‘The Kennedy family emptied their attic into this museum': A visit to the JFK Presidential Library and Museum
By tradition, Irish-Americans in Boston have kept a 'cross, a photo of the Pope and a photo of President Kennedy on their walls'.
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Irish Examiner
2 hours ago
- Irish Examiner
No Name Clubs: Helping Cork teenagers navigate modern life
'IF YOU'D asked me a year ago, 'would you get up on stage and be confident talking to the person on stage?', I'd tell you 100% no, because I wouldn't have had the confidence,' says Jake Costin. Nevertheless, when the 17-year-old from St Joseph's No Name Club in Cork's Mayfield saw one of his pals on stage at the organisation's annual Youth Awards in 2024, he turned to his leaders and said, 'I want to do this next year. I feel like I could do it'. Jake Costen pictured at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson Costin was subsequently nominated by his club members to represent them at the 2025 awards, and in the space of that year, such was his growth in confidence and ability that he went on to win Host of the Year at this year's event, an accolade awarded yearly to two No Name Club members who have made an outstanding contribution to their club and local community. 'As soon as I said 'I'm putting my name forward', [my No Name] leaders and my peers were giving me advice and helping me,' says Costin, whose prize is a three-year college scholarship and a trip to Croatia in July to represent No Name Club through the Erasmus+ programme. He says that being a member of No Name is 'massively enjoyable' and 'a huge confidence booster', and recent research has shown just what a valuable resource the youth-led, volunteer-supported social clubs are for young teenagers as they navigate the difficulties of 21st century life. Jake McCarthy and Emily O'Brien pictured playing games at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson The research, conducted by No Name over several months of last year, drew on surveys and focus groups with members, volunteers, staff, and board members, and compared findings with national data relating to the same demographic as No Name membership (15 to 18-year-olds). A whopping 93% of members reported increased confidence and self-esteem, while 81% said that their mental well-being had improved from being part of No Name. Olivia Meade and Jake Costen pictured playing bingo at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson In contrast, a 2021 study of 4,400 Irish teenagers conducted by researchers at RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences, found that more than 29% of the adolescents described their mental health as 'bad' or 'very bad'. No Name Club, which was founded in 1978, is clearly doing something right. The organisation's ethos has always been to help safeguard young people's 'right to enjoy life, feel respected, and to mature without a reliance on alcohol and other drugs'. Having such boundaries seems to be a key factor in its success, with 96% of members feeling reduced peer or societal pressure to use alcohol or other substances. WATCHING THE GROWTH Natasha Walshe organises the games for a group of teenagers at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson Natasha Walshe, now 30 joined St Joseph's No Name Club in 2011, when she was in transition year. 'I went up on a Monday night and brought a couple of friends. It was great because it was really whatever we needed at the time. We went on outings or had activities like boot camp. Then, when we were in sixth year, sometimes we just went up and had the space to do our homework; it wasn't like a homework club, but that's what we needed at the time and that's what they gave us the space to do. I think that's a real example of the youth-led part of the organisation. It's whatever you need it to be on a given night.' Walshe has had various roles in the club since she 'aged out', and, in addition to being a volunteer and the secretary of St Joseph's, she serves as a board member of the national organisation. Emily O'Brien pictured at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson What has kept her invested for so long is, she says, 'tradition and change', citing the recent Youth Awards as an example: 'There's always that bit of tradition, and a lot of things are still the same, but it's always changing; there are always interesting new young people to see on stage. So while the core of the No Name Club stays the same, each year is different. Each group brings something different. But everything is rooted in that ethos of positive social events without alcohol and drugs.' For Walshe, volunteering is a life-affirming, enriching experience. 'Watching the growth of the young people is unbelievable,' she says. 'In my club, in the Youth Council, they have so many good ideas and such a positive attitude. Their enthusiasm really rubs off on you.' Jake McCarthy pictured at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson Given the hugely positive findings of the recent research, what does she think is key to No Name fostering such confidence, self-esteem and community in its members? 'A big part of it is we take everybody as they are. If you're coming to us and you're already a confident person and ready to be up on stage and are just raring to perform, we have the space for that. But if you're a quieter person, less outgoing, you're treated the same, first of all. But you are met where you are.' Ewan Stockley pictured at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson No Name is a safe space for all young people. 'Whether it is people who are part of the LGBTQI+ community or people from disadvantaged areas or people living with disabilities. We're not one-size-fits-all all. We're very much everybody can come to us, and I think that's very important.' No Name Club board member Edith Geraghty's first involvement with the organisation was in the early 2000s, when she and her late husband Seamus set up Erris No Name Club in Belmullet, Co Mayo. She taught drama and her teenage students were bemoaning the lack of a place 'to hang out'. The club is still thriving today, while Geraghty has since had various roles within the organisation. MEETING PEOPLE WHERE THEY ARE Part of the reason for No Name's longevity, she believes, is down to its ability to evolve and pivot to meet the requirements of its members. 'For example, consent. It was a big thing that was coming up, so we sent our staff to train with the National Youth Council of Ireland on consent so that they could then deliver that best practice back into the club. If anything comes up like that, we're able to pivot and meet it in terms of training.' The training No Name offers is never finger-wagging, but rather seeks to educate and empower. 