Hairline Cracks

Frances Oldham, Chair of child sex abuse Inquiry,
and the Victoria College £10 note
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It is nearly a year now since I did a rundown post on the situation in Jersey (CI). This is not because nothing has been happening there. There has been a lot of developments. But my general Jersey posts have been more by way of a background introduction to the scene there and the Jersey Bloggers have been doing a great job keeping the pressure on and reporting to the world at large.

For convenience I had copied my Jersey posts to a separate blog "Introducing Jersey" and will do the same with this one. That blog also lists the blogs I follow to keep up with current developments in Jersey.

The Inquiry

Probably the most significant development in the last year has been the work of the inquiry into institutional child sex abuse. The inquiry has heard evidence about abuse from survivors and is now moving into its second phase where it will hear from those who were in varying degrees responsible for the running of the institutions being highlighted. The children's home at Haut de la Garenne has achieved worldwide notoriety for the extreme abuse carried out there and for the insensitivity of the BBC in filming the series Bergerac there while there were still children resident on the premises. Another institution was Victoria College, illustrated on the Jersey £10 note above. The addition of the cameo of Frances Oldham is my own doing.

Among those who genuinely want to see a full and open inquiry, opinion is sharply divided about the current set up. On the one hand this is the only show in town and some are anxious to make the maximum use of it to get closure for survivors by having them testify, and to show up the perpetrators of abuse and cover up by exposing them to full public view.

However, there are serious reservations in some quarters about the structure of the inquiry, the closeness of its ties to the Jersey and UK establishments, and the sometimes sloppy way in which it has set about its business. These are articulated by former Health Minister, political prisoner and current blogger, Stuart Syvret.

Funding for the inquiry has also been controversial as costs (mainly legal costs) have escalated from the £6 million originally envisaged to something in the region of a final expected cost of £20 million at present. There is no guarantee that the final bill will not exceed this amount. Some have been using the escalating cost, forecasting a final outcome of £50 million or more, in an attempt to stop the inquiry in its tracks. So far, they have been unsuccessful and the States (Jersey Parliament) has recently supported the Chief Minister's proposal for an extra £13 million by a large majority, although most of the "cabinet" seem to have voted against. Nevertheless, people are generally uneasy about the escalating costs and stricter ongoing monitoring arrangements are being put in place in an attempt to control them. It does not help that the money is going to well paid lawyers, some of whose chambers are well connected with the establishment.

The current inquiry poses a serious dilemma for someone like Stuart Syvret. He would be a key witness by virtue of: his previous role as Health Minister responsible for children's services; his role as a whistleblower which the establishment has gone to great lengths to suppress (by imprisoning him and having his original blog taken down); his role as a public representative in whom many of the survivors have confided and to whom they have provided evidence over the last 7 years or so; and his role as a fearless blogger showing up the rottenness of the establishment. But in cooperating with the inquiry he would be leaving himself open to legal retaliation unless the inquiry were to give him some form of unconditional immunity. As it stands they won't even finance some initial legal advice for him, and, since the establishment have reduced him to social welfare, he is hardly in a position to pay for this himself.

If he doesn't play ball, the inquiry may lack vital evidence and so come to a weaker conclusion. If he does, they may still come to a weak conclusion and by implication devalue his contribution which might otherwise be valuable in any follow up.

As of now, he seems to have decided not to participate. He says this is a personal decision and he is not advising others one way or the other.

There is a parallel controversy going on over whether Jersey should be covered by the (hopefully) upcoming British inquiry into child sex abuse and whether the current Jersey inquiry should be merged into it. The current fragmentation of British inquiries (Britain, Northern Ireland, Jersey) does not make sense given that both victims and perpetrators moved freely across these territories and that these movements contributed to the guilty getting away with it for so long.

The Parapet

It is not an easy decision to stick your head above the parapet in Jersey, any more than it was in Gallipoli or on the Somme. You are in serious danger of having it blown off.

I mentioned Stuart Syvret above and I have covered the fate of Police Chief Graham Power and Senior Investigating Officer Lenny Harper in earlier posts.

The last year has seen the bankrupting of former members of the Jersey parliament, Trevor and Shona Pitman. This resulted from them losing a legal action over a cartoon that they considered defamatory and the authorities opting for the severest available penalty when they could not afford the legal costs. My own gut feeling is that they were set up with the cartoon and that the authorities were only too happy to opt for the most severe penalty which, while it was not to the financial advantage of those who won the case, did effectively deprive the Pitmans of their parliamentary roles.

