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In advance of Pride, our colleague Esme has compiled this selection of LGBT+ novels, non-fiction books and junior reads.Some of the stories on the list are difficult and heavy reads, but also included are books about what really matters, the family who love us for who we are.You can reserve any of these titles online via the Libraries Ireland website. Grab your library card, click on the ISBN number to reserve your copy and enjoy.Happy Pride from all at Dublin City Libraries! Fiction The Night Watch by Sarah Waters. ISBN 9781844082414            Set in and around the Second World War, this tale follows the lives of five people, Kay, Helen and Julia, Viv, and Duncan backwards through the wartime. A well-written period novel full of secrets, tension and romance.Read also:        The Friendly Young Ladies by Mary Renault. ISBN 9781844089529Frog Music by Emma Donoghue. ISBN 9781447249771Little Fish by Casey Plett. ISBN 9781551527208 A challenging look at the life of a transgender woman and her friends living in Canada. The story starts when she gets a phone call from a family friend saying that her dead grandfather might have “Been like her” and the search for meaning that begins in her.Read also:       Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi. ISBN 9780571347216 The Miseducation of Cameron Post by Emily Danforth. ISBN 9780062020574This was recently made into a film, which can be borrowed through the Libraries; 'The Miseducation of Cameron Post'  5060192819298  The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne. ISBN 9781784161002 A man’s life and 70 years of Irish history told from conception on, the struggle of figuring out where you belong in the world as a son with no parents and a country that does not recognise you as belonging with your sexuality.Read also:        A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara. ISBN 9781447294825 A Natural by Ross Raisin. ISBN 9781911214496 Fun Home by Alison Bechdel. ISBN 9780224080514  An incredible memoir of a daughter’s perspective on her family while coming out and dealing with the realisation her father was also gay. One of the most personal and compelling memoirs across the genre, not just within graphic novels.Read also:    My brother's husband Vol. 1 by Gengoroh Tagame. ISBN 9781101871515 First Year Out by Sabrina Symington. ISBN 9781785922589  Non-Fiction            50 Queer Music Icons Who Changed the World: A Celebration of LGBTQ+ Legends by Will Larnach-Jones. ISBN 9781784881504 The Velvet Rage. ISBN 9780738215679 Running Amach. ISBN 9781909895898 Trans like me: a journey for all of us by CN Lester. ISBN 9780349008608  TeenHuntress by Malinda Lo. ISBN 9781907411090One of the most compelling things about Malinda Lo’s YA fantasy novels is the absence of homophobia. She sums it up well in this quote about her world building “There's no trick to this. The author simply has to decide: Are the people in this fantasy world homophobic? Or not?”. Out of all the trials facing her characters, homophobia isn’t one of them. She creates stunning worlds and beautiful characters.Other Words for Smoke by Sarah Maria Griffin. ISBN 9781789090086Weird, spooky and pretty queer YA by an incredible Irish author. Set in county Wicklow twins Mae and Rossa come from the big smoke to stay with their great-aunt Rita and her ward Bevan. Over two summers the twins find that nothing is as it seems and magic is as likely to ruin lives as the tragedies in Irish history did and do.Read also:Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli. ISBN 9780141356099Recently made into a film 'Love Simon'. ISBN 5039036083287 JuniorLumberjanes Vol. 1 by Noelle Stevenson, Grace Ellis, Brooke Allen. ISBN 9781608866878George by Alex Gino. ISBN 9781407158273 Julian Is a Mermaid by Jessica Love. ISBN 9781406380637 This was my favourite kid’s book of 2018, a beautiful story of family, love and acceptance that makes me cry every time I read it.I wanted to end the list on this book because while many LGBT+ stories are difficult and heavy, including a good few on this list, this story is about what really matters, the family who love us for who we are.

