Tag: Stories
Jim Deery
Community development in North Belfast
Jim’s childhood was spent growing up on the Cregagh estate in east Belfast. His family moved to north Belfast when he was ten. “My fond memories of north Belfast are the Cavehill, I think it’s an underused tourist ...
Denis O Hearn
Social and economic justice
Denis’s scholarly interests are in social movements, the sociology of economic change, industrialisation and transnational corporations. Denis was brought up in the middle of the New Mexico desert and remembers a c...
Alan Houston
The Healthy Living Centre
Alan recalls growing up in Portstewart as an “active childhood, but you were very aware of the dangers of the environment that we were living in. There were very few opportunities if I’m honest. You worried about wher...
Angela Ifonlaja
Bridging communities in Belfast
Born in Nigeria, Angela’s family moved to London when she was a child. She remembers many differences between London and her homeland, most notably the British education system. “In Nigeria you move through the school...
Samuel Malcolmson
Surviving a shooting
Marie Breen-Smyth, Associate Dean International, University of Surrey, talks to Samuel Malcolmson about the injuries he received during the Troubles and how his life has been affected. Samuel had joined the RUC in ...
Lynda Walker
Chair of the Communist Party of Irl
Lynda Walker grew up in Sheffield, England and came from a working class background. “It was a fairly run down area, we lived in a couple of rooms in the back of a shop, but we moved onto one of the bigger estates ...
Mo McDevitt
A life in art
Mo was born on the Donegall Road in Matilda Street and moved to Ashley Avenue on the Lisburn Road in south Belfast when she was 5 years old. “It was not the Golden Mile, but it was an area of warm people, again the...
Father Desmond Wilson
Community development in W. Belfast
Father Wilson grew up in the mixed community Ormeau Road area in south Belfast. “Belfast, to us, was an amazing place. When I was growing up I was very fortunate, I was able to go to Saint Malachys Grammar School a...
Vera Henderson
Community development in Tyrone
Vera had a tough start to life. Her mother died when she was only one year old. Her father, unable to manage, sent her to a home until he remarried when Vera was 4 years old. “I don’t remember an awful lot about it be...
Ruth Taillon
Women’s rights and social work
Growing up in post WWII Canada, Ruth left home at an early age: “I left home at a very early age following the hippy trail. I was very interested in music and it was exciting at the time. I quickly got involved with t...
Jackie Redpath
Shankill community development
Jackie Redpath grew up in the Woodvale area of the upper Shankill Road, a child of Evangelical Christian parents, his early life was dominated by the Shankill Baptist Church. “It was a very strict evangelical, fundame...
Aodán Mac Poilin
Irish language schooling
Aodán grew up on the Norfolk Road in west Belfast with his two sisters, his mother who was an Irish speaker and his father who worked as a civil servant. His parents were avid followers of hurling and Gaelic footba...