International Women’s Day is an annual, global event, celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women, and calling for women's equality. As part of IWD celebrations, we’re taking a closer look at some images recording inspirational women.
Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan
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Belfast Telegraph, two women smoking pipes, 1962. HOYFM.BT.1331 © National Museums Northern Ireland
For Myrtle Hill and Vivienne Pollock, ‘Women’s experience is and always has been infinitely more diverse than the stereotypes would allow’. They contend, ‘the immediacy of contemporary photographs… give the authentic flavour of the many worlds women found themselves in’.[1] Many images in National Museums NI’s photographic collections do just this. The women photographed differ in class, age, and background. Some women are named; most are not. Some photographs record women engaged in roles and work, upheld and performed by women for generations, while others show pioneering women, employed in vocations and industries from which they had previously been excluded. All are important in understanding the historical experiences of women in Ireland, and all are worth celebrating.
[1] Myrtle Hill and Vivienne Pollock, Women of Ireland. Image and experience c.1880-1920 (Belfast 1993), p. 1.
Sophia Rosamund Praeger
A.R. Hogg, portrait of Rosamund Praeger in her studio, 1931. BELUM.Y4562 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Sophia Rosamund Praeger (1867–1954) was an Irish artist, sculptor, poet and writer.
Born in Holywood, County Down, Praeger studied at Belfast School of Art followed by Slade School of Art at University College London, where among other prizes, she was awarded a silver medal for life drawing.[2] She wrote and illustrated over twenty-five children's books in her lifetime and provided illustrations for The Irish Homestead, Gaelic League pageants and designs for the Irish Women's Suffrage Federation.[3] A regular contributor to various art societies and committees, Praeger’s work was frequently exhibited at the Royal Hibernian Academy in Dublin, the Royal Academy in London and The Royal Ulster Academy in Belfast.[4]
Her work is said to have ‘played a significant role in the late Victorian and early twentieth century Irish Art World’. [5] This photograph, taken by Alexander Hogg in 1931, shows Praeger in her studio, surrounded by some of her work.
[2] Hill and Pollock, Women of Ireland, p. 104
[3] www.nival.ie/collections/artists-database/view/artist/name/praeger-sophia-rosamond/
[4] Hill and Pollock, Women of Ireland ,p.104.
[5] www.nival.ie/collections/artists-database/view/artist/name/praeger-sophia-rosamond
The Postal Service
Belfast Telegraph collection, a postwoman delivering the Christmas mail to a house in Belfast, 1942. HOYFM.BT.1065 © National Museums Northern Ireland
The employment of women in the UK postal service expanded massively during the First World War, with thousands of women occupying temporary positions previously reserved for male staff. This employment was further extended in the Second World War, with the Post Office calling for women to volunteer as postwomen before the Christmas of 1940. While initially a temporary measure, due to their impressive performance, the decision was made to retain them for further work. By November 1941, around 100,000 women were employed by the Post Office in either permanent or temporary capacities.[6] These photographs show women working for the Postal Service in Belfast, during the Christmas Rush in 1941 and 1942.
[6]www.postalmuseum.org/collections/women/
Belfast Telegraph collection, postmen being assisted by postwomen during the wartime Christmas rush, 1942. HOYFM.BT.1066 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Belfast Telegraph collection, Women in the sorting office of Belfast G.P.O., during the Christmas rush, 1941. HOYFM.BT.1067 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Nursing
Belfast Telegraph collection, The City Hospital, Belfast. Sister Fummigan with an electrically heated cot, 1948. HOYFM.BT.464 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Women have often taken the lead in medically assisting and nursing those in their families and communities. A number of photographs show women working professionally as nurses in the early twentieth century. In these images, women are demonstrating new apparatus and technology being utilised in their line of work.
Belfast Telegraph collection, the Royal Maternity Hospital, Belfast, showing a nurse with two babies one being weighed on scales, 1937. HOYFM.BT.484 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Belfast Telegraph collection, The Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast. A nurse and technician in the sterilising plant, 1943. HOYFM.BT.499 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Wartime Industry
Belfast Telegraph collection, Barn Mill, manufacture of dummies for parachutes, 1944. HOYFM.BT.1048 © National Museums Northern Ireland
During the Second World War, Barn Mills in Carrickfergus was taken over by Littlewoods of Liverpool, for the manufacturing of parachutes, flying suits, and Mae West life jackets. The mill, which had a largely female workforce, became the world’s largest parachute factory with approx. 1,200 employees.[7] These photographs from the Belfast Telegraph collection provide a fascinating record of women at work in the factory.
[7]Mid & East Antrim Borough Council, ‘Carrickfergus across the centuries: A walk through the historic town and harbour’ November 2020. P. 87.
Belfast Telegraph collection, Littlewoods factory, packing small parachutes into containers, 1944. HOYFM.BT.1060 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Belfast Telegraph collection, Female workers at sewing machines making parachutes. Littlewoods factory, 1943. HOYFM.BT.1183 © National Museums Northern Ireland
House and Home
Dundee McKinney collection, John Straghan's house with Miss Ramsey and Mrs Rodgers. Group at above including Mrs Rodgers and Mrs Boyd. HOYFM.DUNDEE.399 © National Museums Northern Ireland
An array of photographs held by National Museums NI show that throughout the late nineteenth and twentieth century, Irish women were challenging the notion that their place was in the home. Nevertheless, many images also record the diverse domestic experience of women, from different classes and backgrounds. Here are just a few.
