Tag Archives: Dublin

The Most Disturbing Speech in Irish Politics

I moved to Ireland in 1997 and have not regretted it one day. I love the place and the people. Does that mean it is a perfect place? Of course not. I would be lying if I said there is no antisemitism in Ireland, because there is. But compared to most other European countries, it is not worse, in fact, it is probably less here in Ireland then elsewhere in Europe.

However, there have been politicians, and there are still a few, who were blatantly antisemitic. None worse though than Oliver J Flanagan.

In May 1943, as war raged across Europe and Nazi atrocities were coming to public attention, he stood as a candidate in Laois-Offaly, promising to rid Ireland of the Jewish stranglehold. This is a part of his maiden speech in the Dail (the Irish Parliament).

“I should like to co-operate with the Government or with any Party that I believed was going to introduce legislation in the best interests of the Irish nation. I should like very much to be in a position to support any measure brought forward in this House with that object, but I am very sorry that I cannot associate myself with this Bill or with anything relating to the public safety measures introduced by the Cumann na nGaedheal government or by the present Fianna Fáil government because I have seen that most of these Emergency Acts were always directed against Republicanism. How is it that we do not see any of these acts directed against the Jews, who crucified Our Saviour nineteen-hundred years ago and who crucifying us every day in the week? How is it that we do not see them directed against the Masonic Order? How is it that the I.R.A. is considered an illegal organisation while the Masonic Order is not considered an illegal organisation? You do not hear one word in these acts against the banks who are robbing the people, right, left and centre. I told the electors in Leix-Offaly that the banks were robbers. The police were listening to me. Does the Minister for Justice think that, if the banks were not robbers, the police would have allowed me to make that statement in public without attempting to make me prove it? This government is introducing an Emergency Powers Bill now to prevent the suffering masses of the Irish people from ridding themselves or the poverty, emigration, debt, seizures and a thousand and one other national ills which I could continue to enumerate in this House until this day—week, but I do not propose to waste your precious time doing so.

All that I have to say is that my heart goes out to the men who are on hunger strike today. I made a request to the Minister the other night to release these prisoners. I am sorry I made such a request. I had a right to demand it on behalf of the people who sent me here as a republican. I am demanding it now. Seán Mac Cumhaill sent me a telegram last night asking me to deny a certain statement made by the Minister. Perhaps you, Sir, would tell me if it would be in order to read this telegram to the Minister since he did not think it worthwhile.

I want to ask that the Emergency Powers Order, which prevents the division of land from taking place, be immediately lifted. The Minister for Lands wrote me some time ago to say that there was not sufficient staff in the Land Commission to deal with the division of land. How is it that there are thousands of well-educated young men being forced to take the emigrant ship, not from Galway Bay or Cobh this time to take them to the greater Ireland beyond the Atlantic, but to take them from Dun Laoghaire and Rosslare to the land beyond the Irish Sea, the land of our traditional enemy, to help England in her war effort against Germany? There is one thing that Germany did, and that was to route the Jews out of their country. Until we route the Jews out of this country it does not matter a hair’s breadth what orders you make. Where the bees are, there is the honey, and where the Jews are, there is the money. I do not propose to detain the House further. I propose to vote against such Orders and actions, and I am doing so on Christian principles. The Minister for Justice could not give me a straight answer a few moments ago. I am sorry that I interrupted him in the heat of the discussion. Of course, one needs great patience to listen to what is going on. I know very well that even the clergy in the Minister’s constituency are up against him.

Father Keane, the parish priest of Athleague, is up against him, and when the clergy are up against him. surely it will be hard for any of us to support him. I thank the Chair for allowing me to make my statement.”

source
https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/debates/debate/dail/1943-07-09/8/

Stolpersteine-Holocaust history on your doorstep.

A Stolpersteinplural Stolpersteine; literally means “stumbling stone”, metaphorically a “stumbling stone” is a sett-size, ten-centimetre (3.9 in) concrete cube bearing a brass plate inscribed with the name and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination or persecution..

