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A Nation Is Born celebrates a formative period in the history of the Irish state: the 15 years during which Ireland emerged from the rubble of wars and violence and set up as a fledgling country while establishing a diplomatic presence on the world stage. The photos presented have been hand-colourised by photographer John O’Byrne, infusing energy into this often-overlooked time. With over 150 photographs gathered from archives around the country, accompanied by insightful and accessible commentary by historian Michael B. Barry, A Nation Is Born brings a fresh perspective on our history and our past to life in a compellingly real way. Here is the introduction by Barry…
OVER THE PAST decades, Ireland has risen from being a relatively backward agricultural country to a prosperous nation with advanced industry.
In common with many first-world countries, there are great social problems (not to mention the imposed partition of the island), but in our 26-county state we can take pride that we enjoy one of the longest continuous democracies in the world and possess the first constitution ever adopted in a free referendum.
Over recent years, there has been, understandably, a huge amount of attention given to the stirring period of the Irish Revolution, from 1916 to 1923. However, there is much less awareness of the decades that immediately followed. These were hugely important in the formation of present-day Ireland.
Thus when John O’Byrne and I came to consider doing a book covering this period, we saw it as worthwhile, necessary and the logical continuation of our recent book The Irish Civil War in Colour.
While we largely knew that this was the epoch that shaped Ireland, we had only a vague idea of the actuality. It was the time of our grandparents (in my case, my parents – in the late 30s, my mother, then a teacher in Bristol, sent money back to support her parents at their farm in West Cork, to help them survive the Economic War).
While in a general sense we were somewhat aware of Cosgrave, de Valera and the Blueshirts, the precise detail of the period was an unknown, a blank space (and I suspect it is the same for most of the Irish population). However, when we started investigating we were hugely impressed.
As we delved into this period, we comprehended better the important events in the constitutional, political and institutional sense, pivotal episodes that changed the nature and direction of the 26-county polity.
But, in addition to these worthy topics, it turns out that the period is a fascinating one. There were big events like the Tailteann Games, and underpinning the immense power of the Catholic Church, two great celebrations: the centenary of Catholic Emancipation and the holding of the Eucharistic Congress. The transformation from the previous Victorian way of life was well underway.
Everything was changing – the style of dress, type of housing and social activities. There was modernisation, helped by the technical innovations of WWI such as improved cars, trucks and buses. The rapid advances in aviation had an impact: pioneering aviators of the 1920s and 1930s were drawn to this small island off the coastline of Europe, ‘the nearest parish to America’.
In selecting the images, we cast a wide net. We are fortunate that Ireland enjoys some outstanding and comprehensive archives and libraries. We searched for the photos that told of the momentous events, but also for those that depict the lives of ordinary people – the leitmotif we used was that the image must be interesting and impactful.
On the odd occasion, a very poor quality image had to be used to illustrate a key part of the story. In the course of writing my previous illustrated books, I have developed a particular style of accompanying each photograph with a granular caption that tells the story and helps to move the narrative along.
There is an art in putting a large and nuanced amount of information in a small place: one has to pour a quart of information into the pint space available for the caption.
Michael B. Barry is a historian who has written many books including the bestselling Victorian Dublin Revealed, a trilogy of books on the Irish Revolution period, and the critically acclaimed An Illustrated History of the Irish Revolution 1916–1923. John O’Byrne is a professional photographer and colouriser. Over the last decade, he has specialised in colourising military scenes from the early twentieth century. A Nation Is Born is published now by Gill. It is nominated in the An Post Irish Book Awards 2023 in TheJournal.ie’s sponsored category, Best Irish Published Book of the Year. Find the full list of nominees and more information at the awards’ website. You can vote here anpostirishbookawards.ie/vote.
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This type of low paid insecure work is likely to become more and more common and the journal could really have taken a more critical look at it rather than putting out what is essentially an ad for the company. Cleaners with hassle get paid ‘up to €10′ an hour while the customer pays €12 making a tidy profit for the owners, but without them having to bear any of the responsibilities that normally come with being an employer – like paying employers’ PRSI or providing sick pay, holidays or maternity leave – and without the workers, who are effectively their employees having any of the rights, given that the website states it’s an ‘introduction service’ for self-employed cleaners. Despite this, its owners have no problem with indefinitely scalping at least a sixth of the value of these workers’ labour off them.
wtf are u talking about.. Are you trying to debate the business strategy of affliates ??
Its capitolism, a simple finders fee.. whats wrong with that. €10 an hour is more than what some people have at the moment so quite literally the market will dictate whether they will have customers or not !
You miss the point of this company completely…. the cleaners aren’t employees anymore than the properties advertised on daft belong to daft.
This isn’t just an ad for a business, there is actually an extremely valid business message there. Pick a niche and do it really well. This is one of the most increasingly important lessons that all businesses and especially start -ups can learn from.
