The Great Famine

During the early years of the 1800's, Irish landlords enjoyed the successful times because the prices for agricultural products were high, due to war. After the French at Waterloo were defeated however, the prices fell. The landlords quickly found that they could get more money by turning their land of small farming plots into grazing lands. There was a small problem though...what would they do with the hundreds of tenant farmers living on their estates? But this was a very small problem with a simple answer. They just merely kicked the families out and off of their land (even if their rent was fully paid up) and destroyed the huts the workers lived in so they could not return. There was a lot of these homeless tenant farmer families wandering aimlessly about on the highways, begging for food just to keep alive because of these unjustly acts.
The Irish reply to this outrage was the making of more secret organizations to carry out midnight raids. Some of these organizations were called Rightboys, Thrashers, Ribbonmen, and Whitefoots. The English response to the Irish response was quick. They set up a program of shipping offenders to Australian prisons. Little crimes that today would only get a warning from a judge concluded in severe sentences--for example, one man named Martin Kinsella from Wexford was caught stealing glue. Because of his crime he was sentenced to Australia for seven years. Any crime that was even a little serious received a life sentence.

One might assume that through all the years of depression, nothing worse could happen to the Irish, but then came "The Great Famine". As the nineteenth century progressed, the Irish became very dependent on the potato for their main food source. In fact, a majority of rural people lived on it completely (the potato is one of the few foods that has all the basic vitamins necessary to maintain a human life). Several English committees that studied the economic situation in Ireland warned that if there was a major failure of the potato crop, extensive starvation would result. All these warnings were ignored.

In 1845 it happened, the biggest fear hit Ireland and suddenly became reality. A disease attacked the potato crop and half of the crop was destroyed. People harvested the few potatoes they had and prayed that the next years crop would be an abundant one. But the crop of 1846 suffered even more than the previous year. To add to the misery, that winter was the "severest in living memory". When the 1847 crop failed also, the Irish population of the whole nation was faced with starvation. This is when the first wave of immigrants escaped their starving homeland. The majority of this first group went to Canada because prices were very low--ships bringing lumber to England were glad to receive paying passengers instead of returning to Canada empty. Unfortunately, many of these people carried typhoid and many other diseases with them on to Canada.

Ironically, during these tragic years it was only the potato crop that failed in Ireland. Wheat, oats, beef, mutton, pork, and poultry were all in excellent supply but the Irish-English landlords shipped these to the European continent to soften the starving there and receive a very good profit in return. When people today wonder about the hatred between the Irish and the English, they don't recognize the fact that Irish peoples memory is a long one and that stories are still being told about those ships leaving Irish ports loaded with food at the same time that their ancestors were eating grass to live.

All throughout the years of the horrific famine, which continued past 1847, the English government was unwilling to give any money to Ireland to help with the famine because, as they said, "the Irish will use it only to buy guns to revolt against them." They were also reluctant to provide material aid such as soup kitchens because, "they will get used to the free food and never become of be self-sufficient."

As an sign of how bad things were, when Americans (primarily Quakers) offered to send food to Ireland, England demanded that the food be first landed in England and then transferred to English ships--to assure that the English's shipping interests were fully employed. The American press so taunted this law, asking how greedy could England be at a time when hundreds of thousands of their people were starving, that England finally backed down and let the American ships sail directly to Ireland.

Author C.W. Smith, an Englishwoman herself, was dumfounded by the way her countrymen were behaving during the famine years. As she says, "It is not characteristic of the English to behave as they behaved in Ireland. As a nation, the English have proved themselves of generosity, tolerance, and magnanimity, but not when Ireland is concerned. The moment the very name of Ireland is mentioned, the English seem to bid adieu to common feeling, common prudence, and common sense, and to act with the barbarity of tyrants and the fatuity of idiots."

In 1849, Queen Victoria decided to visit Ireland. Press stories reported the pomp and circumstance escorted her arrival in Cork harbor. They described the great variety of troops and bands as she arrived by ship and it was this day that William Kindles became a local hero. A huge Union Jack was flying over the dock directly above the spot where the Royal parade was to pass. Somehow, William was able to get near the flagpole and cut the ropes so the flag dropped on the heads of the lead marching band (he promptly emigrated to America).

During the Queen's visit no expense was spared to make the tour a success. At one banquet, $5,000 was spent on food and wine alone. The Duke of Leinster, one of the better Irish-English landowners and landlord over the area where many of the Chinless lived, was disgusted with the overwhelming spending. He wondered how in this land where hundreds of thousands were starving, where a family of six could be kept alive for a week for less than $1, the Queen's government could justify spending thousands of dollars to entertain a privileged few for one night!

It is estimated one and a half million people died of starvation and disease in The Great Famine. Another million people emigrated, the people that had bitter feelings about the land they loved. Some cut off all ties with the motherland and never looked back. The majority however, never lost their love for the land they left. They continued to follow what was happening in Ireland. They talked and sang about it as they gathered together at social events. It was said of this immigrant generation that few found success and prosperity in America...this had to wait for their children's and grandchildren's generations.

"For the great Gaels of Ireland
Are the Men that God made mad.
For all their wars are merry
For all their songs are sad."

"The magic of the witty films" by Alejandra Vargas

If you just want to have a good time, you probably would like to see
Speed 3, one of the episodes of the Father Ted, an Irish popular
television programme.

The show depicts the lives of three Irish Catholic priests on the
remote fictional ‘Craggy Island’, I mean, somewhere on the west coast
of Ireland. Their names are Ted, Dougal and I really don’t remember
the name of the retired and wasted one… ¿Is he Jack?, I don’t Know.
Ah!, and there is also the housekeeper, Mss Doyle, an eccentric and
ugly old woman with a terrible make up.

