around the world as Irish people emigrated around the world. But it does appear that – with an estimated shebeens now operating in Ireland – that there has been a resurgence of them courtesy of COVID and clampdowns.

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THE IRISH SCENE | 47

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THE IRISH SCENE The Irish Club is a members only club, and we welcome new members. Application forms can be downloaded from the website.

| 49

30

th

ANNIVERSARY A BLAST

AT MIDWEST IRISH CLUB

After being delayed for six months by COVID 19, the anniversary celebrations took place on Saturday 28th November 2020.

The event was opened by local singer D’Arcy Hay, who sang some Irish songs in an Australian accent.

Following were the girls from Torc Ceili Club who made the long trip up from Perth. Our thanks to Caroline McCarthy, Amy Lawlor, Kate-Lynn Vaughan and Caitriona Slane for their involvement and enthusiasm.

Not only did they dance for us, but they also introduced some of the audience to the finer points.

Just before our dinner the internationally renowned “Broken Pokers” warmed up the assembled multitude (as much as it could be due to COVID regulations, we could have doubled the crowd).

After a magnificent dinner it was back to the music and frivolity, with inaugural president Paddy Monahan up and singing, followed by another ex-president, Jack Regan, not to be outdone Frank Kelly was up and into it. No way could we get existing president Sean Dillon to perform.

During the night Sean performed the naming of Regan’s Bar and Kelly’s Snug in honour of the two ex-presidents.

It was an honour to have three ex-presidents and the current president here for the event. A great night was had by all.

50 | THE IRISH SCENE

THE IRISH SCENE | 51

The glennons

‘AS A FAMILY WE HAVE CHOSEN NOT TO BE PRISONERS OF THE PAST’

BY LLOYD GORMAN

On December 23 2020 Supreme Court Justice Stephen Hall handed down a life sentence (minimum 40 years) to Claremont serial killer Bradley Edwards, 51, which the judge said would most likely mean the convicted murderer would spend his remaining days in prison. The next day Denis Glennon, the father of Ciara Glennon – one of the two young Perth women whose lives were violently ended by Edwards – delivered a dignified and powerful statement and comments which say as much about the media interest in stories such as theirs, at another seminal press conference in Police HQ, similar to the one he gave back in September after Justice Hall found Edwards guilty of murder for Ciara and Jane Rimmer (Ciara Was Strong In Spirit, Had Great Courage, Irish Scene November/December 2020). Here, as then, is a full transcript of his remarks, which according to the Irish born parents Denis (Co Mayo) and Una (Co. Monaghan) and their daughter Denise will be the final time they ever plan to speak publicly about Ciara or the long investigation and torturous trial process.

52 | THE IRISH SCENE

DENIS GLENNON:

“Thank you Commissioner for organising this... again I only speak for the Glennon family... I’ve prepared the notes and I will refer to them, I find that easier, just as I did the last time, but I’ll speak for a little less time this time.

The sentencing yesterday ends the very long investigation and judicial hearings regarding the person now convicted for Ciara’s murder. It also ends one of the darker chapters in Western Australia’s history that which has become known as the Claremont serial killings and it is apparent from the spontaneous applause, unexpected applause in the court room yesterday, when Justice Hall announced a life sentence with a minimum parole of 40 years, that the people of Perth want the convicted person never to be released from prison.

My family concurs with the judge’s decision and those public sentiments, now we continue to be contacted by the media which I understand and while recognising your obligations to your employers and your audiences, it is my family’s strong preference and a request for privacy that that be respected as much as possible.

At the last media conference here I asked that questions be deferred until another time and you kindly agreed to that, and for that I am grateful.

‘AS A FAMILY WE HAVE CHOSEN NOT TO BE PRISONERS OF THE PAST’

The questions that are still coming to us have a strong commonality in those questions and those kind of requests from the media, and what I have done is to make an honest attempt to pick the most commonly asked questions and to touch upon the most frequently asked requests and its been an honest attempt by me to do that so to meet my families desire for privacy but also to try and address the media’s requirements and wishes I’ve attempted to answer the bulk of these questions and deal with those requests in the best way that I can.

Now they are not in any particular order or priority of importance but a frequently asked question is do we speak with the Spiers family and the Rimmer family over the years and that has been asked so many times and the answer is “No, we didn’t” because I believe that every member of each family dealt with the devastation in their own way caused by the murders and understandably since the commencement of the trial we have come to see more of each other as families and to better know each other, and that applies to the families affected by the Huntingdale and Karrakatta offences and these positives we view as positive developments.

Now another question is will we participate in or contribute to the books, the articles, the other media presentations that are in preparation and of which we are aware because we have been approached. The short answer is no. This has been an exhausting journey for Una, Denise and me and the promise I made to Ciara, which you know of, to find the person responsible for her murder has been fulfilled from my families perspective and we now wish to cease reopening and re-reading that chapter in our lives and we do not wish to spend further time in expressing our views on a perverse, premeditative predator who with ruthless determination sought out and abducted young women to rape and kill, simply for his own gratification. We don’t want to spend any more time on that as a family. Instead, we wish to use the time to remember Ciara in a quiet space and draw strength from her courage and appreciate the gift of her short life of 28 years.

Another question that is frequently asked is would we participate in a story, in a programme, either written media or TV if the story was such that we had what is frequently called full copy approval and we’ve had a number of those, and the answer again is no because over the last 23 years I’ve learned that a guarantee of full copy approval is a misnomer. I understand the reasons why such a pledge cannot be delivered by the reporter or the interviewer that has asked us, I understand that.

Another question is would we participate in a story in exchange for a fee or a sum of money being donated to the Ciara Glennon Foundation which we established shortly after her murder and since the verdict was announced that type of request has surfaced and been introduced to us and my answer is as follows. It is unnatural for a parent to bury a child and to have Ciara killed in the prime of her life was and is our worst nightmare and the suffering is never ending, its unimaginable, its indescribable and to accept money in exchange for reliving or retelling how Ciara died or laying bare our personal journey of agony it would be an affront to Ciara and all that she was as a person and all CONTINUED ON PAGE 54

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THE IRISH SCENE | 53

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that she stood for and I find these approaches offensive, I don’t even answer them any more, I think you’ll understand.

Another question we’ve received is would we participate in a story or programme concentrating on Ciara’s personality and strength of character. Now this is the most frequently asked question over the years and more recently particularly during the trial and since the verdict and it comes in a variety of forms and it is always accompanied by assurances that the proposed story or programme will be helpful to other victims of crime, will only embrace Ciara’s strength of character and her fight to survive, it will be a tribute to her, it will remember her in ways she deserves, it will be inspiring to other people who may be going through a difficult time and similar sentiments like that. Now the position that Una and Denis and Denise have taken on that is Ciara’s private life is just that, it is private and it to remain private.

Una, Denise and I and Ciara’s close friends know what kind of person she was, our memories of Ciara are precious, are sacred and intimate details of the horrific circumstances of her murder and how bravely she fought to save herself they were revealed in depth during the trial, these details are well documented in the 590 plus pages of Justice Hall’s verdict. So there is no reason for us, we believe, to augment these details and quite frankly its just to hard, its too difficult.

If we were to respond to such requests it reignites a reliving for us not only of the pain, the sadness and the early despair we experienced but it also reignites the remorseless disregard shown by the convicted person for the suffering he caused, he has done enough damage to my family… and I will not permit him to cause further damage.

Another question we are frequently asked is did the guilty verdict bring some sense of closure? Now the concept of closure is just non sensical. There is no such experience as closure. Our life is now divided into two very distinct parts – one with Ciara, and

54 | THE IRISH SCENE

without Ciara, there will always be an empty chair at the table especially birthdays, anniversaries and times of celebration, just as now, Christmas.

Recently, and it really was since I mentioned here for the first time in this room that we would not provide Victim Impact Statements, so we’ve had a number of questions why? So, my answer to that question is the Victim Impact Statements are optional and as I have stated previously in this room as a family have chosen not to be prisoners of the past. Deep grief, its a very personal private journey especially for a parent whose child is horrifically murdered and we formed – that is Una and Denis in particular and Denise agreed – we formed a view there was no necessity to share the details of that journey in the very public environment of a courtroom. We’ve been through twenty years of not knowing who murdered Ciara, we have been deeply involved in the lengthy investigation over about the same period of time and we are emotionally drained by the long trial.

Now there is no denying we have been impacted, no denying that. Grieving never ends but it doesn’t end life. We prefer instead of the Victim Impact approach to reflect in quiet and quiet places about Ciara and the gift her death has brought. Now the impact of her murder on mum Una, that’s documented in Una’s emotionally honest and sometimes agonisingly raw book Ciara’s Gift, Grief Edged With Gold. And before I leave answering that question I wish to pay tribute to the power of the two extra ordinarily courageous and memorable impact statements read in court yesterday. They will be forever remembered. We witnessed two very brave ladies.

‘AS A FAMILY WE HAVE CHOSEN NOT TO BE PRISONERS OF THE PAST’

The next question that is asked is has justice been delivered for Ciara and that has really come on the table since the verdict. As best it can in this world, yes. We would dearly love to have Ciara back with us but that’s not possible. We are at peace with the circumstances in which we find ourselves. Ciara would expect no different from us. We will continue to try and walk with as much dignity as we can muster through this nightmare we have been catapulted into. There is no sense of revenge, only gratitude to so many people.

Another question I’ve been asked a number of times, if there is an appeal will I continue to remain close to the case. The answer is no, the collateral damage to personal health and family life is simply too severe. And yesterday while coming out from the courtroom for sentencing I didn’t answer any questions from a number of people who approached me, some of you are sitting in the room here I think, and for that I apologise, but I didn’t want to. The question asked was did we have any comments on the sentence passed of the person convicted and the answer is yes, I do. We believe the sentence is appropriate and just and we are especially pleased that the person convicted is never going to hurt or kill another woman in Perth. We trusted in Justice Hall’s wisdom, his experience and sense of fairness that we witnessed throughout the trial. I’ve already expressed gratitude for his timely deliver of the verdict and today I would like to add further thanks for his erudite explanation of the reasons underpinning his sentencing decision yesterday. We are fortunate to have such wisdom, skill and expertise in the West Australian justice system, we really are.

Now, I trust the answers I have given will be of some assistance to you. They are my honest attempt to pick out the most frequently asked ones and the requests we’ve been more frequently asked and answer them as honestly as I can this morning. So on behalf of my family then I wish everyone here a Happy Christmas, a Holy Christmas, and we extend – Una, Denise and Denis – our very best wishes to you for a safe 2021. And in conclusion, and this may come as a surprise, I ask that you include in your thoughts and your prayers not only the victims of these horrendous crimes but also include the parents of the convicted person, they... too... are in their own crucible of suffering. Thank you very much!”.

People who took to twitter having just watched Mr Glennon deliver the family’s message and response to the media were universal in their reaction to what he said and how he said it: Lee Steel @LeeSteele_ · Dec 24, 2020 Denis Glennon is a man of pure class and dignity.

The way he finished a gut wrenching press conference by wishing people a Merry Christmas and also encouraging us to spare a thought for Edwards’ parents.

Hannah @HanBarry93 · Dec 24, 2020 Denis Glennon has asked we keep the parents of Bradley Edwards in our thoughts and prayers, saying they are going through their own suffering we can’t possibly understand. A class act of a man. #claremont

Cordon SAnitaire @sliprule · Dec 24, 2020 I think I just witnessed some of the most compelling TV in Australian history. Denis Glennon’s press conference just then will live in my memory. What an incredible man.

Michael Skehan @mickskehan · Dec 24, 2020 If anyone needs a lesson in class, humility, a dignified response and how to deal with the Media watch the press conference Denis Glennon just gave in #Perth The man is all class especially after what his been through in life.

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THE IRISH SCENE | 55

g’day from gary gray AUSTRALIA’S AMBASSADOR IN IRELAND Stay up to date with what’s happening in the Australian Embassy, Ireland by following:

@ausembire

Australian Embassy, Ireland

@AusEmbIre

Last year, when former WA Labor Minister Gary Gray AO was asked

by Prime Minister Morrison to resign from his job in mining to become Australia’s Ambassador to Ireland he could hardly have imagined the year that was in store. And yet, in Gary’s own words, his tenure which started in August 2020 has been simply “Perfect” and Gary has quickly set about ensuring the Australian Embassy in Ireland as one of the most active and engaged on the island.

SUPPORTING AUSTRALIANS IN IRELAND In the lead up to Christmas, Gary was pleased to meet with horseracing trainee Angus Robertson who is a long way from home (Scone in New South Wales) completing his 2-year training as part of the Godolphin Flying Start thoroughbred racing programme, currently based in County Kildare. Angus is part of the 2020 intake of 12 trainees into this world-renown thoroughbred industry leadership programme, and the only Australian in the group. COVID-19 may have slowed down the travel aspect of the course, but Angus is still enthusiastically learning the many aspects of the business of horseracing, with modifications made to ensure the course is COVID compliant, with some course modules moving online. It was great Angus was able to stop by the Embassy when he was in Dublin and tell us all about this fantastic programme and understand a little more of the interconnectedness of the global thoroughbred racing industry, and the role that Australia plays in the Godolphin story.

COVID-19

Above: Australian Embassy dog Ted especially liked meeting Angus from Godolphin and wished him a very Merry Christmas.

56 | THE IRISH SCENE

Speaking on Ireland’s approach to COVID-19 Gary said, “The approach here is markedly different from that in Australia. Ireland’s unique circumstances as a member of the European Union (EU) and its particular relationship with Northern Ireland means the closure of international borders was not an option. Instead, the Irish have been deliberate and thoughtful in the way they have maintained economic activity in key areas of their country while also prioritising the health of the most vulnerable in society while keeping the border to the North open and free. This has allowed us as an Embassy to maintain contact with key stakeholders, provide vital consular services for Australians in Ireland and visit a number of regions across the island when restrictions permitted.”

