Oldtown’s First Electric Light
The year’s defining immediate experience was the severe winter of 1946–47. Meteorological records place the sustained cold spell in Ireland from late January until the middle of March; by the beginning of February ponds were frozen widely enough for skating, while temperatures at Dublin Airport remained below 5°C between 22 January and 7 March. Snowfall did not simply make roads picturesque or inconvenient. Persistent frost, easterly winds and repeated storms isolated places, delayed traffic and made already scarce supplies harder to move.