Rory & Ita (19 page)

‘When I started the apprenticeship, I went to the school of printing, at Bolton Street College of Technology, a half-day, every day, for two years. And the following two years I went to night classes, twice a week. The third year was book work, how to design and assemble books, and then, in the fourth year, general display and jobbing.
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I was always interested in the display aspect of print, and thought I’d like to develop my knowledge and skills. So I went, first of all, to Rathmines, the technical college there, and found that it was more geared towards advertising agency work. And I discovered, after general conversations with other students,
that the advertising agencies offered a whole lot of jobs; nice jobs to go to, you were honoured to work for them, but they didn’t pay you much. Unless you owned the place, you got paid buttons, but you felt good. So I said to myself, “That’s no good for me,” as I was earning a good wage as a compositor, and I decided that I might learn more in the National College of Art. So I went there the following year. I originally went to learn design – that’s what I signed up for – but there was this Dutch professor who had a habit of imposing his ideas on the students. Everybody ended up with the same-looking poster, or that sort of thing. That wasn’t what I really wanted, so I changed my mind and decided to go to drawing school.

‘I discovered that I liked the pure art aspect, and I forgot about commercial design. I could do design work but I became much more interested in the aesthetics of art. You couldn’t make a living; it seemed that most of the best contemporary artists had to teach to survive. But it was much more attractive to me. And, of course, there was the wonderful world of the galleries. At that time, the drawings and etchings of the masters, Rembrandt and Orpen and O’Sullivan, were on display in the National Gallery, and I loved them. I learned about perspective, and then went and did a lot of drawing in what was known as “the antique,” that is, drawings of plaster casts of classical figures and heads. Then I was promoted, to go to life class. It was a great achievement, the idea of drawing real naked women. When I told people, they got quite excited. In fact, it was an artistic thing; one never thought of it in terms of being sexual. It was just the art. But I think my friends thought I was just a dirty old man, in a privileged position.’ He doesn’t
remember any of the models. ‘They came and they went. But there’s one man I remember, a German, a fighter pilot who’d been a prisoner of war in the Curragh camp. I think his name was Heinz Grau – that’s the name in my memory. He attended the College but, now and again, he sat as a model. He was a rather arrogant man. We didn’t know much about Nazis or their attitudes because we’d been sheltered from it, but it was only after the War ended, and in the years after, when I was looking at films, I began to see him as the quintessential Nazi. He had it in his very expression, manners and behaviour. He’d go about taking up your space in the drawing room, as if it was his, and, once or twice I had to remind him to take a walk or to move aside, because he was standing in the way. He’s the only one of the models I can really remember, because I still have a pencil drawing of him.

‘I went to the College of Art in the evenings. I started going twice a week during the first year, and I ended up going five times a week. I had a ball. I got involved in the students’ society as well, and actually got to editing a students’ magazine called the
Garret
. It was short-lived; everybody read it, but few bought it. We also spent weekends sketching, in places like Powerscourt and the zoo. And we went to all sorts of peculiar places, for parties. There were many places around Leeson Street; some of the students had digs there. I went to one party, and I brought along something in a brown paper bag. The room was three flights up, and we thought we’d open a window; there was a terrible smell in there. One of my friends opened the window, and the next thing we saw was a drop of three storeys – it was a door that opened to a drop. It may originally have been some kind of
warehouse. But it was only the grace of God that stopped one of us from falling out. After all that, the parties and the dances, I’d get my bicycle and go home, find my dinner that my mother had left in the oven, eat the dinner, go to bed, and be up to go to work in the morning. It was a great life.

‘I had my first bottle of stout in McDaid’s. It didn’t taste good but everybody else looked like they’d been drinking it all their lives, and I wasn’t going to be any different. So I stuck it out; it took me about an hour and a half. After three bottles of stout you’d be ready to sing, fight, or have a deep philosophical conversation with neither beginning nor end. I’d gone with Dick McGuirk and Jack Gleeson, from the College of Art, and a couple of other characters. We decided we’d get adventurous and we went down to McDaid’s, which was frequented by many artistic types. There were four of us at the College of Art who, generally, worked and partied together, or went to dances. I’d already known Dick McGuirk from secondary school; he was an accomplished water-colourist. There was Des O’Sullivan, a laconic type who, somehow, was always up to speed with the news and gossip of the art world. Kevin Borbridge was the fourth man; he was always in need of fixing up with a girl for the dances.

‘We drank bottles of stout. There were very clear distinctions about what was drunk. There was stout, which was in bottles. It was Guinness, but every pub had its
own labels; it was bottled down in the cellars. When you were in the pub, you called for a bottle of stout. You could also call for a pint, but that was porter. Working-class men drank pints. The porter was also Guinness, but was a brownish colour, more brown than the black Guinness stout. So, a “pint” was a pint of porter. I never drank one. I drank bottles of stout. Occasionally, you’d go wild and ask for “a small one,” a small whiskey; that was when you were feeling good. A lot of regular drinkers would call for a bottle of stout and a chaser – a small whiskey. Pints were rarely drunk. There were, however, a few clients who asked for a “half and half,” a mixture of stout and porter.