Robert Welch, flowering linen; woman at fireside in kitchen. BELUM.Y.W.05.10.4 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Dundee McKinney collection, Miss McKinney, Tom & Elsie McKinney, with Mrs Eva Fitzpatrick Mullen and children from Dublin. HOYFM.DUNDEE.359 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Education
Belfast telegraph Collection, 100 year old Cloy Primary School, the teacher Miss Hazel Hetherington standing outside the school with most of the 34 pupils, 1956. HOYFM.BT.1246 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Photographs from the collections reflect the active role women in Northern Ireland played in educating children and adults. This sample of images show women engaging in teaching professions in a variety of times and contexts.
Philip Woods, Ashton Street Playscheme (Belfast). Focus on the teacher in the foreground talking and gesturing to the children along the back wall, 1976. BELUM.W2015.118.2.11 © National Museums Northern Ireland
W.A. Green, Graymount hospital outdoor school, Belfast. HOYFM.WAG.3303 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Agricultural Labour
W.A. Green, a view of women in a field overlooked by a man spreading out flax to dry. HOYFM.WAG.1015 © National Museums Northern Ireland
In the early twentieth century, many Irish photographers were interested in recording old rural customs, and creating idyllic picture postcards.[8] Consequently, some of their work records women engaged in agricultural labour, including these two photographs taken by W.A Green and Robert Welch. In the first, a group of women spread retted flax, with their heads protected from the sun, while in the second, two women are breaking clods of earth in a potato crop in the Glens of Antrim. [9]
[8] W.A. Maguire, A Century in Focus: Photography and photographers in the North of Ireland 1839-1939 (Belfast, pp, 86-118).
[9] Myrtle Hill and Vivienne Pollock, Women of Ireland, p.47.
Robert Welch, girls "setting" seed potatoes, breaking clods with spade, Glenshesk, Co. Antrim. BELUM.Y.W.01.56.25 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Linen
W.A. Green, a view of a lady scutching flax to the side of a house with another lady in the background spinning HOYFM.WAG.1017 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Ulster is historically famed for its Linen production. Since the middle of the eighteenth century, linen was the most popular textile manufactured in Ireland. [10] With the industrialisation of Belfast, many factories and mills channelled their efforts into producing linen, to such a degree the city was often given the name ‘Linenopolis’.[11] Linen production would have been nothing without women. Photographs from the collection show them involved at every level; spinning flax, sewing and weaving the material, and working in large and often unhygienic mills and factories in Belfast.
[10] Emily Boyle, “Linenopolis” The rise of the textile industry’ in J C Beckett et al (eds) Belfast, The making of the city (Dublin 1983), p. 41
[11] W.A. Maguire, Belfast: a history ( Belfast, 2009), p. 102.
Robert Welch, two girls embroidering linen outside door of thatched house, county Down. BELUM.Y.W.05.99.22 © National Museums Northern Ireland
A.R. Hogg, Brookfield Linen Company Ltd. Mill. Interior, 1911. BELUM.Y3255 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Clubs and Societies
A.R. Hogg, Belfast Naturalists' Field Club, Parkmore Excursion. HOYFM.ARH.256 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Many clubs and societies in Britain and Ireland had an exclusively male membership in the early twentieth century. National Museums NI’s collections contain a number of photographs recording women actively engaging in, or as members of, social clubs and societies. While nearly all are middle-class, these photographs represent one way in which women were challenging cultural prejudices and excusatory norms.
A.R. Hogg, Ulster Arts Club group on lawn, 1913. BELUM.Y1608 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Corran Radio Factory
Belfast Telegraph collection, Corran Radio Factory, female worker testing Pye sets, 1949. HOYFM.BT.1022 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Corran Works Ltd, part of the Pye Group, manufactured radio sets and components. Opening at the harbour in Larne in 1947 with 130 employees, by 1964 this had risen to over 1200. [12]These photographs record one industry in Northern Ireland providing women with work following the Second World War.
[12] www.midandeastantrim.gov.uk/things-to-do/museums-arts/industrial-heritage-week
Belfast Telegraph Collection, Corran Radio Factory, female worker winding coils, 1949. HOYFM.BT.1021© National Museums Northern Ireland
Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan
Philip Woods, Mairead Corrigan speaking at London Peace Rally in Trafalgar Square, 1976. BELUM.W2015.118.59.2 © National Museums Northern Ireland
In 1976 Belfast women Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan were awarded a Nobel peace prize ‘for the courageous efforts in founding a movement to put an end to the violent conflict in Northern Ireland’.[13] The movement, known as the Community of Peace People, sought to bring an end to the conflict between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland using non-violent strategies. It brought together thousands of people in protest marches in 1976 and 1977. The women were stirred to action through tragic incident; in August 1976, Mairead Corrigan’s sister lost three children as the result of shooting in Belfast, which was witnessed by Betty Williams.[14] While the Northern Irish peace movement disintegrated in the course of 1978, these images record Corrigan and Williams actively involved in peace efforts in 1976 and 1977.
[13] www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1976/corrigan/facts/
[14] www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1976/williams/facts/
PhilipWoods, photograph of Mairead Corrigan, Betty and Ralph Williams, Senator Thompson and Lady Fisher taken outside in a residential street, 1976. BELUM.W2015.118.34.2 © National Museums Northern Ireland
Philip Woods, Victoria Park Peace Rally. Mairead Corrigan speaking to another lady, 1976. BELUM.W2015.120.44B.27 © National Museums Northern Ireland