Sir, – My investigation into the old city and county clubs of Ireland, some 30 in number, has revealed that all was not as might be popularly supposed. In such clubs, Dissenters, Catholics, large farmers, professionals, “in trade”, Home Rulers and even Sinn Féiners combined at times outnumbered the landed gentry, military and Church of Ireland clergy sitting in the clubs’ leather armchairs in wood-panelled morning rooms.
Today, and much transformed, only seven of the clubs are known to survive: the Kildare Street and University Club, the Stephen’s Green Club, the Armagh County Club, the Dundalk Club, the Galway County Club, the Tyrone County Club and the Ulster Reform Club. Minute books and ledgers of the Clare County Club (Ennis), Cork County Club, the Fermanagh County Club and the Kerry Club (Tralee) have emerged.
But do any of your readers know the whereabouts of the papers of Dublin’s Daly’s Club, the Hibernian United Services Club, and the still-thriving Stephen’s Green Club, as well as Ireland’s only female response, the women’s Alexandra Club in Grafton Street and later Stephen’s Green?
DONAL McCRACKEN,
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Professor Emeritus,
Centre for Communication, Media & Society,
College of Humanities,
University of KwaZulu-Natal,
Durban,
South Africa.
