The Harvest Emergency of Ireland 1946

Volunteers and farmers reflect on the harvest emergency of 1946, when thousands of volunteers joined with The Nations’s farmers to help salvage the harvest.

[@volusian95]

Love this channel

[@anascal]

I remember that year, and the wheat sprouting in the stacks, my father with tears in his eyes contemplating a bleak winter. Luckily the sun came out next day, Sept 6th and there was relief.

[@780special]

This deserves a wide audience. Thank you.

[@sayitloudlynothing5406]

Wow thats great so many came to help the farmers at that time

[@buckodonnghaile4309]

The work wasn't light but the hands were many

[@mrsinn2642]

Thanks as always. Would love to see more of this.

[@Irish780]

Fantastic colour video of times gone by

[@COIcultist]

Video? In honour of my father I will state the obvious. It was "Filum!"

[@ropaul8006]

We could use that spirit now

[@dellhell8842]

The harvest that year was so wet, public servants, etc. were redeployed to the farms.

[@Monaleenian]

What farms? Private farms? It almost sounds like we had Soviet style collective farms!

[@dellhell8842]

@@Monaleenian Yes, private farms. Both public sector and private sector employees volunteered to help out. The country was facing potential famine.

[@Monaleenian]

@@dellhell8842 Mad stuff altogether. Hard to believe we were so exposed to starvation by 1 bad harvest 100 years after the famine.

[@dellhell8842]

@@Monaleenian It was just after the WW2 emergency and food rationing. There is a good article on it online from Maynooth University called Rationing in Emergency Ireland, 1939-48 in the section called Battle for the Harvest.

[@COIcultist]

Monaleenian. It was 1946. Lots of the world was short of food especially Europe. Britain had far harsher rationing after the war than during it in an attempt to help feed Europe. Britain was still having harsh rationing into the 50s. My father came over in the late 40s and if you had money Ireland was relatively a land of plenty.

[@johnmccasthy6153]

Life was so natural and simple

[@edwardogrady6587]

As long as you didn’t do anything to upset the parish priest or the local guard, natural & simple times indeed.

[@GK-fq3cy]

Thought it didn't rain back in the good old days ☺️

[@paulc3749]

what great people

[@anacasanova7350]

Cuanto han sufrido los irlandeses con su cruel vecina.😢 Ahora se han hecho fuertes con muchos siglos de sufrimientos. Se merecen lo que han conseguido.😊🇪🇸

[@rockyroadblues100]

Si gracias Ana

[@markharris1223]

Delightful!

[@joelarkin4268]

I love the videos about lreland 🇮🇪☘️☘️☘️🌈

[@Rbenson1979]

1800s... technology.. saved the day..

[@sdrtcacgnrjrc]

Very interesting video. I presume the footage in the fields is a reenactment EDIT// possibly AI enhanced/ restored footage from the time (see reply below)

[@msb9997]

I believe this might be AI enhanced. Meaning - taking the original film that is then 'AI upscaled to 60fps, 4k depth awareness'. It's amazing!. Really brings the old footage film to life.

[@sdrtcacgnrjrc]

@@msb9997 that makes sense (it looks authentic)

[@dellhell8842]

The film is almost certainly authentic and not a reenactment. The clothes, the hair styles and the general gait of the people appear to be realistic and are not as you would see in a reenactment. And then there's the machinery. While the tractor at 0:56 is a Fordson, which was very common then and many are still preserved and available today, the tractor at 3:06 is a very rare Allis Chalmers WC tricycle model. The working life of this tractor ended in the early sixties if not much before that, and while there a few preserved in the country, having something so rare in a reenactment is very unlikely.

[@caezar55]

Good honest work in those days...nowadays they'd be screaming for a free house off the government and voting for SF/IRA.

[@dY5FUNCT10N4L]

You do realise we gave out land and houses in those days?

[@pourgeois1308]

What? Haha

[@barra6709]

@@dY5FUNCT10N4L I'd imagine they went to Irish citizens back then.

[@Morningstar-xz5bl]

now they are paying farmers to destroy crops

[@vespasian266]

When spending money on imported american grain is worse than starving people to death. and no doubt the farmers got paid for the crop why'll the volunteers got a thank you very much.

[@edwardogrady6587]

And the crop grew all by itself with absolutely no input or establishment costs?

[@georgedoorley5628]

the country was that poor then it was not an option .........grain was very very expensive compared to what price it is today .................lots of the volunteers were the employees of local business that were owed money for the imputs that grew the crop ..........if the crop was lost .....they were not far behind ........

[@georgedoorley5628]

i remember a bad harvest in 1986 when it looked like it would be lost .........weather took up in mid september after 3 weeeks of solid rain .........grain intake near me ran 24 hours a day when there was suitable weather ..........they had a lot of credit given to farmers and it was just as important for them to get in the crop ....one worker that was a union man closed the gates one sat night at 8 ........manager reopened them in under a hour and took over his post . till he came in on sunday morning at 9 am ...........he was on holidays for the rest of the harvest for his own protection .......

[@edwardogrady6587]

@@georgedoorley5628 Agriculture & unions were never the best of friends, especially in a case like this. God controls the weather, not unions

[@df289]

Dubs always saving the country

[@thomasphelan4691]

Wow climate change in 1946

[@connoroleary591]

1946 was followed by 1947, the worst winter in memory. But keep it under your cap. We must keep up the pretence that until the 1980's, the climate was a slow, benevolent and predictable force. It was the change to wet cloudy summers in the 1840's that caused the potato blight to destroy the potato harvests The Irish Times tells us that: "all the temperature gagues are going the wrong way". What way do they want them to go? One or two degrees colder for Ireland would mean a huge cut in food production. There is a great silliness abroad.

[@PVAglue-fi4kc]

Yea, it would be far worse is the planet was getting colder.

[@thomasreilly6362]

​@@connoroleary591 Its pored with rain almost all year but the shores are bone dry after a few hours. The lakes and rivers are at the same levels all year round. There has been little growth grass as its been too cold from April to September. Houses have had fires lit all summer. We couldn't put the cattle back until late February. 2024 has been a poor year.