Rico Sorda started blogging as an investigative reporter some years ago and has done sterling work. He has, however, incurred the wrath of the resident public nuisance, and he and his wife have been subject to death threats and a vicious campaign against her in her place of work.

Neil McMurray and Bob Hill have continued attempting to hold the authorities to account with very solid and authoritative blog posts, and I'll bet they have not been free of retaliation, though they have not advertised it.

The Craven Media

Both the BBC and the Jersey Evening Post have continued their craven support of the establishment. I have the impression that they are too embedded to even think of doing otherwise. There have been some slight cosmetic changes but nothing to rock the boat.

The highlight of the Post's existence must surely have been during the Nazi occupation when everyone read it and its copy carried a higher authority. I sort of had a soft spot for the Post since they published my letters in 1961 and criticised my online Nazi references last year, but we mustn't allow this personal affection to cloud our judgement.

I had wondered over the years how a local branch of the much respected BBC could be so captured by a corrupt establishment. Post Savile revelations from HQ show that it was very much in the house style. Some years ago BBC Jersey published an "official" report which purported to criticise the then Chief of Police who had been making a nuisance of himself by having the temerity to support the exposure of child sex abuse and of the ensuing cover up. BBC has had the former Chief's response to its accusations in its possession for a few years now but refused to either publish it or even refer to its contents.

I can't really comment on Channel TV, or ITV Jersey, or whatever it is called, as I don't know much about it apart from it having got a prize a while back for a scissors and paste job which passed for investigative reporting.

Alternative Media

I may be over optimistic but I have the impression that, in more recent times, the blogs have been steadily increasing their readership, both in Jersey and beyond, and that they are becoming the staple diet of those seeking some balance and sense of reality in their sources of news and information. I sincerely hope this is the case as the bloggers are not only doing trojan work but are taking serious risks in fighting corruption in such a small and feudal based community.

The Voice for Children blog has a solid record in general reporting but particularly in its video interviews. Its recent interview with Chief Minister Gorst was ground breaking and a welcome recognition by some element of the establishment of the serious role played by bloggers in the unfolding story of the island. MSM eat your hearts out.

Election

There was an election to the Jersey parliament late last year but it really hasn't changed anything much. It's mostly a case of the same old compliant faces with the same little merry-go-round at the top.

Jersey does not have a party system. People are elected (often unopposed) on an individual basis and this is a system that seems to suit the establishment very well thank you. Recently, an effort has been made to inaugurate a party system with the establishment of a new party, Reform Jersey, with Deputy Sam Mézec as its chairman, but so far its impact has been very limited. Still it is a step in the right direction. Deputy Montford Tadier, another of the good guys, is also a member of Reform, as is Deputy Geoff Southern. Outside the party, but very much attempting to hold the authorities to account is Deputy Mike Higgins.

Meanwhile, the establishment have attempted to consolidate their hold on Government by instituting a system of Cabinet co-responsibility in tandem with an increase in the Chief Minister's power to appoint and fire ministers without reference to parliament.

On the debit side too (I think) is the return to parliament of Deputy Andrew Lewis, who, as Home Affairs Minister, was implicated in the illegal suspension of the then Police Chief, Graham Power. Deputy Lewis has a lot of questions to answer. Perhaps his re-election will make this self-proclaimed integrity-promoting candidate more answerable to parliament and the public. Who knows? One lives in hope.

Failing Entity?

Jersey has long been a rich place even if not all those living there are rich. In the real economy its exports were agriculture and tourism. But the big money for the few has been in the financial sector (tax haven). The financial sector globally is being tightened up and, as Stuart Syvret has argued, not enough attention has been paid to developing the real economy. One of the results is now an emerging public finance deficit which was denied before the last election but is now admitted.

Apparently, there is no Plan B. So the island may be in for a rough ride in the future.

Those Cracks

And finally, the cracks.

The power elite have run Jersey very comfortably since the end of the Occupation. They remained relatively untroubled by the widespread child sex abuse which they have succeeded in covering up. They have been helped by a public who were either unaware of, or uninterested in, the corruption at the heart of the system. However, it is getting harder now to ignore what is going on and the bloggers are playing a large part in shedding light on the malfeasance.

