“Wear a mask – it hasn’t gone away, you know.” The last two weeks have seen two coronavirus deaths but 800 new cases (Health NI | BBC). Sınn Féın’s Gerry Adams remarked, on Sunday 13 August, 1995, that the IRA “haven’t gone away” (YouTube).
Previously on this wall (on Newtownards Road): Inspiring Belfast | Reading Between The Lines
Previously from Hallion: Wash Your Hands
Previously: Sectarianism – It Hasn’t Gone Away
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Dominic Cummings, advisor to the ruling Conservative party in the UK government, was a source of controversy and widespread derision in May when he claimed that he had driven (during the coronavirus lockdown) from London to Durham in order to deliver his son to his grandparents and then to Barnard Castle to test his eyesight (WP). Protestations of disbelief and calls for his resignation were widespread, including the amendment to the east Belfast graffiti shown above: “We’re in this together – except for Cummings”. For the original, see Inspiring Belfast.
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Due to the coronavirus pandemic, people celebrating the Twelfth yesterday were encouraged to maintain physical distance from others by staying in their gardens as the bands marched by. Homeowners decorated their properties (perhaps using these Twelfth At Home packs in Lurgan). Here is video from the Belfast Telegraph of this year’s marches.
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Here is the bonfire in Pitt Park (east Belfast) that was set alight yesterday evening for “Eleventh Night” (for some images see this Kevin Scott gallery). This year, due to the coronavirus pandemic, there is a banner advising people to “Stay 1m apart! Thank you”, in addition to nationalist symbols such as the Irish Tricolour.
For the mural in the background, see Culture Threatens No One.
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In the 1860s, Ballymacarrett, Mount Pottinger, and Lagan Village, all on the east side of the Lagan, were not a part of Belfast (Lennon-Wylie). Lagan Village stretched from where Hutchinsons car dealership now is down to the modern Park Parade, just above Ormeau Park. In the 1880s Belfast expanded and Lagan Village Road became Ravenhill Road (NVTv). Ormeau Park opened in 1871 (WartimeNI). It did not then include the BMX track celebrated in this mural.
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The heroes of the past are the soldiers of WWI and WWII (commemorated by the poppies growing in ACT Initiative‘s Shankill Road Community Garden, above, and in the 75th anniversary VE Day posters in Madrid Street, east Belfast, below); the present-day heroes are the doctors, nurses, and staff of the NHS, symbolised by the rainbow in both images.
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William McFadzean won a VC for sacrificing himself on the morning before the Battle Of The Somme (in WWI) and is commemorated in several murals. He shares a plaque here with “Vol W Miller”, who is perhaps the (modern UVF) volunteer Billy Miller from Donegall Pass who was killed in an RUC ambush in 1983 (Long Kesh I/O). The two names on the newer plaque are unknown on-line, perhaps having survived the Troubles and being recently deceased.
The title of today’s post comes from the Laurence Binyon poem For The Fallen.
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“Glentoran FC. Pride of Ulster.” Two examples from the Glentoran sticker campaign in the early months of the year, before coronavirus put and end to the season and the players on furlough. See previously Le Coq Sportif.
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Still in the window of Harland House (Templemore Avenue, east Belfast) two years after the World Cup, Union Flag and IFA bunting and a ‘Deutschland’ scarf. NI did not qualify, Germany did not make it to the knock-out stage, and England lost to Croatia in the semis.
It’s not known what the connection to Edward Harland (of Harland & Wolff) is – please get in touch.
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Seosamh Mac Coille Collection 