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"Our own story and its telling is as vital to our sense of wellbeing as a good meal and a warm bed."
Welcome to Irish Life and Lore - the site dedicated to the Oral History of the Counties
of Kerry, Cork, Limerick, Clare, Galway, Tipperary, Laois, Offaly, Kilkenny, Mayo, Wexford, Kildare, Carlow, North and South Dublin, Meath and Donegal. An Oral History Collection was also compiled in the Falkland Islands in November 2009.

Irish Life and Lore - Maurice and Jane O'KeeffeAn archive of over 1,800 recordings have been compiled by Maurice and Jane O`Keeffe of Tralee, Co. Kerry, for their Irish Life and Lore Series. As they are commissioned by the Local Authorities, or other bodies in each county, the O`Keeffes compile an oral history audio Collection of approximately 50 hours or recorded material, with accompanying catalogue. Each recording is produced on an individual CD, and the audio Collection is also produced in digitised format: audio in 128kbps mp3 sound and the catalogue in PDF.

Every topic under the Irish sun is included in the recordings - local and national history, family histories, folklore, music, local customs, traditions and beliefs, teaching and schooling, fishing and farming traditions, boglands and turf, rural electrification and the growth and development of rural villages and towns, the Economic War and the Emergency Period, the 1916 Rising, The War of Independence and The Civil War.



  • Irish Life and Lore Books
    A new book, featuring ten of the people recorded for the three Cork Collections, entitled "Chronicles of Cork - An Oral Record" edited by Jane O'Keeffe came off the presses on the longest day of the year - 21st June 2010. The book is available in bookshops in Cork city and county and will be in shops countrywide from Monday, 26th July at a price of €15. more »

    The new Irish Life and Lore Master Catalogue, in two volumes with index, is now available.

    Liberties Press in Dublin recently published "Written in Stone" by former Kilmainham Jail archivist, Niamh O'Sullivan. The book relates to the grafitti on the cell walls of the Jail, written by Republican prisoners during the War of Independence and Civil War.more »

  • New Digitised Format
    A Master Catalogue in two Volumes with Index, has been compiled in hard copy, which includes information on all 1,800 recordings compiled in the Irish Life and Lore Series since 1994. Digitised versions of all of the recording and catalogues have also been produced - the recordings are in 128kbps mp3 audio format and the catalogues are in pdf format.
    For more information on this new digitised format, please contact us or view the Master Catalogue.
  • The Old Kerry Journal - Second Edition
    The Second Edition of the Old Kerry Journal has been published by Russell McMorran and Maurice O'Keeffe.more »

 

Irish Life and Lore CollectionsMost of the recordings in the Irish Life and Lore archive have been divided into Collections according to the counties in which they were compiled. Each Collection is comprised of approximately 50 hours of recordings accompanied by an illustrated catalogue giving a brief synopsis of each recording. The Collections are on DVD with mp3 sound and the catalogues in pdf format and they are now available at a cost of EU 150 each.
Contact us to purchase one of the collections.

Some special Collections have also been compiled: Cork Institute of Technology Collection, 1916 Collection, Bord na Móna Collection and Falkland Islands Collection.

The most recent Collections completed are:
 

 

 

 

 

 



View all thirty two Irish Life and Lore Collections »

 

Featured Wexford Opera CD
Nicky Cleary
From a very young age Nicky Cleary was a great collector of 78 rpm records, which were sold locally by M. J. Collins’s record shop. Another opera buff was Séamus O’Dwyer, who would encourage and advise Nicky, and give him direction as to the right choice of record. In 1954, Nicky started work backstage as a Festival volunteer. He speaks about the ...

Featured Cork City CD
John O'Shea No. 2
John O’Shea saw a need to amalgamate Cork City’s theatre companies to form one drama group, The Father Matthew Hall, which originated in the CCYMS, Castle Street, and which moved later to the Capuchin Hall, and finally to the Palace Theatre. John detailed the circumstances which led to the use of each venue, the logistics involved, and how the ...

Featured North Dublin CD
Bernadette Marks
Bernadette Marks is very much involved with the Historical Society and works on local history in the old Carnegie Library building. She describes her first employment in the Government Employment Agency in Middle Abbey Street, in the 1960s. In the 1980s, she was involved in a FAS project in Swords, which provided her with a rare opportunity to ...

Featured 1916 CD
Michael Finucane
During the summer of 2004 Michael Finucane was on holiday in Killarney with his family so I travelled there to meet him. Michael was born in Newtownsandes, later known as Moyvane, in May 1903. He was taught in National School by John B. Keane's father and Bryan McMahon's father - a literary education indeed. News of the Rising in Dublin on Easter ...

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