The late Christine Keegan and her daughter Antoinette. Photo courtesy of Sam Boal
The Cork Mother Jones Committee is proud to announce that the 2020 Spirit of Mother Jones Award will be presented to Antoinette Keegan of the Stardust Victims Committee.
Antoinette and her mother Christine Keegan were due to speak in Cork at this year’s Spirit of Mother Jones Summer school. Sadly, Christine passed away in July after a lifetime of fighting for justice for the Stardust victims.
The Keegan family have been central to the efforts for the past 40 years to investigate the causes of the fire. The recent announcement of a new inquest into the victims of the Stardust Fire is testament to the determination of Antoinette and her family and the Stardust Victims committee to pursue the truth of the night of the 13/14th February in 1981.
“The Spirit of Mother Jones Award is awarded this year to Ms. Antoinette Keegan of the Stardust Victims Committee for her determination, resilience and longstanding efforts to pursue truth, accountability and justice for the Stardust victims and their families over almost 40 years.
Antoinette and her late mother Christine and father John have pursued answers to what happened at the Stardust fire on 14th February 1981, where 48 young people lost their lives, including Antoinette’s sisters Mary and Martina.
In spite of her own injuries, the loss of her sisters, and the failure of the Authorities to provide answers, Antoinette has continued to actively campaign to uncover the full truth of the events of that night. She is an inspiration to so many!
For her bravery, courage and commitment, Antoinette Keegan is a very worthy recipient of the 2020 Spirit of Mother Jones Award.”
The Cork Mother Jones Committee
The award has been presented each year since 2013 by this committee to the person we feel most represents the fighting spirit of Mother Jones, who was born Mary Harris here in Cork in July 1837 and went on to become known throughout the world as Mother Jones. She fought for the rights of workers and the trade union movement and was involved in numerous campaigns
We will arrange to present the award representing The Children of Lir to Antoinette as soon as it becomes safe to do so in view of the current Covid-19 situation. It is hoped Antoinette will be able to come to Cork to speak at the Spirit of Mother Jones summer school in 2021.
The Revolutionary period and the subsequent creation of the Irish Free State and later the Republic has given rise to some amazing family stories. Very few can surpass the story of Sean Dunne, a Trade Union organiser, mentored by Jim Larkin and later Labour Party TD.
Filmed in West Cork, this discussion with local historian and author Diarmuid Kingston reveals the account of the Ahawadda Ambush (located on the road to Ring outside Timoleague) on 10th May1920, in which three Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) lost their lives in an ambush. This was the greatest loss of life of old RIC members in a single ambush in West Cork during the War of Independence.
Among them was Constable Edward Dunne from Co Laois. He was 32 years old, married to Bridget Coppinger, a school teacher with two children. Their young son Sean, was born in December 1918 in Timoleague. Constable Edward Dunne was buried quietly in Raheen in Co Laois.
The Old Courthouse in Timoleague, where the bodies of the three RIC constables were taken following the Ahawadda Ambush.
Sean grew up in Waterford and Wicklow and in the late 30s was arrested and served time in the Curragh Internment Camp for Republican activities. He came under the influence of Jim Larkin and the Workers’ Union of Ireland and became one of the most effective union organisers in rural Ireland in the 1940s, founding the Federation of Rural Workers (FRW), which had up to 20,000 members at its height.
As its General Secretary, he organised countless strikes among rural workers and was instrumental in campaigning for and obtaining the weekly half day for his members in the early 1950s.
Later he was elected a TD for the Labour Party, when he was just 28 years old, and became one of the most colourful elected public representatives in the Dail. He had the record of being ejected from two parliaments, Dail Eireann and Stormont, as well as British Labour Party conferences.. Once labelled “an extreme communist” by Sean MacEntee,
Sean Dunne was described by one political correspondent as being “in daily conflict with Authority on cases of social justice, on the side of the lost nobodies of the world”.
