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 The
Emergency
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 Almost
from the moment that de Valera and his new Fianna
Fáil party were elected in 1932, Ireland was plunged
into a series of "emergencies". De Valera fulfilled
an election promise to suspend the payment of land
annuities to Britain, and Britain retaliated by
raising import duties on agricultural products to
40%. De Valera swept through the Dáil the "Emergency
Imposition of Duties order" imposing reciprocal
taxes. Economic War had begun.
Limerick's farm-based economy was reduced to a state
of barter. This was the period during which
Ireland's interventionist, control economic style
was developed. The Laissez-faireism of the 1920s was
abandoned in the face of skyrocketing unemployment,
poverty and emigration. The state set up
non-agricultural industries such as Turf Development
Board (Later Bord na Móna) and Aer Rianta (airports
authority). In 1935 Charles Lindbergh was consulted
on the building of an airport on the Shannon Estuary
at Rineanna (later renamed Shannon Airport), and in
1937 Foynes was developed as a stopping point on the
flying boat route across the Atlantic. During this
time, the de Valera government introduced several
emergency laws to suppress the IRA and General Eoin
O' Duffy's fascist Blue-shirt army.
This first Emergency ended in 1938 with the
Anglo-Irish Free Trade Agreement, when Neville
Chamberlain's appeasement policy allowed a climb
down. The UK would end economic sanctions and return
the treaty ports in exchange for a once-off payment
of £10m.
The following year, the outbreak of World War II
forced the introduction of the Emergency Powers Act
to control prices and imports. Ireland, with no
native merchant fleet, and no coal, gas, or oil
supplies faced hard times indeed. An army officer
named Captain McKenna described it as the day
"Realisation dawned on Ireland that the country was
surrounded by water, and that the sea was of vital
importance to her." Towards the end of the war,
shortages of rubber and petrol particularly ended
all non-emergency motorised transport, including
rail, to and within the city. Lord Adare restarted a
four-horse stagecoach route to his hotel in Co.
Limerick, a sight not seen since the 19th century.
The army was expanded massively to over 300,000 in
preparation for the expected invasion by either
Germany, attempting a stepping-stone approach to the
invasion of Britain, or Britain herself, seeking use
of the ports. Knockalisheen barracks (later
Knockalisheen Refugee Camp) was built near Limerick
at Meelick to house the new defence forces.
Post
War
 The
economy of the Limerick area was largely neglected
in the post war period and the city and county
became characterised by extremely high emigration
and unemployment. With the exception of Shannon
Airport and a few related businesses and a few
clothing factories, Limerick had no industry. The
economy was based on farming and services, fuelled
in no insignificant part by remittances from the
extensive diaspora. A few of the many who left
became successful abroad, including the actor
Richard Harris the BBC presenter Terry Wogan, and
the school teacher turned memoirist, Frank McCourt.
Limerick also had a few famous visitors during this
time. In 1963 Irish-American US President John F.
Kennedy visited Limerick as part of his tour of
Ireland. He was presented with a locally produced
christening robe made of Limerick Lace. From 1956,
about 500 Hungarian refugees were housed in
Knockalisheen, near Meelick a few kilometres from
the city, following the failed uprising in their
country. A few settled, but the majority moved on
within a few years to new lives in the UK and North
America due to the bad economic situation in
Limerick.
Shannon airport also attracted a varied crowd. At
this time nearly all transatlantic flights stopped
at the airport, the most westerly in Europe, to
refuel. Irish Times journalist Arthur Quinlan who
was based at Shannon boasts at having interviewed
every US president from Harry Truman to George H. W.
Bush and many Soviet leaders, including Andrey
Vyshinsky and Andrei Gromyko. He also famously
taught Fidel Castro how to make an Irish coffee and
is the only western journalist to have interviewed
Che Guevara.
On March 13th, 1965, Guevara suddenly arrived at the
airport when his flight from Prague to Cuba
developed mechanical problems, and Quinlan was on
hand to interview him. Guevara talked of his Irish
connections through the name Lynch and of his
grandmother's Irish roots in Galway. Later, Che, and
some of his Cuban comrades, went to Limerick city
and adjourned to the Hanratty's Hotel on Glentworth
Street. According to Quinlan, they returned that
evening all wearing sprigs of shamrock, for Shannon
and Limerick were preparing for the St. Patrick's
Day celebrations. (Scotsman Newspaper, The night Che
Guevara came to Limerick, Sun 28 Dec 2003).
In 1968, the government published the Buchanan
Report on the regional dimension to economic
planning which had largely been ignored. The report
recommended on the social and economic
sustainability of industry in the regions, which
gradually lead to investment and improvement in the
Limerick area.
Celtic
Tiger
 The
seemingly sudden economic growth of the 1990s,
termed the Celtic Tiger, making Ireland one of the
richest countries in the world, had deep foundations
stretching back through the 1980s and 1970s.
Shipping in Shannon estuary was developed
extensively during the period with over 2bn pounds
investment.
A tanker terminal at Foynes and an oil jetty at
Shannon Airport were built. In 1982 a massive
Alumina Extraction Plant was built at Aughinish.
60,000-ton cargo vessels now carry raw bauxite from
West African mines to the plant, where it is refined
to alumina. This is then exported to Canada where it
is further refined to aluminium. 1985 saw the
opening of a huge power plant at Moneypoint, fed by
regular visits by 150,000-tonne tankers. EEC funding
was poured into infrastructure.
Industrial estates at Raheen and Plassey (Castletroy),
and energetic government intervention, brought in
numerous foreign firms, notably Analog Devices, Wang
Laboratories and Dell Computers. A science and
engineering focused third-level college called NIHE,
Limerick, elevated since 1992 to university status
as the University of Limerick, and the establishment
of Limerick Institute of Technology, furthered the
area's reputation as Ireland's Silicon Valley.
Thomond College of Education, Limerick was a
successful teacher training college and was
integrated into the university in 1991.
In 1996 the city had a brief moment of world
attention when the Irish writer Frank McCourt
published Angela's Ashes. The book tells of the
author's childhood in a rundown and dirty slum of
the 1930s and 40s. The book won the Pulitzer prize
and was made into a feature film in 1999. The slums
spoken of in the book had long since been removed,
and local people were embarrassed by the sudden
unflattering discussion of the city. When McCourt
wrote the book's sequel, 'Tis, it was answered with
the locally written Tisn't, which painted a better
face on the city.
The appearance of the city has been undergoing a
gradual face-lift: two new bridges over the Shannon,
and soon a tunnel to complete the orbital road; many
of the older buildings have been replaced, some
controversially such as the ancient Cruises Hotel
(see Architecture of Limerick). City architect, Jim
Brown, led the way in turning Limerick around to
face the river. Ireland's third tallest building,
the 58m Riverpoint, completed in 2006, near
Steamboat Quay, an area of fashionable restaurants
overlooking the Shannon.
The new wealth not only halted the high levels of
emigration chronic through the 1980s, but led to the
first large-scale immigration for centuries. The
City now boasts a Russian delicatessen, a Chinese
supermarket and several South Asian, African and
Caribbean food shops. Near the Crescent Shopping
Centre, and down the road from the Mormon church, is
Limerick's first Mosque.
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