Irish Economic and Social History

This essay addresses the question of why Ireland's sheep and wool diminished in economic importance during an era in which they seemed to count so much for other states. From 1780 to 1800, the Irish Government and Parliament enjoyed greater autonomy to shape what Julian Hoppit describes as a ‘political economy of wool' but used it to discount sheep and wool. After the Union, there was a belated effort by Irish political elites to promote sheep and wool in Ireland's improvement, but it proved a spectacular failure. Integrating political economy and economic history, the essay shows the importance of wool in Ireland’s political dynamics and the profound impact of these politics on the economic history of Irish sheep and wool.

From small beginnings running a glazing and house-painting business in Mountmellick, later members of the Star family became master-painters and wallpaper manufacturers in Dublin between 1820 and 1880. In Mountmellick, they were Anglicans with a Quaker clientele; in Dublin, a new generation became Catholics, serving a Catholic clientele and specialising in church decoration. Their story highlights both possibilities and problems in operating a business in nineteenth-century Ireland. It also gives a new angle on aspects of Ireland's ‘devotional revolution’, the nature of Irish nationalism and limits to Dublin's industrial development. Building on both historical and genealogical research, a look at one family business suggests how other families and their histories, in similar economic and social settings, could be described and analysed.

The general public, both within Ireland and further abroad, has begun to take an interest in Irish lifting stones. A simple premise, lifting stones are historically significant stones which were typically lifted as tests of manhood within rural and fishing communities in Ireland. It is an Irish practice with global parallels in Europe and Asia. The popular history of this endeavour is currently being written with claims that this practice, once popular, was wiped out during the Great Famine. This article marks the first academic study of lifting stones in Ireland. It situates them in a domestic and global context, discusses the sources one can use in studying the topic and uses a combination of folklore, anthropology and fiction to evaluate known written sources on the topic. More importantly it highlights the multifaceted and gendered histories which can be told through this topic. The article thus seeks to do three things: first to raise awareness of the public histories being written on this topic, second to implore a more rigid groundwork for studying this practice and third to stress the value such an area has in the growing field of masculinity studies in Ireland.

The 1930s was a period of profound crisis for Irish dry cattle farmers. Understandably, many blamed the then Fianna Fáil government, which instigated a trade dispute with Britain and harboured a deep aversion to the cattle trade. In this context, many viewed the government's decision to reduce the cattle herd in 1934 as part of a grand plan to upend largescale cattle farming. As this article demonstrates, the situation was far more complex. The government certainly sought to reform Irish agriculture but was unwilling to preside over the complete collapse of the cattle trade. The Irish government's intransigence played a part, but the worst years of the crisis also owed much to British protectionism. Yet, notwithstanding the conditions, farmers stubbornly stuck to cattle.

From 1945 and into the 1950s in Ireland's economic history has been described as post-war recovery and gloom and doom respectively, leading to the 1960s golden age. However, despite this gloomy outlook, with some delays attributed to the Emergency, a ‘quiet revolution’ kicked off in late 1946. That revolution was the Rural Electrification Scheme (RES) of the Electricity Supply Board of Ireland, a scheme designed to bring electric power to every village in Ireland. While some academic research has addressed the RES, detail on specific locations and effects is lacking, which is surprising given the effects the scheme had on life and economy in rural Ireland. Drawing on archival evidence, existing history texts, media and some oral histories, this paper explores the story of the first village to receive power under the RES, namely the village of Oldtown in County Dublin. This story is largely untold, and in particular, why this village was the first is explored. The benefits of electric power to rural homes and farms are also detailed. In the case of farming, early shoots of today's thriving tillage and horticultural activity typical of North County Dublin are apparent.

Between 1949 and 1960 Irish carcass beef exports increased eight-fold, expanding from 6,400 tons to over 50,000 tons. This unprecedented growth marked a fundamental shift in the structure of the Irish livestock industry, as the country moved from an almost exclusive dependence on the live cattle exports in 1949 to a situation where forty per cent of animals were shipped as beef eleven years later. This article examines why Ireland embraced beef processing, who were the main actors in the emerging industry, and where were the primary markets. Moreover, the article details how beef processors restructured their operations and reorientated their exports to Britain and the US following a major downturn in demand between 1954 and 1956. It also assesses the implications of the industry's success for the farm sector and for the historiography of Irish agriculture in the 1950s.