Around this day in 1945, newspapers began to report a blight affecting the potato crop in Ireland and elsewhere in Europe. This was the beginning of The Great Famine, also known as the Great Hunger. It was a period of mass starvation and disease in Ireland from 1845 to 1852. It constituted a major historical social crisis and had a significant impact on Irish society and history.
The worst year of the famine was 1847, which became known as “Black ’47”. The population of Ireland on the eve of the famine was approximately 8.5 million; by 1901, it was 4.4 million. During the Great Hunger, roughly one million people died and over one million more emigrated.
Long-term reasons for the scale of the famine’s impact included the system of absentee landlordism and single-crop dependence. Initial government actions to alleviate famine distress, which were constructive but limited, were ended by a new Whig administration in London that pursued a laissez-faire economic doctrine. Additionally, some members of the British government believed that the famine was divine judgement or that the Irish lacked moral character.
Large quantities of food were exported from Ireland to England during the famine, and the refusal of London to bar such exports was an immediate and continuing source of controversy. This controversy contributed to the exacerbation of the Irish issue in British politics, the intensification of anti-British sentiment, the intensification of Irish nationalism and the campaign for independence. Additionally, the famine indirectly resulted in the eviction of tens of thousands of households, a situation exacerbated by a provision that forbade access to workhouse aid for those possessing more than one-quarter acre of land.
Famine Memorial in Dublin
not nice!
BADA BING!!
Hell hath no fury like an Internet commenter who hasn’t read the article but wants to disagree anyway.
A man just called me evil, I needed that. Thought I was losing my spark for a minute.
WHEN YOU’RE DEAD, YOU DON’T KNOW YOU’RE DEAD. THE PAIN IS FELT BY OTHERS. THE SAME THING HAPPENS WHEN YOU’RE STUPID.
It’s “Lake Ontario” not Lake America. It’s “Gulf of Mexico” not Gulf of America. It’s “convicted felon” not president.
Them: “You’re so quiet!” Autistic person: “Correct. I’ve analyzed your patterns and decided you’re not safe.”
If you could just snap your fingers and make five people disappear for good with absolutely no consequences to you, who would be the other four?
“I talk to an invisible man who controls the universe.” If uttered in a psychiatric ward, it’s a symptom. If proclaimed in a church, it’s a sermon.
Any stairway can be a stairway to heaven if you’re clumsy enough.
St. Upid, Patron saint of economic collapse.
Whenever someone asks what I’m doing later and my answer is “nothing,” please understand “nothing” is not an opening in my schedule. “Nothing” is the event. It’s the plan.
Am I Fat? Boomers: You Could Lose A few Pounds Millennials: “No You’re Beautiful” Gen Z :” We Don’t Body Shame Of Course You’re Not. Gen X: ” I Know 5 Fat People and You’re 4 of them’
“If stupidity got us into this mess, why can’t it get us out?” (Will Rogers)
WARNING!
Today is the birthday, in 1941, of Otis Redding, American singer-songwriter, record producer. After appearing at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival Redding wrote and recorded his iconic ‘(Sittin’ On) The Dock Of The Bay’ with Steve Cropper. The song became the first posthumous No.1 record on the Billboard Hot 100 and The Dock of the Bay became the first posthumous album to reach No.1 on the UK Albums Chart. Redding was killed in a plane crash on 10th December 1967. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVjnBo96Ug
