The Emergency: 'On This Day In Irish History'

Penultimate unsuccessful IRA plot to detonate 1000lbs of gelignite under Nelson Pillar in Dublin’s O’Connell Street – the plan fails when an IRA unit unfamiliar with the capital’s geography is pressed into service in pitch darkness at dead of night. The resultant explosion fells three trees in St Anne’s Park in leafy coastal Clontarf, killing eight pigeons and a woodcock. Naturalists condemn the outrage. In London, the Queen and her government feel cosy and safe, but for how long?

Ireland, still a fledgling member of the EEC is at the centre of a controversy based on confusion over what membership of the EEC means exactly. Following the dispatch of an information committee from Brussels, several Fianna Fail TDs are disabused of their belief that the EEC is a legal means of importing arms to be used against the British. The controversy dies down, but the information committee is eaten somewhere in Kerry by unknown political activists with big bushy eyebrows and caps.

Ireland threatens to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike against Russia for that country’s refusal to support the GAA’s ban on “foreign games” – while the threat causes much laughter, some of it fatal to older politburo members, Beria the head of the KGB observes that “These Irish may be a force to be reckoned with in the future”. Thus Beria becomes the first ever outright winner of the Moscow heats of So You Think You’re Funny, when his comments wipe out all of the older politburo members to survive the original threat.

Ireland is mapped from space for the first time by Brother Alouicious of Tullow, an early experimenter with psilocybin fungi – the resultant maps resemble an enormous big toe with pictures of oxen dotted on it, yet are accurate enough to lead travelers to their death within eighteen minutes of departure from any spot in the country.

Only ever Late Late Show hosted by Gay Byrne in 25 years not to contain a shot of a nun.

A lighter hearted moment during the Norman conquest of Ireland when Sir Bryan D’Styupidd, the unluckiest knight in the realm, beheads himself at the Battle of Baginbun. He is later made Earl of Leinster and eventually Lord Lieutenant, ruling for fifteen years before the scandal of his lack of head breaks and ruins his political career.

Freak high winds from Africa dump tonnes of Sahara Desert sand on the south and east of the country. A particularly strong gust deposits the North African city of Casablanca in Balbriggan in North County Dublin. The occurrence goes unnoticed by natives of both locales for three weeks, although many Casablancans do admit to feeling “Colder and somewhat ripped off”.

The tragic death of Mad Frank Brophy occurs in Wicklow. Frank is an avid supporter of both sides in the Civil War and this evening, coming home late after mass down a dark alleyway, he ambushes himself and guns himself brutally down. Frank is later buried in two neighbouring graveyards and his wives fight bitterly for years over the ten bob note discovered in the deceased man’s trousers.

The Athlone to Athlone Circular Railway Company launches its inaugural train service. The first train, the 10.01 from Athlone to Athlone via The Back Of Athlone carries local dignitaries on the twelve minute journey back to where they started. The railway’s owner, entrepreneur and discredited engineer Billy Gargle disappears with the fares and a sack of pension books that evening. Plans to extend the railway line to Athlone West come to nothing when four drivers loose their lives in successive attempts to ford the Shannon without a railway bridge.

Twelve banks in Dublin city centre are raided to the tune of a total of £4.1 million, by a man bearing an uncanny resemblance to the Fianna Fail leader Charles J. Haughey. Gardai eventually question the international statesman at his North Dublin hideout, only to be told “Go away. I am counting money and am entirely innocent of any crime”. Investigating officers cease with this line of inquiry, but do tell reporters that they are pleased to note that Mr Haughey ”Knew our fathers well”