'Historian' Volume 6 issue 2

HISTORIAN DUBLIN UNIVERSITY HISTORY SOCIETY VOL. 6 ISSUE 2

Liverpool’s 1966 Experience: The term ‘glocalisation’ has been used in sociology to describe the convergence of the local and the global common in modernity. An early example of this phenomenon can be seen in the experiences of the host cities of the 1966 FIFA World Cup, notably Liverpool. The city hosted five games throughout the tournament, with teams including Portugal, Brazil, the Soviet Union, even North Korea playing in Goodison Park.

These ‘exotic’ imports brought the international and the provincial into contact in a carnival atmosphere for three weeks, but for the people of Merseyside, the events of July 1966 were conceived of within a local sphere as much as they constituted national or indeed global moments.

The England of the 1960s was a more culturally complex place than has often been assumed, and nowhere was this more true than in Liverpool, the home of the Beatles, the archetypal icons of the ‘swinging sixties’ mythopoeia. To many in 1966, Liverpool, and northern England generally, was still a largely industrial, working-class region, somewhat removed from the mods and miniskirts at the forefront of the popular conception of the 1960s. The city had long maintained a distinct identity within England, often attributed to its status as one of Britain’s primary ports, which led to the city becoming a ‘melting pot’, with various influxes of immigration, dominated by at least 300,000 Irish migrants who crossed the Irish Sea in the nineteenth century.

A notable feature of Liverpool’s distinctive sense of identity within England is the unusual prominence given to sport, particularly football, in its construction. Discussions of this identity have often been imbued with both football and politics, typically drawing on the city’s overwhelmingly left-wing, Labour Party base. 2019 saw Liverpool fans draw the ire of Conservative politicians and commentators when a number of them booed the British national anthem at Wembley before the Community Shield match. This is by no means a new development, as popular mythology tells of Liverpool fans singing ‘God Save our Team’ before the 1965 FA Cup Final, or chanting ‘we’re not English, we’re Scouse’ on terraces since the 1970s. Identity, politics and football have always been intertwined spheres in the city of Liverpool.

As a global event, a precursor of the ‘mega-events’ that we are used to today, the 1966 World Cup forced the inhabitants of host cities to conceive of their localities and indeed of themselves within a global sphere. The incongruous image, for example, of the famed Russian goalkeeper Lev Yashin walking through Newcastle Airport, his fishing rod and tackle under his arm, and telling reporters ‘my main ambition is to catch some trout. You have trout in the North, no?’ juxtaposed the international with the provincial.

THE GLOBAL AND THE LOCAL Similarly, when the Liverpool Echo reported on the bizarre arrival of twelve professional ‘cheerers’ accompanying the North Korean team, it did so in the paper’s gossip column, as though the cheerers were local socialites that readers might hope to catch a glimpse of. Famed stars such as Yashin or Portugal’s Eusebio became objects of fascination in provincial cities. One young fan would later describe the reaction of his peers to witnessing the Portuguese’s four goal display versus North Korea as ‘A bunch of Scousers chanting Eusebio! Eusebio! Eusebio!’.

Forty-eight years later, on the news of Eusebio’s death, the Liverpool Echo wrote that he was ‘fondly remembered on Merseyside’. That such a connection was formed between the people of Liverpool and a seemingly ‘exotic’ talent, whereby ‘Scousers’ identified with a Mozambique-born Portuguese footballer, makes clear that the 1966 World Cup in Liverpool can be understood as an early example of ‘glocalisation’.

Almost a week before the opening of the tournament, the Lord Mayor of Liverpool welcomed the players of the Hungarian team to a reception, where they were presented, the Liverpool Echo records, ‘with a special recording of Liverpool sounds.’

They include the clatter of a gangway being lowered for a Mersey ferry, a Liverpool bus conductor asking for fares, a newsvendor selling the Echo, a beat group, the Kop choir, [...] appropriately the last song on the record is the Spinners folk group singing ‘I Wish I Was Back in Liverpool’.

In this episode a confluence can be seen between the identity of Liverpool, its civic politics, and the city’s relationship with football. For Scousers such a convergence was no new revelation, but the 1966 World Cup would see these concepts born out in a new, global sphere.