G’DAY FROM GARY GRAY

This approach of living with COVID-19 has been carefully managed and has worked remarkably well for Ireland which currently boasts the lowest COVID-19 infection rates, per head of population, in the EU. With this as the foundation, the Embassy has been able to visit Mayo, Waterford, Louth, Armagh, Meath and Galway – engaging with local stakeholders, community groups and industry to better understand the political, economic and social environment in which they operate.

The Embassy in Ireland, located on St. Stephen’s Green in Dublin have been helping Australians living in Ireland to get home during the most difficult of circumstances and has fielded the second highest number of calls in Europe, second only to the Embassy in London.

Right: Gary was pleased to meet with Brid Stack and her family in County Cork ahead of her relocation to Sydney, joining the GWS Giants for the 2021 AFLW season. Below: Ailish Considine was pleased to introduce Gary to her local AFL women’s team the West Clare Waves when he recently visited ahead of Ailish’s move to Adelaide, playing for the Crows in the AFLW.

AFL IRELAND WOMEN’S TEAMS A GROWING TALENT POOL The Australian Embassy in Ireland is proud to support the AFL Ireland’s women’s league and offers consular support to those talented young women selected to play in the Australian league. Gary recently travelled to Spanish Point in County Clare to meet with Ailish Considine and her local AFL women’s team the West Clare Waves following Ailish’s resigning with the Adelaide Crows in the AFLW League. Gary also met for a COVID compliant garden chat with Ailish’s family and also met Ailish’s sister Eimear who has represented her country playing Irish Rugby - a talented family indeed.

Gary also recently travelled to Bishipstown, Cork to meet with Brid Stack who is soon to join the GWS Giants in Sydney in early 2021. Brid is a highly decorated GAA sportswoman and will be travelling to Australia with her husband and young son - both of whom Gary also had the pleasure to meet in a COVID compliant garden setting, along with Brid’s parents. Closer to home for Irish Scene readers, Grace and Niamh Kelly have resigned with the West Coast Eagles, and Irish teammate Aisling McCarthy will be joining them following her trade from the Western Bulldogs for the 2021 season.

All up, the Embassy has supported more than 15 young women - nearly a whole AFLW team - leaving Irish shores to play in the Aussie AFLW 2021 season. We wish all athletes every sporting success as leaders in their respective new AFLW teams and know the Australian Irish community will be cheering them on through the 2021 season.

LOOKING AHEAD TO 2021 Commenting on the work of the Embassy since arrival Gary said, “The staff I have inherited here are just terrific. Engaged and driven, they have allowed the Embassy to continue operating at the highest level over a very challenging period. As we move into 2021 with realistic hope that the worst of the pandemic may be behind us, I look forward to continuing the work of the Embassy and announcing plans to mark 75 years of diplomatic relations between our two countries.

2021 represents 75 years of diplomatic relations between Australia and Ireland, and plans are underway to mark this important milestone in both Australia and Ireland. With so much dependant on the status of the pandemic, the Embassy looks forward to announcing these plans shortly.

THE IRISH SCENE | 57

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

Australian-Irish Heritage Association

SUNDAY FEBRUARY 28

We invite you to come on board and share the fun in organizing and promoting events and activities of relevance and interest. We are actively looking for new members to the committee and helpers on the sidelines. At our last meeting on 12 December we welcomed 5 guests who indicated willingness to be involved in creating a new future for our organization. We are looking for expressions of interest for the role of editor of the quarterly Journal.

Venue: Irish Club Committee Room,

61 Townshend Road, Subiaco Date: Sunday February 28 at 3pm,

followed by complimentary

afternoon tea Contact: Secretary Tony Bray on 9367 6026

or secretary@irishheritage.com.au

AIHA FILM CLUB SEASON WEDNESDAYS FEBRUARY 3,10,17,24 MARCH 3

Tenth annual outdoor Irish Film Festival with a programme of rarely seen and some classic Irish cinema.

Private garden cinema. Ample parking available. Big fifteen-foot cinema screen.

AUSTRALIA DAY BUSH CONCERT IN IRISH CLUB THEATRE AIHA presents an afternoon celebration of Australian and Irish songs, poems, reflections and an Australia Day quiz, with an Irish afternoon tea. Singers, performers and readers/writers welcome - contact our secretary below.

Fred Rea launched this format for Australia Day 2017 and it was a great success with an intimate experience of superb performers in air-conditioned comfort, full bar, tea & coffee and Irish fare.

Venue: Irish Club of WA Theatre, 61 Townshend Road, Subiaco Date: Australia Day, Tuesday 26 January from 3pm Cost: $10, pay at the door Enquiries: 9367 6026

THE FOURTH TUESDAY BOOK CLUB MEETS FOURTH TUESDAY OF THE MONTH, WITH EXCEPTION OF DECEMBER

January 19: “The Wild Laughter” by Caolinn Hughes, presented by Mary Rose Cullinane. Reviewed in The Irish Scene July/Aug edition. (NOTE this is the third Tuesday due to clash with Australia Day)

Venue: Irish Club Committee Room, 61 Townshend Road, Subiaco, 7:30pm Admission: Free. All welcome. Light refreshments provided. Tea and coffee from the Bar $2 Contact: Convener Mary Purcell, m.purcell@telstra.com

IN PLANNING FOR 2021

Easter Monday Rockingham Catalpa Commemoration ANZAC Commemoration Subiaco War memorial ‘Horses Coming Home’ folk musical, Irish Club Matinee ‘The Zoo’ Irish Club Theatre with introductory talk Annual Mary Durack talk, Irish Club Theatre ‘Daniel O’Donnell Tea Dance’, Irish Club Irish special interest documentary, Irish Club Programme: To be released in January Parlour Concert featuring local authors for all ages Plus: Each night a supporting Irish short Guest speakers and other literary events

Venue: Entry:

Seating:

Contact:

film or documentary, together with tea/coffee and cakes. Icecreams $2 Kensington (South Perth) Donation $10 to cover catering and costs, pay at the gate.

Come early for best seats, bring deckchair if running late Tony Bray on 9367 6026, check our website and facebook

AIHA BOARD OF MANAGEMENT PRESIDENT – HEATHER DEIGHAN TREASURER/ MEMBERSHIP – PATRICIA BRATTON SECRETARY – TONY BRAY COMMITTEE – GAYLE LANNON Supported by a tier of volunteers. Please talk to us if you are interested in being involved in some way!

Check out events on www.irishscene.com.au/calendar-of-events.html Australian-Irish Heritage Association Non Political - Non Sectarian - Emphatically Australian

Be proud of your Irish heritage 58 | THE IRISH SCENE

PO Box 1583, Subiaco 6904. Tel: 08 9345 3530. Secretary: 08 9367 6026 Email: secretary@irishheritage.com.au or admin@irishheritage.com.au Web: www.irishheritage.com.au Find us on Facebook @australianirishheritage Membership due 1st January – Family $65, Concession $55, Distant (200kms from Perth) $45.

Membership fee includes tax deductible donation of $20

The End of the Innocence Along with many other parents, I attended my daughter Sophie’s sixth class graduation ceremony from Primary School at Eglantine School in Cork back in 2006. All in all, it was a very enjoyable and moving occasion.

Bill with his daughter Sophie on her first day of school, 1998 It started off with some messages from the graduating girls, followed by Mass and then each of the three classes entertained us with their respective musical productions. Canon Crowley was very participative and Ann Ryan and her staff are to be congratulated on the quality of the occasion and for allowing us, as parents, to be part of this great event. Refreshments were also provided afterwards for the benefit of both pupils and parents.

It was a watershed moment for the young girls, now moving away from their primary incubation nest, after having spent eight of their twelve years here.

For the past four decades there have been close on a half a million pupils participating in primary level education in Ireland. The general aims are to enable the child to live a full life as a child and to realise their potential as a unique individual. They are also taught

to live and interact with others while also being prepared for further education.

At the beginning of the ceremony, one of the girls happened to mention ‘ni bheid ár leitheid ann aris’ (you’ll never see the likes of us again). This struck a chord with me as I had come across it previously in the literature of the Blasket Islands, who were lamenting the loss of their particular way of life at that time.

How right the young girl was. We are all made unique, and there is nobody like us on the planet.

We all leave our mark, maybe written in the smaller history books, and we will all be missed. That is why murder is such an evil act, as we are taking the life of a unique entity that can never again be replaced.

It can be a wonderful world out there from the vantage point of youth, and there is always the prospect of opportunities and the unexpected being around every corner. Imagination is more important than knowledge, and should always be cultivated.

One of the advantages of being very young is that you don’t have to let the facts get in the way of your imagination. It’s going to be both a challenging and interesting world out there to absorb their talents.

Rolling the film forward, Sophie is now 26 years of age, is Manager of a shop in Cork, and is also expecting her first child. A brand new adventure is just around the corner for both mother and child, and may they bring each other the purest of joys in the years ahead.

‘THE TRUE SIGN OF INTELLIGENCE IS NOT KNOWLEDGE, BUT IMAGINATION’ – ALBERT EINSTEIN. BILL DALY Originally from Tallow in West Waterford, Bill spent 30 years in Cork as a Senior Manager in the Electronics Manufacturing industry with such companies as Apple, EMC and Logitech.

He has been working on his own as a Consultant/Contractor in Manufacturing Operations and Materials for the past 18 years.

He also attended UCC and has a BA Degree in Archaeology and Geography. Bill is now resident in Connemara, Co. Galway since 2009.

THE IRISH SCENE | 59

Ulster rambles I have always been fascinated by how technology has influenced the many modern gadgets which we all take for granted. Desktop computers are well out of date but I still spend many hours playing around with photographic and video making programs. The ubiquitous iPhone and it’s clones have taken over from desktop computers, photographic cameras, mp3 players, tape recorders and even such mundane items such as compasses and torches.

I was playing around with ‘Messenger’ on my phone when I came across a name from the past. Let’s say her name was Chris. Chris was writing about a friend who had been a boarder at “Methody”, short of course for The Methodist College Belfast. Because of COVID and the lockdown, some ex-boarders from Methody had formed a group to help pass the time in their homes. As some of you know, I had been a boarder there for seven years. I wrote on Messenger that I knew her friend. She promptly wrote a lengthy reply. I duly wrote a short phrase to which she replied with an even lengthier passage.

I had forgotten that Ulster (or should I say Northern Ireland here) was in lock down and (I was soon to learn) she had not spoken to anyone for quite some time. Without thought I clicked on the video button on the phone - perhaps accidently or in frustration, as I don’t seem to be able to ‘thumb’ my text messages at great speed. Eighty five minutes later I was able

to end the very one sided conversation. She was everything a normal, or should I say average, Ulster person could be. She told me about her life in the Province and why, after University (in Belfast) she stayed in that insular part of the world. It was almost the same reason why I (and all my colleagues) left. She told me about all the people from Ulster she knew who lived in Perth and what they did but never asked me one question about my life in Perth. She told me about life in Portadown and why the locals never called it Craigavon when it was supposedly joined to an adjacent town called Lurgan.

Enough of that for the moment; let me try to bring you up to date with the present situation, or at least the situation at the time I am writing this article. Although the Brexit deal overall has been frustratingly slow, parts of the solution can change overnight.

So what is happening over there at present? Why are situations like border checks such a big issue? As part of a hard-won peace deal between Ireland and the UK, both governments agreed that the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland should be practically invisible. For example there should be no cameras or border posts. Of course this was easy when both Ireland and the UK were part of the EU, and people and goods could move between the two countries unhindered.

The UK’s withdrawal from the EU and now a new deadline means a new arrangement is needed for the first of January. The reason behind this is because of the risk that goods could be moved between the UK to the Republic of Ireland, which remains an EU member. Of course any change must avoid bringing back visible border checks and this is proving to be an almost insurmountable problem.

So what is going to happen on January 1? It seems that everyone (well everyone who has any say in the matter) has agreed that checks will not take place at the border. Northern Ireland will continue to follow many of the EU’s rules, meaning that trucks can continue to drive across the border without having to be inspected.

Now as it stands, that is simply not going to work, so they will try a new “regulatory” border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain (that is England,

60 | THE IRISH SCENE

ULSTER RAMBLES

Will there be checks on the Irish border after Brexit? Picture: PA Media/bbc.com

may not! (I have to make my apologies here for being such a boring pessimist myself!)

So do you reckon there will there be other checks and how will they disguise these?

Right now the UK and the EU are negotiating a trade deal to try to eliminate new charges known as tariffs - from being introduced on other goods from 1st January. In Australia, thanks to the Chinese, we all know the consequences of tariffs.

Scotland and Wales). That’s because, unlike Northern Ireland, Great Britain won’t have to follow EU rules in future (I do hope this is making sense for you. Do they really think that this will work or is it that they are just trying a patch-up job by allowing another extension?) Of course this means checks on goods moving between Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

So what are these checks you might well ask? The EU has very strict rules about what can enter its market when it comes to some foods such as meat, milk, fish and eggs, to name a few. From 1st January, some food products arriving in Northern Ireland from England, Scotland or Wales will need to be checked to ensure they meet EU standards – (whatever they are) they will need to go through a border control post at sea ports, where paperwork will be checked and some physical inspections will take place. Is this the ‘regulatory border’? I can only assume so. To appease the people who should and will disagree with this, the powers that be have offered an initial three-month “grace period” where the rules will not be enforced on the food they bring into Northern Ireland. This is to give them time to get used to and adapt to the changes as well as ensuring supplies are maintained.

Apparently some meat products, like sausages, will have a longer six-month grace period. Well why not.

Isn’t the Ulster fry famous?

