September  2005 Edition

Oral History Projects

Clare County Council:
An Oral History of County Clare

Commencing in July 2002, Clare County Archive’s Oral History Project has been running for just over three years. The main objective of the project is to establish a sound archive to collect recordings of all aspects of living and working in County Clare. This is a powerful means of preserving the unique memories and experiences of Clare people, which might otherwise be lost. A repository of memory will then be created bridging gaps in the documented archive.

During its first phase, the oral history project consisted of two components, the women’s oral history archive, and the oral history archive of Our Lady’s Hospital in Ennis, County Clare. The second phase of the project commenced in 2004, building on the foundations that were laid in its first year.

To date, the project has received funding from Clare County Council and from the Heritage Council under its Museum and Archives Grant Scheme. 

First Phase of the Project
Women’s Oral History Archive
The women’s oral history archive documents through the spoken word the daily lives of women in County Clare. The aim of this component of the project was to record the life experiences of women from a variety of social backgrounds, and their views and observations on historical events and social change. 

A series of fifteen interviews were conducted with women from both urban and rural backgrounds in Clare. The candidates were generally over seventy years of age. They included Susan, a public health nurse from Lahinch, who states with pride how she never lost a baby during her career as a midwife. She also recalls the kindness of local people who used to leave parcels of food outside her door. Ellie, a member of the travelling community, talks about her childhood and life on the road. She describes her father’s work as a tinsmith, and how they lived in tents made of hazel sticks and canvas, and slept on beds of straw. Bridget from Dysert O’Dea describes her marriage as a ‘made match’, recalling how her father and brother walked her husband’s land before telling her all about it. The couple only met for the first time when they were buying the ring in a jeweller’s shop in Ennis!

The recordings highlight the significant changes that have taken place for women in County Clare over the last fifty years or so. Life was generally very challenging for women, with many working hard running a farm or family business as well as rearing a family. What comes through particularly strongly, however, is the strong sense of community in rural Ireland. Times were tough but a helping hand was never far away. Margaret from Cooraclare describes how her mother would send her each evening to the home of a very poor family a couple of fields away with a bottle of milk and piece of cake. Another lady recalls how local women would always be on hand to assist in the birth of a new baby in rural communities throughout Clare. The archive contains valuable information on childhood, education, working lives, marriage and childbirth, and economic and social circumstances.

Our Lady’s Hospital
Our Lady’s Mental Hospital in Ennis opened its doors for the first time in 1868. One of the largest public buildings in County Clare, the hospital played an important role in the local community, not only for its provision of mental health services, but also as an employer and a purchaser of local produce. 

Clare County Archives acquired the paper archive of Our Lady’s in 2002 from what was then the Mid Western Health Board. The collection is an extremely valuable source of research for local historians studying the social and economic history of Clare. An oral history project was also conducted at this time. The main objective of the project was to create an oral history archive that would compliment the traditional archive by recording aspects of the hospital history not covered in the documentary archive. The recordings focus on Our Lady’s from the 1940’s to the hospital’s closure in 2002, recording the many changes that occurred in the management of the hospital and in patient care. A total of twenty-five interviews were conducted with both former and current staff. Administrators, doctors, nurses and tradesmen all shared their own personal experiences. In many cases, these were long-serving officers who had commenced their careers in the 1940s or ’50s. 

The recollections provide an insight into the daily workings of Our Lady’s Hospital and document the history of the institution. They reveal a hospital that was terribly overcrowded with up to seventy in a ward and only inches between patients’ beds. Without the availability of drug therapies at the time highly disturbed patients simply had to be restrained, with one former charge nurse describing his first impression of the day room as being like stepping into the jaws of hell. The advent of drug therapy, however, brought great changes to the area of patient care. The provision of Largactyl, for example, allowed some previously chronic patients to go home for the first time. Methods such as Insulin Therapy or Electric Convulsive Therapy are also described. Other developments in the care of patients included the provision of vastly improved meals, regular clothing, and the unlocking of wards as Our Lady’s moved from institution to hospital. 

The hospital grounds were also home to a number of families including that of the Resident Medical Superintendent, the gatekeeper, and the Land Stewart. The late Dr Patrick Power was Resident Medical Superintendent from 1957 to 1982, and interviews were conducted with his wife and four of his children. These recordings are truly fascinating as Dr Power’s wife, Maura, describes arriving at the hospital, settling into her new home, rearing a family and the patients who did jobs in her home as part of their rehabilitation. The Power children recall growing up in the hospital, work on the farm, the annual rose show, the Dickensian kitchens, and of course, the patients. Kieran Power recalls his father’s battle to get resources for the hospital, and one incident where he actually locked the Visiting Committee from Clare County Council into the toilets for ten minutes in an attempt to convince them of the need for improvements!

The oral history archive of Our Lady’s has provided an important historical record of the hospital, reflecting some of the great changes and developments in the area of Irish mental health during the twentieth century. The oral component of the collection has undoubtedly enriched the documentary archive.