Dunne was a serious and witty orator and had a sharp turn of phrase when required. When the Fianna Fail party which in government under Taoiseach Jack Lynch established a secretive business financial support group known as An Taca (1966-1969). Dunne led the charge when he compared the organisation to the “Costa Nostra”.
“I was supplied with a list of the Capo Mafiosi…..is that what one would call them, the captains of the Mafia?.”
He then named Charles J Haughey, the Minister for Finance as the leader of An Taca. It was devastating criticism and contributed to the decline of the business ‘clique’ which provided financial support to Fianna Fail.
He retained his republican views although his socialist principles remained undimmed. Very opposed to colonialism, Dunne was one of the very first to raise the appalling treatment and torture by the British army of the Kenyan people in their efforts to defeat the Mau Mau uprising in the early 50s.
With the aid of an extremely loyal working class support base he was elected to the Dáil in 1951 and 1954 elections but he ran into financial trouble and was declared bankrupt in 1956.
Sean Dunne married Cora Ryan in June 1956, Cora was one of eight children of Seamus and Agnes Ryan from Co Tipperary. The Ryans had initially set up the Monument Creameries in 1919 and had turned it into a very successful enterprise comprising 33 shops selling fresh foodstuffs around the Dublin area. The business was run by Agnes Ryan, following the death of her husband in the 1930s.
A subsequent appeal by Dunne to the Supreme Court was successful in November 1957, but it was too late to save his Dáil seat as he could not stand in the March 1957 election. Cora and Sean struck for London where they worked for 3/4 years before returning. Having burned many bridges with the Irish Labour Party, he instead stood and was elected as an Independent Labour TD, with the support of Labour party activists from all over Dublin. The Labour Party could not ignore his support of their own members and he was readmitted to the party in 1963 and he was re-elected to Dáil Eireann in 1965 and 1969.
His famous Leabhar Ballyfermot which he always carried contained the details of his constituents’ problems. Trade union organiser, writer, playwright, orator, Irish speaker and campaigner for social justice, this west Cork born politician died suddenly following the General Election in 1969.
His funeral at the Pro-Cathedral was attended by President Eamonn De Valera, Taoiseach Jack Lynch, Fine Gael Leader Liam Cosgrave and the Cabinet and thousands of workers.
He had travelled a very long road in life and his virtual State funeral was in stark contrast to that of his father who was buried quietly in a graveyard in Co Laois almost 50 years earlier.
Brendan Corish gave his graveside oration.
“Sean Dunne’s death has robbed the Labour movement of one of its strongest personalities, the working people of Ireland of one of their most formidable defenders and Dail Eireann of one of its most able parliamentarians.
His entry into politics coincided with his long and bitter struggle to organise the rural workers of Ireland into a trade union and establish their entitlement to just wages and humane conditions
His identification with the causes of the defenceless and lower paid sections of the community were legendary, springing from his youth and his association with Big Jim Larkin under whom he served his trade union apprenticeship.
Sean Dunne lived a full life, became a legend in his own lifetime, a privilege given to few men”
Sean Dunne born in Timoleague in West Cork on 18th December 1918, died on 25th June 1969, aged 50. Son of an RIC father and teacher mother. Active Republican. Imprisoned and Interned. Labour and Trade Union organiser. General Secretary of the Federation of Rural Workers (FRW) Elected to Bray Town Council and Wicklow County Council. Elected to Dail Eireann 1948 Labour Party TD Dublin County. Elected to Dublin County Council Re-elected to Dail Eireann 1951 and 1954. Elected Alderman to Dublin City Council Elected to Dail Eireann Independent Labour TD 1961 Re-elected to Dail Eireann Labour Party TD 1965 and 1969. Freelance Journalist. Playwright and Orator. Achieved the Half-Day for rural workers.
In this film documentary discussion with Diarmuid Kingston, we look at the Ahawadda Ambush and we examine the subsequent life of Sean Dunne T.D. Diarmuid is the author of Beleaguered (A History of the RIC in West Cork during the War of Independence) and has written extensively on the period. The film will be shown during the forthcoming Spirit of Mother Jones festival and forms part of our contribution to Cork Commemoration 1920-23.