'As teenagers, they're at that time in life when they want their peers and they need a peer group,' says Geraghty. 'There's also an assumption that we break down, which is that everybody is drinking. When you actually sit down and talk to teenagers, they're not, but they think all the others are. [The club] gives them a peer group, so when they go out and socialise they're able to say 'no, we're not drinking tonight. We're in the No Name Club'. And that's extremely valuable. And once they get the confidence that brings, it tends to stay with them.' Jake Costen and Olivia Meade pictured at the St. Joseph's No Name club in Mayfield. Picture Chani Anderson The research found No Name members out-performed the national average on several key metrics, from well-being to alcohol and drug misuse. For example, 54% of 17/18-year-olds reported they aren't drinking alcohol compared to the national average of 18%; while 96% of all club members stated they aren't engaging in substance misuse. 'We put the structure in place. We put the boundaries in place, they know what they can and cannot do,' says Geraghty. 'But within that space, they get to make all the decisions. They get to choose what they want to do.' Three years ago, Geraghty became grievously ill. While in hospital, and being told she 'wouldn't make it', she was Zoomed, FaceTimed, and visited by all the young people she'd known in Erris No Name Club, as well as all those she'd met travelling to clubs countrywide as a No Name development officer. 'They came to see me and to tell me that under no circumstances was I to die. It's not often you get a chance to realise that you've had an impact. 'It was such a marvellous, life-affirming thing for them to do.' A few months after she finally left hospital, Geraghty, who lives with severe complications from her illness, took up a seat on the No Name board. 'I have never missed an event since. The organisation has wrapped itself around me. They have gone above and beyond. The support that they've given me has been absolutely outstanding. I always describe No Name Club as a family and that's what we are.' See Cobh No Name Club is currently looking for a venue. If you can help, please email admin@
The Journal
9 hours ago
- The Journal
Over 175,000 historical records lost during 1922 Four Courts explosion recovered and put online
OVER 175,000 historical records which were lost in the 1922 explosion and fire which destroyed the Public Records Office in the Four Courts have been recovered and made available online. The records have been made freely available from today to mark the 103 rd anniversary of the Public Record Office explosion , which was located in the Four Courts. The records are available on the website of the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland and work to replace and digitise the more than 175,000 historical records involved more than 75 partner archives and libraries across Ireland and the word. The dome of the Four Courts on fire Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo Dr Ciarán Wallace, co-director of the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland, remarked that the team has found records in archives and libraries around Ireland, both north and south, and also around Britain and the world. Speaking to RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Wallace said: 'Wherever Irish people went, records seem to go. 'And English administrators who'd worked here might go back to England with the records that they had accumulated in their time here as senior officers in Ireland.' Wallace explained that the work involves examining the catalogues of its 75 partners and once the team recognises a name in the collections, they ask to see the papers of those donors. 'Suddenly, up comes records that are copies made before 1922, in the days before photocopiers and scanners, when copies are made longhand. 'So these are centuries of transcriptions that have been scattered all around the globe and on we're able to bring them back into one central location.' The records also includes 60,000 names from 19th century censuses, which were previously unknown or unavailable. When asked how the census material was fashioned together, Wallace praised the work of his colleague Dr Brian Gurrin. 'Before 1922, the census exists in the Public Record Office,' explained Wallace. Advertisement 'You could hire a genealogist to go into the archive and trace up your family history by hand. 'You then go off with your family history under your arm but when the genealogist retires or dies, their notes get left into the archive. 'It's finding those notes, sometimes scrawled and scribbled, taken from the census that was then burnt in 1922.' And when asked to pick out something from the more than 175,000 historical documents that fascinated him, Wallace pointed to a document in the medieval accounts from around 1284, of records of supplies going to build a king's castle in Roscommon. He also pointed to an Irish language letter from Co Donegal penned in around 1661. 'On the road between Donegal town and Barnesmore Gap in June 1661,' said Wallace, 'the local English authorities seized a letter which was written in Gaelic script. They couldn't interpret the letter or get anybody in the locality to interpret it. 'So they thought this was highly suspicious and they sent it down to Dublin for investigation and it then gets sent over to London.' When it was translated, it turned out to be a letter by the Franciscan Order. Wallace explained: 'Oliver Cromwell is dead, the new King has come in, and Franciscans are thinking, 'maybe we can get better dispensation under the new monarch coming in'. 'Of course, the English can't read this letter and they think it's something highly suspicious. 'It ends up on an intelligence file in London, where it has sat for over 400 years and is available online our website.' Meanwhile, the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland has over 350,000 historical records on its website, from medieval rolls to the pre-Famine census. 'There are portals, with one for medieval research, the 1798 Rebellion and a population portal,' said Wallace, who said that within these portals people will be able to easily search for the particular area of interest they have. Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone... A mix of advertising and supporting contributions helps keep paywalls away from valuable information like this article. Over 5,000 readers like you have already stepped up and support us with a monthly payment or a once-off donation. Learn More Support The Journal
RTÉ News
16 hours ago
- RTÉ News
'New lease of life' - Project digitises archive documents
