Croker .... know your history 125 years on!

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Croker .... know your history 125 years on!

Croke Park is the nerve-centre of the GAA at this time of the year and many of us spend as much time as we can there.  The action on the field occupies most of our thoughts but we also spend much time marvelling at the wondrous structure itself - surely a sight to behold.  The name of the venue and of its three stands are part and parcel of daily vocabulary but how many GAA folk actually know much about where those names come from?

An Appendix to the bulky Official Guide (Part 1) provides a fascinating insight into the three men most closely associated with the GAA's foundation in 1884 viz. Maurice Davin, Michael Cusack and Archbishop Croke.  Our younger members in particular might like to read the letter from the Archbishop to Cusack where he explains his motivation for agreeing to become the first Patron of the GAA.  What a powerful, well-structured and passionate piece of writing - well worth a read!

We're unlikely to agree with all of the sentiments expressed and the force with which they were delivered, clearly reflective of a very different era.  Still, it would be interesting to consider how applicable that letter is to today's modern, cosmopolitan Irish society.  For example, if one substitutes "USA" for "England" would much of it hold true?  Now there's a thought for a college project!!

Here is an excerpt from the letter to get you started, maybe even animated?

"if we continue travelling for the next score years in the same direction that we have been going in for some time past, condemning the sports that were practised by our forefathers, effacing our national features as though we were ashamed of them, and putting on, with England's stuffs and broadcloths, her masher habits and such other effeminate follies as she may recommend, we had better at once, and publicly, abjure our nationality, clap hands for joy at sight of the Union Jack, and place ‘England's bloody red' exultantly above the green"

Click here to read the letter in full.  The full Official Guide is stored at our ‘Useful Documents' link.

Feel free to submit any comments you might have on this item, or on any other interesting Kilmacud or GAA topic, via the ‘Submit Content' link.

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