History

Nowadays Dante Alighieri is primarily remembered as the author of the Divine Comedy, but there was a lot more to him than that. Politician and poet, he ended his life in exile from a city which he had once ruled. He elevated the language of…

During the 1936 U.S Presidential election, William Dudley Pelley, the son of a Methodist minister from Massachusetts entered the race as a candidate for the Christian Party. Formerly a foreign correspondent across Europe and Russia in the…

The 19th century was a time of turmoil in Europe, as the fallout from the shock of the French Revolution and the realization that real social change was possible continued to reverberate through the continent. Many people responded to this…

Timothy Murphy was born in 1751 in Delaware, Pennsylvania, the son of Donegal parents. Thomas and Mary Murphy left their Tirconnell home just months before Timothy was born. The Ireland they left was racked by penal laws, land agitation,…

Fame is a fleeting thing. Someone can be a celebrity in their own time but give it a few decades and if they’re remembered at all it’s usually only for a single aspect of their lives. Newton revolutionised mathematics and ran the Royal…

October 6th is marked in the Irish historic calendar as Ivy Day, the day which saw the passing of the 'Uncrowned King of Ireland' Charles Stewart Parnell in 1891. His passing was mourned greatly across Ireland, including in Cork, a city he…

Nature versus nurture is one of the oldest debates there is. Are we predetermined to become who we become, or is it the world we encounter that shapes us into who we are? The story of David (”Tiger”) Roche and Boyle Roche seems almost…

The cliched idea of the “thin line between genius and insanity” is one that has been discussed by both psychiatrists, cultural commentators and pop psychologists for decades. In one sense it’s an iteration of the “tortured artist”…

The Berwick fountain on Cork's Grand Parade is an iconic piece of street furniture on Leeside. The fountain was gifted to the city by (and named after) a Kildare man who died in a horrific accident 150 years ago. Walter Berwick was born in…

Henry James O'Farrell is a name largely unknown in today's world but 150 years ago his name was trending for all the wrong reasons when he carried out an assassination attempt on a member of the Royal family. O'Farrell was born in 1833 at…