Created by the artist Gunter Demnig in 1992, Stolpersteine are brass-topped cobblestones embedded in the pavement outside a home or building of significance pertaining to a Holocaust victim.

There are already over 91,000 stolpersteine in over 700 locations. Many cities and villages across Europe, not only in Germany, have expressed an interest in the project. Stones have already been laid in many places in Austria, Hungary, the Netherlands, Belgium, in the Czech Republic, in Poland (seven in Wrocław, one in Słubice), in Ukraine (Pereiaslav), in Italy (Rome) and Norway (Oslo). Today the first stolpersteine will be placed in Dublin, Ireland.

The first Irish stumbling stones were embedded at St Catherine’s National School in south Dublin by their creator, German artist Gunter Demnig.

Founding trustee of the Holocaust Education Trust Ireland, Lynn Jackson, explained that in the early 20th century Ireland had a Jewish population of around 5,000 people and the area around the South Circular Road and Portobello in Dublin was once known as “Little Jerusalem” as there was a vibrant Jewish community there.

Speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, she said the stones will commemorate six Irish victims of the Holocaust: Ettie Steinberg Gluck, her husband Wojteck Gluck, and their baby son Leon, along with Isaac Shishi, Ephraim Saks and his sister, Jeanne (Lena) Saks.

I just want to highlight the youngest of the group.

Leon was born on the 28 March 1939,in Paris. Unfortunately, the threat of violence spread throughout France in 1940 and this put them in danger. From 1940 to 1942 the small family was in hiding, moving from place to place, rarely staying still for more than two nights at a time.

Back in Dublin, the Steinbergs, Leon’s grandparents, worked desperately to save their daughter Ettie by getting her and her family back to Ireland. Pleas were sent to the Vatican and the Red Cross for information, but to no avail. They eventually managed to secure three visas from the British Home Office in Belfast and sent them to Toulouse, where the family was in hiding. However, they arrived one day too late for Ettie, Vogtjeck and little Leon. The Glucks had been caught in a round-up of Jews on the 2 September 1942 and were put on a train to Auschwitz.

sources

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/146364294/leon-gluck

https://www.rte.ie/news/regional/2022/0601/1302393-stumbling-stones/

Unveiling of six Stolpersteine in Dublin

The Charley Project-My interview with Meaghan Good.

The Charley Project profiles over 14,000 “cold case” missing people mainly from the United States. It does not actively investigate cases; it is merely a publicity vehicle for missing people who are often neglected by the press and forgotten all too soon. A person must have been missing for at least one year to be listed; see the FAQ for additional information on the site, its goals, and its founder/administrator. This is my interview with Meaghan Good, founder of the Charley Project.

One of the cases we talk about is of Annie McCarrick, 26, of Long Island, New York. She went missing on 26 March 1993. She was living in Sandymount, Co. Dublin. The last confirmed sighting of her was at a post office in Enniskerry, Co. Wicklow. However, there was an unconfirmed sighting of her outside Johnnie Fox’s Pub in Glencullen, Co. Dublin. This sighting was by a doorman of the pub who said she was with an unknown man. They left the lounge of Johnny Fox’s Pub and entered the cabaret room where the unknown man paid for both of them to enter. McCarrick had invited her friend, Hilary Brady and his girlfriend, Rita Fortune to dinner at her apartment the next day. When McCarrick was not there, they contacted her parents in New York and she was reported missing. McCarrick’s parents, John and Nancy McCarrick arrived in Ireland shortly after their daughter was reported missing, but left after a six-month long unsuccessful search for McCarrick.

source

Landing

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

$2.00

Chaim Herzog-Irishman and President of Israel.

On may 26,1992,Israel’s President Chaim Herzog unveiled a rock from Jerusalem, at Auschwitz. The rock serves as a permanent memorial to the 1.65 million Jews who were murdered there.

Visibly anguished and tearful, President Herzog said the following words during the unveiling.