Of course at this stage there is a large BUT. But what happens after this period is unclear, and will be the subject of future negotiations that might be solved before the end of the year or if you are a pessimist,

However, even if those talks fail, (all right I won’t write it) a temporary exemption has been agreed for Northern Ireland. Known as the trusted trader scheme, the vast majority of goods going from Great Britain to Northern Ireland will not face any tariffs. That said, there will still be some new paperwork requirements (sorry trees) from January 1 - so businesses will need to prepare. Get ready with your pencils and pens!

I really cannot see all this working but it is a step forward and plan ‘E’ might get closer to a more permanent solution. It is worth remembering that Brexit only arrived by a margin much less than Biden’s victory. Personally, I would have liked to see a second referendum. I suppose that was never going to happen much like our own referendum on “daylight saving”.

I better get back to my iPhone, which I have to charge up before my golf game tomorrow. Yes, we have to use it on the golf course to keep the scores. Some of the more seasoned players refuse to use it. They claim it uses up too much battery, when in fact they just use it as a phone and have difficulty with its other functions.

BEST WISHES FOR A BETTER 2021 AND AS ALWAYS MAY YOUR GOD GO WITH YOU.

DAVID MacCONNELL

THE IRISH SCENE | 61

a minute with synnott MEET KEITH HINDES

Q) WHAT TOWN AND COUNTY DID YOU COME FROM AND DO YOU HAVE A BIG FAMILY?

A) I come from a small village on the banks of the River Shannon in County Offaly called Shannonbridge, known for its great fishing and also famous for its World Heritage site at Clonmacnoise. I’ve a fairly small family: mum, dad and two sisters, one of which lives here in Perth.

Q) HOW FAR DID YOU GO IN YOUR SCHOOLING?

A) I studied Engineering at Athlone Institute which was quite close to home as coming from a farming background it was always handy to be close to home to help out.

Q) WHAT DID YOU WORK AT BEFORE YOU LEFT HOME TO COME TO OZ AND HOW LONG AGO?

A) Growing up I was always working on the farm or with Dad and my uncles in the construction game and after my studies I worked at Laois County Council and Bord Na Mona.

Q) WAS PERTH ALWAYS ON YOUR MIND OR HOW DID YOU END UP HERE?

A) In late 2010 I decided to move to Australia and to Perth where my good friend was based. I suppose also at the time Ireland’s economy wasn’t healthy and immigration was on the cards for most young Irish people and whether people admitted it or not it wasn’t the easiest decision in the world to leave family and friends behind but it had to be done!

Q) WHERE DID YOU FIRST WORK WHEN YOU CAME TO OZ, WHAT POSITION DID YOU HOLD AND ARE YOU STILL EMPLOYED THERE?

A) I was extremely fortunate when I moved to Australia to find a job that was recommended to me by an old friend in a construction company and after a few weeks headed to a mining project in the Pilbara. The mining boom was still strong in WA and the first position I held was an 62 | THE IRISH SCENE

engineering role, over the next eight and half years with that company I held various positions and got to travel and live extensively in WA. To say the least it was/has been a great experience and even at one stage I got to work for the government which gave me an opportunity to work in indigenous communities and learn more about their culture and their lives. As time has moved on so have the range of projects I’ve worked on.

Currently renewable energy is becoming ever popular and I’ve moved into that area, working on wind and solar projects which are quite interesting, I believe this will be a big focus in the coming years so it was something I was keen to do.

Q) YOU LOVE A LAUGH! WHERE DO YOU GO TO MEET THE LADS AND LADIES FOR THE CRAIC?

A) You’re definitely right Tony I do love to socialise, and you’ll find us from time to time at “Ownnies Corner” at the Quinn or the other usual Irish pubs. We have a great group of friends and we do enjoy ourselves on our time off, we’re all from different walks of life and enjoy the stories and having the craic, as you know for our chats I love the old stories from home.

Q) DO YOU HAVE ANY HOBBIES OR PASTIMES?

A) Couple of expensive hobbies - I try to collect whiskeys and not drink them! I also enjoy horse racing, we have a group which is involved in a syndicate or two and we do get a great kick out of it. “We reckon we could have a cup winner in the stable” ha ha ha!!!

Q) WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE IRISH SCENE AND THE EDITOR LLOYD GORMAN AS A NEW OWNER?

A) I do enjoy the Irish Scene and reading through it as it provides some great information. I think it’s an important part of the Irish community and for people who don’t have social media it gives a good insight to what’s happening or what’s coming up

A MINUTE WITH SYNNOTT

around our areas and around the world! Keep up the good work.

Q) IS IT HARD FOR YOU TO LIVE LIFE NORMALLY AMID THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC?

A) Even though COVID-19 has had massive effects all over the world, I think we have been fortunate in WA as we are quite isolated ourselves. For the past 10 months I’ve been working remotely and for our company we had a lot of workers coming from Europe so it was slightly difficult at times but we worked through it. I only felt the effects when I came back to Perth and saw it was a ghost town during the height of the pandemic and what my family back home would tell me. All said it’s definitely been difficult and hopefully it’s heading in the right direction both here and back home!

Q) DO YOU GO HOME OFTEN, OR DO YOU RING YOUR MOTHER EVERY WEEK?

A) Yeah I like to get home once or twice a year to see all the family and given the current pandemic that’s a bit difficult but with all the technology it does make it somewhat easier with Skype and other video apps to talk to the family. For sure I ring my mum every week if I didn’t, she’d definitely be letting me know.

Q) YOU’RE NOT GETTING ANY YOUNGER, WILL PERTH ALWAYS BE HOME?

A) Holy moly Tony I’m not that old!!! I suppose you can never tell what might happen in the future, Perth is definitely a place you can see yourself settling down in, it’s such a good lifestyle here however Ireland always is a special place for me so who knows, there’s pros and cons for both.

Q) YOU ALWAYS HAVE A THAT LOVELY GIRLFRIEND AROUND YOU. IS MARRIAGE ON THE CARDS SOONER OR LATER?

A) As you put it so well Tony I’m not getting any younger and sure you’d never know. Although I think there’s a few more lads in the group that may step up before me and they know who they are! But don’t worry Tony you’ll get an invite when the day comes as long as you give us a few bars of ‘Nessum Dorma’ or ‘Time To Say Good Bye’.

Interview edited for clarity and length.

TONY SYNNOTT

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THE IRISH SCENE | 63

CLADDAGH REPORT FROM HOME TO HOME: CLADDAGH’S ORAL HISTORY PROJECT We had a great night on the 10th December at the WA Maritime Museum celebrating the completion of the Claddagh Oral History project. It was a wonderful celebration honouring the seniors who so generously opened their homes to Claddagh volunteers to come and interview them and gifted us with their migration stories. Very aptly the museum overlooked the quay where almost all the interviewees had first set foot in Australia!

Early in 2020 The Claddagh Association was awarded funding from the Irish government’s Emigrant Support Programme for initiatives to mitigate the effects of COVID-19. We used part of this funding along with Claddagh’s own contribution to organise the Claddagh oral history project. This brought people together safely, at a time when they were at risk of more isolation and loneliness than ever before, to build connection between members of the Irish community in WA and celebrate and preserve our shared heritage.

Anne Wayne, Claddagh coordinator, led the project and trained a team of enthusiastic volunteers in oral history interviewing. Eleven Claddagh Seniors

Top: Richard O’Mahony, oral history interviewee, reading the Acknowledgement of Country in Irish. Above left: From Home to Home - Oral Histories of Irish Seniors in Western Australia. Above right: Ellie O’Callaghan performing at the launch.

Below left: Claddagh Oral History Launch at the Australia II Gallery, WA Maritime Museum. Opposite top: Tony Bray, Heather Deighan (AIHA), Marty Kavanagh, Hon Irish Consul, Margaret Allen, CEO, SLWA, Heather, McKenna, Tom Quinn, Peter M

participated and the resulting collection of interviews is a valuable record of their unique migration journeys to Australia which highlights the diversity and resilience of the Irish community in WA. At the event Honorary Consul of Ireland in WA, Marty Kavanagh, launched our book of edited excerpts from the interviews, From Home to Home: Oral Histories of Irish Seniors in Western Australia. Our thanks go to the Australian Irish Heritage Association who part-funded the printing of this book. Claddagh have made this book available free of charge via our website at: claddagh.org.au/claddagh-oralhistory-project/ At the launch our Chairperson, Heather McKeegan, also handed the interview collection over to the CEO of the State Library of WA (SLWA), Margaret Allen.

The Claddagh Oral History interviews

64 | THE IRISH SCENE

www.claddagh.org.au

Crisis Support: 0403 972 265

13/15 Bonner Drive Malaga 6090. Enquiries: 08 9249 9213

THANK YOU AND HAPPY NEW YEAR will be included in the SLWA Migration Voices archive which is part of the UNESCO Australian Memory of the World Program. This archive is freely available to anyone via the SLWA catalogue on their website or in person by visiting the State Library.

We will also share highlights from these interviews with Irish Scene readers over the coming year. In this issue you can read the story of Thomas O’Hanlon of Co Louth.

He was interviewed by Claddagh volunteer Thelma Blackford of Co Galway.

Thank you for your support throughout 2020.

It is much appreciated by all who avail of Claddagh’s services as we continue to be busy providing help and support to members of the Irish community in WA who are in difficult circumstances. The infographic below comes from our 2019-2020 annual report and shows the work that Claddagh were able to do with the financial and voluntary support of the Irish community in WA.

CLADDAGH SENIORS The Claddagh seniors group had a wonderful lunch at The Mighty Quinn Tavern on the 18th November. The seniors subcommittee also made arrangements for the group to attend the Irish Theatre Players Pantomime in December. This was a booked-out success. All agreed that it was most enjoyable and a great way to end the year’s activities. On the 18th January, 2021 the group will get away from the heat with a movie at Innaloo cinemas.

They will be seeing a 2pm showing of Summerland which promises to be a beautiful and uplifting film. If you are interested or know a senior from the Irish community who would like to attend you can register by calling Patricia Bratton of the Seniors Subcommittee on 0417 099 801/08 9345 3530 or by contacting Claddagh Coordinator Anne Wayne on admin@claddagh.org.au/08 9249 9213

The team at Claddagh wish you the very best for a wonderful New Year. We all hope it is a great improvement on the last!

IF YOU OR SOMEONE YOU KNOW NEEDS ASSISTANCE IN 2021 YOU CAN CONTACT CLADDAGH ON OUR CRISIS LINE: 0403 972 265.

If you are in a position to be able to contribute financially this would be gratefully received for Claddagh’s support work through the year. Tax deductible donations can be made at our GiveNow page: https://www. givenow.com.au/thecladdaghassociation or via bank transfer to Claddagh’s account. The details are: Bank: Commonwealth Bank • Account name: The Claddagh Association • BSB: 066153 • Account no: 10771928 Ref: Your initial & surname +DON THE IRISH SCENE | 65

Tom O’Hanlon

Tom O’Hanlon was born in 1936.

He is from Benagh, Co. Louth.

We had a little farm in Benagh. I wasn’t very long at school. We had three teachers and 60 students.

Our headmaster, he was a devil. He had a sally rod.

I was about ten when my father died, that was it [for school]. I worked at home on the farm ‘til I was 23.

We’d all horses then. You see, when my father died in 1946 horses were the thing. I ploughed with a horse.

Now, our farm at the time, we owed £350. I can’t get a job. Because if I could get a job in the forestry I would. But they had said, ‘Oh, well you’ve got land.

You’ll need time off to gather the spuds and then after that, this and that’. Then Bord Na Móna wants men, so I go up there. Now, when I worked there, and we’re cutting ... we were on this collector. It’s like a harvester. It’s only a basic wage. Dusty as hell, and you could imagine a conveyor belt on tracks coming up through the bog. We’re getting two and eight pence an hour. And we paid two pound a week to the camp.

I went to England in ‘59 to work. On the boat I met this Paul Kerrigan from Kildare. He was going back after he’d been on holidays. I met him, and he said he’d buy me a drink. And I said, ‘I’m short of money’.

He said, ‘Out where I’m working,’ - he was working in Dartford Tunnel - and he said, ‘I can get you a job there, no worries’.

You see when I leave Bord na Móna, I’m getting two and eightpence an hour. Now, I go to Dartford Tunnel, where we’re paid cash. My first pay was £37. Honestly and there was half crown notes, and I couldn’t believe. Now we owe £350 on the house at home. I had to clear this in three months. Paid it off, the whole thing. When I finish there, I just seen Ford is in Essex. Right. I go over there, and I get a job. And I was there for five years in Dagenham. I worked for Ford factory.

I came to Australia when I left there. They were advertising. It was £10. If I applied from Ireland, I would have never got it. The Australian Immigration said that the Republic of Ireland is not in the Commonwealth. You can’t apply from Dublin. I went up to London, to Australia House. The top man there then was Downer, Alexander Downer. The quiz was easy. And then you had to have a medical, no worries.

Aye, they sent me a letter. And then there was bad 66 | THE IRISH SCENE

reports about Australia, in the paper, this come from the Poms coming back. So, right. I put it back for about two years.

We left on Friday the 16th of March [1963]. On the P&O Oronsay, took four and a half weeks. And we went through the Suez Canal and Port Said. When we started into the canal, it was just late in the evening.

And I’m saying, oh I was going to miss the scenery.

When we woke up in the morning, we thought we were on the ocean. But we’re in this big lake, and the ships were waiting. We went through mostly in daylight, just one ship at a time.

We called into Fremantle. We went on a tour in Perth, you see, on the coach. It was a beautiful day, and you know Perth looks very nice in the sunshine. Can you imagine the Swan River? And I said ‘What a lovely place’. The boat went on to Woolloomooloo, right under the bridge. Sydney Harbour.