Philip Bailhache has long been seen as one of the puppeteers and a man with many questions to answer. Up to recently he has managed to divert any efforts to hold him to account. Some years ago he was seen reading confidential official documents to which he should not have had access. He traduced the witnesses but finally had to back down, sort of. More recently he appears to have had direct or indirect access to a confidential document which is part of the current child sex abuse inquiry and he, or someone on his behalf, has been in apparently inappropriate contact with the chair of that supposedly independent inquiry. He unsuccessfully attempted to stop the inquiry in its tracks just as it was getting to the stage of calling in those with responsibility for child care in the past. He had been a Governor of Victoria College when abuse was taking place there.

Last year, former Deputy Shona Pitman was run down by a car which crashed a red light. The police have been negligent in following up this incident and have been obstructive in providing Shona with documentation to which she was entitled, namely a copy of her own statement and insurance details for the driver of the car. The latter, I assume, in an attempt to obscure the identity of the driver. Following Shona's interview with Voice for Children, and further comments from her on that blog, insurance details were finally provided and it appears the identity of the driver is not without interest. This narrative is now in the public domain. Without the bloggers it would presumably have remained hidden as have such incidents in the past.

These are hairline cracks in the system, but in a period when the inquiry is in full swing, and when part of its terms of reference are to flush out political interference in the justice system, the fireworks may be about to commence.

Satire

It is said that you are not fully mature if you can't laugh at yourself. So let's end on an uplifting note.

Voice for Jersey has recently been giving airtime to Lord Reginald Hamilton Rawley Tooting-Jones III who has been taking some potshots at the system.

And Reform Jersey, the only actual political party so far, have done a pictorial satirical analysis (below) of the present shadow party system on the island. To understand this fully you would need to have some familiarity with the existing make up of the parliament which is quite complex and strongly biased in favour of the status quo.

Stay tuned.

A shadow party analysis of the current parliament
Thanks to Reform Jersey
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Gorgeous Curvy Lady

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Could this be you? The details are on the poster (above). The shop is Tempted in Raheny, Dublin 5 (below).

The Lord Mayor's Coach

The front of the coach
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There I was in the old Council Chamber in City Hall, waiting for the start of a lunchtime talk on the digitisation of the UCD Folklore Archive, when Greg Young invited me to join him after the talk to check out the Lord Mayor's Coach. His walking group had lined up an appointment to be shown the coach which is stored at the Council's depot in Ringsend.

Mick the Coach

So, after two bus journeys and a long walk, we hit the waterworks just as the official walk were approaching from the other direction. We joined up and went to meet Mick Kinahan who was going to show us the coach and tell us all about it.

Mick is now retired, but up to recently he was, among other things, in charge of the coach, and, more than that, he was responsible for getting the coach back to its present condition. Apparently, there were bits of it all over the place and the coach still needs another small piece to make the job complete.

It is lovingly, and expensively, looked after and stored in a special temperature controlled room at the depot. A far cry from the impression given in this piece of shite reporting last year.

The coach was originally drawn by six horses with a postillion (rider-driver) on the leading pair and a coachman seated at the front of the coach. These days it is drawn by only two horses.

I'll try and keep the text relatively short for the rest of this post and hope you enjoy the pictures. I can't show you a side view of the coach as its storage space is quite confined, but you can check it out in the first link above.

There is an almost life size carving at each of the four corners of the coach. The one above is Justice, but for some reason her scales are folded on her knee. Perhaps they would bounce around too much when the coach is moving, or, like the statue at the entrance to Dublin Castle, there may be a deeper symbolism involved.

This lady has the horn of plenty (cornucopia) and, unlike the other three, has one breast exposed.

Her ladyship has a different horn, packed with dosh to overflowing. There appear to be some very real coins there below the gilt, but that's another story.

The last of the four has her sword sheathed and also sports a lily or a sheaf or corn. Not quite swords into ploughshares but I'm sure that must be the sentiment.

Then there's all the stuff around the top. At the front, the keys of the city and a hat that I assume represents that worn by the mayor in days of yore.

At the back, we have the folded scales of justice again.

At each of the four corners we have an angel. Horrible looking creatures, but this seems to have been a fashion of the times. Cherubs abound, I've seen them on the Jersey mace and in paintings.