Cathal Byrne Senior Sophister TSM English and History

THE Glyndŵr Rising: THE LAST First written in 1312 and revised throughout the medieval period, the Prophecy of the Six Kings foretold the decline of the House of Lancaster. Predicting that a ‘Dragon shall rise up in the North’, ‘a Wolf that shall come out of the West’ and ‘a Lion of Ireland shall fall in company with them’, the prophecy claimed that these rebels would make ‘England tremble’ and King Henry IV ‘flee for dread.’ This prophecy reflects the events of Glyndŵr Rising, a Welsh independence movement led by Owain Glyndŵr, the Wolf in the West, allied with Sir Edmund Mortimer, the Lion out of Ireland, and Sir Henry ‘Hotspur’ Percy of Northumberland, the Dragon from the North. Besides achieving Welsh independence, the uprising aimed to assume Henry’s power and divide England into three parts to be governed by Glyndŵr, the Mortimer family, and Northumberland. While the prophecy claims that this partition will last ‘for evermore,’ the rebels were eventually defeated by Henry and Wales later annexed into England.

Before the reign of Henry, the Welsh were largely supportive of King Richard II because he filled political posts with Welshmen; however, after the deposition of Richard by Henry in 1399, political opportunities for the Welsh diminished, creating a sentiment of insecurity and uncertainty throughout Wales. Out of this remaining support for Richard, small skirmishes broke out along the Anglo-Welsh border. Amongst this atmosphere of unrest, the English Crown personally affronted Glyndŵr after failing to resolve a land dispute between Glyndŵr and an English baron, Reginald Grey. Furthermore, some claim that Grey intentionally withheld an order from Henry to raise troops from Glyndŵr, who was then branded as a traitor within the circles of the English Court. These two events eventually led to Glyndŵr becoming involved in the rebellion. By September 1400, he was the leader of the revolt, after being declared Prince of Wales, an act of aggression against the English Crown because Henry’s son, Henry of Monmouth, held the title. After this, the Welsh launched attacks against the English in Wales, which Henry struggled to stop.

Mortimer and Percy became intertwined with the conflict after they were chosen by Henry to defend England against the Welsh rebels. However, in June 1402, after losing in battle, Mortimer was taken prisoner by Glyndŵr. Henry, suspicious of Mortimer’s defeat and imprisonment, forbade Mortimer’s brother-in-law Percy from paying his ransom because he believed that Mortimer could be a traitor. Henry seized Mortimer’s estates, which, coupled with his refusal to pay Mortimer’s ransom, caused Mortimer to pledge allegiance to Glyndŵr.

WELSH WAR OF INDEPENDENCE By the end of 1402, he had married Glyndŵr’s daughter and declared his efforts to remove Henry from the throne and instate his nephew, who had a claim to the throne, as king.

Percy also felt betrayed by Henry.

Though he supported Henry in his deposition of Richard, Henry refused to repay the Percy family for their service to the Crown. The Percys were responsible for protecting the English border against Scottish insurgents.

While Henry never paid the Percys for their defence, he demanded their prisoners. Henry’s inadequate dealing with the Welsh rebellion left most of the responsibility to the Percys, who had to protect both the Anglo-Scottish and Anglo-Welsh borders. Lastly, Henry refused to pay the ransom of Mortimer. In July 1403, Percy met English forces in the Battle of Shrewsbury, without Glyndŵr’s army and most of his Northumberland assistance. The rebels were defeated, and Percy was killed in battle.

The uprising continued despite the defeat at Shrewsbury. In 1405, the Welsh received French assistance; however, the Welsh forces still suffered heavy defeats. Led by Henry’s son, Monmouth, the English then began an economic blockade of Wales, restricting trade and weapons.

By 1407, many Welshmen had surrendered their allegiance to Glyndŵr, discouraged by the blockade’s effect on the rebellion. Glyndŵr’s headquarters at Aberystwyth Castle surrendered while he was away, further turning the tide towards the English. In 1409, Harlech Castle surrendered and the English captured Glyndŵr’s wife and daughters, as well as Mortimer. Glyndŵr continued attacking the English as late as 1414, though his support was greatly reduced, to little effect. By 1415, Glyndŵr disappeared from the historical record and Henry’s son, now Henry V, reinstated full English rule in Wales. While Glyndŵr’s rebellion failed, his revolt was the last major push for Welsh independence before Wales was annexed into England in 1536. He is now considered a national hero, reaching a mythical status in Wales, akin to that of King Arthur.