When I come to Sydney, because I had my reference from Ford in Dagenham, General Motors Holden, they were looking for people. So I got a job there because I had a driver’s license. And they wanted forklift drivers. And because I had my license, they put me on training, a test, I got this certificate for operating a forklift. And they give me a truck driver’s license like that. That was a good job. And I worked there, staying in Bondi. It was a holiday apartment. In the summer

FROM HOME TO HOME: ORAL HISTORIES OF IRISH SENIORS IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA

time you rented it out by the week.

But in the winter ime, you could get a six months lease.

I met a friend, John Conlan, on the boat. We decided we’re going to have to stay two years in Australia.

We might as well get an old car, and we’ll drive around, and see as much as we can. So we head off the week President Kennedy was assassinated. Remember that time? We drove across the Nullarbor. It was miles of dirt. We camped out every night. We got to Perth and we camped outside in Midland so we didn’t have to pay. We had a job before we came

“

Newman. Each one of them was a different contract because when we finished everyone was paid off and we’d get 10% bonus. That was tax free because it was classed as the end of employment.

When I finished the Hamersley railway line, I flew up to Darwin.

Instead of flying back to Perth, I just go around Australia. So I headed up to Darwin. I bought a Volkswagen Beetle. It was a ‘55 or something. I worked with Darwin City Council. I was the leading hand. I drove trucks, about a year.

When we left Darwin we had a car. So we went to head off around

So we head off across the Nullarbor the week President Kennedy was assassinated”

into Perth. Then we stayed in the Portree Guest House. It’s number one on George’s Terrace. It was like a boarding house. At that time, the T&G building was the highest building in Perth. And you paid a shilling to go up.

The woman at the guest house, her husband worked on Cockatoo Island. And she always used to go down to the BHP office. They had an office in George’s Terrace. I went to work for BHP at Cockatoo Island. We flew up on a DC3. To get from here to Derby, was 16 hours flying. And they took, it was £33 then. So then if you stayed six months, you would get it back. I stayed the whole year.

I worked on the iron ore mines, their railway lines. I was in charge of the rock excavation, the drill and blasting. Every one of them railway lines I done, Pannawonica, Wickham, Paraburdoo, Tom Price and Mount

Australia. Just, down, about 50 miles down the road is Rum Jungle. When we get to Batchelor, Batchelor was a little town, the policeman he was half our age.

And he said, ‘Barney Bannon ...

He’s an Irishman. Barney works here. And if Barney finds out that there’s three Irishmen in town and I let yous go, he’s going to kill me’.

So we had to stay to meet Barney.

So we all did jobs in the uranium mine.

My job was the store truck. I drove from Rum Jungle to Darwin every day. A big seven tonne truck, big flat top truck and I had the trailer.

I went to Darwin five days a week.

And then Saturday, I collected all the yellow cake on my truck in 40 gallon drums.

I was stuck in Mount Isa for three months. I went and worked in the lead mine. When you start at Mount Isa you get a five pound lead bonus every week. That’s

while you learn the thing. After a couple of weeks, then earn your pass there, how to do the blast and the drill and everything. And you’re classed as a contract miner.

I went to Townsville. I’m going around Australia, so I drive all the way up Cooktown. The very top. I’m coming back down and then in Innisfail there was a sign ‘Cane cutters wanted’. I went into the employment office. It give instruction how to go, 16 miles down the Bruce Highway and you turn right into Silkwood. And there was two cane farms there. At that time cane farms were only like 40 acres. It was all small. All the cane farms, the main line comes out along the farm. You have to lay your own track. Four men can do it easy. They’re light rails. I’m there, I suppose three or four months.

I had to go back to Sydney because I left me case in Sydney. I knew Blowering Dam on the Snowy, so I went down there and got a job, just a year. They had a camp.

Snowy had a camp. Then we came back to the Pilbara. Telfer, I was at five years, Telfer was the last job before we came down. We built the Wickham Pannawonica railway line. That took about more than a year.

I’m proud of being Irish. I settled ok, [in Australia]. I kept on saying ‘This is the best country in the world’. Western Australia especially. I mean, even our temperature. When I went back home [to Ireland], after 10 years, it wasn’t much different than when I left. They didn’t have a Celtic Tiger.

Tom was interviewed by Claddagh volunteer Thelma Blackford.

Thelma is from Loughrea, Co. Galway and migrated to Australia in 1970.

THE IRISH SCENE | 67

GIOLLA AIREAGAIL LE DÓNALL MACAMHLAIGH

Mo mháthair a chonaic an fógra sa pháipéar. ‘Stokers wanted. Live in. Apply Matron, Harborough Rd Hospital, Northampton.’

‘Ba cheart duit é a thriail’ ar sise, ‘nó tá mé cinnte gurb é Dia a chuir i do bhealach é.’

Bhí mé díomhaoin ó d’fhág mé an tArm trí mhí roimhe sin, agus ó bhí mé le dul anonn ar aon nós nárbh fhearr dom an deis seo a ghlacadh ná bheith ag dul ann sa seans agus bheith ag imeacht thart ag tóraíocht lóistín nuair a landálfainn thall?

Scríobh mé an litir agus chuir mé chun bealaigh í agus, tráthúil Dé, bhí freagra faighte agam taobh istigh de chúpla lá. Bhí mé féin is mo mháthair ag faire chuile phost agus croí i mbarr béil againn ag súil leis an dea-scéala. Ach ní túisce a bhí an post faighte agam ná tháinig cumha ar an mbeirt againn ag smaoineamh go mbeinn ag fágáil an bhaile le dul ar an gcoigríoch. Bhí mo mháthair is mé féin an-mhór le chéile riamh agus, tar éis go raibh a fhios againn go gcaithfinn imeacht luath nó mall, ghoill sé ar an mbeirt againn anois.

Ghlaoigh mo mháthair isteach ón tsráid ar dhuine de na páistí a bhí ag súgradh thart agus chuir sí síos chuig an siopa í faoi choinne cáca mhilis le go mbeadh fleá againn in onóir na hócáide. Nuair a rug sí ar an bpota, ag dul ag déanamh an tae, chonaic mé go raibh deoir faoina súil.

Chuaigh mé i mbun na ngnóthaí láithreach. Bhí go leor dintiúr beag le socrú an uair sin, ní hé fearacht an lá atá inniu ann, agus bhí faitíos orm dá gcaithinn an iomarca ama ag déanamh réidh go mb’fhéidir go gcaillfinn an post. B’éigean dom dul 68 | THE IRISH SCENE

agus pictiúr a fháil don phas agus foirmeacha a líonadh in áras na ngardaí le cárta aitheantais a fháil. Nuair a bhí an méid sin déanta, agus litir curtha ar ais chuig an mátrún agam, shocraigh mé síos ag fanacht leis an lá mór. Bheadh moill coicíse orm. .........

Chuaigh na laethanta thart ar cosa in airde, agus de réir mar a bhí sé ag teacht i ngar don am mhothaigh mé mar a bheadh méara fuara an éadóchais a i ngreim ar mo phutóga. B’fhacthas dom go mbeinn go mór i ndiaidh na rudaí beaga coitianta a chleacht mé le fada: an comhrá agus an dea-chaint a bhíodh ag na leads thíos ag an gcoirnéal san oíche; comhluadar agus aoibhneas na ndaoine bochta istigh in áit an toistiúin sna pictiúir oíche phá; agus feabhas an phionta tígh Larry tar éis am dúnadh. Bheinn uaigneach freisin ag smaoineamh ar an spraoi agus ar an ngreann a bhíodh againn istigh sa teach seo againn féin. Mo dheirfiúr is mo bheirt deartháireacha a bhí sa bhaile an t-am úd; bhí m’athair agus deartháir eile liom san Arm, duine acu i gCorcaigh, an duine eile i mBaile Átha Cliath. .........

Dé Luain, 12.3.1951 . Shínigh mé ar maidin inniu don uair dheireanach agus d’iompair mé céadmeáchain guail abhaile do mo mháthair. Tá chuile shórt faoi réir agam anois di, an garraí rómhartha is glanta agus caoi curtha ar an seanteach taobh amuigh. Beidh mé in ann cúnamh is fearr ná sin a thabhairt di as seo amach, nuair a bheas mé ag cur pinginí airgid abhaile chuici as Sasana.

Irish Mams NOR Playgroups Monday, Wednesday & Fridays

EIMEAR BEATTIE

IRISH FAMILIES IN PERTH IS A VOLUNTARY NON PROFIT ORGANISATION WITH OVER 16,000 MEMBERS ON OUR SOCIAL MEDIA GROUP. We provide Irish emigrants with advice on how to best assimilate into the Western Australian culture and lifestyle. We communicate with our subscribers through social media where topics such as long lost relatives, housing, jobs and social events are covered. It is a vibrant active forum that provides a wealth of knowledge to young families and singles emigrating to Western Australia.

IFIP contributes to a cohesive Irish Community by working together with many of the wonderful groups in Perth that support Irish culture and heritage.

IFIP AIMS TO:

NOW THAT COVID 19 RESTRICTIONS HAVE BEEN LIFTED, OUR PLAYGROUPS ARE BACK WITH A BANG! Our playgroup meetup is a purpose-built playgroup centre which has undergone recent refurbishment. It has a bright indoor area and a small kitchen complete with small fridge, microwave, tea and coffee making facilities.

Outdoors, there is a covered playground attaching to the building and the outdoor area is fenced with a locked gate ensuring the safety of our little ones. It also has a large selection of indoor and outdoor toys ensuring that all parents and kids receive a warm reception.

We have a number of vacancies for our Wednesday meetups 9-11am and a few on Monday Playgroups for any families interested in joining.

We offer 2 free trials for you and your little ones to come and play prior to joining. We cater for children from 6wks to 5yrs. Please contact Sorcha McAndrew for Wednesday group queries and Lynsey Staunton for Mondays. Based at Padbury Playgroup on Caley Road New members are always welcome.

• Coordinate Irish family events including twice weekly playgroup.

• Develop Irish Culture & heritage.

• Help Irish people with any problems that might arise and provide a link to Australian and Irish support services.

www.irishfamiliesinperth.com facebook.com/groups/irishfamiliesinperth THE IRISH SCENE | 69

G’Day from melbourne I hope you all have had a happy and safe Christmas. I’d also like to wish you all the best of luck in your endeavors for 2021.

Another year gone and no doubt there will be many wishing there was never a 2020 year and will be happy to see it go. We have seen an overdose of sad news last year and I don’t think there’s a person on this planet that hasn’t been affected by it, in some way.

My frustration is well documented with the Devil’s curse of this COVID19 blight that has caused so much pain and sorrow to millions. It has been a massive effort by the six million plus Victorian population, considering the horrid draconian lockdown imposed by the State’s premier. All credit to Mister and Missus Average and zero credit to the State premier who imposed such harsh restrictions. His method is what you would call using a missile to eliminate a fly. The main objection from all was the Premier’s treatment of the population, treating adults like children and not respecting that we are all responsible for our own safety and don’t like being treated like children. I will try and bite my tongue as I work my way through this article trying to stay positive and not dwell on what has already been written over and over about again in 2020.

If I may take the liberty of shining a light on some of my expectations’ for the coming 2021. I expect to see a number of positives by this time next year.

We will look back at how we learned to live side by side with COVID19 and how we will have made massive strides to defeating it. There are a number of vaccines in trials to date and there are some that have already passed the trials and are almost ready for distribution. Australians are expecting our governments’ multibillion dollar vaccine orders to be distributed to the public in early March at no cost to the public. I expect the USA, the UK and Ireland will soon also have a vaccine available. Once the vaccines are administered, the world should be able to recover 70 | THE IRISH SCENE

and return to some sort of normal. Now, I did say some sort of normal, because the world will have changed in many ways. Don’t be afraid of change, as there will have to be change. Just as when the seasons change, we see a different weather page.

I have been lucky in my life, to have always seen something good come out of something nasty and I don’t expect that trend to change now. When I left my hometown Cork in 1974 and migrated to Australia for a change, it was a dramatic heart wrenching experience for me. The pain of adjusting to a new life way back then is now only a far diminished memory today. You might well ask, was the hard decision I made for a change to my life then and the pain that I experienced in 1974 worth the risk?

In one word: ABSOLUTELY. I have had amazing life experiences in so many ways. I met wonderful people who encouraged, guided and supported me from day one of my arrival. All this is well documented in a book I wrote some years back, titled ‘A Time of Secrets’. I have had two very successful business careers, first in the Automobile industry and later in the Finance industry. The business success that I had allowed me to venture into writing for magazines here in Australia, along with writing for papers and magazines in Ireland and the USA. I have also had the privilege of having some of my music recorded here in

G’DAY FROM MELBOURNE

Australia, as well as in Japan and Ireland. So you may well ask again, was the suffering pain of change in 1974 worth it all? You be the judge.

Now let’s look at the pain of 2020 and how we may turn that into something positive. Until a reliable vaccine arrives it’s all about social distancing and being safe. Don’t kid yourself, life was never meant to be perfect. I look at the COVID19 pandemic as no different to taking a long road journey. Sometimes the road you travel on can be rough, sometimes there may be potholes along the way. Sometimes there are obstacles to be mindful of, and then there’s also the sometimes unfriendly traffic lights, which always seem to change to red when you arrive at them.

Just like life, there’s no straight road as such. When preparing for a road journey, do you always expect to travel and arrive safe? Not preparing for some of the hazards mentioned above could be fatal. What’s so different with life’s road journey? We always expect to arrive safe, don’t we. I did say ‘expect’ – we are almost always optimistic about arriving safe at our destination. So why shouldn’t we be optimistic about life’s journey? As I see it, we are on life’s bumpy road with a few obstacles (COVID19 this time) but we should not allow that to disrupt the rest of our journey. We have ambitions to fulfill before we come

to the end of our life’s journey. Santa may not have called this year but I bet that’s not the last time our children or grandchildren will see him. Mankind has been plagued with many health concerns over the years – The Great Bubonic Plague (aka the Black Death) Cholera, SARS, AIDS, Tuberculosis and many versions of Flu’s and instead of the world’s population being wiped out, guess what, we have increased in numbers, so much so that some of us might have to migrate to the moon as we are running short of space on this planet.

