One hundred blogs is a reason to celebrate this September day in 2018. Yes 100 articles, 150,000 words, at least 400 pics – and the 100 stories have received 64,000 views and climbing every week. In 2018 alone we have received over 32,000 views. The list of all that has been published can be viewed on Offalyhistoryblog. We have lots more lined up. We welcome contributors, so if you have a history story you want to share contact us. The other big story is happening on Monday night with the launch of Offaly History 10.
OFFALY HERITAGE 10 (2018) Launch Monday 24 September
Launch by Danny Owens, Chairman of Offaly County Council,
at 8 p.m., Monday, 24 September 2018, Offaly History Centre, Bury Quay, Tullamore. Why not come along and pick up a signed copy. This issue will go out of print as has no. 2 so you have been warned to buy early. And it’s incredibly good value. How many word – 150,000 – so a lot of cogitation and a lot of ink.
This is the tenth volume of essays from the Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society on the history of County Offaly. With essays from historians, writers and academics this tenth journal makes a significant contribution to existing scholarship on the county and on Irish local history.
The volume also contains information on the Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society, the county heritage office and reviews of recent books of Offaly interest.
464 pages including 24-page Gallery of Events in 2016 and 2017 in full colour. Softback €15, hardback €20
150,000 words
18 articles
200 illustrations
Stitched for durability
Already published in this series are:
Offaly Heritage, Journal of the Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society,
volume 1 (2003)
volume 2 (2004) out of print
volume 3 (2005)
volume 4 (2006)
volume 5 (2007–08)
volume 6 (2011)
volume 7 (2013)
volume 8 (2015)
volume 9 (2016)
volume 10 (2018)
Offaly Heritage 1–10 (excluding no. 2) are available from Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society, Bury Quay, Tullamore, Ireland, info@offalyhistory.com 05793 2141 and local bookshops. The number of issues of each journal is small and forms a valuable and growing library for County Offaly. The online bibliography of Irish History known as www. Irishhistoryonline cites almost 700 articles and books directly about Offaly History and of these at least 150 are from this Offaly Heritage publication series first commenced in 2003.
What’s in Offaly Heritage 10
This new series is a wonderful repository to be referred back to time and again for detail on the history of the county. Offaly Heritage 10 is priced at €15 in paperback and €20 in hardback and is excellent value and priced to make it available to a wide market. Comparable publications are generally at least double this price. The new book will be formally launched on 24 September 2018 by the chairman of Offaly County Council, Danny Owens. The book is printed to a high standard and runs to 464 pages covering aspects of the story of the county from ideas about the monastic towns of the midlands to Seir Kieran and on to the difficult sixteenth century. Of the local families, that of Michael Molloy the Tullamore distiller is looked at as are the O’Briens and Sherlocks of Rahan. Sudden Child death in the mid-nineteenth century is analysed from inquest records. So too is the scattering from Crown lands in Kinnitty and the building and management of the workhouses in Offaly in the nineteenth century. When did people leave and did they receive assistance? Jennifer Harrison in her article on Fr Patrick Dunne talks of his career in Eastern Australia. How did we develop our courts during the revolutionary period? Did you know that we had a second prime minister born in Tullamore? Now when was that and who was he/she? There are stories of the O’Regans and of love and romance in Birr and a pioneering ‘Speedway’ ace, Fay Taylour, also from Birr. Memories of the rural electrification schemes in Offaly are recalled.
The spread of stories makes for an exciting read and a book to keep near you for returning to time and again. Our cover is of Croghan Hill to mark the purchase of the field at the summit of the hill by Offaly County Council. The council successfully defended its possible destruction in the mid-1970s.
Contents of Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 451, softback €15, hardback €20. Available online at http://www.offalyhistory.com
Thanks to our editor, editorial team, and contributors. All gave of their time for research and writing free of charge.
Thanks to Offaly County Council for its support for this publication.
Foreword, Helen Bracken, President Offaly History, ix.
Editor’s Note, Ciarán Reilly, x
Note on Contributors, xi
Lorcan Harney, ‘Early Medieval ‘Monastic Towns’ or ‘Forts and Fields’: Reflections on the urban character of Viking Age ecclesiastical settlements in light of the emerging archaeological evidence’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 2–20.
Muiris O’Sullivan, Michael ‘Bodhi’ Rogers, Denis Shine and Stephen Mandal, ‘Seir Kieran: Place, pilgrimage, and tradition in the monastic midlands’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 21–42.
Diarmuid Wheeler, ‘Good borderers or mean men advanced by service to great wealth? An analysis of two martial men in Elizabethan Offaly c. 1558–1582’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 43–52.
Michael Byrne, Michael Molloy, the founder of the Tullamore Distillery, 1777–1846, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 53–84.
Michael Byrne, ‘Rahan Parish, county Offaly: The O’Brien-Sherlock estate and the founding of the Presentation Convent’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 85–133.
Lisa Shortall, ‘Instances of death in infancy and childhood in the inquest casebooks of James Dillon, King’s County Coroner, 1836–1859’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 134–167.
Tim P. O’Neill, ‘The Crown lands at Kinnitty’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 168–184.
Brendan Ryan, ‘The Workhouses of Ireland and their manifestation in King’s County’,
Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 185–228.
Jennifer Harrison, ‘ “One of the most picturesque of the early priests”: Father Patrick Dunne in Eastern Australia’ in Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 229–238.
Steven Egan, ‘Just another cog in the Revolution machine? .An Examination of the Dáil Éireann Courts of County Offaly, 1920–1922’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 239–273.
John Gibbons, ‘Rural Electrification and the arrival of the “Electric” in county Offaly’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 274–286.
Joachim Fischer, ‘Georg Heinrich Bacmeister (1807–1890): A forgotten son of Tullamore’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 288–291.
Redmond O’Regan, ‘Denis Joseph O’Regan (1874–1941)’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 292–296.
Rosemary Raughter, ‘Letters to Parsonstown, 1898–1901’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 297–302.
Pádraig Turley, ‘Offaly’s Queen of Speedway: The career of Birr’s Fay Taylour’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 303–328.
Book Reviews, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 330–344.
Michael Byrne, ‘Writings on Offaly history, 2016’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 345–350.
Michael Byrne, ‘Writings on Offaly history, 2017’, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 351–355.
Launch of Offaly Heritage 9 and Tullamore in 1916, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 356–358.
Obituaries, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 360–381
Amanda Pedlow, Report from Offaly County Council Heritage Office for 2016 and 2017, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 382–393
Conferring of Honorary Life Membership on Fergal MacCabe, Celestine McNeill and Brendan Ryan, 7 December 2017, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 394–397.
Annual report on Offaly History for 2016, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 398–408.
Annual report on Offaly History for 2017, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 409–426.
List of Members of Offaly History, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 427–428.
Gallery of photographs of events 2016 and 2017, Offaly Heritage 10 (2018), pp 429–451.
For further information see our www. Offalyhistory.com, to buy online and/ or email us at info/@offalyhistory.com,
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