At the side, two more of them, with the city sword and mace along with the three flaming towers for Dublin and the harp for the nation as a whole.

And a slightly more formal set of arms, mercifully angel-free.

Mick explains the workings of the coach from the inside. He needs the window open to communicate, and, indeed, so would the Lord Mayor have, in order to hear the acclaim of his people and wave his hand out the window. They were all hises in those days.

However, if the natives (sorry, citizens) got stroppy and started throwing rotten eggs and tomatoes, or tried to open the door and pull out the mayor, he had the perfect defence. There is a window, like the old train windows with the strap, which he can pull up, and in so doing the outer door handle is disabled. You couldn't be up to those fellas.

Each of the coach doors has a painting.

The one above shows the statue of King Billy in College Green and the side of the then Irish Parliament building (now the Bank of Ireland)

There is also a painting at the back of the coach. I'm not sure whether this portrays the welcoming of the king or the mayor but no doubt, it too is full of symbolism.

The suspension is something else. The cabin is suspended, independently of the main chassis, by leaf springs and leather straps and it could almost sway in the wind it's so sensitive. I had the privilege of getting up inside the cabin and it is really something. I got a bit overcome, waving to my loyal supporters on the outside. They reciprocated with enthusiastic smiles and gestures of loyalty and gratitude. Not an egg or tomato in sight.

But back to symbolism, what is this snake doing in the inner suspension of the cabin? I thought St. Patrick sorted them out over a century earlier.

This, I think, is an Irish wolfhound in the outer cabin suspension. A native species at least.

If you're curious about all this symbolism, I gather there's a guy doing a paper on it which will be published in the not too distant future. Can't wait myself.

The group of walkers and talkers who kindly invited me to share their visit. Greg is the one beside Mick.

Where is it ? No. 36

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And if you know, you might also add who?

Answer in comments below please.

Update - almost immediately
It's only up and the solution is already on the front page of the Freeman's Journal. Would somebody tell Felix Larkin's mammy to keep him off the streets for a decade or two.

Yes, he's done it again.

I had a premonition when I put it up that he'd know it, but thought he might just have kept his head down in that hallowed hall.

Anyway, here it is in context.

Daniel O'Connell in conversation with Thomas Davis
in the beautiful surroundings of Dublin's City Hall

To see the rest of the series click on the Where? label below. To see those still remaining to be solved click on unsolved in any of those in which it appears.

The Great War at the Guinness Storehouse

During this year, the 100th anniversary of the first full year of WWI, there is a clatter of talks, seminars, plays, re-enactments and the rest taking place throughout the country.

Myles Dungan, known to the public for his weekly history show on RTÉ radio and his book on WWI, brought his Great War Roadshow into partnership the the Guinness Archive for a day to give us an excellent conference on various aspects of the war.

The Archive contributed this fine hall in the Guinness Storehouse, along with an early morning coffee and pastries, and, once inside the building, you could do the tour for free during the lunch break.

Trish Fallon

Trish Fallon, from the Archive, welcomed us all in great style, brought us up to date with the location's housekeeping, and offered us the continuing cooperation of the Archive in our historical and genealogical endeavours.

Myles Dungan

Myles Dungan, effectively MC for the day, kicked off with his own contribution, appropriately titled Lions, Donkeys and Paddies: The Irish Experience of the Great War.

He took us through a wide range of material, including the Gallipoli campaign, and identified some of the donkeys whose names had a familiar ring, Haig and Gough among them. Others I had not heard of but they didn't bring any credit on themselves or their country.

Ciarán Wallace

Ciarán Wallace, of UCD, in a talk entitled Keeping the Home Fires Burning: Civilian Life in Wartime Ireland, gave us a fascinating overview of the home front, a front that tends to be forgotten in the heat of battle. We heard of families trying to cope with rising prices, of the munitions factories which gave some employment, of the resistance to conscription, and of the dreaded telegrams from the front.

Upside down union jack, shell factory, Parkgate St.

I was amused by this detail from his picture of the Shell Factory at Parkgate St. One of the few occasions I have seen the Union Jack portrayed upside down. Those who know me will know that this is my version of bird watching.

Gordon Power

Gordon Power gave us Irish Military Genealogy 1900-1922 - Tracing your WW1 Ancestors.

He showed us the painstaking work involved in teasing out the whole story from genealogical and other records and dazzled us with his analysis of photographic material. Sherlock Holmes was only in the halfpenny place beside this guy.