Katie Sewell Senior Fresh TSM English and History

RECONSTRUCTION: AMERICA’S Reconstruction, or ‘America’s Unfinished Revolution’, as the historian Eric Foner calls it, occupies a curious place in American history. It re-integrated the Southern states into the Union after their defeat in the Civil War, bringing extraordinary gains to former slaves for a time. Some African-Americans struggled however, living indistinguishable the lives from before the war.

Reconstruction was remarkable for very quickly creating a society where African American men could participate in politics. 700,000 African-Americans in the Southern States were registered to vote in 1868. The forty-first and forty-second congresses, sitting from 1869-73, comprised of six African-American congressmen and one senator from the former Confederacy. Political office also witnessed changes in diversity; 2,000 African-American men held federal, state and local political offices during Reconstruction, an extraordinary achievement given the lack of diversity in the politics of the North. Only Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Connecticut granted equal voting rights in 1865. There were forty-one documented African-American sheriffs in the South during Reconstruction, twenty-five deputy sheriffs, five mayors, seventeen county treasurers, thirty-one coroners, thirty-five tax collectors and 228 justices of the peace or magistrates.

Reconstruction was one of the only periods in American history where the South offered more Fig 1. First ‘Coloured’ Senator and equal political opportunities for men than the Representative North. Many ethnically diverse professionals and prospective political candidates emigrated to the South, such as D.B. Colton who moved from Ohio to South Carolina in 1875 and worked as a campaign manager. In South Carolina, African-Americans held a majority in the state House of Representatives all throughout Reconstruction, electing two speakers of the House and in 1874 they gained a senate majority. Northern journalist James Pike reported in 1873 ‘The Speaker is black, the Clerk is black, the door-keepers are black, the little pages are black’. Some Northerners were horrified by Southern equal political participation, and in 1867 The Independent asserted that it ‘ought to bring a blush to every white cheek’ that ‘the political equality of American citizens is likely to be sooner achieved in Mississippi than in Illinois – sooner on the plantation of Jefferson Davis than around the grave of Abraham Lincoln’. The creation of schools for African-American children also meant illiteracy was reduced by two thirds in the fifty years after the Civil War. Reconstruction was also remarkable for the intermittent mixing of the races on terms of equality. It was a period before ‘Jim Crow’ laws mandated the separation of races in everything from prisons to buses to cemeteries, which began to be enacted in earnest in the 1890s. Pre-empting the civil rights movement of the 1960s, some mobilised to resist legalised discrimination, and in 1867 there was a revolt against segregated ‘Star Cars’ in New Orleans, resulting in General Phil Sheridan ordering an end to segregated transport. Similarly, in South Carolina and Mississippi in 1868 freed slaves demonstrated for civil rights legislation that would treat them as equals on public transport, resulting in the passage of anti-discrimination laws.

Surprisingly however, these instances of progression existed alongside the continued exploitation of former slaves. The Thirteenth Amendment outlawed slavery ‘except as punishment for a crime’, and Southern legislatures exploited this loophole.

UNFINISHED REVOLUTION

Immediately after the war vagrancy laws targeted at African-Americans were passed in six states, which defined as ‘vagrants’ any unemployed freed slaves, and officials could hire them out for up to a year to the highest bidder. In Mississippi, people were arrested for offences such as disturbing the peace, ‘unlicensed’ preaching or selling alcohol and hired out when could not pay large fines. One observer wrote that convicts in the South worked under ‘armed guards, who stand ready to shoot down any who attempt to escape’. African-Americans could even be murdered by their employers, as happened with Eliza Jane Ellison in Atlanta, who was shot in 1866 for arguing about payment for extra washing.

The gains of Reconstruction also existed alongside the constant threat of violence.

African-Americans may have voted and held political office, but the cost of this was often being attacked. Georgia legislator Abram Colby was killed after a speech in which he asserted that African-Americans should have equal rights. Tennessee saw a candidate for the state legislature murdered in 1874. Voters were also brutally targeted, and the presidential election of 1868 saw especially violent white supremacist attacks in Louisiana, which witnessed a thousand murders between November 1867 and Election Day in 1868. Judge Albion Tourgée in North Carolina’s central Piedmont district counted among the Klan’s offences during Reconstruction twelve homicides, nine rapes, fourteen arson cases and over 700 beatings, one of a woman 103 years of age.