Bucolic dreams of some politicians and the sentimental views of the Irish countryside idyll by writers masked the growing community tensions between the multi-acre farming class which had purchased their farms and the many rural landless labourers and their families who existed in poverty..
Yes Ireland was now free as in the “Irish Free State; but it became a very cold place for those who did not fit in with the new conservative vernacular of church, education and land ownership. And all that really mattered in rural Ireland was land, land and land!
For those men who did not emigrate and found work with farmers or in the agricultural co-operatives, Sean Dunne by organising them into a trade union and by organising strikes, helped to provide many labourers and rural workers with a semblance of class allegiance and in the radical few his activities encourages the stirrings of a radical political identity in the 40s and 50s.
Social issues began to be raised and discussed by emboldened elements of the unionised workforce in the rural bastions of smug conservatism. Unfortunately it took another generation of their sons and daughters who survived the emigration culls and their subsequent movement to urban Ireland to join in the transformational changes in Irish society and its supporting institutions from the 1980s onwards. Sean Dunne had helped to light the fire!
Update: On Saturday August 13th 2022, relatives of the three RIC men killed at the Ahawadda Cross ambush of May10th 1920 unveiled a memorial to remember the events outside Timoleague on that Monday afternoon.
Originally postponed due to Covid-19, the dignified ceremony took place in the presence of a gathering representing families on both sides of the ambush. Following a blessing of the monument, local historian Diarmuid Kingston gave an account of what took place on the nearby road.
Constable Edward Dunne, the father of labour and union activist Sean is listed among those who died on that day. Perhaps one day, the people of Timoleague will erect a monument to one of their famous sons!
Historian, Diarmuid Kingston alongside the plaque.The large attendance present.
Site of the Ahawadda Ambush.
The Grave of Charlie Hurley at Clogagh Cemetery. Hurley led the ambush at Ahawadda Cross and was later killed on the 19th March 1921 in a confrontation with the British Army.
Peadar King is a journalist and documentary film maker and is well known as the producer of the documentary series for RTE “What in the World”. His latest book published recently by Liffey Press, War, Suffering and the Struggle for Human Rightsis a powerful indictment of war and chronicles human rights abuses in times of conflict. Peadar interviews people from war zones whose descriptions of the impact of war and the horrible devastation which follows are heart breaking.
He states that “all wars are based on lies” and uses the Irish phrase “Chroi Bhriste” to describe the unspeakable horror endured by those who suffer.
The very human accounts in this book of the results of war are taken from interviews with the ordinary people and they paint in graphic detail the indiscriminate destruction of bombs on people and their communities.
Have we become inured to war? We can now watch versions of wars on our TVs and computers, but to many it’s more virtual clickbait with neither the impacts, the questions, context nor explanation sought nor provided.
Yet, Europe, the UK, the USA, Russia and China supply 75% of all weapons used in these wars which are fought over power, resources and oil and in the near future…. fresh water supplies!
“And The World Turns Away” features a discussion with Peadar King and will be shown during the Spirit of Mother Jones Festival.
Beginning on Saturday 1st August, the Cork Mother Jones Committee in conjunction with Cork Community TV are making available on television, some of the talks and presentations, which have been delivered at the Spirit of Mother Jones Festivals and Summer Schools since 2012.
The original series of Mother Jones annual lectures, will be shown on Saturday next while during the month of August, further talks delivered over the years at the Summer School will be televised. These will feature Margaret Aspinall, Louise O’Keeffe, Fr. Peter McVerry, Chris Mullin, Anne Twomey and many others.
These are free to view, thanks to Frameworks Films and Cork Community TV, for allowing us to celebrate Mother Jones during August.
The 2020 festival will be held in late November 2020. Further talks and speakers, will be televised during the November Festival.
The 8th annual Spirit of Mother Jones Festival and Summer School continues today and until next Saturday night. Below you will find today’s programme.