A few months ago the biggest fear for all Melbournians was that COVID19 would run rampant, filling up our hospital beds, morgues and then wipe out thousands of the population. So far so good, all we have to do now is live safe and be aware that the virus is still out there waiting to latch onto anyone who refuses to ignore it.

Remember the virus is no different to any of the obstacles that challenge you in your everyday life, such as driving your car.

Just remember to keep your distance and stay safe.

I WISH YOU AND YOUR FAMILY ALL THE BEST FOR 2021. UNTIL NEXT TIME, BE GOOD TO THOSE WHO LOVE YOU AND SLAINTE FROM MELBOURNE.

MIKE BOWEN

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IRISH FAMILY HISTORY WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?

If you have migrated to Australia from Ireland you are probably a typical Irish Scene reader. And yet the FamilyHistoryWA Irish Special Interest Group has not been paying you much attention recently. This issue’s column is just for you.

You might have a young family - or not started yet - or perhaps you migrated many decades ago and your family has now left home.

Everyone has a family history. You may know few of your ancestors, only the living ones, but before them are long lines of parents of parents of parents. You might think it’s too soon to get into family history or you might just not be interested. But the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 has taught us all that life can be very fragile and is not at all guaranteed.

If you have children about to start school, one day one of them will come home with a family history project. They’ll have to record the names of their family members, where they lived and died, the relationships between those ancestors and themselves. It gives them a sense of connection within your family. Their grandparents might not be in Perth but they will probably be excellent sources of information after your children have exhausted what you know. A few family Zoom sessions could be scheduled to try to find out this information.

We are suggesting that you don’t wait till the family tree project is your child’s homework, but that one of your New Year resolutions is to write as much of this down as you can now. Your child’s grandparents may not all be alive when your child wants to ask them who were their parents and where did they live.

So how do you do this? Most people start off with a simple family tree - like the picture opposite. It doesn’t need to be as fancy of course, it’s just to show the structure.

You start with the names of your children, where and when they were born (the date is enough), when and 72 | THE IRISH SCENE

where they married, then the same for their parents and grandparents, going back one generation at a time. Instead of a tree, some people use a list of the members of each family. This is easier to display more information about each person. However a small tree diagram is easier for children to understand how they and you fit into the family. They can add in small photos to the tree, especially if there are relatives they’ve never met.

Don’t worry if you cannot fill in every section, just fill in what you can, and think about who might have that missing information – a parent, a sibling, or a cousin. Maybe on your next video call you can ask family members about the gaps in your information and eventually, when we can travel internationally again, you can ask them in person. Won’t that be wonderful?

If you are already a grandparent yourself, it’s important you record your family history now while you have the chance - before there’s no one for your children and grandchildren to ask.

You can just draw up a tree chart or a form yourself or use one already designed for the purpose. You can download free forms many places; just google “genealogy forms”. Or use this link to masses of different forms www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/ Genealogy_Research_Forms#The_Bailey.E2.80.99s_ Free_Genealogy_Forms (you may have to create a free account with one of the providers first).

There are many different forms that take account of step families and adoptions too. Some of the forms are to print off and write into the spaces. These are easier for using during Zoom chats or if you are visiting relatives. Others are designed to be typed into and saved on a computer.

Every generation back you go, you double the number of ancestors you have – 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great grandparents and so on. If you know quite a bit about your ancestors these charts can quickly get

MORE INFO ROBYN O’BRIEN, Convenor Irish Special Interest Group E irish.sig@fhwa.org.au Book a place at the next IRISH GROUP MEETING at TryBooking: tinyurl.com/ISIG-TryBooking Book for forthcoming FHWA events

a bit crowded. The forms usually just try to capture a few generations at a time and link each family together with multiple charts. If your charts start to get a bit messy there are family tree software programs, some of them free, which can help you record and store many generations. That’s if you really get the genealogy bug! So when you run out of living people to ask you can search the records for your more distant ancestors. FamilyHistoryWA’s Irish Special Interest Group can help here.

In the course of your investigation you will come across extra information about the brothers and sisters of your direct ancestors – your aunts and uncles, great aunts and uncles, cousins. They may not easily fit into the ancestor charts but can be added to the family group forms, or lists of the members in each family.

It doesn’t matter which form or chart you use. Just make a start.

In addition to the names, dates and places information, you may like to think about writing some memories about your life that your children might love to read down the track.

Funny anecdotes, places you’ve lived and jobs you’ve had, hobbies and interests that your children may not know about. You don’t have to start at childhood and work forward. Just write down things as they come to you.

PLANS FOR 2021 In 2021 the Irish Special Interest Group will continue to meet online via Google Meet until the COVID-19 restrictions permit more people in our meeting room (the limit is currently just 12). The meeting dates are: 17 January, 18 April, 18 July and 17 October.

View online FHWA events this week Go digging for resources at the IRISH SIG WEBPAGE at FamilyHistoryWA: tinyurl.com/irishsig JOIN FAMILYHISTORYWA FACEBOOK GROUP – researching family worldwide, open to all Join in the chat or ask a question at the FAMILYHISTORYWA DISCUSSION FACEBOOK GROUP FamilyHistoryWA (FHWA) membership.wags.org.au T 9271 4311

On 17 January Jenni Ibrahim will be showing you how to navigate your way around Griffiths Valuation (1847-64), a major substitute for nineteenth century censuses. And Cheryl Hebbs will cover the earlier Tithes Applotment survey (1823-37). At later meetings we will demonstrate other useful sites for finding your ancestors, including aids for finding place names.

You need to book a place at any future meeting using the online booking site TryBooking, details above (you cannot book for a meeting more than three months ahead). Those who have booked will be sent a link to the Google Meet shortly before the 2pm meeting.

New members and visitors are welcome.

FamilyHistoryWA was closed over the Christmas-New Year break (20 Dec – 10 Jan) but will be cranking up with lots of exciting online events from 11 January - some for beginners, and others for experienced researchers. Non-members and new members are welcome to join in from home. See the links above. A small payment may be required.

You can will also be able to visit the FamilyHistoryWA library and resource centre at 6/48 May Street Bayswater - by appointment only to ensure we meet the building’s capacity restrictions. Opening hours are given on the FamilyHistoryWA homepage.

Happy and successful researching!

JENNI IBRAHIM

on behalf of the Irish Special Interest Group

THE IRISH SCENE | 73

paula from tasmania

COMBING THROUGH THE EVIDENCE IN THIS RURAL CRIME THRILLER Fleur Macdonald’s latest novel ‘The Shearer’s Wife’ encompasses two linked stories set forty years apart. The opening story is set in 1980 and chronicles the arrival in Barker, South Australia of Rose and her husband, Irishman Ian Kelly on their way to a shearing job. Rose is pregnant and concerned her husband’s nomadic drifter existence is not what she wants for herself and her children.

The story skips to 2020 with the Australian federal police in Barker arresting a grandmother for narcotic possession. One of the detectives involved in the procedure is Fleur’s most loved creations, Dave Burrows, however this story is not Dave’s story but instead the story of reporter Zara Ellison. Being involved in the investigation has come at the right time for Zara, who has just been dealing with a personal loss.

What these investigations uncover is a link between Rose and Ian Kelly from forty years ago and the present narcotic possession.

In writing this novel Fleur drew on as inspiration the rural shearer’s strike from March to May 1983, disputing the use of wide combs. The controversy 74 | THE IRISH SCENE

began when the Australian workers union represented shearer’s concerns of the use of wider 2.5 inch combs which would increase productivity.

Fleur says, for all her good intentions of being in control of her stories, often her characters will write themselves and go their own way! We can expect another rural fiction from Fleur in November next year and a new Dave Burrows adventure in April.

“THE SHEARER’S WIFE” BY FLEUR MADONALD IS OUT NOW. PUBLISHED BY ALLEN AND UNWIN.

MAY-YA ESCAPE WORK Part The Block meets Escape to The Country, and part uniquely Maya, is ‘Bottlebrush Creek’, the second novel from Maya Linnell, the author of ‘Wildflower Ridge’.

The emphasis here is on fixing or mending a property as a metaphor for mending relationships. The protagonist Angie McIntyre has taken on the task of fixing up her idea of a perfect home to envelop her little family, the fixing a metaphor for her and her partner Rob Jones desire to mend their relationship.

However, nothing is ever perfect not even Angie’s house, as its neighbours are Rob’s parents. It seems more ‘fixing’ than first thought is called for, especially with grandparents that can seem to do everything on a better and bigger scale (a gigantic toy cow for example) for

PAULA FROM TASMANIA

their grandchild.

Continuing the metaphor of repairing is the idea that working on a relationship is preferable to opting out of it for something new. Sometimes some simple adjustments can preserve the integrity of what you have rather than giving up and walking away.

“BOTTLEBRUSH CREEK” BY MAYA LINNELL IS OUT NOW. PUBLISHED BY ALLEN AND UNWIN.

PERFECTION IS NO STRANGER TO LIANE MORIARTY I spoke to Liane Moriarty about her book ‘Nine Perfect Strangers’ and which is soon set to become a movie.

I was delighted to learn of Liane’s Tassie connection through her husband who is originally from the state.

The other man in Liane’s life is her dad.

Liane tells me her dad, a self-made business man, encouraged she and her siblings to pursue what they loved in life, commit to it and complete it.

Liane’s dad believed in bringing an idea to fruition and by doing so transforming the present.

With that kind of creative thinking backing up the family’s endeavours, it is no surprise Liane started out in adverting, creating catchy punchlines and injecting life into the humble brochure so people would want to read them.

Liane envied her sister who published before her and says the desire to be a writer was always with her.

When I tell her some of her characters in her latest novel are written reminiscent of the style of the writing of Patrick White, she says she find that flattering.

In her novel ‘Perfect Strangers’ set in a health and wellness resort, nine ordinary people with the normal human anxieties about their imperfections connect, among them a romantic novelist whose career is waning, young people with much too much mullah and an ordinary mum abandoned by her husband for a newer model, who needs an injection not of botox but self-esteem!

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CONTINUED ON PAGE 76

www.exportair.com.au | THE IRISH SCENE

75

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 75

These ‘perfect strangers’ in their time at the facility realise that they are not really strangers at all but bonded by their individual imperfections and that the real stranger is perfection itself.

“NINE PERFECT STRANGERS” BY LIANE MORIARTY IS OUT NOW. PUBLISHED BY PAN MACMILLAN AUSTRALIA.

RURAL RESPECT ‘Bush School’ is the story of Peter O’Brien on his first teacher posting, at only twenty years of age, as the only teacher at a rural school.

Having always lived in Sydney, his appointment was a big change for him.

With a class of eighteen students ranging from age 5 to 15, coupled with a lack of teaching resources, the difficulties were made up for by the nature of the students, respectful of their teacher and their desire for knowledge.

Their learning was activated by the knowledge they could apply creatively from their work on the land. The boys could use skills from shearing to teach them about maths and other subjects.

Similarly, the girls could use their knowledge of sewing and crafts to learn principles in other areas of education.

In 2017, sixty years on from his first teaching appointment, Peter attended a teachers college reunion with a number of other teachers. He was magically transformed back to those long ago times in that he could visually see the children there in front of him again.

In his retirement Peter, with encouragement, desired to write about these times and even caught up with a student who had gone on to manage a 76 | THE IRISH SCENE

grazing property, whom reminded him that those schooldays were the best of his life.

Peter says the key and an essential rule to live by as a teacher is not to teach the subject but instead teach the child the skills to allow them to the means to harness their creativity and learn in a way that city children do not.

“BUSH SCHOOL” BY PETER O’BRIEN IS OUT NOW. PUBLISHED BY ALLEN AND UNWIN.

DRESS FOR SUCCESS I spoke to Amanda French, General Manager at ‘Dress for Success Hobart’ about the work they were doing to empower women aiming to join the workforce. The organisation was presented with a $10,000 CommBank Staff Community Grant after Commonwealth Bank employee and long time supporter and volunteer for ‘Dress for Success Hobart’, Annette Roberts nominated them.

‘Dress for Success’ is a charity that has gone global after its inception in 2006. Hobart joined in 2011. The aim of the organisation is to provide women of low income a chance to access professional looking clothes (even some big brand items) so they present well at interviews. It is not just the appearance that is tackled but women are also helped with writing their resume and schooled in replying to selection criteria.

The whole process hopes to bring confidence to women in their job search and provide a support network throughout a process in a competitive environment, that can be quite challenging, for those out of paid work for some time and those who have yet to experience paid work. The clients range from girls aged sixteen years and up, looking for their first job, to women sixties-plus seeking to re-enter the work force, the fact is there is no limitations for those wishing to improve their chances of entering the workforce.

The volunteers who provide the service are well trained, essential especially during the pandemic of COVID 19 where face to face assistance had to be moved to online assistance. Although the delivery of the service was different, the professionalism of the service remained.

YOU CAN READ MORE AT THE FOLLOWING: HOBART.DRESSFORSUCCESS.ORG/

DR KARL, YOU ARE OUR ONLY HOPE In his latest book ‘Surfing Safari, Through Science’ Dr Karl Kruszelnicki travels the galaxy searching for the amazing and unusual. He encounters everything from cells that can repair lungs damaged by smoking, the age of the earth, to spectacular spiders who strategically plan their captures, and if at first they don’t succeed develop alternative plans.

You may have heard that when someone stops smoking the

PAULA FROM TASMANIA

spider takes arachnids to another level of accomplishment. The Portia’s unique talent allows it to strategically plan attacks on its prey, and if they fail it can take what occurred in to account and propose alternatives.

body immediately begins repairing, new stem cells appear to replace the old damaged ones. We still don’t know everything about this creative process and if other parts of the body also have this miraculous mending method, but the continued study offers hope regarding the body’s ability to heal itself.