Against this backdrop of violence, Southerners were also let down by the Supreme Court. In United States vs. Reese in 1876, the court ruled that the Fifteenth Amendment (1870) did not confer the right to vote on African-Americans, but merely forbade the vote from being withheld on basis of race, allowing for exclusion from voting by poll-taxes and literacy tests. Some states enacted a ‘grandfather clause’ which exempted descendants of those who could vote before the Civil War, which of course only included white men. Political participation largely sputtered out post-1877, and just 285 of Reconstructions 2,000 African-Americans officials held office after 1877. Alonzo Ransier, who had been South Carolina’s lieutenant governor, was reduced to working as a day Fig 2. Fifteenth Amendement labourer in Charleston.

In conclusion, Reconstruction certainly deserves its title of America’s ‘tragic legend’, conferred on it by Kenneth Stampp. Another historian, William Gillette, even suggests that white supremacists gained from Reconstruction as they were granted more electoral college votes and congressional seats owing the expanded franchise which theoretically included African-Americans, who were then excluded from voting. The ephemeral nature of many of Reconstruction’s achievements means that the view of W.E.B. Du Bois, the first non-white man to earn a PhD, that southern AfricanAmericans ‘went free, stood a brief moment in the Sun, and then moved back into slavery’, seems accurate.

Moya O’Sullivan Senior Fresh Single Honours History

THE PAST AND THE FUTURE We all know the phrase, “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” It is a cautionary quip; not to mimic the mistakes of our ancestors. So, how is it that such a famous saying exists simultaneously with a widespread desire to return to the past?

In recent years, another phrase attracting notoriety among the American population to articulate sentiments about the past is that of “Make America Great Again.” Invented as a political slogan for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, the phrase demonstrates the misguided notion that the past was altogether better. Those trying to recapture America’s supposed greatness have, in fact, brought back some of the less desirable facets of America culture. In the context of the dawn of a decade, where many people have growing feelings of returning to the ‘Roaring 20s’, we must be critical of which elements of the 1920s we wish to embrace in the 2020s.

The 1920s saw the first exercise of women’s suffrage and newfound social liberty for women. The flapper remains a popular image of the decade and it was a national phenomenon. Women were, for the first time on a large scale, engaging in the economy and occupying more jobs in the post-WWI workforce. In some cases, new technologies like the washing machine and vacuum cleaner eased the labour of housework.

However, women of colour and immigrants could not always enjoy these modern benefits. Today’s feminism advocates intersectionality. If we are to learn from the women of the past, we may take note of the liberation and freedom for women to engage in ‘unladylike’ pastimes and fight for new rights. Though in an effort to not repeat the past, we should bear in mind how regional and racial inequalities persisted throughout the decade. Instead, we must understand that minority women have additional needs in the feminist movement which are particular to their experiences.

Perhaps the most prominent feature of the 1920s which we have seen repeated in recent years is growing racial tensions and a resurgence of white supremacy. After World War One, there was a period known as the Great Migration in which black people moved in significant numbers from the rural South to the cities of the North. There was a notable concentration in Harlem, leading to an explosion of art and culture which allowed the entire decade to be known as the Harlem Renaissance.

Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Louis Armstrong, Aaron Douglas, among many others, became iconic figures in this movement which was a celebration of black culture. However, the physical movement of black people was accompanied by the inverse movement called White Flight.

OF THE TWENTIES This was essentially the departure of white people from areas that were becoming predominantly black. However, this did not necessarily lessen strife. The year 1921 saw the eruption of the Tulsa Race Massacre. Due to exaggerated fears of black people, and a rising vigilante justice mindset, an armed mob killed between 100-300 people and burned the Greenwood neighbourhood, leaving over 8,000 black people homeless in just eighteen hours. The news of this incident was widely suppressed and the truth of the scale of the massacre was not fully known until 2001. As for the rise of the Ku Klux Klan and racial violence, as well as increased nativism and the 1924 Immigration Act, these cannot be forgotten due to the important cultural movements of the 1920s.