It is frequently claimed that the EU gave us equality, and certainly it has helped to have Equal Pay and Equal Treatment Directives, but it was frequently women workers who forced the government to implement the improvements in their employment conditions to which new legislation entitled them. If laborious industrial relations procedures did not deliver for them, the women were quite prepared to take to the streets to insist that they be treated fairly.In the 1970s the public telephone exchanges could provide jobs with steady, albeit low pay and the expectation of a pension if a woman stayed until retirement. As it was generally expected at the time that marriage and child-bearing would be a woman’s primary role in life, the poor terms and conditions were not a deterrent if one was only thinking of being in the job for a few years.In the early 1970s, pay discrimination between men and women was institutionalised in both the public and private sectors. The government introduced the Employment (Equal Pay) Bill in 1973 but claimed that they could not enact it because it would cost too much. They appealed the Equal Pay Directive that came from the EU in 1975 but were told that they would have to pass the Anti-Discrimination (Pay) Act 1974, which the Minister for Finance had tried to defer until 1977. RTE’s Seven Days programme marked the introduction of equal pay with a report shown on 11 July 1975. They found that in the Civil Service and the Public Service the gap between male and female pay rates had actually increased, despite the Directive from the EU.The Post Office Workers’ Union (POWU) held an Equal Pay Telephonists Symposium in October 1976, which had its biggest ever attendance of female members. The largest delegation was from the Dublin Telephones section and the average age of the delegates was early to mid-20s. In March 1977 the POWU Executive gave authorisation for several two-day strikes in the Dublin Exchanges. Their intention was to draw maximum public attention to the way they were being treated without totally crippling the telephone service. By 1979, their claim had been recognised by the Labour Court but was still not implemented by the management.One of the notable aspects of the press coverage of the various industrial actions conducted by the telephonists was the involvement of journalists who reported extensively on the way the women were being treated. The journalists’ support elicited a lot of public sympathy for the telephonists because it meant that the unfairness of their treatment was revealed to people outside the exchanges. Irish Independent, 8.1.1979The Department of Posts & Telegraphs finally made the equal pay settlement in February 1979. There was a fairly widespread belief at the time that when a wider strike began within a week of that payment, that the Department did not expect the women to support their male colleagues in lower grades when they went on strike for a long overdue pay rise. That turned out to be a very wrong assessment. The telephonists went out en masse and remained out for the full nineteen weeks of the strike, although they had nothing to gain for themselves.Dublin Central Historian in Residence Dr. Mary Muldowney

As part of our commitment to exploring local history, and due to the large Traveller Community in the area, notices were displayed in Finglas Library in early 2019 looking for old photographs of Travellers. Sr. Patricia Lahiff, an educator and community worker based in Finglas since the 1970s, made contact. Traveller spokesperson and poet Chrissie Ward (second from right), her grandson, award winning actor John Connors, and other members of the family, attend the launch of "Finglas Travellers: a snapshot" in Finglas Library on 5th March. Sr. Lahiff is also a keen amateur photographer, and through the decades took photographs of the Travellers with whom she worked closely. Her vast collection also includes poems written and dictated by Travellers, and she was kind enough to allow some of her material to be displayed in the library.Five generations of the Collins family attend the launch of "Finglas Travellers: a snapshot" which was on view in Finglas Library until 30th March The exhibition, entitled "Finglas Travellers: a snapshot" was launched on March 5th 2019, and remained on display until the end of the month. Among the attendees at the launch, was Traveller spokesperson and poet Chrissie Ward (a number of whose poems were included in the display), her grandson, the award winning actor John Connors, Fr. Paddy Kelly, and five generations of the Collins family. Attendees at the launch of "Finglas Travellers: a snapshot" on 5th March in Finglas Library, include Sr. Patricia Lahiff, who took many of the photos in the display, Chrissie Ward, Traveller spokesperson and poet, Fr. Paddy Kelly and actor John Connors.The exhibition also included some older images, which were intended to link Sr. Lahiff's photographs back through the decades and centuries, and in doing so demonstrate the long, rich history of Irish Travellers.  Barbara Leonard, librarian.    

Britain faced similar issues ruling Ireland and India: both had to be held to maintain British international credibility and independence movements in both were driven in large part by religion. Irish nationalists drew parallels between their own struggle and that in India, particularly the brutality of colonialism. The above below, from the satirical newspaper, The Lepracaun, compares British rule in the two countries: executions and burning of homesteads in Ireland, while India saw the brutal practice of execution by cannon, particularly associated with the British suppression of the rebellion of 1857. The cartoon is pointing out the dark side of British rule: the ‘Upas Tree’ of the title refers to a highly poisonous tree common to Asia, while the figure of John Bull piously reading the common book of prayer while surrounded by bones, death and destruction is an unsubtle reference to the hypocrisy of evangelical imperialism. History Document of the MonthEvery month the Dublin City Council Historians in Residence will be highlighting a document from Dublin City Public Libraries and Archives Digital Repository.  An image of the selected document will be on display in branch libraries during the month.Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research. 

