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Dairy Expansion
Read Article: Dairy ExpansionCounty Limerick’s dairy economy was changing rapidly around 1900 as the Maypole Dairy Company strengthened the connection between rural milk production and large-scale commercial retailing. At Knocklong, where the company had built a creamery during the mid-1890s, farmers delivered milk for mechanical separation and butter-making rather than producing every finished article within their own homes.…
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Route Endorsed
Read Article: Route EndorsedLimerick County Council looked towards the Irish Sea in 1900 when it supported proposals for the developing railway and steamship connection between Rosslare in County Wexford and Fishguard in Wales. The surviving account mistakenly calls the Irish port “Roeselare,” the name of a Belgian city, but the intended destination was Rosslare. Although both harbours lay…
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Militia Mobilised
Read Article: Militia MobilisedThe South African War entered everyday life in Limerick during 1900 when the Royal Limerick County Militia was embodied for extended military service. Since the army reforms of 1881, the historic county force had formed the 5th Battalion of the Royal Munster Fusiliers and maintained its local headquarters at Strand Barracks. Its mobilisation connected families…
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Commons Uproar
Read Article: Commons UproarThe House of Commons descended into uproar on 2 February 1900 after Colonel Edward Saunderson invoked remarks attributed to John Daly, the Mayor of Limerick, during a fierce attack upon Irish Nationalists. Speaking in a debate on the Government’s conduct of the South African War, the North Armagh Unionist argued that a ministry dependent upon…
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Fatal Confusion
Read Article: Fatal ConfusionCappamore and the surrounding district lost a medical practitioner in early February 1900 when Dr Charles Philip Tennant died after accidentally swallowing carbolic acid during an evening visit to a family at Rath. Tennant served patients across the Cappamore and Murroe area, where a country doctor might travel considerable distances to reach sick people in…
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Mortgage Fetter
Read Article: Mortgage FetterA mortgage dispute involving County Limerick auctioneer John Browne and Patrick Ryan, a farmer of Ryaninch in County Tipperary, reached the Irish courts in 1900 after Browne sought £62 10s in commission from the sale of Ryan’s property. What appeared to be an ordinary contractual claim raised a larger question about the limits placed upon…
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Stud Dispersal
Read Article: Stud DispersalThe Irish racing world received unexpected news in January 1900 when reports announced that Lord Dunraven intended to break up his stud farm at Adare and offer a number of its thoroughbreds by public auction in Limerick the following month. The decision immediately concerned County Limerick, where the Dunraven estate had long influenced employment, social…
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Materials Wanted
Read Article: Materials WantedLong before recycling became a familiar part of everyday life, the English and Continental Company invited Limerick residents to recognise the commercial value hidden in unwanted materials. Operating from 63 and 64 Mungret Street in 1900, the firm advertised for discarded goods that could be purchased, sorted and returned to productive use. Its premises stood…
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Excursion Riot
Read Article: Excursion RiotA railway excursion organised by Cleeve’s Creamery in Tipperary town drew the Limerick-based company into public controversy on Saturday, 7 April 1900. The creamery, then the town’s largest employer, arranged a special train to Dublin for its mainly female workforce during Queen Victoria’s final visit to Ireland. Each employee received a rosette in red, white…
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Election Violence
Read Article: Election ViolenceThe South Mayo by-election of February 1900 drew Limerick directly into a bitter struggle over the direction of Irish nationalism. John Daly, the veteran Fenian then serving as Mayor of Limerick, travelled to County Mayo to support Major John MacBride, whose candidature was promoted while he fought beside the Boers in South Africa. Daly’s intervention…