Extending the Parameters in Phase Two
The second phase of the Oral History Programme commenced in 2004. The objective of this phase was to build on the foundations laid in the project’s first year. The parameters of the Oral History Project were extended to reflect the richly diverse community of County Clare. Interviews were conducted with fifteen individuals covering a range of different subjects including the experiences of refugees, travellers, local authority staff and councillors, local business and trades people, musicians, and sports people.

Recollections were recorded from men and women throughout the county. These included an interview with a blacksmith from Ballynacally who had taken up the trade as a young man like his father and grandfather before him. Tommy recalls his earliest memories of the forge and the methods and equipment used. An interview with Kitty, an elderly concertina player originally from Ennistymon, reveals how her great love of music led her to produce her own CD recorded at home in her kitchen. The early days of Shannon Airport are described by a man who spent thirty-seven years of his working life at the airport. In addition, a lady describes her life at Dromoland Castle, the ancestral home of the O’Briens, the descendants of Brian Boru, High King of Ireland. Grania recalls her earliest memories of the estate, the war years when the Irish army set up camp at the castle, opening the estate up to tourists, and the sale of Dromoland Castle.

Future Plans 
Clare County Archives aims to expand its oral history project to include other subject areas relevant to the county and its people. The provision of a listening station for researchers in the Council’s new headquarters is also on the cards, as is a publication on the project which will contain extracts from a selection of interviews. 

The County Archives also hopes to work more closely with local community groups, promoting the importance of oral history in their areas.

With its rich cultural heritage, Clare offers endless possibilities to be explored!

Róisín Berry
Clare County Archives

Louth County Council:
For the people, by the people

This article is an edited version of what appears on the Louth County Council website and is reproduced here with the permission of Louth County Archives Service.

Louth County Archives Service (like other county archives services) is currently conducting an oral history archive project throughout the county. Many people believe that their lives, their day-to-day lived experiences, are not worthy of permanent remembrance. As a result, an invaluable and irreplaceable source of local historical knowledge is lost to present and future generations as the county’s older residents pass away. The oral history project is designed to save a part of the community’s past and to help record the social history of the county through the voices of its inhabitants. Members of your family or community can surprise you with a wealth of information and insights into major events of our times. Oral history is people’s history. For example many of Louth’s residents can remember the Dundalk jailbreak of 1922; the legacy of the Great Northern Railway Works, Dundalk drawing 0–0 with Glasgow Celtic in 1979; Louth winning the Sam Maguire in 1957 (or indeed in 1912!); Macardles Brewery; the floods of 1977; President Clinton’s visit in 2000; the first Heinkel cars rolling off the assembly line; the impact of World War II on the county; local dance bands like the Shadows, Charlie Nutty and the all girls band of Edwin Mitchell playing the ‘Hibs’, the Pavilion, the Rink, the Railway and Wellington Halls; the arrival of the Merryweather Hatfield in 1932; the Drogheda Brass Band winning the National Band Championships in 1976; the shelling of Millmount Fort in 1922; the building of the Drogheda Technical School in 1936; the genesis of the Drogheda Samba Festival. Events like these have been integral in the shaping of Louth as we know it today.

Oral history is a method of gathering and preserving historical information through recorded interviews of participants in past events and ways of life. Oral history has several unique attributes that no other historical source provides. Oral history allows you to learn about the perspectives of individuals who might not otherwise appear in the historical record. While historians and history students can use traditional documents to reconstruct the past, everyday people fall through the cracks in the written record. Politicians, activists and business leaders may show up regularly in official documents and the media, but the rest of us seldom do. Chances are, if someone had to reconstruct your life story from the written record alone, they would have very little to go on—and the information they would be able to gather would reveal very little about the heart and soul of your daily life, or the things that matter most to you. Historians of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries can rely on extensive correspondence and regular diary entries for information about life in the past. But in the digital age, telephone, e-mail and web based communication have largely replaced those valuable written records. Without oral history, much of the personal history of the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries would be lost to future historians. Even in situations where we have extensive documentation about someone, it may only reveal the party line so to speak, neglecting personal and private experiences. The Oral History project gives people the opportunity to participate in the historical retelling of their lives. In addition to filling in gaps in local history sources, the oral history archives will provide a source of research for those with literacy problems and those who may have felt excluded intellectually from using archives.

Our aim is to establish an official county oral history archive as part of our facilities to ensure that a vital source of information about our local heritage is protected and to provide public enjoyment of our local heritage. To do this we require the assistance of people across the entire spectrum of Louth society. The community and lives of Louth’s residents have been profoundly shaped by regional, national and international events. We need to document the experiences, memories, opinions and perceptions of individuals throughout the county so that part of Louth’s history is being documented by the people of Louth. We hope to encompass a wide range of topics as possible.

Russell Shortt
Louth County Archives

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