Spirit of Mother Jones Festival and Summer School on Thursday 1st August.
The Radical Irish Diaspora
11:00 a.m. Lorraine Starsky
“In the Footsteps of Mother Jones – The Life and Legacy of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn 1890- 1964”
Cathedral Visitor Centre
1.00 p.m. Music at the Maldron.
William Hammond
2.30 p.m. Dr Kieran Groeger.
“The Extraordinary Life of John Swiney, the United Irishman from Shandon.”
Cathedral Visitor Centre
5.00 p.m The Limerick Soviet
A collaborative documentary between the Limerick Council of Trade Unions and Frameworks Films. We celebrate the 100th Anniversary of The Limerick Soviet. Author Liam Cahill will introduce the documentary. An exhibition on the Limerick Soviet courtesy of Cork City Library will be on site.
Maldron Hotel, Shandon
7.30 p.m. Anne Twomey Shandon Area History Group.
“Mary Elmes …………An Irish Heroine”
Firkin Crane Theatre
8:00 p m Fili Na Reabhloide (Poets of the Revolution)
Myo Café, Popes Quay.
Readings from your favourite poets of revolution and social change.
The 7th Spirit of Mother Jones Festival & Summer School came to an end last evening (Saturday, 4th August) with a well-attended toast to Mother Jones at the plaque in her honour at John Redmond Street. The 2018 festival has been a tremendous success with capacity crowds at all our events and a combination of fabulous lectures, film and music.
We wish to thank all those who contributed to making the event such a success.
Here are some photos from Saturday’s events:
Micheline Sheehy Skeffington who gave a fascinating insight into the life and activism of her grandmother Hanna Sheehy Skeffington
William Hammond of the Cork Mother Jones Committee makes a presentation to Micheline Sheehy Skeffington
Frank Connolly who spoke about his new book NAMA-land
Frank Connolly after receiving presentation from Ann Piggott and Ann Rea of the Cork Mother Jones Committee.
Musician Mick Treacy with his daughter Jennifer
Ukelele band providing some of the music at the Butter market plaza
Loretta Williams as “Mother Jones” at the Mother Jones plaque
Rory McCarthy sings at the Mother Jones Plaque
Some of the crowd at the annual Toast to Mother Jones at the Mother Jones Plaque
Loretta Williams as Mother Jones with Ann Piggott of the Cork Mother Jones committee
Ladies in period costume at the Mother Jones Plaque
Emily E.LB Twarog will appear at the Spirit of Mother Jones summer school on Friday morning 11am at the Cathedral Visitor Centre.
Emily Twarog
For many people in Ireland, American politics remain a mystery, we do not understand how Donald J Trump could be elected President of America. Dr Twarog will examine one aspect of the election, why more white women vote Republican and voted for President Donald J Trump.
Emily will address the topic: “The Female Vote: Why Gender Matters in American Politics”
“You don’t need the vote to raise hell”
Mother Jones
“Throughout the twentieth century, working and middle-class women struggled to collaborate. For many working-class women, Mother Jones’ declaration that “you don’t need the vote to raise hell” rang true far more than Alice Paul’s persistent call for equality through the vote. This division continues into the twenty-first century as they deepen along multiple identities – racial, class, gender, and educational.
White women repeatedly voted against their own self-interest. Let us run some numbers. In 2004, Republican George W. Bush got 55 percent of the white female vote and Democrat John Kerry got 44 percent in what analysts call a “reverse gender gap” (one working in the GOP’s favor) of 11 points. In 2008, Republican John McCain got 53 percent of the white female vote and Democrat Barack Obama got 46 percent—a gap of 7 points.
Compared with four years earlier, the reverse gender gap remains but decreased by 4 points. Progress? No. In 2012, Republican Mitt Romney got 56 percent of the white female vote compared with President Obama who got just 42 percent. Far from narrowing, the reverse gender gap among white women widened to 14 points.