I love the way some people immediately can be so critical of anyone in business and the idea that if they run a business, they must be making loads of money for themselves simply through the exploitation of “the workers”. What about the ongoing time, effort and investment that the owners have put it in to get the business started and keep it going? As a business owner you don’t just wake up one day and magically have money coming into your bank account for zero time and effort.
What exactly should The Journal have been more critical of? If there is a market for the service, then it will take off and many of the cleaners I’m sure will be making more than they are now, as Rob says. Presumably anyone already earning a good, “secure” living if such a thing exists anymore might not be inclined to sign up as a cleaner of the service, no one is forcing them. Unless of course they prefer the flexibility that this type of working arrangement may possibly bring them compared to other employment options they may have. Many people may actually be pretty happy to have this option open to them.
In fairness, the article tells us nothing about how the cleaners earn their money and what sort of rights they have. It would be interesting to know, given that more and more people these days have to rely on precarious work. I have to agree with the original poster that the article does read rather like an ad for the company.
They earn their money by cleaning at an agreed rate per hour. They are self employed not employees. They have the same rights as any other sole trader.
Well did Cian. Pretty sure Hailo doesn’t pay PRSI for their drivers, dictate annual leave etc. Some people really just love having a moan at any good news story. Ok cleaners aren’t millionaires but they choose to get into the game. It’s generally a very flexible form of self employment, very suitable for people with children in school and if anything, Hassle are bringing these people into the tax net (doing us all a favour). The modern young professional is much more comfortable using apps than yellow pages or even poorly laid out websites. This is simply supply meeting demand in a niche. Fair play and best of luck to them! This could be a European wide success story with a talented young Irish Woman at it’s heart.
Ian, they can choose which jobs to accept and which not to. Therefore they can pick their own hours, their own work locations. The website provides a platform for them to advertise their own services. Interested customers can decide whether to avail of those services and the cleaners themselves can choose whether to provide services to particular customers or not.
And in fairness, the article doesn’t look like it is meant to be about the rights and arrangements that the cleaners have with the company so why should The Journal focus on it? It seems like a pretty straight forward arrangement in any case, the details of which are not hard to find on the website for anyone who is interested. I personally clicked to read the article because of the business lessons alluded to in the headline. Fair enough the company will be getting a bit of publicity from having their name featured on here, but reading about other people’s business successes and failures is always a lot more interesting and meaningful when you know the name and details of the business itself.
Do landlords advertising properties on daft have to continue to pay daft at least a sixth of their monthly rent? that’s what the workers in this case will have to do. It’s not just a ‘finder’s fee’, it’s continuing exploitation.
Well estate agents do.. ? whats your point !!
It’s a really good idea suiting both people who want to work as a cleaner doing whatever hours best suits them and people who want to have their home cleaned on an irregular basis, perhaps when ill and unable to do it themselves. Wishing them well.
Not a bad idea, hope it comes to cork soon!
Fleetingwhim, they are providing an ongoing service. Regular matching of customers to cleaners for ongoing jobs that come up.
Is it just the fact that the company charge any fee at all that you have a problem with? If the cleaners received €12 per hour and the customers paid €14 per hour, would this still be exploitation to you? Should the website instead become a free community service?
Although I would imagine it to be against their T&Cs I can imagine that over time people engaging the services of cleaners may well end up making arrangements directly with the cleaners. If the arrangement was for the cleaner to earn €10 directly from the home owner, or even if they split the difference and agreed €11 per hour, is that exploitation because the customer has knocked money off the “value” of the worker’s labour?
The website provides a particular type of service which both customers and cleaners can choose to avail of or not. There are alternatives open to cleaners which are a whole range of marketing and advertising options such as their own website, leaflet drops, advertising in local newspapers etc. That all costs money too. This service provides them with a new option to access a steady stream of customers (assuming of course that it takes off) in what seems to be a fairly convenient way.
Garglebin is an even better app if I’d ever get around to doing it. After the World Cup now I’ll make a burst.
and what would gargle bin be (now that you’ve mentioned it) ?
I presume it will let me summon a cleaner to discreetly dispose of the stash of empty vodka bottles in my wardrobe?
A crap ‘article’ if it even deserves that description. Author must have had an IOU to this business that he repaid with a lazy Sunday fill the gap piece. Good luck with the business guys but this is an advert disguised as business journalism, simple as.
Well I was interested to read a short summary of what seems like an interesting business. Ok, it’s clearly useful for this company to get the publicity, but I still regard this as a valid business article. When a company comes up with an innovative business model that may have a major impact on some industry, it’s perfectly reasonable for the business media to publish articles about it. Just think of Ryanair, Amazon.com, Hailo, etc.
Do you not cover lusk? I need a cleaner….
Interesting idea. I like it as a would be customer, however as it’s only available in Dublin it is useless to me
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