From creativity to creation itself, as Dr Karl looks at the age of the creation of the world. It was a 17th century Irish Archbishop, James Ussher, who estimated the earth’s age by studying the bible, at that time considered the definitive historical record on everything. Ussher concluded after his biblical study that it was 400BC on a weekend that the creation of the world occurred. Ussher’s calculations were noted in a bible’s margins and were considered as true as the bible they were written on. Now with better scientific methods and knowledge we can conclude the earth was created 4.6 billion years ago.

These two different views on the creation of the earth are still very polarised views today and can be seen in the friction between those who trust in science regarding COVID 19 and those who trust only in faith.

While disagreement continues to reign between faith and science, the cunning of the Portia spiders of North Eastern Australia can’t be disagreed upon. This

Possessing good eyesight, the spider can work out an approach that has the best possibility of capturing its prey. It can lure other spiders by vibrating its web so prey come closer to investigate why it is moving. It may even lower a thread of its web to an adjacent web so it can, swashbuckler-like, make its way over and burrow its bite potently into its prey.

An additional feature of the book is bonus content where you can download an app, allowing reader to watch Dr Karl as a hologram stepping out of the book to introduce each chapter.

‘SURFING SAFARI, THROUGH SCIENCE’ BY DR KARL KRUSZELNICKI IS OUT NOW. PUBLISHED BY ABC BOOKS.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 13

All the young dudes!

UON is number ONE

If Van Morrison turned 75 last year, then so too did another child of 1945, Oliver McNerney, who some readers might be familiar with from his work on local and community radio. Oliver has been spinning records/discs and chatting on air for a long time now, including 20 years with Shannonside Radio in his native Longford, and is currently with VCA 88.5FM, from Ellenbrook.

Oliver has always loved music and never misses an opportunity to get up close with musicians and artists, inside and outside the studio. He is pictured here with the legendary Belfast singer in London in 1970 – the same year that Moondance established Morrison as a major singer. Fifty years later both Van the Man and Oliver the DJ are still doing their thing.

Oliver’s show streams live from the VCA studios every Saturday afternoon from 3pm till 5pm. Call him for a request at 9297 1088 or text 0481 988 505.

Bragging rights in the first Business News RISE Business Awards went to integrated energy company UON, based in Malaga. Founded and built up by Dubliner Mark Keogh in 1988 UON was crowned Western Australian business of the year as well as large business of 2020, the latest in a long line of gongs and accolades for the firm which employs 279 people and has revenue of more than $56 million a year. Mark is originally from Rathfarnham in Dublin and set up UON not very long after he arrived in Perth. He is also uncle to Perth Glory striker Andy Keogh.

Tony and Veronica McKee PO Box 994 Hillarys WA 6923

Tel (08) 9401 1900 • Fax: 9401 1911 Mob: 0413 337 785

info@mckeefamilyfunerals.com.au www.mckeefamilyfunerals.com.au THE IRISH SCENE | 77

BOOK REVIEWS

THE MUSIC ADVANTAGE

BY ANITA COLLINS / ALLEN & UNWIN $32.99

In 2018, a Perth primary school, located in an area of low income and high unemployment, took part in a significant music experiment. ‘Don’t Stop the Music’ was screened on ABC TV documenting the remarkable effect music had on the lives of the school’s pupils. The week after it went to air, publishers Allen & Unwin contacted Dr Anita Collins, one of those closely involved with the project, to see if she could document the theory behind the programme. THE MUSIC ADVANTAGE is the result of that approach with Collins explaining how music influences brain development; how it enhances attention span; helps build self confidence and leadership qualities; benefits creativity and assists memory amongst babies, school children and beyond.

Originally a high school music teacher, Collins pondered as to whether learning music helped students become high achievers, or were some students already clever and therefore drawn to learn music.

The chicken or the egg? Nature or nurture? Collins’ findings in this book are based on wide-ranging research over many years, talking to musical 78 | THE IRISH SCENE

luminaries and educators, visiting international neuromusical labs to gain an understanding of just how music impacts on brain development. Despite all the complicated theory underpinning the benefits of music to children, Collins enthusiastically presents these concepts simply and concisely in order ‘to open the door for... the everyday reader, parent, teacher and student’ to reveal the irreplaceable role music plays in the education of children, while highlighting its lifelong advantages and benefits.

According to the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra’s Principal Conductor, Benjamin Northey, THE MUSIC ADVANTAGE ‘is essential reading for parents, educators and policy designers’. I think the secret of this book is that Collins has written it as she speaks; I got the feeling while reading that she was just talking to me. Perhaps, if our primary and government secondary schools refrained from slashing music support to pupils, Australia would be much higher up the world academic rankings. I would certainly recommend this book to all parents, and personally regret that music did not play a much larger part in my young life. - Reviewed by John Hagan

HONEYBEE

BY CRAIG SILVEY / ALLEN & UNWIN $32.99

It’s been a long time between novels for Fremantle’s Craig Silvey, but this one is well worth the wait. His previous book, international best seller, JASPER JONES, considered a modern Australian classic and released in 2009, went on to win INDE and ABIA Book Of The Year awards and was also made into a feature film starring Toni Collette and Tom Long. At the centre of JASPER JONES was 13 year old Charlie

BOOK REVIEWS

Bucktin, while HONEYBEE features yet another adolescent, 14 year old Sam Watson, who narrates this coming-of-age tale.

We first meet Sam as he stands on a Perth overpass wanting to end his life. At the other end of the bridge is Vic, a worn out old soldier, who also is intent on suicide. Bonded by suffering, a fateful connection is made, the pair save each other and form an unlikely friendship. Through a series of flashbacks we learn that Sam, a sensitive, gentle, impressionable young boy, sought to end his life because of constant humiliation meted out by his mother’s macho, domineering partner.

Sam moves in with Vic, cooks and cares for the old man, as he seeks the support and love necessary to help rebuild his life. Vic teaches the boy how to mend engines and Sam meets the quirky Meemeduma family, including their vivacious, outgoing daughter Aggie, who also influences the direction of his life. We follow Sam’s angst and battles as he begins to develop characteristics that do not match his gender.

At its core, HONEYBEE is a novel about growing up, unconventional types of love and family relationships. It is brimming with humour and compassion, and packed with wonderful, witty, luminous dialogue. This is the quintessence of skilled, page-turning, story-telling, with Silvey adroitly teasing out the secrets that seemingly lie behind nondescript facades. - Reviewed by John Hagan

HOME STRETCH

BY GRAHAM NORTON / CORONET $32.99

It’s the summer of 1987 and the small, fictional, Irish town of Mullinmore is preparing for a wedding. On the eve of the ceremony, the bride, groom and four other friends drive to the beach. On the way home there is an accident and three of the party, including the couple due to be married, are killed when the car crashes at a roundabout. Three survive – but are they the lucky ones? Connor, son of the local publican,

one of those who escape the wreckage, admits to being the driver. Fleeing the shame, and blame, of the Mullinmore community, Connor seeks refuge abroad, firstly in Liverpool (where he realizes he is gay), then London, and finally in New York. The novel follows Connor over the next three decades as he seeks to forget his past and forge a new life away from his rural Irish roots. But secrets can only be kept for so long and eventually Connor must confront his past.

Following his departure, life for the rest of Connor’s family continues, but not without some heartache.

His sister, Ellen, marries one of the other accident survivors, Martin, who becomes the local doctor and father of their two children. In 2012, their son Finbar (also gay) while on a gap year working in New York, runs into his long departed uncle Connor whom he encourages to return to Mullinmore to be reunited with his family. Now Connor faces many dilemmas. How will the town, including those who survived the calamity, receive him after all these years? Will his staunchly Catholic parents accept their son is homosexual?

Can he be forgiven for the accident? Can he forgive himself?

According to Norton, ‘The choices we make as young people can have long lasting consequences, sometimes unexpected, and often devastating’.

In this, his third book, master interviewer and TV celebrity, Norton describes HOME STRETCH as his ‘most personal story to date’ perhaps because, like himself, the central character, Connor, is gay.

While he delves into gay relationships, Norton is essentially sketching a much larger tapestry as he chronicles the progress of Irish society from an era when homosexuality was punished, to the country becoming the first in the world to support same sex marriage. HOME STRETCH is essentially the author’s love letter to his homeland as he celebrates the fundamental facets of Irish friendliness, forgiveness, stoicism and willingness to accept, and embrace, change. - Reviewed by John Hagan CONTINUED ON PAGE 80

THE IRISH SCENE | 79

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 79

A SONG FOR THE DARK TIMES

BY IAN RANKIN / HACHETTE AUSTRALIA $32.99

It’s been a few years since he retired from the Edinburgh Police and age seems to be catching up with ex-Detective Inspector, John Rebus. He no longer smokes, only drinks in moderation, and is moving to a ground floor flat because he can no longer cope with stairs. Before he can settle in to his new abode, Rebus receives a telephone call from his somewhat estranged daughter, Samantha, who lives on the north coast of Scotland. She informs him that her husband, Keith, has disappeared and she fears for the worst. Rebus immediately hops in his ageing Saab and heads north to assist.

Before his vanishing, Keith had been very involved in a history project researching the workings of a local prison camp that housed WWII German prisoners. Some still live in his village harbouring diverse feelings about their time in custody. On arrival, Rebus starts to nose around and sure enough a body turns up. Is the corpse linked to the former prison camp or perhaps to the hippy commune which is adjacent? How will Rebus fare without his badge, no official standing and beyond the well honed networks of his native Edinburgh?

Meanwhile, Rebus’ former colleague, Siobhan Clarke, is busily investigating the murder of an apparently rich Saudi student who has links both to Scottish nobility and a devious property developer who is eyeing off the WWII camp and the commune land.

Both the student and the developer were frequent patrons of a new gin bar owned by (who else?) Rebus’ former adversary, Big Ger Cafferty.

The question arises: are these cases in any way connected, and if so, how? Rankin, with his superb storytelling technique, deftly weaves his way through these parallel issues while addressing changing social aspects such as class disparity, Brexit, politics and blackmail. The John Rebus of A SONG FOR THE DARK TIMES is still the dogged, sometimes 80 | THE IRISH SCENE

infuriating, intuitive investigator, although arguably a slightly diminished one and there are indications that Rankin will eventually retire him for good. If not exactly a thriller, this is certainly crime writing of the highest order by a virtuoso of the craft. The title foreshadows a tale of morality, regrets, relationships, ageing and lost opportunities. - Reviewed by John Hagan

WETTENING AURALIA

BY PETER BURKE / AURELIA PRESS

This fine study of a complex and still controversial subject in Western Australian history is a wellcrafted and unusual piece of work. It came late to this writer’s attention, which is annoying. It would have been a real pleasure to absorb and enjoy it back when.

It is a skilfully crafted documentary novel about two closely linked, pivotal events in our State’s history.

Firstly, the planning, building and opening of the world’s longest water pipeline – the one from the Goldfields to a distant reservoir near the coast.

Mundaring Weir. Secondly, the key role of the great Charles Yelverton O’Connor in the project and the tragic end of his life after he suffered a prolonged barrage of highly personal attacks and false accusations.

O’Connor was a member of a respected County Meath landed gentry family. His father virtually ruined himself by sacrificing everything in attempts to help the poor and desperate during the famine years. O’Connor the son made engineering his profession and, after moving to Western Australia, demonstrated his skills in complex projects around Perth and Fremantle. He was made Engineer-in-Chief of the colony and won the trust and loyal friendship of Premier John Forrest. That in itself was quite an achievement, as Forrest was an exacting, hard driving man.

The premier’s wife Lady Forrest turned on the tap in 1903 at the grand, successful launching of O’Connor’s project. The remarkable thing about the pipeline was that it did not go over budget. By then, of course, O’Connor had taken his own life after being subject to prolonged, outrageous press attacks, accusations and outright lies which would have shaken the most hardened, sleezy media types of our time.

The big issue, as Mr Burke points out, was “who dunnit…’’. Who came up with main barrages of lies

BOOK REVIEWS

and wild suggestions in the Sunday Times?

Who was so good at “broadcasting invective at random”.

The detective work is interesting. Mr Vosper, a former of the Sunday Times, had doubts about the project but was no longer around and wrote nothing about it. He died in January, 1901.

His successor, as Mr Burke reveals, was the culprit. He was Thomas (‘Tommy’) Walker (1858-1932), an Englishman who later became a leading light of the parliamentary Labor Party in Western Australia and eventually Attorney General of the State. Author Burke dug very deep in tracking down the gentleman’s early life and career. The details are appalling. He postured as a stalwart republican, anti-clerical and anti-establishment man of the left in both journalism (among other things) and politics, but left a trail of wreckage behind him which, in four jaw dropping and disgraceful instances, could easily have resulted in criminal charges and ruin.

“

He was later famous for vindictive political rhetoric

... Burke is both frank and fair and he asks awkward questions. One of them is terrible in its implications.” both in and outside parliament and on the bench. Of course, as Burke notes, when in high office himself the ‘outspoken’ Walker was “thin-skinned, litigious and abjectly hypocritical with regards to press freedom”.

Walker was directly responsible for the lies and innuendos which destroyed O’Connor. Author Burke is both frank and fair and he asks awkward questions.

One of them is terrible in its implications. Why have some scholars and writers - and by extension the rest of the community - more or less given him a free pass in the historical sense? - Reviewed by Peter Conole

ADAPTING: THE LIFE, TIMES AND GLOBETROTTING ADVENTURES OF AN IRISH NURSE

BY MARY HOLLIDAY / MARY JOSEPHINE HOLLIDAY

Born in Ireland into a patrilineal inheritance system, Mary Holliday recognised early on that there was no future for her in the staunchly Church-controlled Ireland of the mid20th Century. Her “best” prospects were an approved husband followed by decades of rampant baby making and domestic drudgery.

