Unity

Might be worth looking at 'Urban Tales' on RTE 1 this Tuesday 27th February at 7 pm as it features a piece on Limerick Soviet in 1919. Seems the piece might be short so hopefully might be suitable to put up on youtube, we will see. A very inspirational period for some of us, photographer Brian Cross talked about his project on it here and Aileen O Carroll has notes from her talk on this time in Limerick history here

Bottom Dog

Comments

[Ron]

The 10min slot didn't do the soviet justice. But I suppose that it was a very fair appraisal of the events, given the short time alotted.
Maybe they'll do a full 30min programme on it in the future? It would be nice to have something like that before the 90th anniversary.

Apart from Liam Cahill's book 'Forgotten Revolution' (which is probably the best overall telling of the story of the soviet), there are some other publications for those interested in finding out more.

There are of course some articles by Jim Kemmy, which appear in various editions of the Old Limerick Journal.
There is an educational pack, which was prepared by the Limerick Labour History Society (I think), edited by Dave Lee. There is a copy of this in the local history reference section in the City Library in the Granary.
In 2003 the Limerick Soviet Commemoration Committee published a revised and updated edition of D.R. O'Connor Lysaght's pamphlet 'The Story of the Limerick Soviet'. (People's Democracy published the original version in 1979.)
An Irish member of the Socialist Party (England&Wales) [then called Labour Militant] wrote a pamhlet on the Limerick Soviet, which was published in 1994. (I don't think this is available online at the moment, but if I can find my copy I'll get it put up on the Limerick Socialist Party's website.)

The last two pamphlets mentioned go a little deeper than merely telling the story of the events, and look at some of the lessons that can be drawn from what happened. This, after all, is what the study of history should be about.
It would be nice if the Socialist Party in Limerick could produce a new pamphlet for the next big anniversary, in 2009.