175,000 new historical records lost during a fire at the Four Courts during the Civil War in 1922 are being made available online from today, including 60,000 names from the Irish 19th century censuses. Since it was launched three years ago, the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland has been tracking down copies of documents lost in the blaze from archives across the globe. Seventy-five institutions in Ireland and abroad have contributed digital images of transcripts and duplicates of documents that were destroyed when the Public Record Office was burned to the ground. The documents are now available online as part of the project led by Trinity College Dublin and supported by the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport. The 60,000 names of Irish families from a number of censuses - from the 1800s - were painstakingly compiled from transcriptions of documents in the National Archives of Ireland and Public Record Office of Northern Ireland. Among them are extracts from the journals of two genealogists, who copied the censuses as part of their work. Dr Brian Gurrin of Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland, who is also a population and census specialist, said they reveal the ordinary lives of people in the decades before and after the Great Famine. Dr Gurrin said: "When the Record Office was destroyed the personal notes of those genealogists and records agents suddenly became the only census records that were surviving or were available. "So many of those genealogists submitted their personal notes into the Public Record Office after it was re-established after the destruction." He said those collections have been retained in the National Archives and "they're available to the public but they're very difficult to access because they're not really catalogued in any great way". Dr Gurrin said census information "is scattered throughout the collections", adding it "can be very difficult to access". "So, what the Virtual Record Treasury project has been doing is going in and accessing those individual notebooks and individual pages, looking through them, trying to find census material that was transcribed and is now destroyed," he said. "This is the first time it's all been in one place," he added. He said the census details provide some "gems" of information about Irish lives, including the size of families, the occupations of women aswell as colourful notes of some census entries. He said: "One genealogist, Gertrude Thrift, who transcribed many thousands of names from the census, transcribed material from Carrickmacross from Humphrey Evans who was the agent to Lord Shirley. "He put a little note against the transcription in the original volume, which is now destroyed, but Gertrude conveniently transcribed a note for us and what it basically says is 'that Humphrey Everett when I asked him his age and the ages of his daughters, he refused to give me the information and chased me away'." Dr Gurrin said another interesting insight comes from Philip Crossley, a genealogist. "He notes John Morriss, who owned a hotel in Headford in Co Galway, describes his eldest son as his son and heir and in the occupation," he said. "He puts down 'walking about', which seems to express some of the frustration that he felt at his son who wasn't pulling his weight in the business," he added. Documents telling the story of the 1798 Rebellion, life in Anglo-Norman Ireland from the 1100s to the 1500s and State Papers from 1660 to 1720 that document the governing Ireland following Cromwell's death are now also online. Ciarán Wallace, Deputy Director of Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland, said the documents have come from all corners of the globe. Mr Wallace said: "All the originals are lost, but these duplicate documents are from London, from Belfast, from across Ireland, north and south, from North America. "We got records from Australia. Basically, it's like a documentary diaspora. Wherever the Irish went, the records went with them and very often, wherever the English went, Irish records went with them as well." He said the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland now have "75 archives and libraries who share their records with us and share their expertise with us". He added that sometimes the records are "already digitised, and other times, we can identify a record and say that's really significant, and we'll arrange to have it digitised and then bring it onto the virtual treasury". "The Norman era papers, the Medieval era papers, some of those on the face of it, sound quite dull," he said. "They're Exchequer records like taxation records, but in those taxation records you see people who are paying their taxes, disputing their taxes, who are paying fees and fines for inheriting land, who are writing to appeal about ownership of land," he added. "You have women and men disputing with the Government." Mr Wallace said when the documents move into the Cromwellian era, "the State Papers Ireland collection from the National Archives UK, we've nearly 28,000 pages of records from the collection". "They are the view from London, looking at Ireland and trying to decide how to govern this colony and you have people again fighting over land ownership, a constant theme of Irish records and intelligence gathering of suspect people," he said. Mr Wallace said there is "an amazing story" of a letter seized in the 1660s written in Irish and "the local government official who gets it can't understand the Irish and he tries to get it translated in the locality and nobody would translate it". He continued: "So he's actually panicking, saying 'is this some secret code about another rebellion?' "In fact, when they do get it translated, it is the Franciscans talking about reorganising the Franciscan Order in Ireland because Cromwell is gone. "This letter ends up on an intelligence file in London and now it's available in Australia for people to see. "We can look and try our hand at reading 17th century Irish." Zoe Reid, Keeper of the National Archives of Ireland, said the project makes documents that have been sitting in archives for decades accessible to new audiences. She said the National Archives has a collection of over 60 million records, adding "our role is to preserve, collect and maintain those records for public access". "What's really exciting about this project is that we're bringing our archival knowledge and expertise along with the historians and their knowledge," she said. "We're bringing the two together and we're learning more about our collections, and we're making our collections even more understandable and accessible for people, and we're bringing them to new audiences and giving them a new lease of life," she added.