Yet neither did she want to simply embark on a ship for America, like so many young Irish had done for so long.

Faced with a love of her nation but a dread of the crippling economic realities of her time, she elected to follow her Aunt Alice’s footsteps. As a first born female in the family, she too, like Alice would become a nurse. Armed with this most portable of careers, the young Mary would forge her own way in the world and, as if to prove that the fate of Irish youth is to roam, she would eventually sail away from her Celtic home, first to Africa and then to Australia.

This collection of stories tells of her journey, successfully navigating her way through life’s adventures. In reading them, Mary hopes they will provide some joy, a sprinkle of laughter, a dose of inspiration and above all, a desire to be accommodating, flexible and tolerant in your own way through life. For is she has learnt one thing on her path, you never get very far if you are not capable of: adapting.

THE IRISH SCENE | 81

Eireborne

GETS AUSTRALIA BACK ON ITS FEET

BY LLOYD GORMAN

AUSTRALIA’S EMBATTLED LIVE MUSIC AND ENTERTAINMENT SECTOR IS GETTING A KICKSTART FROM TRADITIONAL IRISH DANCING AND CONTEMPORARY IRISH MUSIC. Forced into total shutdown by COVID 19, the arts sector lost audiences and bookings in the blink of an eye, leaving tens of thousands of artists, musicians, performers and entertainers amongst those to be hardest hit by the fallout from the pandemic. During the height of the crisis in Australia – and elsewhere – artists themselves went online in large numbers to showcase their talents and entertain others in lockdown.

While the Morrison government rushed to introduce schemes like Job Keeper and Job Seeker, it was criticised heavily for its glacial response and lack of support for the arts. On November 20, 2020 the federal government launched a $60 million Restart Investment to Sustain and Expand (RISE) Fund designed to restart arts, cultural and entertainment activity around Australia. Under the new scheme grants of between $50,000 and $2 million would be given to 115 projects, expected to attract audiences of 11 million Australians at more than 1,000 venues in every state and territory. One of the first projects to be announced – on December 9 by Curtin MP Celia 82 | THE IRISH SCENE

Hammond – was a $481,445 grant for Perth arts promoter Mellen Events to bring a tour of ‘Eireborne’ to Australia.

Brad Mellen from Claremont based Mellen Events said ‘Eireborne’ is a celebration of Ireland’s contribution to the world of music and dance.

It promises to be a 90 minute, fast paced, all Irish spectacle performed by a 15 strong dance ensemble backed by a live band on stage.

“The show has received rave reviews across Australia and internationally and features the music of U2, Hozier, The Cranberries, Enya, The Script and many more (Snow Patrol, Van Morrison),” Mr Mellen said.

“The funding will assist us to deliver an Australian tour of ‘Eireborne’ in 2021, with a total anticipated audience of over 20,000 people nationally.”

Ten full time local positions, over 400 casual jobs and employment for 24 ‘creatives’ would be created directly by the ‘Eireborne’ tour, Mr Mellen added, with spin off benefits for tourism, hospitality and other sectors.

EIREBORNE GETS AUSTRALIA BACK ON ITS FEET

THE RIVERS DANCE THAT WASN’T SUCH A BIG HIT! Left: Eireborne’s lead dancer and co-director, Peta Anderson.

Above: The wildly successful show, Riverdance The Eireborne tour across 16 dates is scheduled to start on March 12 at Parramatta and expected to reach WA on May 2 with a performance at Crown Theatre, followed closely by shows at the Bunbury Regional Entertainment Centre and Albany Entertainment Centre.

The impact of a good Irish production should not be underestimated as the example of Riverdance proves. Originally conceived as a short once off interval display to the 1994 Eurovision in the Point Depot Dublin, it rapidly became a global phenomenon with several troupe touring the world continuously, providing work and travel opportunities for hundreds of young Irish dancers and performers, as well as others.

Indeed Eireborne’s lead dancer and codirector Peta Anderson is herself a former Riverdance performer (2011-2015). Riverdance was so successful that it spawned several other spin off productions and has become the template for shows of this nature. The birth of Riverdance also coincided neatly with the start of the boom in the Irish economy that would become known as the Celtic Tiger, a cultural expression of Ireland’s new found confidence and position in the world.

Even now it continues to make its presence felt. Back in November last year Luna Palace Cinemas in Leederville screened the 120 minute long documentary film Riverdance 25 Anniversary Show.

Australian clothing company Rivers tried to cash in on its brand name and the hit Irish dance show late last year by running its ‘Do the Rivers Dance’ promotion.

For the chance to win $1,000 entrants had to film themselves doing the ‘Rivers Dance’ jig to the sound of traditional tunes provided through its website and then post the video to the company’s Facebook or Instagram sites. The winner was to be announced on September 21.

It is questionable how successful this promotion was for them. Because no news of the winner was to be found on the Rivers website it was necessary to go in search of it. Rivers Facebook revealed just two clips.

One was a low budget botched together collection of clips of a few people who all did a bit of a dance in what appears to be the same store (with a Rivers dance sticker on the floor) somewhere. The winning video is also there. It is a suspiciously well produced and polished minute long clip with some effects and well written lyrics that could have come straight out of a Rivers training manual.

Added to that there is no mention at all of who the energetic winner is, not even a first name or location, but he does at least appear to be Irish (judging by his accent from the signing). If you can know who this chap is (pictured above), Irish Scene would be interested to find out more about him and track him down for a chat about his apparent windfall. Rivers was contacted for comment but did not respond.

THE IRISH SCENE | 83

irish choir perth

THE NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION YOU WILL WANT TO KEEP. There is a modern take on the New Year’s resolution – rather than pick an activity, you choose a word. A word that guides your choices and behaviour across the year, something that can provide you with a ‘reset’ at any point.

The word can be anything that inspires positive change, so instead of that old NY favourite ‘lose weight’, you could apply the word ‘light’ to your life – in the food choices you make and in the way exercise makes you feel, but also to your mood and your mental health. A good laugh is sometimes the best thing to lighten our hearts.

Your word can of course be anything, but at the Irish Choir Perth, we do have one pretty good suggestion – you guessed it, ‘Sing!’

You could sing anywhere and while there is great satisfaction in belting out a tune in the shower, car or local karaoke club, there is tremendously more satisfaction to be had singing in a choir.

The Irish Choir Perth is led by an awesome conductor, Hilary, who puts heaps of energy and fun into teaching us how to bring out the best in our voices, how to warm them up and extend our vocal range and to bring real expression and feeling to those beautiful songs we practice and perform each week.

It’s a great feeling when the parts come together and we can do justice to a song. An integral part of singing is breathing, and as automatic as breathing is, deep and controlled breathing is often forgotten about. After an hour or two of singing however, you leave feeling de-stressed and relaxed.

If all this talk of deep breathing and developing vocal range feels like, well too much effort, we can 84 | THE IRISH SCENE

guarantee that at the heart of our choir is simply good fun. It’s a community choir, it’s there to be enjoyed and we do have a good laugh together.

We’ve had lots of new members over the last 6 months, which we love and we invite anyone who is interested in taking on ‘Sing’ as their New Year’s word to come along and give it a try for a few sessions.

The Irish Choir Perth meets on Wednesday nights at the Irish Club in Subiaco. The new term starts in late January 2021 and generally follows the WA school terms. All the details of the start times, dates and fees can be found on our socials @IrishChoirPerth #JoinInSing

‘The gathering’ FINAL MEETING FOR 2020

THE IRISH SCENE | 85

cooking with lee

CRUMBED CHICKEN SALTIMBOCCA INGREDIENTS

1 skinless, boneless chicken breast 2 large eggs, beaten to blend 1 cup panko breadcrumbs ½ cup all-purpose flour 4 sage leaves Thin slices prosciutto 1 cup vegetable oil 2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil Sea salt & black pepper Lemon wedges (for serving) Dill, parsley & basil (for serving) METHOD

1. Place a chicken breast on a cutting board. Holding a knife parallel to board and working along a long side, cut through center of breast until you are ½ inch from the other side. Open like a book and place butterflied breast between 2 sheets of plastic wrap. Gently pound as thin as possible without tearing meat—about ¼ inch thick.

2. Place eggs, panko, and flour in three separate shallow bowls. Season cutlets lightly with salt.

Working with 1 cutlet at a time, press 2 sage leaves onto both sides of meat. Wrap 2 pieces of prosciutto around each cutlet to make a belt that holds in the sage. Dredge in flour, shaking off excess. Dip in egg, letting excess drip back into bowl. Coat in panko, pressing lightly to help it adhere, then shaking off excess. Place cutlet on a rimmed baking sheet.

3. Heat vegetable oil in a large skillet over mediumhigh until very hot. Carefully lower 1 cutlet along the side of the skillet closest to you and let it slide into oil so it’s lying flat. Swirl oil in skillet carefully so that cutlet is submerged and cook just until bottom side is golden brown, about 2 minutes.

Using tongs, carefully turn and cook until golden brown on the other side, about 2 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack; season with salt. Let sit 5 minutes.

4. Toss the parsley, dill & basil leaves with olive oil, salt, pepper and place on top of the chicken. Serve with a lemon wedge.

For more recipes, check out Lee on Instagram @lee.behan 86 | THE IRISH SCENE

LEE BEHAN

childhood heroEs

BY CIARAIN HOEY

Looking back in my earlier years in primary school, Marshall Mathers – better known as Eminem – was my first childhood hero. Back then I thought his songs were cool to sing song too despite frequent profanities to my mum’s distaste! Diving deeper, Eminem had amazing resilience, growing up in a trailer park, failing year 9 three times in a row despite studying the dictionary most nights to work out ways to make two words that that do not rhyme, rhyme!

Eminem has amazing tenacity to persevere and showup in uncomfortable situations when considered the underdog, and audacity to speak his mind and express life’s ups and downs through the hip/hop rap genre. Eminem became one of the few rappers to win a Grammy. The traits of determination, confidence and ability to change the game in their field of domain aligns with two of my favourite Irish sporting heroes: Roy Keane and Conor McGregor – both receiving the highest accolades in the sport representing the fighting Irish!

Despite being a Liverpool fan – Roy Keane’s incredible mindset and strength of character to remain focussed on winning football matches, relentless drive to leave nothing behind on the pitch in combination sticking up for his teammates in the heat of the battle, setting elite standards consistently and cajoling team mates to consistently train at a high intensity day in and day out to reach the ultimate goal- winning European trophies and leagues. Roy Keane is the ONLY Irish player to make the FIFA 100 – selected by Brazilian legend Pele as one of the “greatest living footballers”. Nowadays Roy is a pundit at Sky Sports, providing sharp, witty and authentic input reminding players core values of grit, determination, desire and to do all you can with what you have.

In the last few years Conor McGregor took the UFC into the Stratosphere by being the first fighter to be the world champion in two different divisions.

In interviews Conor emphasises the importance of showing up and hard work. After dominating the UFC game, McGregor landed an historic boxing fight with Floyd Mayweather. McGregor can captivate and entertain audiences, with his tremendous levels of self-confidence and brash but accurate predictions.

When I first started tuning in to McGregor in UFC 178 in September 2014 in his fight against Dustin Poirier (when Conor was ranked No.9 in the world

and Dustin No.5 in the featherweight division), Conor predicted a first-round knockout and in his eyes, he was number one – sure enough, this was to evolve in to fruition just under a minute and a half into the first round against Dustin Poirier and to become world featherweight champion in December 2015! Conor’s entrance walk has been dubbed and mimicked across the world in different sporting codes.

An honourable mention goes out to Bob Geldof, a fierce, assertive and determined individual – focus on desire of getting projects done and not taking no as an answer, resulting in amazing philanthropic contributions to the world – most notably through Live Aid. All four of these people represent showing up, pushing through discomfort, recognising the opportunity and taking on challenges. Eminem performing in rap battles in Detroit, Roy Keane receiving that yellow card knowing he would be able to play in the grand final – turning Manchester United’s performance round with a goal against Juventus in the semi-final – hailed as one of the finest and highest performances of self-sacrifice and selflessness. McGregor showing up to his first UFC fight on short notice and being underprepared.

Whilst talent has a part to play, these heroic people embed consistency, mental strength and embracing adversity. A characteristic and mindset to consider what you can achieve and do even amid the most surreal year across the world this century.

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Australian Irish Dancing Association Inc.

A HUGE THANK YOU TO EVERY SINGLE MEMBER OF OUR AIDA WA BRANCH FOR YOUR PASSION AND ENTHUSIASM THROUGHOUT THE YEAR 2020. I THINK WE CAN ALL AGREE IT WAS A VERY CHALLENGING YEAR FOR ALL OUR DANCERS AND FAMILIES! YOUR HARD WORK AND DETERMINATION HELPED KEEP THE COMMUNITY OF IRISH DANCE ALIVE Congratulations to all our dancers that competed in our November feis last weekend. Last one for 2020!

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It sure has been a strange year but we are beyond lucky to have held a number of feisanna as well as our State Championships!

Thank you to our local Adjudicators that have made all of these competitions possible Eoghan Quinn SDCRG, Rita Maguire ADCRG, Hilary McKenna ADCRG, Rose O’Brien ADCRG, Eileen Ashley ADCRG and Lara Donelan ADCRG. We would also like to share our deepest gratitude for having the opportunity to hold such events last week and consider ourselves extremely lucky

☘

88 | THE IRISH SCENE

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AIDA WA EXECUTIVE 2020 WA Dance Schools have ended this year with some fantastic Christmas concerts/parties!!! Check out our celebrations below.

