1958 in Ireland explained

Events from the year 1958 in Ireland.

Incumbents

• President: Seán T. O'Kelly
• Taoiseach: Éamon de Valera (FF)
• Tánaiste: Seán Lemass (FF)
• Minister for Finance: James Ryan (FF)
• Chief Justice: Conor Maguire
• Dáil: 16th
• Seanad: 9th

Events

• 6 February – Association football player, 22-year-old Billy Whelan, who played four times for the Irish national team, was among 21 people killed in the Munich air disaster involving English football team Manchester United.^[1]
• 18 March – Taoiseach Éamon de Valera said he would be willing to have talks with the government of Northern Ireland on wider economic co-operation.
• 20 March – Work began on the £80,000 restoration of the State Rooms at Dublin Castle.
• 10 May – The Independent Teachta Dála (TD), Jack Murphy, resigned in protest at the indifference of the main political parties to the plight of the unemployed.
• 12 May – The Ardmore Film Studios were opened by the Tánaiste, Seán Lemass.
• 22 May – The Minister for Education, Jack Lynch, told the Dáil that the ruling requiring women teachers to retire upon marriage was to be revoked.
• 25 July – £100 damages were awarded to a nine-year-old boy who was beaten by his teacher in a national school.
• 28 July – The Carlisle Monument, an eight-foot bronze statue in the Phoenix Park in Dublin, was blown up by an Irish republican bomb in the early hours.^[2]
• 8 August – The United States Embassy in Merrion Square, Dublin displayed plans for a new embassy.
• 8 September – Pan Am's Boeing 707 became the first jetliner to touch down on European soil at Shannon Airport.
• 1 October – Assets and management of the Great Northern Railway were divided between Irish: [[CIÉ|Córas Iompair Éireann]] and the Ulster Transport Authority.
• 29 October – The Government announced that the question of ending the proportional representation method of voting was to be put to the people in a referendum.
• 4 November – In the Vatican, Taoiseach Éamon de Valera attended the four-hour coronation of Pope John XXIII.
• 31 December – The Harcourt Street railway line in Dublin closed, having served Ranelagh, Milltown, Dundrum, Stillorgan, Foxrock, Carrickmines, Shankill and Bray.

Arts and literature

• 21 February – Desmond Guinness established the Irish Georgian Society for the promotion of Georgian architecture.
• 16 June – Brendan Behan's one-act Irish language play Irish: An Giall was first performed at the Damer Theatre in Dublin.^[3]
• 14 October – The English adaptation of Irish: An Giall, (The Hostage), was first performed by Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop at the Theatre Royal Stratford East, London.
• 28 October – Samuel Beckett's monologue Krapp's Last Tape was first performed by Patrick Magee at the Royal Court Theatre, London.
• Samuel Beckett's novel The Unnamable was published in English.
• Brendan Behan's autobiographical Borstal Boy was published in London.^[4] On 12 November it was banned in Ireland by the Censorship of Publications Board.
• Thomas Kinsella's poetry Another September was published in Dublin.^[5]
• Patrick MacDonogh's poetry One Landscape Still was published.
• John Montague's poetry Forms of Exile was published.
• The Oxford Book of Irish Verse, XVIIth century-XXth century, edited by Donagh MacDonagh and Lennox Robinson, was published.

Sports

Association football

• Football World Cup

(The Republic of Ireland did not qualify for the 1958 world cup)

Northern Ireland

• • Group stage
    • Northern Ireland 1–1 Czechoslovakia
    • Northern Ireland 1–1 Argentina
    • Northern Ireland 1–1 West Germany
      • Northern Ireland entered group playoff stage
    • Northern Ireland 2–1 Czechoslovakia AET
      • Northern Ireland qualified for the quarterfinal stage
    • Northern Ireland 0–4 France
      • Northern Ireland were knocked out at the quarterfinal stage