This year marks the centenary of the birth of Séamus Ennis, the renowned musician, singer, folklorist and broadcaster who left behind, to quote from one obituary, “a priceless heritage of Irish tradition to the nation”. Inspired by on-going centenary events taking place across Dublin and at the Séamus Ennis Arts Centre, this blog briefly examines Ennis’s final years and death. (The bronze statue of Séamus Ennis which was unveiled in Naul on 24th October 2001. Courtesy of the Séamus Ennis Arts Centre)In 1975 Ennis settled in The Naul to live out his remaining years on land which had once belonged to his grandparents. A countryman at heart, he felt a strong attachment for the area and christened the plot where he lived in a caravan ‘Easter Snow’ (after the slow air of that name which he was fond of playing). He played an important role in helping to revive interest in uilleann piping during the twentieth century. While he continued to perform across Ireland and sometimes further afield, Ennis’s health gradually deteriorated during the period and he underwent an operation for cancer of the throat. An able cook who could deal expertly with game, as his health continued failing it was noticed that he began to lose interest in food.On the afternoon of Tuesday, 5th October 1982, Ennis passed away at home during his sleep. He was 63 years old. No inquest was held into the death, with the post-mortem examination taking place the following day. On Thursday evening Ennis’s remains were then brought from St. Vincent’s Hospital, Elm Park, to the Church of the Nativity in Naul, with friends and neighbours standing in the rain for almost an hour to greet the cortege, which had been delayed in heavy traffic.The following morning Ennis was buried in the adjoining Naul Cemetery. Leading traditional musicians had crowded inside the tiny Naul church alongside neighbours for the funeral Mass performed by local curate Father Malachy J. Mahon, who also officiated at the graveside ceremony. After the recital of a decade of the Rosary in Irish, broadcaster Séan Mac Réamoinn delivered a bilingual funeral oration in which he spoke of Ennis’s sincerity, prowess as a piper, and fidelity to north County Dublin and Ireland. This was followed by a lament – “Cois Abhainn na Séad” – played by Liam O’Flynn (Liam Óg Ó Floinn) on a set of uilleann pipes given to him by his deceased friend and mentor. (An uilleann piper at a Dublin Street Carnival in College Green, 1984. Available at;http://digital.libraries.dublincity.ie/vital/access/manager/Repository/vital:42327)Since his death efforts have been made to keep Ennis’s memory alive. These include the renaming of a section of Jamestown Road (Finglas) in his honour in 1994, and unveiling of a bronze statue of Ennis with uilleann pipes in hand beside the newly opened Séamus Ennis Cultural Centre (now the Séamus Ennis Arts Centre) in Naul seven years later. On Friday 3rd May, a new Dublin City Council ‘Séamus Ennis Commemorative Plaque’ will be unveiled in Finglas at the site of Burgess Galvin & Co. Ltd., Jamestown Road.Dr. James Curry, Historian in Residence, North West Area.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research. 

Work and the availability of it is one of the features of human society that can be very contradictory in nature but has a huge impact, on the individual, on the community and on the shape of the physical environment in which they are situated. Dublin has expanded enormously since the beginning of the 20th century and many of the industries that were providing employment at that time have changed; either disappearing altogether or adapting to technological and other developments in the intervening century. Thom’s Directories are fascinating and invaluable sources and combined with the information to be gleaned from the Census records, we can learn quite a lot about workplaces that have now disappeared. The activities of one such workplace, the Dublin Cattle Market are well documented in Thom’s Directories, both for its core enterprises and ancillary businesses. [The Dublin City Library and Archives’ Reading Room provides free access to the Directories.]Some of the Thom’s Directories on shelf in DCLA Reading Room (Festival of History, DCLA) The cattle market in Smithfield was set up in the late seventeenth century and the sight of cattle being moved through the local streets was a common one. A new market in the Aughrim Street/Prussia Street area was officially opened in 1863 and became the major point of sale for cattle being driven from Meath and down through the northside streets of the city to boats moored at the North Wall.During the early years of the 20th century this market was the busiest of its kind in Europe; throughput in one year numbered nearly three-quarters of a million animals. The market was held each Wednesday and attracted buyers not only from Dublin's abattoirs but also British livestock traders acting for slaughter houses and farmers in the north of England and Scotland.Dublin Cattle Market c. 1900 (National Library of Ireland, NLI Ref: L_ROY_08909) But cattle were the primary business and the market in Prussia Street was the final sales point for close to 90 per cent of stock exported each year. Houses were built to house the workers in the market and the ancillary businesses. Thom’s Directories show the number of small hotels and guesthouses that accumulated along the streets leading away from the cattle market to accommodate the dealers and buyers acting for sales masters coming from outside the city. It also shows that in the early decades of the century nearly every second building along Prussia Street had offices for cattle agents and others associated with the meat trade.From the cattle market, the livestock were shifted by local drovers into lairages or yards around Prussia Street, before being finally moved into the market on the morning of the sale. After being sold, the livestock were driven along the streets to the nearby abattoirs or down the quays to the docks at North Wall to be exported to England or the continent. Cattle driven through northside Dublin streets (Liam Clare, “The Dublin Cattle Market” in Dublin Historical Record Vol. 55, No. 2 (Autumn, 2002) https://www.jstor.org/)The prominence of the Dublin Cattle Market began to fade in terms of the meat business in Ireland and by the 1970s it had ceased operations. The Drumalee estate was then built on the site and these days, the thriving growth industry in the area is student apartments and expensive coffee shops, as the DIT Campus at Grangegorman has become established. Dublin Central Historian in Residence Dr. Mary Muldowney will give a talk on Disappearing Workplaces in the Central Library, ILAC Centre on Tuesday, 23rd April from 1-2 pm. 