President: Caroline McCarthy TCRG Vice Presidents: Melissa Kennedy TCRG and Samantha McAleer TCRG Secretary: Caitriona Slane TCRG Treasurer: Martina O’Brien TCRG Registrar: Jenny O’Hare TCRG National Delegate: Eileen Ashley

SCHOOL CONTACTS:

CELTIC ACADEMY East Victoria Park & Karragullen www.celticacademyperth.com Siobhan Collis TCRG 0403 211 941 KAVANAGH STUDIO OF IRISH DANCE Maylands www.kavanaghirishdance.com.au Teresa Fenton TCRG 0412 155 318 Deirdre McGorry TCRG Melissa Kennedy TCRG Avril Grealish TCRG THE ACADEMY MID AMERICA & WESTERN AUSTRALIA Subiaco, Wangara & Pearsall Samantha McAleer TCRG Dhana Pitman TCRG Kalamunda Lara Upton ADCRG 0409 474 557 O’BRIEN ACADEMY Joondalup www.obrienacademy.com Rose O’Brien ADCRG 0437 002 355 Martina O’Brien TCRG 0423 932 866 O’HARE SCHOOL OF IRISH DANCING Doubleview, Wembley Downs & Craigie Jenny O’Hare TCRG 0422 273 596 SCOIL RINCE NA HEIREANN Rockingham irishdance@iinet.net.au Megan Cousins TCRG 0411 452 370 SCOIL RINCE NI BHAIRD Fremantle & Lynwood Tony Ward TCRG 0427 273 596 THREE CROWNS SCHOOL OF IRISH DANCE Wangara & Padbury www.threecrownsirishdancing.com Eleanor Rooney TCRG 0449 961 669

Stephen Dawson MLC

Member for Mining and Pastoral Region Minister for Environment; Disability Services Deputy Leader of the Government in the Legislative Council PO Box 2440, SOUTH HEDLAND WA 6722 stephen.dawsonmp@mp.wa.gov.au (08) 9172 2648 • 1800 199 344 (toll free)

TRINITY STUDIO OF IRISH DANCING Morley, Midland, Bayswater & Singleton trinitystudiowa@gmail.com Eileen Ashley ADCRG 0413 511 595 Katherine Travers TCRG Nell Taylor TCRG WA ACADEMY OF IRISH DANCING Malaga Glenalee Bromilow ADCRG 0410 584 051 Sue Hayes TMRF 0412 040 719

THE IRISH SCENE | 89

Irish sports stars pull out of 2021 AFL season

BY AJ GLEW

Three Irish women’s AFL players have withdrawn from the 2021 AFLW season. The AFL world has also seen two Irish recruits pull the plug.

Yvonne Bonner, GWS forward, has withdrawn due to her husband, Paul, being denied permission to enter Australia due to tightened border force restrictions resulting from COVID-19. Bonner played 11 games for GWS in two seasons, kicking seven goals for the club.

Saint Kilda player Clara Fitzpatrick and Western Bulldogs players Katy Herron have also been put on the inactive lists. Fitzpatrick is currently living in Ireland and has been seeking permanent residency within Australia, however her

application has been delayed due to COVID-19. An extension was given to Fitzpatrick and St Kilda by the AFL in the hope Fitzpatrick’s paperwork was processed, but the deadline has passed. Herron decided to not return to AFLW due to family reasons.

Western Bulldog’s General Manager of Women’s Football, Debbie Lee said ‘It’s disappointing Katy won’t be joining us for the 2021 season, but we absolutely understand and support her decision to put her family first’.

Erin Todd, a former Women’s National Basketball League player, will replace Bonner on the team.

GWS Head of Women’s Football, Briana Harvey, said ‘the club was

disappointed not to have Yvonne back this season’. Clora Staunton and Brid Stack, GWS’ other Irish players, are set to play the 2021 season are currently in quarantine.

Meanwhile, Ross McQuillan from Essendon’s men’s league announced in early January that he would retire from Essendon.

The 21-year-old Essendon player is retiring to return to Ireland.

McQuillan becomes the second Irishman to leave Essendon after Connor McKenna made the same announcement at the start of the 2020 season. John Mahoney, head of Essendon Football Club, confirmed the COVID-19 pandemic swayed McQuillan’s decision to return home.

irish golf club OF WA Here are the results from our end of year outing which took place at Maylands Golf Complex on the 13th December. We had 21 starters with a not-too-hot clear day, perfect for some good golfing results.

The winner on the day was John Whelahan with 44pts. Runner-up was Davy Doyle on 43pts. In third place was Peter McKenna on 42pts. Lowest Gross on the Day was PJ Kenny playing off a 5 handicap.

Musical Entertainer / Teacher

Best guest went to John Small with 43pts.

Novelties on the day were shared between Ted Scanlon, John Small, Peter McKenna, PJ Kenny, Jason Coyne and Tom Downey.

The prizes on the day were sponsored by An Sibin, McLoughlin’s Butchers and the IGC.

WE WOULD LIKE TO THANK ALL OUR MEMBERS AND GUESTS WHO SUPPORTED US IN A DIFFICULT YEAR OF GOLF, AND LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU ALL IN 2021.

90 | THE IRISH SCENE

David MacConnell

0413 259 547 0doublexx7@gmail.com www.maccdouble.com

CARRAMAR

SHAMROCK ROVERS FC SPONSORED AND SUPPORTED BY INTEGRITY PROPERTY SOLUTIONS

CONTACTS: MARTY BURKE 0410 081 386 • PAUL DOYLE 0430 080 019

CARRAMAR SHAMROCK ROVERS

With a very successful 2020 season behind us, it’s roll up your sleeves time again as we look forward to the 2021 season. State League teams will commence pre-season training at 6:45pm at Grandis on Tuesday 5th January 2021. Gerry, Adam, Ronnie and Warren are all champing at the bit and looking forward to the 2021 season.

A great time was had by all at the first Awards Night for Carramar Shamrock Rovers, with lots and lots of awards. Check out our facebook page for plenty more photos!

A couple of days after the Awards Night, Gerry and Adam clinched the treble as the Carramar Shamrock Rovers boys were the first winners of the Myles O’Neill charity shield. Myles is a life member of both Carramar Shamrock Rovers and ECU. Thanks to those who came down that day to support, including a lot of former Shamrock Rovers players and committee, and to ECU Joondalup Soccer Club for hosting. Thanks also to the coaching staff, players and everyone who helped make it a great day for the O’Neill family. There was a lot of money raised for various cancer charities.

Above: Marie Parkinson, our well-deserved Club Person of the year.

2021 NIGHT SERIES MATCH FIXTURES Round 1: Carramar Shamrock Rovers vs Swan Utd, 21st February 5:00pm at Macedonia Park Round 2: Carramar Shamrock Rovers vs Olympic Kingsway, 28th February 7:00pm at Macedonia Park Round 3: Carramar Shamrock Rovers vs Kingsley Westside, 5th March 8:30pm at Wanneroo As always thank you to our major sponsors below, and also to Nicky Edwards for his continued support: PIPELINE TECHNICS MADMAN MOTORS INTEGRITY PROPERTY SOLUTIONS

Above left: Jack Bardsley, winner of the Michael Harpen Young Player of the Year, with Michael’s parents Caroline and Dave. Jack also won Player’s Player of the Year. Centre: Marty and the Ladies team.

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2020 State Annual General Meeting THE GAAWA AGM FOR 2020 WAS HELD ON WEDNESDAY 9 DECEMBER IN THE IRISH CLUB. THE FOLLOWING OFFICERS WERE ELECTED FOR 2021:

PRESIDENT: JOHN WHELAHAN

PUBLIC RELATIONS OFFICER: SARAH DONNELLY

VICE-PRESIDENT: ALAN BURKE

REGISTRAR: OISIN MCFADDEN

SECRETARY: TOM MURPHY

TOM BATEMAN GROUNDS MANAGER: SEAN O’CASEY

TREASURER: RONAN CULLEN

There were over 25 motions submitted to the meeting from Hurling, Football, Minor Board and the Gaelic Games Junior Academy of Western Australia. The major motion of the night to be passed was a Masters Fixtures plan for Hurling & Football in Western Australia in 2021. The rationale behind this motion was to allow better access to playing Hurling, Football, Camogie & Ladies Football by reducing code clashes for our dual players. Patrons can also take advantage of knowing how the 2021 GAAWA season will run a number of months in advance.

On behalf of the Executive I would like to thank everybody who played any part in getting our 2020 season played in such challenging circumstances. Your support is greatly appreciated. Thank you also to our sponsors, supporters and all who work behind the scenes so that our games can be played. We truly have a wonderful association with fantastic people involved.

FRANK MURPHY PRESENTS

CELTIC RAMBLES 107.9FM RADIO FREMANTLE SATURDAY 8AM - 10AM PRODUCER: GERRY GROGAN

Music. Conversation. Special Tributes. Interviews.

Celebrating the Ireland of today and past times.

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92 | THE IRISH SCENE

GAAWA

CLUB DETAILS FOOTBALL CLUBS

2020 Minor Board Annual General Meeting THE GAAWA MINOR BOARD AGM FOR 2020 TOOK PLACE IN THE IRISH CLUB ON SATURDAY 5 DECEMBER. THE FOLLOWING OFFICERS WERE ELECTED: CHAIRMAN: JOHN WHELAHAN SECRETARY: TOM MURPHY TREASURER: EIMEAR BEATIEE

GREENWOOD Mens Senior Football greenwoodgfc@hotmail.com

MORLEY GAELS Mens & Ladies Senior Football morleygaelsgfc@hotmail.com

SOUTHERN DISTRICTS Mens & Ladies Senior Football southerndistrictsgaa@gmail.com

ST. FINBARR’S Mens & Ladies Senior Football stfinbarrsgfc@outlook.com

WESTERN SHAMROCKS Mens & Ladies Senior Football westernshamrocks@hotmail.com

HURLING CLUBS

COMMITTEE: OISIN MCFADDEN MARK MCCREA NIALL MARTIN JAMES BOGGAN GAELIC GAMES JUNIOR ACADEMY

ST. GABRIEL’S Mens & Ladies Senior Hurling & Camogie

The Minor Board and Junior Academy have agreed to work a lot more closely in 2021 and a lot of ideas were exchanged during the meeting on how underage development in Western Australia can continue to progress. A further meeting has been arranged early in the New Year to put a plan in place for underage GAA in 2021.

westernswansgaa@gmail.com

The Callaghan & O’Connor Families were thanked for their continued support of underage GAA in Perth. The board also introduced a new competition in 2020, the Richard Callaghan Cup in memory of our colleague, coach and friend Ritchie.

perthshamrocks@gmail.com

SARSFIELDS Mens Senior Hurling

sarshurlingperth@gmail.com

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TOM MURPHY

Secretary Gaelic Athletic Association of Western Australia

PERTH SHAMROCKS Mens Senior Hurling

NIC

I WISH EVERYONE AND THEIR FAMILIES A HAPPY, PEACEFUL AND SAFE CHRISTMAS, ROLL ON 2021!!

WESTERN SWANS Mens & Ladies Senior Hurling & Camogie

NICHOLS ON RD

Ciaran Gallagher, the driving force behind Minor Board successes since 2016, stepped down as Chairman after 4 years of diligent service.

All in GAAWA thank Ciaran for his work in that time.

stgabrielsperth@gmail.com

N BA

GAA GROUNDS

Tom Bateman Reserve Corner Bannister & Nicholson Rds (entrance off Wilfred Rd) Canning Vale

THE IRISH SCENE | 93

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL OUR PAST AND CURRENT AND FUTURE(!)

MEMBERS OF THE GAELIC GAMES JUNIOR ACADEMY (GGJA). ROLL ON 2021!

LIKE MANY SPORTING CLUBS, I THINK NOW THAT WE FACED OFF THE CHALLENGE THAT WAS/ IS THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC, WE FEEL WE CAN NAVIGATE THROUGH 2021 MORE SMOOTHLY WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT AND THE PLANNING OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE FUTURE THAT BRINGS.

94 | THE IRISH SCENE

Speaking of planning for the next season, the venue, season time and training time may change as the GGJA look to finally cement in the bridge between the Junior and the Minors, so once our members come of age, there’s a path to follow for them to continue their passion to play Gaelic Games.

This has been a long term goal for the main executive as well as the academy committee, for about 9 years! So onwards and upwards!

Due to this fluidity with plans, social media and team app and direct messages with be posted and sent as to keep everyone up to date.

We are always looking for fresh faces and helping hands so if you would like to help out please contact us to jump onboard our boat, grab an oar and help steer us in the right direction!

We have more Hurley’s, helmets and sliotars on the way so we are looking to label everything and prevent cross ‘contamination’ so safety will always be a priority going forward. The GAA store (thegaastore.com) have good sales on at the moment for anyone looking to buy Gaelic footballs, sliotars, or helmets, and also lovely Cork jerseys if you’re that way inclined. Cultec.ie

are the crowd we buy our Cultec Hurley’s from, as the ash ones, like myself, struggle in the heat of WA. It’s great for bringing on the skills learned for the little ones having an opportunity to practice at home. So anyone who missed out on buying from us last year can pop online and that should be plenty enough time to order anything in before the season starts, and did I mention the Cork jerseys are especially nice!

On a personal note, 2021 is the year I step down from the Academy committee since starting it up, it’s been such an amazing opportunity for me to meet so many great people, and the craic every Sunday I did enjoy and will sorely miss.

I am heading back to Cork for a while as my father is unwell and I would like to spend time with him. So best of luck to the fabulous coaches and committee going forward, I hope the 2021 season will be the best one yet!

Is mise Le meas,

DEBBIE (CASHMAN) TEAHAN Images from the annual Jim Stynes Memorial Cup in 2020

CONTACT CALL/TEXT: 0406 229 450 EMAIL: GGJUNIORACADEMY@GMAIL.COM FACEBOOK: THE GAELIC GAMES JUNIOR ACADEMY OF WA

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THE IRISH SCENE | 95

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