Births

• 1 January – Liam Fennelly, Kilkenny hurler
• 27 January – Synan Braddish, association football player
• 1 February – Seán Fleming, Fianna Fáil Teachta Dála (TD) for Laois–Offaly
• 2 February – Paddy Prendergast, Kilkenny hurler
• 16 February – Fintan O'Toole, journalist and drama critic
• 1 April – Stephen O'Rahilly, Irish-British physician and academic
• 19 April – Denis O'Brien, entrepreneur
• 30 April – James Hewitt, soldier and lover of Diana, Princess of Wales
• 6 May
  • Tommy Byrne, motor racing driver
  • Ivor Callely, Fianna Fáil politician, member of the 23rd Seanad, TD and Minister of State
• 8 May – Roddy Doyle, novelist, dramatist and screenwriter
• 11 May – Conor Hayes, Galway hurler and manager
• 2 June – John Buckley, Cork hurler
• 7 June – Aidan Fogarty, Offaly hurler
• 8 June
  • Louise Richardson, political scientist and university vice-chancellor
  • Niall Williams, writer
• 5 July – Veronica Guerin, journalist (murdered by drug dealers in 1996)
• 10 July – Fiona Shaw, actress
• 11 July – Martin Doherty, member of the Provisional Irish Republican Army
• 16 July – Michael Flatley, American dancer
• 10 September – Siobhan Fahey, musician
• 16 September – Maura O'Connell, singer
• 18 September – John Aldridge, Irish international association football player, in England of Irish descent
• 11 November – John Devine, association football player
• 21 November – Eddie O'Sullivan, head coach of the Ireland national rugby union team

Full date unknown

• Noel Hill, concertina player

• Glenn Meade, fiction writer

Deaths

• 1 January – Richard Hayes, doctor and Sinn Féin Member of Parliament (born 1878)
• 17 January – Michael Donohoe, Irish-born American politician, Democratic U.S. Representative from Pennsylvania (born 1864)
• 24 March – Seamus O'Sullivan, poet and editor (born 1879)
• 29 March – Jimmy Archer, Major League baseball player (born 1883)
• 24 April – Mabel McConnell Fitzgerald, republican, suffragette and socialist (born 1884]
• 6 July – John Esmonde, soldier, Fine Gael TD (born 1893)
• 28 July – Dick Walsh, Kilkenny hurler (born 1878)
• 13 August – James Lennon, member of 1st Dáil representing the County Carlow constituency
• 24 August – Paul Henry, artist (born 1876)
• 9 September – Máire Nic Shiubhlaigh, actress and Republican activist (born 1883)
• 15 October – Lennox Robinson, dramatist, poet and theatre director and producer (born 1886)
• 2 December – Alan McKibbin, businessman and Ulster Unionist Party MP (born 1892)
• 8 December – Peig Sayers (Máiréad Ó Gaoithín), Irish: [[seanachaí]] (traditional storyteller) (born 1873)
• 19 December – Arthur Gore, 6th Earl of Arran, Anglo-Irish peer and soldier (born 1868)
• 23 December – Dorothy Macardle, author and historian (born 1889)
• 24 December – Martin O'Brien, hurler (Thurles Sarsfields, Tipperary) (born 1885)

Notes and References

1. Web site: Manchester United Player Profiles.
2. https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/monument-men-an-irishman-s-diary-on-the-earl-of-carlisle-goldsmith-and-burke-1.3472987 Monument men – An Irishman’s Diary on the Earl of Carlisle, Goldsmith and Burke
3. Web site: Playography Ireland. Irish Theatre Institute. Dublin. 2015-04-08.
4. News: Bad Boys and Blarney: A Prison Masterpiece. The Herald. Glasgow. 1958-10-23. 2012-03-19.
5. Book: Rosenthal, M. L.. M. L. Rosenthal. The New Poets: American and British Poetry Since World War II. registration. New York. Oxford University Press. 1967. Selected Bibliography: Individual Volumes by Poets Discussed. 334–340.