Speed 3 is actually a short and witty TV show that parodies the film
‘Speed’, This was a movie in the 90’s with the spectacular performing
of Keanu Reeves and the graceful Sandra Bullock. In that one, there is
a bus that had to speed around the L.A. suburbs, keeping its speed
over 50 miles per hour, and if its speed dropped, the vehicle would
explode!

Instead of the handsome guys, the scholar bus and the humanity of the
actions, in this Irish parody we had about three parish priests, some
old naked ladies and a milkman –named Pat Mustrad- that ‘delivers more
than milk products around the cities’. Did you see the coincidence?
No? It’s a comedy: that’s exactly the point.

To figure out what was happening with the milky man the ‘men of God’
made a plan and discover a surprising truth.

After that, another surprise came out and they finally realised that
their faith can’t help them. Use a brick or make a Mess seem like the
only solutions of a huge problem for them. At this point all the
priests become so ridiculous and naive to me, but not wooden. It is
funny and ironic too.

You have to guess the rest of the story, it’s really entertaining: not
spectacular or stunning, but neither tedious or dull. Music isn’t that
gorgeous.

I just want to add that you won’t be in the edge of the seat, but you
will laugh at lot if you keep reading the subtitles. Be aware that,
sometimes, it is difficult to understand the Irish accent. Maybe is
better to see this film with popcorns at home.

Father Ted's Speed3 Chapter Review by Fabiola

“Speed 3” is one of the chapters of Father Ted’s series, an Irish comedy set in the west coast of that country. The main characters are three catholic priests: Father Ted, Father Dougal and Father Jack, and their housekeeper Mrs. Doyle.

In this chapter, there’s a new man in the village who brings many changes and problems. Mrs. Doyle shows a big transformation while Father Dougal gets involved in an unusual adventure. However, Father Ted will have to try and keep the order in the village at the time he manages to avoid the new dangerous pet of Father Jack.

Despite being a low cost production, this is a hilarious and creative chapter that keeps your attention from the very beginning. It has good performances and a very entertaining plot. I found this chapter in particular very funny and gripping because it wasn’t predictable. I’d give it four stars.

father Ted ** Prisilla :)

A hilarious Irish comedy, this is Fathers Ted TV show.
The characters are three priest called Ted ,Jack and Dougal, and their maid Mrs. Doyle. Jack l is always drunk; Ted is always resolving issues and estranges situations that happen around the parochial house , Jack is just like a puppet who does everything Ted says and Mrs. Doyle giving them tea, and smiling stupidly .
This Irish comedy will make laugh a lot, because in every episode happens non sense things, and the characters are dumps, in everything they do or say .
Speed three
In speed three, we will see a new character “The milkman”, all women in the neighborhood are in love of him, even though he is fat and has an ugly mustache maybe he is a Gentleman. In speed three also Mrs. Doyle is in love of him she looks different because she wears make up every time the milkman came to the parochial house to leave milk. She thinks that she looks sexy but she doesn’t.
This episode goes around a mystery ¿ is the milkman dating with all girls in the neighborhood? There many babies that look like him … Ted and Dougal decided to resolve the mystery spying the milkman to find and answer.
They did everything more complicated as always they do, with stupid solutions. But at the end they found that the milk ma was a womanizer, in every house he left milk, he stayed with the woman of the house. Dougal was hired as the new milk man … He took the job with difficulty; he is not very smart to do that; eventhough he almost got killed by the milkman Ted could save him .
An irsih comedy that you’ll enoy all the time, those characters with their stupid things are unpredictable and completely funny, you never know what they are going to do or what are they going to say. But at the end of every episode you just are expecting the other one, because you enjoy more than you expect .

Father Ted Review, by Alvaro Chacón V.

Father Ted is a very funny and entertaining Irish comedy that relates different situations in which a group of fathers of an island are involved.

The episode ‘’Speed 3’’ is about how Father Ted, who plays the leading role, and his partners Father Dougal and Father Jack find out a very suspicious connection between the milkman and the babies of the town. Father Ted thinks up on a plan to collect some proof to catch the milkman who will be sacked because of the information shown. But the milk delivery business can’t be suspended and Father Dougal, a kind of slow and silly father but honest, is chosen to be the new milkman.

That’s the moment when Pat Mustard, the milkman who is a fat and disagreeable person, tries to take revenge of the fathers and the plot turns into an hilarious parody of the famous movie ‘’Speed’’, but the bomb is planted into the milk cart instead of a bus. The Fathers are very distressed for saving Father Dougal’s life and they make several stupid attempts to release their friend from the risk of the bomb that is just about to go off.

Speed 3 is a very creative and clever episode where people will guffaw during 30 minutes of a very different and refreshing sense of humour.

Father Ted review, by Milena Madriz

Father Ted is a comic Irish series, it takes place in a small island where three fathers and their maid live together in the parochial house. They have different personalities, one of them, Father Jack, is always drank, the other one, Father Dougal, is a completely idiot, Father Ted has to deal with all of this and the maid who is always thinking about making tea.

Speed three episode is about how Father Ted has to deal with a new problem which it's about a threat they received, which comes from the milkman who was the lover of all the housewives in the island, and we have to mention too, that the housekeeper Mrs Doyle fancy him, the milkman. The huge problem is about a bomb which involves Father Dougal, while the others have to find a way to help him and save him from a fatal ending.

It could sound like a soap opera but it's not, this is much better. It's a hilarious tale, with a very good and funny performance. The plot is really entertaining, this comedy is gripping, you're not going to stop laughing. The scenery and the costumes are very convincing, it's not a first rate series but you will enjoy it a lot.