‘About the time of the polio epidemic – it must have been in the early 50s – the iron lung was introduced, to save people’s lives. This apparatus helped to control muscular movement and breathing. It was, literally, a miracle machine. At that time, Guinness introduced the big aluminium pressure kegs, to replace the traditional barrels. The drinking fraternity discovered that there was a consistency to the drink from the new barrel, so they’d say they wanted a pint “from the lung”. That’s when the universal drinking of pints of stout started.

‘One particular night we went into McDaid’s and we were into our second bottle, and someone said, “There’s Behan coming in the door,” and we all just left our drinks and went out the other door. When Brendan Behan walked into a pub, contrary to what everybody is writing now, as many people as possible drifted out, because he could be the most obnoxious individual – a dreadful personality. He’d insult everyone in sight, and demand that you buy him drink – and then pass remarks about your sisters and mother. I find it very amusing,
and difficult to take seriously, all these famous people talking about the Brendan Behan they loved. He had no friends in my young days. I think he only got friends when he’d earned a lot of money. Naturally, he got friends then, but he was a dreadful nuisance and a bowsie.’

‘I started my apprenticeship at eight o’clock on the 8th of July, 1940, and it ended seven years later, 1947. I was now on full pay; I’d a pocket full of money. I got slightly silly drunk with a lot of my friends, celebrating. I came back down to earth the following week when I discovered that a lot of people had been hanging around, waiting for me after my seven years in Purgatory, and their hands out in all directions. The Revenue Commissioners took a greater interest in the few bob. My mother thought I was earning a fortune now, and demanded that I make a bigger contribution, because she had a house full of younger ones who had to be looked after. I thought they were already well-looked-after but, however, I increased my contribution. At one stage, after two or three weeks as a journeyman, I was contemplating going to Australia.
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However, I settled down to life as it was.

‘I stayed on at Juverna Press for a year or so. But I was beginning to get restless because I’d been there seven
years and, as well as that, I’d been regularly promised that I was going to be flung out when I’d finished my apprenticeship; there was no doubt that I was going to get the boot. That was the usual fate of apprentices; you got your walking papers and became a journeyman, and there were seldom jobs to be had in Dublin. It was a bit of a worry, there in the back of my mind. But here I was in 1947, and into 1948, and there was a scarcity of craftsmen, business was beginning to pick up, and there was no sign of anyone wanting to deprive me of a livelihood. So I started looking around. I discovered that the best-paid jobs were in the newspapers. But you had to get into a newspaper first, and that wasn’t easy. You had to take the chance of applying for summer work. The papers had such huge staffs that, during the holiday season, there were always vacancies which were filled by casual labour. You took a chance of being appointed to a permanent job. So I took the great gamble and applied to the
Irish Independent
. I was interviewed by the works manager, an Englishman called Bell. To my surprise, I got a job almost straight away; I got a telephone call, at Juverna Press. Then I gave in my notice and all hell broke loose.

‘Jacko, my uncle, was out sick,
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and the manager, Hennebery, went wild when I gave in my notice. He didn’t want to lose me; I’m not boasting, but I was a good, skilled worker and good men were now scarce. Hennebery pointed out how good the firm had been to me. All I could think of was the hardship and tormenting I’d endured all that time; I didn’t hold it against them but I wasn’t going to gratify them either. He then said
that I’d get an additional half-a-crown over the rate, if I stayed. I gently reminded him that he’d promised to fire me at least a dozen times, when I had completed my apprenticeship. The poor man, a fundamentally decent sort, couldn’t understand how and why I could be so ungrateful. He danced around the place and was nearly crying at the idea that I was going to leave them in the lurch. But I did.

‘So I went to work for the
Independent
, to a totally different world. There was no yesterday, no tomorrow, only today – now. When you commenced in the paper each day, there was hardly a sound. The odd metallic sound, if somebody dropped something, but everything was quiet. But then, very gradually, the tempo began to rise. People would arrive, editors, journalists, advertising clerks. They’d whisper something to the stone man,
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who was busy assembling the pages. And then the bits of paper began to fly out from the overseer’s little office; each story was cut up into small takes.
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The linotype operators, when available, would walk up to the overseer; they were handed a piece of the story, and the noise would increase, especially after
9
pm. The linotype hall was an absolute bedlam of clanking machine parts. And the stink of metals, all beautiful – you were part of it. Then everybody would be shouting at everyone, as you came near to printing time; an enormous
amount of din that kept increasing. Certain pages were sent away to be processed by the stereotypers, into big metal plates that were fitted on to the printing press. But the main, important pages, like the news and the sports, were held back until the very last minute. Journalists dashed hither and yon. In the clamour, men exchanged the vilest of insults and forgot about them until the next time they’d had a few jars. And then the editor, in all his majesty, would appear and he would make a pronouncement about closing the edition. The din and the shouting and the roaring gradually ceased, but it happened every day. And you never discussed yesterday’s paper, unless you’d made an awful mistake and there was an inquiry. And tomorrow’s paper – that was non-existent.