Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
YOU MAY THINK that many of the women in my book Blazing a Trail: Irish Women Who Changed the World, like Mary Robinson or Eileen Gray are well known, but you’d be wrong.
Adults know them, but children don’t. Every time I visit a school in Ireland – and I visit over 50 schools a year – I say: “Hands up who knows who Mary Robinson is.” In a class of around 25 only two or three put up their hands.
They know the counties, rivers and mountains of Ireland backwards, but they cannot list Ireland’s presidents. It’s one of the reasons I wrote the book in the first place, to tell children about Mary’s remarkable life and career. The book has now been nominated in the TheJournal.ie-sponsored Best Irish Published Book category in this year’s An Post Irish Book Awards.
Eileen Gray was the first female Modernist architect in the world. Her E-1027 building is admired to this day and her iconic furniture is still produced. But she was forgotten for many years and is only now becoming known as one of the most important and influential Modernist designers.
Flying and football
But there are other women who are also unknown by adults, women who made a huge mark but never made the history books. Lilian Bland from Antrim was the first woman in the world to design, build and fly her own biplane. She did this in 1909, only a few years after the Wright brothers’ first powered flight in 1903.
In 2011 a park in Glengormley, Belfast was re-named after her and a sculpture was placed in the grounds to commemorate her aviation work but it’s taken a long time for her achievement to be recognised.
Professional international footballer Anne O’Brien from Inchicore, Dublin is another woman who has been largely ignored in her own country. Anne was one of the most incredible sports women this country has ever produced.
During her hugely successful 18-year career she won 11 league titles in Italy (playing for teams like Lazio and Napoli) and also the league and cup in France with Stade de Reims. After retiring she went on to coach women’s teams and youth teams, including the Italian under 17s. And yet before researching this book I had never heard of her.
Mary Hannigan from The Irish Times told me about Anne and I’ve since met many of her brothers and sisters and found out even more about her remarkable life.
Vet Aleen Cust, Dr Kathleen Lynn, aviator Lady Heath, artist and business woman Sarah Purser, computer programmer Kay McNulty Mauchly Antonelli, suffragette Hanna Sheehy Skeffington – all these women from Blazing a Trail deserve to be in our history books.
Why have these women been largely forgotten? Why are they not in our history books or sports books? Their contribution was ignored because they were female.
Anne’s sporting prowess didn’t count because she was playing women’s football. Lilian’s record breaking achievement didn’t count because she was a female aviator or ‘aviatrix’.
Blazing a Trail seeks to redress this balance. I hope in three or five years’ time books that highlight women’s achievements won’t be necessary. I hope these pioneers will be in the new, modern history books and school books. And I hope every child will find out who the magnificent Mary Robinson is.
Blazing a Trail: Irish Women Who Changed the World by Sarah Webb, illustrated by Lauren O’Neill is out now, published by The O’Brien Press. It has been shortlisted for two awards at the An Post Irish Book Awards, is a bestseller, and is already being reprinted. To vote for your favourites of the nominees, visit the An Post Irish Book Awards website.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
That’s a significant shortfall. I would imagine compensation and workload are barriers to recruitment. Good luck with that….
This could be a good time for a Fact Check…..
Is there a sign on window staff wanted apply within.
Are all of these vacancies at front line medical staff level or are they ALL vacancies – admin, cleaning, managerial etc.? It would be good to know the facts.
It might shock you to realise that without admin and support staff a hospital simply couldn’t operate. Who buys in supplies? Who delivers them to the wards and theatre? Who negotiates with suppliers for best price? Who runs the tenders for the big contracts to ensure top service and value for money? Your money, you the taxpayer. And that’s only one area of admin. Who pays the suppliers to ensure continuance of supply? We lowly admin people may not be treating patients but our contribution is vital to the smooth running of the hospital. It’ll also interest you to know that most hospitals have outside contractors for cleaning and so those staff wouldn’t be included in the numbers.
“Top service and value for money” ….are you having a laugh. The public service is hamstrung by the unions who do not allow any flexibility of work practices. Demarcation is the order of the day! And as for procurement, the public service procurement function is the absolute worst example of how to get value for the tax payer!
We are operating under EU procurement rules. So go and take it up with them. Or why don’t you come in and do a better job if we’re making such a hash of it. We have had to be very flexible in the last few years as nobody who left was replaced. So the work had to be absorbed by the remaining staff. But hey, don’t listen to someone who is actually working in the area, sit back at your keyboard and criticise a job you don’t do and are therefore clueless about. Better still, sack all the admin staff and give all their work to the frontline staff. And watch hospitals collapse under the strain. Idiot!
If you want to contact someone in the hospital who do you ring? Admin staff. If you want to know when a test is? Admin staff. Need to query something with a doctor/nurse? Admin staff. Need the hospital cleaned? Admin staff. Need the patients fed? Admin staff. Need patients transported around the hospital? Admin staff. I could go on.
I would say staff shortages will soon cost more than they save once the lawsuits for patients not receiving enough care start happening.
Living in Dublin is just too expensive. Until the housing emergency is solved this will only get worse.
And you can thank Kenny, Noonan and Burton for that. Great thinkers and forward planners!
I can imagine the adverts trying to woo nurses, doctors and physios home “come to Ireland, where you will be paid less, taxed more, be scapegoated by your manager, the hospital, the HSE and the government, where politicians will spin things to make the public think you are overpaid and underworked….”. I can imagine those living in Australia, Canada etc chomping at the bit to leave their well paid and respected jobs to come home.
” keep the recovery going” brings a whole new meaning to noonan’s comment. . .
Following an injury (dislocated shoulder) I ended up in the casualty department in Beaumont at 22:30. I got the best treatment. Everybody was so so nice and so efficient. No waiting.
For all my follow up appointments I ve been seen within 15mins of the given time. (Today I’ve been seen by the physio 5 minutes before the time.)
Well done to all the staff there. They deserve a medal!
have your say