In 2016, despite the presence of a white woman on the ballot, the gap persisted among white women with a staggering 10-point split. Republican Donald Trump got 53 percent of the white female vote and Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton got 43 percent of the white female vote. As a whole, white women still opted to vote for someone who not only did not look like them, but was also heard by the entire nation (and beyond) admitting to sexually harassing women.
In my talk, I will examine the complexities of American electoral politics in more depth”.
—
Emily E. LB. Twarog, PhD is Associate Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign School of Labor and Employment Relations Labor Education Program
Affiliate faculty, European Union Center
Affiliate faculty, Women & Gender in Global Perspectives
Emily is the author of a recent Politics of the Pantry: Housewives, Food, and Consumer Protest in Twentieth Century America (Oxford University Press) in hardback and e-book. Available Indiebound, Amazon and Powell’s (a union shop).
Louise O’Keeffe describes herself as an ordinary West Cork woman and mother of two children. Yet this extraordinary woman took the Irish government to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which in January 2014 found in her favour in a landmark judgement.
Louise had fought a long 20 year battle through the Irish courts to get civil redress for the sexual abuse which she suffered in Dunderrow Primary School in Co Cork in the early 1970s for which her school principal Leo Hickey was convicted. In 1998, Mr Hickey was charged with 386 criminal offences of sexual abuse involving 21 former pupils. He pleaded guilty to 21 sample charges and was sent to prison for three years.
Louise was deemed ineligible for compensation from the Residential Institutions Redress Board and so began her long journey, with the aid of her solicitor Ernest Cantillon, through the High Court, (January 2006), and the Supreme Court, (December 2008), which both ruled that the State was not liable.
The Four Courts, Dublin, seat of the Supreme Court
Following the Supreme Court decision, the State Claims Agency (SCA) wrote to 135 other people around the country who had made similar claims and effectively threatened to pursue them for legal costs if they did not drop their claims immediately. Many did drop their claims through fear of exposure to large legal costs!
Undaunted, Louise bravely continued her fight and on June 16th 2009 (Application no 35810/09) took her case to the ECHR which in January 2014 found the Irish State to be in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights for its failure to put in place any mechanism of State control to protect Irish schoolchildren from sexual abuse in relation to the abuse Louise had endured in primary school.
European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg
On the day of the ECHR decision, Louise stated “This is a great day for the children of Ireland”. Two days later the then Taoiseach Enda Kenny on 30th January 2014 apologised to her for the “horrendous experience she had to go through” and he stated that she was “a woman of extraordinary commitment”.
There has been ongoing controversy about the Government’s interpretation of the ECHR’s finding. Many commentators such as the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission and University College Cork’s Child Law Clinic suggest that the Government’s redress scheme is overly restrictive in its interpretation of the ECHR O’Keeffe finding. This appears to have now made it almost impossible for victims to qualify for redress as the State requires that a prior complaint of abuse must have existed in the school before the claimant was abused.
The Minister for Education appointed Justice Iarfhlaith O’Neill as an independent assessor to examine appeals where the State Claims Agency decided claims were ineligible. Justice O’Neill has sought an explanation from the Minister as to whether the rejection by the adversarial SCA, of many claims on the grounds of evidence of prior complaint was consistent with the ECHR O’Keeffe judgement. Very few cases have been settled under the State scheme to date.
Louise O’Keeffe will tell the story of her fight for justice at the Spirit of Mother Jones Festival on Thursday afternoon 2nd August at 2.30 pm at the Cathedral Visitor Centre. All are welcome.
Update: 24th June 2026. With no resolution or fair compensation in sight for many of the women of Dunderrow National School, the women decided to speak out on RTE (Radio Telefis Eireann), the national broadcaster of Ireland, about their treatment at the hands of Leo Hickey, school principal.
The following article by Ailbhe Conneely, Social Affairs Correspondent of RTE, provides an excellent summary of how the women have been treated by successive Irish governments. It makes for sad and disturbing reading.
Launch of 2018 Spirit of Mother Jones Festival and Summer School
The seventh Spirit of Mother Jones Festival and summer School takes place in Shandon Historic Quarter from Wednesday 1st August to Saturday 4th August.
