Thread by @CMacCoille

On 21 January 1919, our parliamentary democracy began when the First Dáil met in the Round Room of Dublin’s Mansion House, three years before the end of British rule in this part of Ireland.
The Dáil had to meet in private after it was banned in September 1919.
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Report on the First Dáil, headlined ‘Cloud-Cuckoo Land’ which appeared in the Irish Times, then a pro-unionist newspaper. One of many fascinating exhibits in anniversary exhibition at Leinster House. Booking closed, but there’s talk of re-staging it later in the year.
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The Leinster House is a terrific evocation, in Irish and English, of the Dáil’s first day in 1919 and history since then. This spectacularly wrong prediction by Field Marshal French, then British Lord Lieutenant in Ireland, caught my eye.
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Countess Markievicz was the only female member of the first Dáil. No woman yet as Taoiseach, but as you tour Leinster House, Noel Murphy’s painting of the 53 female members of the current Oireachtas is evidence of progress so far. #womeninpolitics
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The first Dáil’s offices were in 6 Harcourt st, now @CnaG hq,
which was often raided by British troops (booking open for tours this Sunday).
Filming for a special @TG4TV programme @Cuanbos showed camera operator Martin Hartnett Michael Collins’s rooftop escape route.
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Sign over entrance to the Mansion House Round Room informs visitors, in Irish,
“The first meeting of the first Dáil took place in this room on 21 January 1919.”
Monday’s joint sitting of Dáil and Seanad here is live on RTE.
Special programme on @TG4TV 7.30pm, Monday.
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The other event that took place in the Mansion House on 21 January 1919 (the timing of this gathering of Royal Dublin Fusiliers ex-POWs was altered to accommodate the Dáil).
Irish history, like all history, is complicated.
MH exhibition open today, no booking needed
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Missing word: exhibition.

Dublin Lord Mayor Laurence O’Neill believed the Mansion House should be ‘the Home of Civil and Religious Liberty’.
The attitude that led to his decision to allow MH meetings on the same day of the first Dáil and of British Army veterans.
Mansion House exhibition today
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Strangely, there are no known photographs of the first meeting of the first Dáil on 21 January 1919.
Thomas Ryan’s painting is the only image we have of that historic day.
The first known photos were taken in April 1919.
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https://twitter.com/oireachtasnews/status/690229797121888256?s=21

Yes, there’s a badge. Got this (free) in Leinster House. Here’s hoping the very good anniversary events taking place there this weekend (👏 to the actors!) are repeated during the year.
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Clár speisialta @7LATG4 le @mairinnighadhra.
@TG4TV 7.30pm, Dé Luain.