“In this dread place, I stand here brokenhearted. This ground on which we stand was drenched in the blood of the pure and holy. In this place, a fearful fire consumed all that was generously supplied by the Nazi annihilation machine. I stand here representing the state that came into being for us, the Jewish people, three years after the conclusion of the ineffable crime,”

The slab of rock from Jerusalem, inlaid with a memorial plaque, was intended for Auschwitz. But it took the Israeli president six months before his visit to convince the Polish authorities to place it at the site. The Poles agreed only after the personal intervention of President Lech Walesa.

Chaim Herzog was born in Belfast on September 17,1918. The family moved to Dublin when his father became chief rabbi of Ireland. Isaac Herzog was an ardent Zionist and Irish nationalist. Chaim was bar mitzvahed in Adelaide Road synagogue, and received his secular education at Wesley College. Proficient in cricket, rugby and boxing, he was Irish youth bantamweight champion.

Sent by his parents in 1935 to attend a Talmudic academy in Jerusalem, he joined the Haganah, the underground Jewish paramilitary force. He studied law at London University and was called to the bar in November 1942. Enlisting in the British army, after lengthy training he was posted in 1944 to Normandy as an intelligence officer.

Herzog participated in the liberation of several Nazi concentration camps as well as identifying a captured German soldier as Heinrich Himmler. After the German surrender, he was assigned to identify and interrogate top Nazi officials.

He left the British Army in 1947 with the rank of Major.

In Israel he directed Israel’s Labour Party’s public relations office in the 1981 general election, and won election to a Knesset seat. As Labour’s 1983 presidential candidate he attracted cross-party support, and was elected as the sixth president of Israel. After the deadlocked 1984 general election he played a major role in the formation of the “national unity” government.

On a 1985 state visit to Ireland he inaugurated the Irish Jewish Museum on Walworth Road in Dublin, and in 1987 became the first Israeli head of state to visit Germany. He was re-elected unopposed to a second five-year term in 1988.

He died on April,17 1997. His son Isaac Herzog is the current President of Israel.

sources

Herzog Uneveils Memorial Stone in Emotional Visit to Auschwitz

Click to access 1992-05-27_101.pdf

https://www.ushmm.org/information/about-the-museum/mission-and-history/herzog

https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/abroad/the-belfast-man-who-became-president-of-israel-1.3433703

https://www.rte.ie/news/world/2021/0602/1225566-isaac-herzog/

https://www.tracesofwar.com/sights/90645/Memorial-Stone-Chaim-Herzog.htm

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

$2.00

Happy Birthday Gary Moore

Robert William Gary Moore was born in Belfast on 4 April 1952,the son of Winnie, a housewife, and Robert Moore, a promoter who ran the Queen’s Hall ballroom in Hollywood. He grew up near Belfast’s Stormont Estate with four siblings.

He credited his father for getting him started in music. When Moore was six years old, his father invited him onstage to sing “Sugartime” with a showband at an event he had organised, which first sparked his interest in music. His father bought him his first guitar, a second-hand Framus acoustic, when Moore was 10 years old. Though left-handed, he learned to play the instrument right-handed. Not long after, he formed his first band, The Beat Boys, who mainly performed Beatles songs. He later joined Platform Three and The Method, amongst others. Around this time, he befriended guitarist Rory Gallagher, who often performed at the same venues as him. He left Belfast for Dublin in 1968 just as The Troubles were starting in Northern Ireland. A year later, his parents separated.

After moving to Dublin, Moore joined Irish blues rock band Skid Row. At the time, the group were fronted by vocalist Phil Lynott. He and Moore soon became friends, and they shared a bedsit in Ballsbridge.

After leaving Skid Row, Phil Lynott formed the hard rock group Thin Lizzy. After the departure of guitarist Eric Bell, Moore was recruited to help finish the band’s ongoing tour in early 1974. During his time with the group, Moore recorded three songs with them, including “Still in Love with You”

After Thin Lizzy, Gary Moore had a successful solo career. He is one of my all time guitar heroes. Unfortunately I never got to see him live, he died on 6 February 2011. I did get to see his brother Cliff Moore perform live in our local pub. In 1994.

