History
During the Easter Rising of 1916, the GPO served as the headquarters of the uprising's leaders. The assault by the British forces extensively damaged the building and it was not repaired until the Irish Free State government took up the task some years later. The original columns outside are still pocked with bullet-marks. An original copy of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic is on display in the An Post museum at the GPO, where an exhibition highlights the history of the postal service and the GPO. The building has remained a symbol of Irish nationalism. In commemoration of the Rising, a statue depicting the death of the mythical hero Cúchulainn sculpted by Oliver Sheppard in 1911 is housed in the front of the building and was featured on the Irish ten shilling coin of 1966. Despite its fame as an iconic place of Irish freedom, ground rent continued to be paid to English and American landlords until the 1980s.
The broadcasting studios of 2RN, which later became Radio Éireann, were located at the GPO from 1928 until the 1960s. Draws for Prize Bonds are held weekly, on Fridays, in the building.
Nelson's Pillar was formerly located in the centre of O'Connell Street adjacent to the GPO, however the Pillar was destroyed by the IRA in an explosion in 1966. The Spire of Dublin now takes a dominant position on the site of the Pillar.
Read more about this topic: General Post Office (Dublin)
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Certainly there is not the fight recorded in Concord history, at least, if in the history of America, that will bear a moment’s comparison with this, whether for the numbers engaged in it, or for the patriotism and heroism displayed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“We don’t know when our name came into being or how some distant ancestor acquired it. We don’t understand our name at all, we don’t know its history and yet we bear it with exalted fidelity, we merge with it, we like it, we are ridiculously proud of it as if we had thought it up ourselves in a moment of brilliant inspiration.”
—Milan Kundera (b. 1929)
“You treat world history as a mathematician does mathematics, in which nothing but laws and formulas exist, no reality, no good and evil, no time, no yesterday, no tomorrow, nothing but an eternal, shallow, mathematical present.”
—Hermann Hesse (1877–1962)