This photograph (larger image below) from the Dublin City Library and Archive shows groups of women with their babies and young children outside St Monica’s Babies Club in St. Augustine Street, close to John’s Lane Church in the heart of Dublin’s Liberties.  This club, - one of about 170 set up throughout Ireland - opened in 1909 and aimed to educate mothers in the overall care of their infants by holding classes and appropriate lecture series on the premises.(St Monica's Baby Club)St. Monica’s Babies Club had been established by the Women’s National Health Association (WHNA).  This group was set up in Ireland in 1907 as part of the Irish International Exhibition, by Lady Aberdeen, wife of the Lord-Lieutenant who had a life-long interest in social and healthcare issues.  The WNHA focused on finding ways to eradicate tuberculosis within the general population, - a primary cause of early deaths in the adult population - by coordinating pasteurised milk distribution, and opening a range of healthcare centres with the support of government.  It also tried to address the social conditions and issues surrounding the extremely high infant mortality rates that existed in Ireland at the time.Catherine Scuffil, Historian in Residence, Dublin South Central.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research.

This week I have had the great pleasure of visiting Massachusetts and presenting a paper at the annual national meeting of the American Conference for Irish Studies held in Boston. It was my second time attending such a gathering, having also presented a paper on Dublin poet Maeve Cavanagh MacDowell two years ago, when ACIS met in Kansas City, Missouri. This time around I spoke about the life of Dora Maguire, another woman who happened to be profiled in R. M. Fox’s 1935 book of essays Rebel Irishwomen.Whereas the likes of Maud Gonne and Countess Markievicz became legends in their own lifetimes, Dora Maguire (1889-1931) was perhaps the most obscure of Fox’s dozen ‘Rebel Irishwomen’. A friend of the author, she died aged forty-one in February 1931 after years of ill-health. During my paper I spoke about Maguire’s upbringing in England and the north of Ireland, time spent in Blackburn and London during the First World War (when she worked as a nurse and developed suppressed diphtheria and tuberculosis), decision to move to Ireland around the time of the War of Independence, and employment at St. Ultan’s Children’s Hospital in Ranelagh during the 1920s.I then focused at length on her arrest in 1925 over an incident at the Princess Cinema in Rathmines. Evolving into an ardent republican during her adulthood, Maguire was indignant at the time about the screening across Dublin of short films concerning the Prince of Wales’ recent dominion tour of South Africa. Entering the “Prinner” – as the Princess Cinema was known to locals – on 6th August 1925 with an inkpot hidden on her person, Maguire stood up and hurled her makeshift missile over the heads of the theatre orchestra as soon as the offending picture was shown, causing considerable damage to the screen and generating newspaper headlines.Surviving foyer plaque from the Princess Cinema, the scene of Dora Maguire's arrest in August 1925. Known locally as "The Prinner", the cinema closed its doors in 1960 and was demolished in 1982 (Photograph courtesy of Carol Dunne, Dublin City Libraries).This incident is the focus of The Spirit of Dora Maguire, an historical comic strip by Dublin artist Aidan J Collins. Some artwork from this creation, which came about in 2018 following a talk I gave in Dublin on Maguire’s life the previous year, can be seen below:Blueprint still from an animated video by Aidan J Collins. This is based on one of the panels from his 2018 historical comic strip The Spirit of Dora Maguire (Courtesy of Aidan J Collins).On Monday 20th May 2019 I will be teaming up with Maeve Casserly (Historian in Residence, South East Area) for a joint talk about Dora Maguire and St. Ultan’s Children’s Hospital at Rathmines Public Library. The event starts at 6:30pm and all are welcome to attend.Dr. James Curry, Historian in Residence, North West Area.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research. 