The Shamefvll ende of Bishop John Atherton.

Atherton

The Shamefvll ende of Bishop John Atherton. or in modern day English, the shameful end of Bishop John Atherton is probably a good example of”Be careful what you wish for because you may just get it”

John Atherton  was the Anglican Bishop of Waterford and Lismore in the Church of Ireland. But prior to that he was canon of St John’s, Dublin in 1630; chancellor of Killaloe in 1634; chancellor of Christ Church and rector of Killaban and Ballintubride in 1635. In 1636, under the patronage of Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Atherton was appointed as Lord Bishop of Waterford and Lismore.

Although a Buggery Act had already been in place in England since 1533, it was found in 1631, that this law did not apply to Ireland. The buggery act was basically a Sodomy Law.

A sodomy law defines certain sexual acts as crimes. It is fairly vague in its definition of what sexual acts meant by the term sodomy and are rarely spelled out in the law, but were  generally  understood by courts to include any sexual act deemed to be unnatural or immoral. Sodomy typically includes anal sex, oral sex, and bestiality. The Sodomy laws were really targeted against Homosexuals and not so much against Heterosexuals.

Atherton was outraged that this act did not apply in Ireland and pushed for the enactment of “An Act for the Punishment for the Vice Of Buggery” in 1634.

On November 11 1634 the Irish House of Commons passed the act.

house of

In 1640 Atherton  accused of buggery with his steward , John Childe. The Bishop’s fellow clerics desperately tried everything  to prevent the judgement being carried out , in order to avoid disgrace to the reformed religion of Ireland. But the verdict of guilty was greeted  by cheers in court, and Atherton  was nearly lynched  on his way from court  to the jail in Cork.

Atherton was executed by hanging in Stephen’s Green, Dublin, after reading the morning service for his fellow cellmates. Allegedly, he confessed about the ‘crime’ to the priest ministering him immediately before his execution, even though he had proclaimed he was  innocence before that and maintained that claim during the execution.

The irony of it was that he was the first to be executed for buggery in Ireland under the law he pushed so hard to enact.

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

$2.00

Hitler’s Irish sister in law.

brdie

Bridget Dowling born on July 3, 1891 in Dublin. She grew up at Flemings Place, near Mespil Road.  She was still in her teens when she met Adolf Hitler’s half brother Alois Hitler, Jr. at the Dublin Horse Show in the RDS in 1909.

2019-03-12

Alois had pretended to be a wealthy hotelier who was touring Europe, but in fact he was a kitchen porter working in the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin, which he later admitted to. He had left Austria  for, Dublin, Ireland, in 1896, aged 14, because of the  increasingly violent arguments with his father and the strained relationship with his stepmother Klara.Adolf’s mother.

Bridget fell for Alois’s charms and after a number of months courting in Dublin,the couple eloped to London in 1910 . mainly due to her family’s disapproval of her relationship with Alois, ,  They married on 3 June 1910 and later settled in Toxteth, Liverpool. On the 12th of March 1911, the couple had a baby boy called William Patrick,or Paddy.

The Census of England and Wales from 1911 shows that all three were  residing in Liverpool at 102 Upper Stanhope Street. Alois is listed as “Anton,” and wrote down the German word “sohn” (son) in reference to Patrick William.Bridget’s name is crossed out on the form as Cissy Fowling, instead, she appears as “Cissie Hitler”

cissy

In 1914 Alois left his wife and son and went to Germany. After WWI he pretended he had died. He had remarried although he was still married to Bridget, thus committing bigamy and he was charged with bigamy by the German authorities in 1924, but escaped conviction because Bridget intervened and divorced him even though she was a devout Roman Catholic.

Bridget raised her son as a lone parent  She moved to Highgate, North London, and took in lodgers to pay the bills.