Deirdre McParland

Deirdre McParland, the Guinness Archive Manager, spoke on Guinness and the War. A huge number of employees joined up with the encouragement of the company. Preference, if you can call it that in hindsight, was given to single men but volunteers came from all ranks and grades within the company right up to board level. Jobs were held open for those lucky enough to survive the conflict and this applied whether or not they were fit for work on return.

Incidentally, a very abbreviated version of the Guinness Archive can now be interrogated online and if you find an employee who is a direct ancestor you can get a copy of their employment records.

So, if you are doing your family tree and are related to, but not descended from, a Guinness employee you'd better buttonhole a surviving direct descendant to accompany you on your trip into the Archive. I was lucky enough to get in before these restrictions applied and I have the records of some of my cousins. They are absolutely fascinating. [Lest I get anyone into trouble, I should say that I have shared these records with my cousin, who is a direct descendant, and he is perfectly happy with me having them.] So, if you're in my position, get hold your Guinness descendants while there are some of them still around and get in there quick.

Brendan McQuaile

Finally, Brendan McQuaile gave us March Away My Brothers in which he acted out the journey of a young lad, Lar Kelly, from Bridgefoot Street in the Liberties. This took us just up to the 1914 Christmas Truce, soon after which Lar was blown to smithereens. Based very loosely on a real person, this was a combination of acting and song, got across with great gusto.

Memo: Four Generations of Coopers in Guinness - my cousins the Flemings.

All Quiet on the Western Front

Cathy Scuffil with 1911 map of her native Dolphin's Barn
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Last night the Southside ventured Northside to educate the natives on that well known boulevard the South Circular Road (SCR). They learned that it wasn't really circular; that it was originally built by the military to join up some of their emplacements (barracks/jail); that houses were only gradually built along it, initially in small terraces, the names of which are almost lost; and that it was never finished. It was conceived along with the North Circular Road to ring the city but the two never joined up and are still separated by the Phoenix Park.

The southsider, was Cathy Scuffil, who had done her masters thesis on the SCR and the northside location was St. John the Baptist Centre in Clontarf, home to the Clontarf Historical Society.

Dolphins Barn postcard 1910

Cathy was born and raised in Dolphin's Barn, so she had a head start in her study. But, as she told us, the area she thought she knew, she didn't know at all, and her thesis was a voyage of discovery.

She wanted to study her own area and her supervisor required her to take a substantial piece of road, so she chose the SCR and focussed on the then newly released digitised 1911 census.

The results were fascinating, not just looking at a freeze frame of those living on the road in 1911 but chasing up their lives, with particular emphasis on a number of families.

For years the road was identified in sections such as SCR Portobello, SCR Dolphin's Barn, and this was reflected in the numbering system. In fact, before those sections were consolidated, habitations along the road consisted of individual isolated terraces, each with its own numbering system. Now it is just numbered from one end to the other and lots of interesting features have gone.

Leonard's Corner
looking east to St. Kevin's church c. 1911

The Poddle river, which eventually flows into the Liffey, has been culverted since way back. Cathy showed us pictures of the no man's land laneways under which the river now flows.These pathways once represented parish boundaries and they have not been built on because, in theory at least, nobody owns the river.

We heard of industries such as the White Heather Laundry and its covert purchasing of rat poison; of the tramline which never quite reached Rialto; of the Wicklow widows who had married locals after coming to town for work; and of Monsignor Kennedy whose territory stretched from James's St. to Dolphin's Barn and who came to a sticky end after falling down the front steps of the Parochial House. I have a carte de visite picture of him from my granny's papers.

Leonard's Corner
looking west towards Dolphin's Barn c. 1911

The SCR at Leonard's Corner is intersected by Clanbrassil St. which was a major shopping street for the nearby Jewish community.

Much later, in the 1940s, a granduncle by marriage, and my godmother, lived in a house just out of shot at the left of the above picture. When they moved in it was a Jewish house, but as the Jews died off or emigrated and as the Christian family gradually took up more of the house, it ended up a fully Gentile house, but not before the family became accustomed to performing Shabbos Goy services for their co-tenants on their sabbath.

If you want to take a more systematic look at the SCR in 1911 you should read Cathy's book The South Circular Road, Dublin, on the eve of the First World War.

