Nick Maxwell RECOLLECTIONS OF IRISH IMMIGRANTS IN THE ‘SLAVE NARRATIVES’ FROM THE NEW DEAL’S WORKS PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION (WPA) By Joe Regan On 2 November 1938 Mal Boyd sat on his porch in Pine Bluff, Arkansas; he recollected his father’s years as a slave in Texas: ‘Papa belonged to Bill Boyd. Papa said he was his father and … Read more
As a part of the Second New Deal, President Franklin D. Roosevelt approved the establishment of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), which employed some five million Americans between 1934 and 1943. The Federal Writers’ Project was established in 1935 as part of this to provide employment for teachers, writers, librarians and other unemployed white-collar workers. … Read more
ASKED TO NAME A FEMALE IRISH INTERNATIONAL SPORTS STAR, INDIVIDUALS SUCH AS THE ATHLETICS ALL-ROUNDER MARY PETERS, THE ATHLETE SONIA O’SULLIVAN, THE SWIMMER MICHELLE SMITH DE BRUIN OR THE BOXER KATIE TAYLOR WOULD SPRING TO MIND. FEW WOULD HAVE HEARD OF CECILIA BETHAM. By Brian Griffin For a number of years in the 1860s, Cecilia … Read more
Betham’s sporting prowess meant that she attained something akin to celebrity status. Not only was she fêted in the press but she also had a dance dedicated in her honour. There was even a faint echo of the modern sporting celebrity’s endorsement of sports goods and other commodities, when Betham wrote approvingly in the Archer’s … Read more
Cecilia Maria Eleanor Betham was born in January 1843 in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, the second child and only daughter of Molyneux Cecil John Betham and his wife Elizabeth, the only daughter of Sir Richard Ford, chief magistrate at Bow Street, London. In 1846 the Betham family was recorded as residing at 123 Park Street, Grosvenor … Read more