Her son had moved to Germany in the 1930s and tried to capitalize on the Hitler name, he even got help from his uncle Adolf who got him a job in a bank. But William “Paddy” Hitler soon became an embarrassment for Adolf Hitler, especially after William threatened to tell the press that Hitler’s alleged paternal grandfather was actually a Jewish merchant. William moved back to the UK and immigrated to the US in 1939, where he eventually joined the US Navy in 1944.

us navy

In 1939, Bridget joined her son on a tour of the United States where he was invited to lecture on his infamous uncle. She decided to stay with her son in the USA Bridget settled in Long Island, New York, changing her name to Stuart-Houston, as did her son.

in 1947 William married  the German born Phyllis Jean-Jacques,The couple had four sons: Alexander Adolf (born. 1949), Louis (born. 1951), Howard Ronald (born died 1957–1989), and Brian William (born. 1965).

Howard Ronald Stuart-Houston, was a Special Agent with the Criminal Investigation Division of the Internal Revenue Service. He died in an a car crash on 14 September 1989,leaving behind no children.

Allegedly the other 3 sons of William made a  pact not to have children in order to end the Hitler bloodline, but Alexander denied there was an intentional pact to do so.

It is amazing to think that the Hitler bloodline is still continuing because of an Irish woman.

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

$2.00

 

 

Sources

Mail Online

Irish Central

Journal.ie

Independent.ie

 

 

 

 

Richard Hayes AKA Captain Gray-Ireland’s WWII code breaker.

Doertz

Although Ireland was neutral during WWII it didn’t stay completely out of the war.There were even some famous Irish war heroes like the Beamish brothers from Cork who became RAF flying aces.

beamish

On the other hand there were less conspicuous heroes, unlikely heroes even like Limerick man Richard Hayes.

He was born in Abbeyfeale, Co. Limerick and grew up in in Claremorris, Co. Mayo. He was educated in Clongowes Wood College in Klidare and in Trinity College in Dublin.

trinity

Richard Hayes was no soldier ,he was a librarian, in fact in he was the director of the National Library in Dublin. It is nor clear how Colonel Dan Bryan, head of Ireland’s G2 intelligence service identified Hayes as a code breaker, but he did, probably because Hayes,was highly regarded for his mathematical and linguistic expertise.

Great  Britain had complained of radio transmissions from a house in north Dublin owned by the German Embassy.ciphers had been found on another captured spy here. So with the support of Eamon de Valera, who always had a big interest in maths, Hayes was given an office and staff to go to work on the German codes.The coded messages were a substantial  threat to Irish national security and the wider war effort.

Hayes’s biggest  nemesis was Dr. Herman Görtz,

Gortz

In the summer of 1940, Görtz had parachuted into Ballivor, County Meath, Ireland uis goal was  to gather information. He moved in with former IRA leader Jim O’Donovan. His mission was to act as a liaison officer with the IRA to get their their assistance in case of potential German occupation of Britain. However, he quickly decided that the IRA was not reliable enough. On landing, he had lost the ‘Ufa’ transmitter he had parachuted with. Goertz, attired in a Luftwaffe uniform, then walked to Dublin. He was not arresested despite calling into a Garda barracks(police barracks) in Co Wicklow, asking for directions to Dublin.

Goertz’s  was eventually arrested in Dublin in November 1941, he was carrying a code later described by MI5 as “one of the best three or four in the war”.

The “Görtz Cipher” – which was a complex substitution of figures for letters had puzzled many of the greatest code-breaking minds at Bletchley Park, but the mild mannered librarian from Co.Limerick had cracked the code. The first of the Goertz messages to be successfully decoded was unlocked with the key ‘Cathleen Ni Houlihan’. Informed of the breakthrough by Hayes, Cecil Liddell of MI5 visited Dublin in 1943 and the Irish and British secret services continued to share intelligence information until the end of the war.

