The Liberties

Finally found a really nice family-friendly hotel, and it's actually properly family-friendly.

It's the Aloft Hotel in The Liberties there, and they're doing kids eat free all through, up until, I think, the 1st or 2nd of November, so all through midterm break.

So with one adult meal, you get one free kid's meal.

And they've got lots of offers on.

They did, Richard.

My parents both were born around The Liberties, and they both br- were brought up really poor.

They lived in tenement housing.

Uh, as you're probably aware, Dublin had a lot of slum l- cl- we- dwellings at the time, a lot of, um, a lot of tenement housing.

[upbeat music] Moncrieff on News Talk.

St. Augustine and St. John's Church in The Liberties in Dublin, known locally as John's Lane, experienced something of a rebirth last weekend.

After a gap of two decades, the church bells rang out again, thanks to a small group of volunteers.

But they could always do with some additional hands.

Michael, thanks a million for c- for coming in to talk with us today.

You're very welcome indeed.

Uh, that's, uh, Michael Ryan there, ringing master at John's Lane in the Liberties.

[upbeat music]

It seems like other than a small financial loss, the biggest impact was to the fish and the ecosystem.

But in Dublin, Ireland, a fire that raged in the Liberties District in 1875 took 13 lives, and none of them were due to the fire itself.

I'll tell you about that after a quick break.

If you love listening to this podcast every week and you want to show your support, that would mean a great deal to me.

The fire we're going to talk about now ended up with the death of 13 Irishmen.

Let's go back to 1875.

The inner city area known as the Liberties is the oldest part of Dublin, Ireland.

It's so old it can trace its origins all the way back to the Vikings.

And then in regards of me Da passing away, so came a coping me- mechanism in regards of grief.

And it came out then, back in the '90s was an epidemic of heroin in the Liberties.

I'm from the Liberties, the Dublin 8 area.

And I suppose I started experimenting with heroin.

I got addicted to heroin, and when the family found out, they brought me up to Lord Edward Street, and I met a man named Paffay and Paul Hatton, who became a very good friend of mine, and I went into Coolmore Residential Treatment Center.

I remember going to visit her little c- tiny cottage in the center of Dublin.

My granny is from w- the area of Dublin called The Liberties, which is, you know, like pretty much a spitting distance from Guinness's brewery.

She's salt of the earth Dublin.

Yeah.

Yes, so was I.

And I remember telling them, this makes me sound like 100 years old, I remember being offered a small house at the time of the Liberties for £3,000.

You know, I mean, that's like the price of a ticket to Australia now.

John? Yeah, you know, I was 18 when I left Ireland in 1986.