Details of this year’s events will be released at a Press Launch in Cork’s Maldron Hotel tomorrow (Wednesday 26th June).
The Cork Mother Jones Committee is delighted to announce a varied and topical programme of events for the festival in 2018.
As well as the traditional venues at the Firkin Theatre and the Maldron Hotel, we are particularly pleased to announce that many of the talks at this year’s summer school will take place at the Cathedral Visitor Centre attached to the historic North Cathedral.
In effect Mary Harris/Mother Jones is coming home as it was on 1st August all of 181 years ago that she was baptised at the North Cathedral in the very same 200 year old baptism font which is still used today in the Cathedral.
Among the major highlights of the festival will be the premiere of a new documentary, Fords – Memories of the Line’, a film about what it was like to work on the assembly line at Ford’s car manufacturing plant in Cork, which operated on the Marina from 1917 to 1984. The documentary was produced by Frameworks Films, a Cork based production company, in collaboration with Ford’s Ex-Workers Group. It will document the closure of the factory in 1984 and the impact this had on the men, their families and the city of Cork. This should be of interest to anyone connected to the Ford Motor Company and its car factory in Cork
The Committee intends to celebrate the achievements of the suffragette movement and the one hundred anniversary of the right of women to vote, which took place in the 1918 election.
The Cork Mother Jones Committee is very pleased to confirm that Dr. Micheline Sheehy Skeffington, the grand-daughter of suffragette leader Hanna Sheehy Skeffington has agreed to speak about her grandmother at the 2018 Spirit of Mother Jones summer school.
Hanna Sheehy Skeffington was born in Kanturk, Co Cork in 1877 and went on to spend a lifetime fighting for the rights of women, including the right to vote, until her death on 20th April 1946. Hanna’s husband Francis Sheehy Skeffington was murdered during the 1916 Rising.
In an extraordinary coincidence, during a visit to America in 1918, Hanna Sheehy Skeffington had shared a speaking platform in San Francisco with Mother Jones.
The two Cork-born women met and spoke together at this meeting on April 16th 1918.
Hanna’s American visit and her meeting with Mother Jones will be described by Micheline at the Mother Jones summer school on Saturday 4th August, 2.30 at the Firkin Theatre in the Shandon Historic Quarter.
Professor Louise Ryan, a native of Cork, is professor of Sociology at the University of Sheffield, who has published extensively on the suffragette movement. Her recent publication Winning the Vote For Women is a huge contribution to an understanding of the period will examine the connections between the Irish campaigners for womens’ rights and the trade union movement.
Further Cork highlights include a specially commissioned lecture from noted Cork historian Anne Twomey who will speak on the lives and influence of Mary, Annie and Muriel MacSwiney. This will be of major interest to many people in view of the role of the MacSwiney family during the War of Independence and in the new State.
University College Cork historian Luke Dineen will lecture on Cork born Thomas “Corkie” Walsh, a member of the Irish Citizen Army, who fired the first shot of the 1916 Rising in Dublin. A memorial was recently erected to “Corkie” Walsh in St. Finbarr’s Cemetery.
According to James Nolan, spokesperson for the Mother Jones summer school
“We are thrilled that Dr. Sheehy Skeffington and a wide range of the other speakers have agreed to come and speak at the seventh annual Spirit of Mother Jones summer school.
They will explore the various connections between the campaigns for votes for women and the trade union movement as well as the war of Independence over hundred years ago while others will speak on current international and national topics.
The summer school has gone from strength to strength and many hundreds are expected in the Shandon area as a further indicator of the growing importance of this unique event and the line-up of speakers and films this year is testament to this.”