Another German spy in Ireland , Günther Schultz, had used an un-coded system of “microdots”, allowing tiny messages to be contained within the letter “O” in newspaper cuttings, which had baffled the American OSS. Hayes cracked that too , as well as enciphering system used by the  Sicherheitsdienst

The captured Germans only knew their quiet-spoken and polite interrogator as “Captain Gray”, only a few at the G2 secret service knew that Captain Gray was Richard Hayes.

Hayes

Hermann Goertz was released from jail in Athlone in August 1946, but was arrested again in 1947. Friday May 23, 1947 he arrived at the Aliens’ Office in Dublin Castle at 9.50 am and was told he was being deported to Germany . Goertz was afraid he would be handed to the Soviets ,he opted to take his own life.

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

$2.00

 

Sources

Irish Times

RTE Radio

Wikipedia

 

 

 

 

Hitler in Dublin, Ireland.

Alois

Many people think that Hitler committed suicide on April 30, 1945. This is not true, he actually died on May 20, 1956 in a traffic accident  aged 74 in Nidwalden, Switzerland.

But before I am getting a whole bunch of emails and comments saying how wrong I am ,please allow me to explain. I am talking about an A.Hitler, but not Adolf. The Hitler I am referring to is Adolf’s  half brother Alois.

Alois was born out of wedlock on January 13 1882. His Father Alois Hitler Sr, had an affair with Franziska Matzelsberger. Alois Sr was married at the time to Anna Glasl-Hörer but when she died 6 April 1883 he married Matzelsberger, Alois Jr then got the surname Hitler.

On August 10, 1884 at the age of 23. Alois’s mother died. Alois Sr married his housekeeper Klara Pölzl. Adolf Hitler was the son of Alois Sr and Klara.

KLARA

Alois Jr left home for, Dublin, Ireland, in 1896, aged 14, because of the  to increasingly violent arguments with his father and the strained relationship with his stepmother Klara.

After working as an apprentice waiter, he was arrested for theft and served a five-month sentence in 1900, followed by an eight-month sentence in 1902.

In 1909 he attended the Dublin Horse Show where he  met Bridget Dowling and her father William/ Alois claimed to be a wealthy hotelier touring Europe ,but in fact, he was a poor kitchen porter at Dublin’s Shelbourne Hotel.

Shelbourne

Alois dated Bridget at various Dublin locations and soon they were talking about marriage. On 3 June 1910, the couple left for London, where they would live  in Charing Cross Road for a while. Her father threatened to charge Alois with kidnapping but accepted the marriage after Bridget pleaded with him.

The couple settled at 102 Upper Stanhope Street, a boarding house in Toxteth, Liverpool and, in 1911 they had their only child, William Patrick Hitler.William Patrick would eventually join the US Navy, after failing to secure a place in the British Navy, where he took up the fight against his uncle’s army.

william

Alois abandoned his family. just before the start of WWI. He returned to Germany, remarried  in bigamy, and pretended after the war that he was dead. His lie was later discovered, and he was charged with bigamy by the German authorities in 1924. He escaped conviction due to Bridget’s intervention. Bridget raised her son alone with no support from her husband from whom she was eventually divorced.

 

 

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

$2.00

Cairbre aka Slats- A Real Dubliner

mgm

Born on March 20 1919, Cairbre is probably one of the most famous Dubliners to have ever lived, but yet hardly anyone knows him.

Maybe it’s because he was renamed to Slats?

As so many stars, Cairbre came from humble beginnings. There was no crib or hostel for him when he was born, there may have been a stable. He was born in Dublin Zoo.

When MGM opened their studio they needed a mascot, Not just any mascot but one with a bite and a roar. So they bought Cairbre the Lion from Dublin Zoo and shipped him over to Hollywood, where they changes his name to Slats.

This of course did not please Cairbre one bit, when he was asked to roar he just refused. Being from Dublin he was just not going to do as he was told especially not after they  changed  his  name.

MGM did stick with him though as the first logo from 1924 to 1928 as their now so famous MGM Lion, there have been 6 after him, but the Dubliner Caitbre aka Slats remains the first MGM Lion.

slats

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

$2.00