It is these same movements which have re-emerged in the last few years and are poised to continue in the 2020s. Once more, the KKK has become a socially acceptable group in the American far-right and Trump’s anti-immigration policies— like his popular campaign promise to build a wall along the Mexico-America border and the early travel ban— fulfil some ambitions to “Make America Great Again”. Rather than repeat the rampant racism and violence of the 1920s, it is important to look back to the values and achievements of the Harlem Renaissance, which are better suited for an appearance in the 2020s.

Any policy invoking the word “again” should be of great concern to historians and laypersons alike. As has been said over and over, the past is not to be repeated. If anything is to make a comeback from the last century, it should be the commitment to progressive social movements.

To idealize the past is a mistake historians know well to avoid. One cannot ignore certain parts of history in favour of others if one wants to learn from the past as the age-old saying instructs us too. If any lessons are to be learned from the past, they should be to think critically, fight injustice, and understand that any country which romanticizes its past is not teaching its full history.

Libby Phillips Senior Fresh Single Honours History

Fig. 1 David Low ‘The Match of Form’

HISTORIC HOROSCOPES ARIES - 21ST MARCH - 19TH APRIL

2020 will be all about balance for the Aries. Standing with American president Thomas Jefferson and painter Van Gogh you will be ambitious about your goals this year. The necessity to be realistic however, will provide you with stability which will be seen in all aspects of your life.

TAURUS - 20TH APRIL - 20TH MAY

For the Taurus 2020 forecasts a calm and steady year. With leaders such as Cromwell and Hitler born under this sign being impulsive is not an option for the responsible Taurus. Remember to always be open to suggestions and advice.

GEMINI - 21ST MAY - 20TH JUNE Gemini will have a refreshing and active 2020. Born under this sign are harbingers of change such as Queen Victoria and President John F. Kennedy. This is a year to improve the different aspects of your life and the lives of those around you.

CANCER - 21ST JUNE - 22ND JULY

Sharing a sign with Henry VIII, Cancer needs to be ready for changes in 2020 with improvement in love and career on the cards. Whether you choose to take up these opportunities or let them pass, depends entirely on you.

LEO - 23RD JULY - 22ND AUGUST

Life will be full of twists and turns for Leos in 2020. With Napoleon and Amelia Earhart falling under this sign a job change or a new business is not an unsurprising prediction; be warned of flying too close to the sun and remember to choose your battles wisely.

VIRGO - 23RD AUGUST - 22ND SEPTEMBER

Virgos such as Elizabeth I and Mother Teresa were known for their practical, peace keeping nature. In 2020 think twice before making any serious commitments or decisions; this is not a year to be stagnant nor to make rash decisions.

LIBRA - 23RD SEPTEMBER - 22ND OCTOBER

The Libra will have a relatively easy 2020; a year to enjoy and make merry. With patrons such as Gandhi and Margaret Thatcher, Libras have many responsibilities both civic and political but for 2020 relax and rejuvenate in preparation for the future.

SCORPIO - 23RD OCTOBER - 21ST NOVEMBER

Foretold for the Scorpio is a year of liberation and freedom something Trotsky, born under this sign would have relished. You will feel free of all restrictions and limitations in your life; this is a good time to focus on learning a new hobby or planning a revolution.

SAGITTARIUS - 22ND NOVEMBER - 21ST DECEMBER

2020 is a year of resolutions for the Sagittarius, a time to let go of your past baggage and clean up on aspects of your life. Perhaps like Churchill and Stalin who share this sign you’ve fought your wars and lost your battles; now it is time to move on.

CAPRICORN - 22ND DECEMBER - 19TH JANUARY

For the Capricorn this year you will strive for calm and tranquillity. Tired of running the rat race you are ready to take a break. Learn new ways to meditate and be creative perhaps take up writing or indulge in music like your fellow Capricorns Edgar Allan Poe and Elvis Presley.

AQUARIUS - 20TH JANUARY - 18TH FEBRUARY

2020 is the year to prove your abilities, Aquarius! Take your place alongside Jackson Pollock and Virginia Woolf as you reach your creative peak this year. Do not however get carried away by this new-found energy, remember to save for a rainy day.

PISCES - 19TH FEBRUARY - 20TH MARCH

For the Pisces 2020 will be a year of excitement and adventure. You will be brave enough to be open to changes and try new things. With George Washington and Mikhail Gorbachev sharing your sign embrace your initiative and thrive in your new environment.