We are very fortunate that we have, within our membership, some dedicated historians who have undertaken great research on the past activities and personalities of our club.
We are conscious of boredom setting in during this current period of no football and all of us adjusting to spending more time at home, so we are going to endeavour to provide you with some reading material over the next few weeks in the hope that we can alleviate some of that.
First up we have the second edition of a pamphlet ‘The Enduring Legacy of an Idle Youth’ by club member Ciarán Priestley.
An Ebook/PDF version to download or view is now available.
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Originally printed in 2010, this 2020 updated second edition pamphlet focuses on the founding of the club in 1890 and some of the club’s key figures from that era and around the turn of the 20th century.
The author Ciarán Priestley writes:
“During a tumultuous period in Irish history, a small group of young Dubliners decided to embark upon an ambitious project to start a club from the ground up and play the emerging sport of Association football.
“While their well-heeled education had honed their skills and promised much, their young adult lives were afforded indulgence and little substance.
“In defiance of an overly-extended and idle youth, the Bohemian Football Club was created as a vehicle for ambition, improvement, victory and loss.
“While those who assembled at the Gate Lodge in the Phoenix Park on 6 September 1890 have long since departed, the club created in their image has survived many generations since.
“The Bohemian Football club of 2020 may live closer to the values of its founders than at any other moment in its history.”
Ciarán originally intended holding a talk on the pamphlet in The Back Page on April 1. That will now obviously be put on hold. But in the meantime, you can listen back to a talk he gave to Dublin City Libraries in 2014.
We will have more reading material in the coming days and weeks. But if you have any particular articles of interest that you would like to see revived and circulated among our members, please don’t hesitate to suggest them to me at pro@bohemians.ie.
Similarly, if you wish to submit a new article for consideration, please get in touch.