My own associations with the road are from a more modern era, as you will gather from the above. So I hope Cathy will revisit this area and bring us up to date on its later goings on.

A final remark: Cathy was not the only crosser of the Liffey in the context of the SCR; the road itself ends up on the north bank at Islandbridge.

If ever you go ...

"Shaming the Custom House" Liberty Hall
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I have taken my title from a verse of Paddy Kavanagh's

If ever you go to Dublin town
In a hundred years or so
Inquire for me in Baggot Street 

And what I was like to know.

That was the title for last year's "One City, One Book" and John Dorman has taken some of the poems in the book and sketched the locations described in them.

His exhibition is currently in Raheny library till the end of the month (April). It is well worth a visit. The sketches incorporate buildings and maps of their environment, a sense of object and of place.

The one above is quite obviously Liberty Hall and the accompanying poem by Austin Clarke (below) only goes a small bit of the way to expressing how I feel about this monument to 1960s' hubris and pretentiousness. Anyway, give it a read yourself and see.

Poem written during the construction of Liberty Hall

Part of the exhibition in Raheny library

You can see more of Dorman's sketches on his website, both in this series and albums covering a wider range of subjects.

My own comment on Liberty Hall is fully captured in this visual (not in the exhibition !).

Cold Revenge

German WWII Defences, La Corbière (MP2) Jersey (CI)
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Once upon a time, a long time ago (1961) when I was working in Jersey (CI) I became aware of the Nazi occupation of the island covering the period 1940-45. The signs of the occupation were to be seen along part of the coast in the form of the observation towers and gun batteries which were to provide a "ring of steel" around the island.

Although more had been planned, only three towers were constructed before the end of the occupation: No.2 at La Corbière (shown above); No.3 at the north-west most tip of the island; and No.1 at Noirmont Point, overlooking St. Brelade's Bay.

It was this last one I chose for my suggestion that it be turned into a German museum with a certain amount of bells and whistles. I made the suggestion in a letter to the Jersey Evening Post, the island's only newspaper, and one which came through the occupation in grand style.

My letter suggesting a museum,
and the put down by G C H LE COCQ

I was quickly put down by G C H LE COCQ who was very insulted by my suggestion, and there the matter rested.

My recent comment to the Jersey Evening Post
and C Le Verdic's reply

Jumping forward to today, the Post reported recently that an archeological dig at Grouville had turned up a ceramic plate with a swastika on it. I was reminded of my 1961 suggestion and drew the paper's attention to it anew in a comment on their piece (above).

This evoked a reply from C Le Verdic as follows:

What a superbly penned put down from G.C.H. Le Cocq (not De Dotteville, then?) and what superb revenge has been served cold by Noirmont eventually getting your museum and, as far as I know, Le Cocq not getting his cross.

P.S. Well done keeping the cuttings. I would have done the same!

So I checked it out, and sure enough

The bunker has been restored to a very high standard and provides a unique insight into the sheer scale and thoroughness of German military engineering.

I'm sure it lacks some of my suggested bells and whistles but it is a restoration.

It is said that revenge is a dish best served cold and it is none the less sweet for a wait of over half a century.

Father Browne

Father Frank Browne SJ
(1880-1960)
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I have never read any of his religious writings or heard any of his sermons. In fact, I have no interest whatsoever in them.

For me, he is simply a dedicated and pioneering photographer.

He achieved world fame for his photos from the first two legs of the Titanic's maiden voyage. It was only a refusal by his superiors that saved him from the last leg, which would most likely have meant we would have ended up with no photos at all.

Father Browne's room/lab at Emo (1931)

Photography was a passion for him all of his life and the above photo shows his room at the Jesuit house at Emo from 1930 to 1957. He had organised extra power points for his photographic equipment and also special blinds and curtains for his window so that it could be turned into a darkroom within seconds.

"Self under Anaesthetic" (1938)

But the photo above is really the point of my post. The ultimate "selfie". In 1938 he was taken into Vincent's Hospital for an appendectomy. He rigged up his camera in the operating theatre with a time delay on the shutter so that he could take his own photo while being anaesthetised. Now, that takes some beating for its day.

The Father Browne website is here. I have mentioned him before on this blog. And I would like to thank E E O'Donnell SJ and Messenger Publications for the above photos and information. The book is cleverly titled "The Life and Lens of Father Browne" and it is an inspiring read.