The Soloheadbeg Ambush in January 1919 did not lead to a wide scale conflict immediately. For much of 1919, the Irish Volunteers embarked on a mainly defensive campaign, primarily searching for arms. As a result, some skirmishes broke out leading to some deaths.Isolated deaths of RIC men occurred in Limerick, Clare, Mayo and Tipperary. The shortage of arms was the main problem posed. Gun shops and private homes were raided for arms. In March 1919, all such premises were raided in the North-East of Dublin city.The most successful arms raid throughout the whole war occurred at Collinstown Aerodrome, present day site of Dublin Airport, on 20th March 1919. As the Aerodrome was heavily guarded by the British Military, according to Patrick Houlihan, a Volunteer and employee at the Aerodrome, the local Volunteers had to submit plans to the Irish Volunteers General Headquarters (GHQ) for approval. Once it was granted, two guard dogs at the Aerodrome were poisoned the afternoon before the raid, 19th March, calculated to kill them some hours later, to prevent an alarm being raised. That night the raiding party, numbering about 25, were dressed in khaki and masks, supplied by GHQ. Some volunteers engaged in disarming and tying up the sentries, 20 in number, whilst others collected all the arms and ammunition they could. The haul was transported away in two cars. To prevent a chase, over 20 cars in the military garage were demolished with sledgehammers. Acting in almost total silence to capture the sentries and sticking clearly to their well thought out plans, was key to the raid’s success.75 rifles and 5,000 rounds of ammunition were secured. There were no casualties nor prisoners taken. It was the largest loss of weapons by the British army from a single operation throughout the whole conflict. Many of the arms captured that day ended up in the IRA arms dump at the Naul in North Dublin. The British decided to punish the locals, a trend they would continue throughout the war, a foolish move which brought more and more support for the Volunteers. All 800 workers were sacked on the Collinstown site and replaced by military personnel. It was an act of collective punishment, recognised and resented as such. Cormac Moore, Historian in Residence, Dublin City Library and Archive.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research.

Last month I was in the King’s Inns building for the launch of a remarkable short film. Trish McAdams directed and wrote Confinement for the Grangegorman Development Agency, who asked her to create a public art project. The film’s 30-minute running time evokes three hundred years of the history of the King’s Inns, Henrietta Street and the Grangegorman Asylum. The story is told through the imagined voice of Tony Rudenko, an artist who lived in Henrietta Street until his death in 2014, who was also a friend of the director.(Poster for Dublin International Film Festival showing of Confinement)The film opens with animated maps of the Henrietta Street area in the early 18th century.  It tells how the beautiful houses in the street were built originally for the wealthy, eventually accommodating the poor, and recently seeing many of them currently undergoing restoration to former glory. This is a history well told by the Tenement Museum at 14 Henrietta Street.The King’s Inns was built with its back to Henrietta Street and its magnificent frontage facing in the direction of Grangegorman, which was at various times since the late 18th century the site of a workhouse, a prison and an asylum for the mentally ill.(The King’s Inns building seen from Constitution Hill)By the early 19th century, the workhouse and prison had been merged into the hospital, which was added to over the years until its peak in the early 20th century, when it had over 2,000 patients. During the cholera epidemic of 1832, the hospital was used to isolate patients and was referred to as the Dublin Cholera Hospital for the duration of the epidemic.(Surviving gate to the asylum buildings at Grangegorman)For the film, McAdams animated her own wonderful drawings that are based on actual photographs of the inmates of the asylum, contained in the inmate records.  The site is now part of the huge development in the Grangegorman area, which hosts the DIT campus of the new Technological University Dublin. Dr. Mary Muldowney, Historian in Residence, Dublin City Library and Archive.Dublin City Council Historians in Residence are available to meet groups and schools, give talks, walks etc, run history book clubs and advise on historical research.