The addition of the new venue, the Cathedral Visitor Centre will allow for a further expansion of the summer school and we are so happy that Mother Jones is returningclose to her birthplace and indeed the very place where she was baptised in 1837”
Jim Nolan
Among the other speakers confirmed is Mary Manning who on the 19th July 1984 refused to register the sale of two Outspan South African grapefruits at the Dunnes Stores Henry Street branch and set off a chain of events which captured the world’s attention. Mary will tell the story of the Dunnes Stores Strikers and their historic fight against Apartheid which aroused the interest and gratitude of Nelson Mandela himself, on Friday evening the 3rd August at the Firkin Theatre at 7.30. Her book Striking Back. The untold story of an Anti-Apartheid Striker in conjunction with Sinead O’Brien, will be available.
Ms Louise O’Keeffe who having failed in the High Court and Supreme Court and who then took the Irish government to the European Court of Human Rights where she was successful over its failure in its duty to protect children in Irish school will speak about her lengthy 20 year battle through Irish courts.
Investigative journalist Frank Connolly will speak on NAMA-land. – How the transfer of billions of euro in public assets enriched a new elite which is the subject of his latest best-selling book.
The festival’s strong American connections is again reinforced this year by the presence of Dr John Barimo who will talk on the reasons why many American trade union and working class people supported Donal Trump. Dr Emily Twarog of the University of Illinois will discuss the role of gender and the female vote in the USA, which had an influence in the election outcomes. Actress Loretta Williams from Illinois will re-enact Mother Jones at her fiery best.
Other films include the Cork premiere of Up to the Last Drop – The Secret WaterWar in Europe, produced by Small Planet Productions in Greece and directed by Yorgos Avgeropoulos.
On the final evening we have a special showing of the film Pride at the Firkin Theatre which documents the extraordinary cooperation between the London based LGBT community and the Welsh Miners during the 1984 British Miners Strike.
There will be a wide range of musical events, featuring Jimmy Crowley, John Nyhan, William Hammond, Richard T Cooke and the Shandon Shawlies and the Cork Singers Club in the wider festival at various locations in the Shandon Historic Quarter to celebrate the life and spirit of Mother Jones.
As the fame of Mother Jones spreads, 2018 has seen the erection of a road marker commemorating her on the famous Route 66 in Illinois as well as an exhibition at the new museum near Mount Olive her final resting place. There have been further exhibitions and gatherings in Chicago.
In early May 2018, the Irish Ambassador to America, Mr Dan Mulhall paid a visit to the grave and monument to Mother Jones at Mount Olive Miners cemetery accompanied by Rosemary Feurer of the American Mother Jones Heritage Project.
We wish to thank the Irish Trade Union movement, the Cork City Council and our sponsors for their support, all events are free and open to the public (but please come early as some events fill up quickly).
1st August 2017, is Mother Jones Day in Cork and it is also the opening day of the 6th annual Spirit of Mother Jones Festival & Summer School in the Shandon area of the city.
Today’s events start with the official launch of this year’s festival by the Lord Mayor of Cork, Councillor Tony Fitzgerald at the Maldron Hotel.
After the opening ceremony takes place, at 2.30pm there will be a showing of “Mother Jones: America’s Most Dangerous Woman” by Rosemary Feurer.
This will be followed at 3.00pm with a lecture by Julianna Minihan who will talk about the life and career of Florence Kelley entitled: “Slums, Factories and Child Labour: Florence Kelley (1859-1932)”.
At 4.00pm there will be a showing of “Mother Jones and her Children” by Cork based Frameworks Films which was shot in Cork and the United States in 2014. This will be followed by a discussion with the film-makers and others involved in the project.
At 7.30pm there will be a series of lectures (The 2017 Mother Jones Lectures) as follows:
“Revitalising the Labour Movement – What can we learn from the Justice for Clery’s Workers’ campaign victory?” – by Ethel Buckley of SIPTU
James Goltz of the United Mine Workers Association (USA) will formally present the proclamations from the AFL-CIO and UMWA (see news item on this site 31/8/2017) to view the proclamations
“Challenging Injustice, Inequality and the Unethical” – Ed Byrne, President of the ASTI.
The day winds down at 9.30pm with a session of music from the Cork Singers’ Club in the main bar at the Maldron Hotel.
