Stories and photos sought to mark ifas 60th anniversary

Damian McCarney

The editorial of The Anglo-Celt dated January 1, 1955 called for farmers to unite under one organisation, to strengthen their bargaining position. Clearly the Celt’s editor was reflecting on a national debate as a fortnight later the National Farmers’ Movement, the precursor to the Irish Farmers Association, was formed. In March of that year the Celt reports on a trio of organising meetings in Bailieborough. Ballyconnell and Ballinagh - where names like George Claxton, chairman of Meath Macra na Feirme, Bennie Donohoe of Templeport Macra and a Mr A M Smith appear as vocal advocates of the new organisation. These milestones in the Association’s formation locally, are outlined in a dossier that Declan Fitzpatrick hands across the table in Belturbet’s Seven Horseshoes Hotel.
Declan is part of the committee tasked with compiling a book to commemorate the IFA’s 60th anniversary. With the whos, whats, wheres and whens detailed already compiled in this print-out, the back of the work is broken on the first 30 years.
The painstaking work has been done by researcher Sean Colgan who, courtesy of a TÚS scheme, has spent 19 hours a week sifting through Johnston Central Library’s archive of The Anglo-Celts.
“He’s flying through it,” says Declan admiringly in his gentle manner. “For us to do that research would have took an age.”
The book committee is made up of former county chairman and secretaries and the commemorative book will be edited by former Celt editor Johnny O’Hanlon and published this autumn. Declan has been an IFA member for the last 30 years and served a four year stint as county secretary.
“For better or for worse I was given the role of contacting the 32 branches in Cavan,” he says. “Since late January I’ve contacted every branch, phoned branch chairpersons or met them on my travels, explained to them we’re doing the book.”

Showed its strength
He’s in search for items of interest - old photos, stand-out memories and stories for inclusion. Amongst the items sought includes pictures and names of those who participated in a famous protest march to Dublin in 1966.
There’s still some like Declan’s Belturbet neighbour, Paddy O’Reilly, who remembers suffering the blisters in the epic march to the capital to stand up for farmers’ rights.
“That’s when the organisation showed its strength,” says Declan.
Why were they marching?
“I was only three at the time,” he says with a laugh, that shows the genuine need for the commemorative book to preserve key moments in the organisation’s history.
“Well it was basically the same issue of prices of product,” he supposes. “We seem to be still marching.”
Declan has huge admiration for those farmers who shaped the IFA in those formative years.
“People of my age don’t appreciate the work the founding members put in. I was involved in farming organisations myself and I realise the background work that goes on - the hard digging and phoning people and encouraging people. It must have been even more difficult them times because there were no mobile phones.”
He relays reminiscences of Paddy O’Reilly, who was also a county secretary in the 1960s - to organise a meeting, say in the Farnham Hotel as county meetings were in those days, they had to notify branch members by letter.
“You had to organise get some man with a car - there wasn’t too many, to go to a meeting in Cavan. Whereas now if there’s a meeting to be held in Cavan you get a text and we all get in our cars. It was 10 times the work at that time.”
While many of the branches now only meet once a year, Declan believes that the work in establishing them in each community has paid dividends.
“What makes the IFA work is the branch structure at county level. If there is ever an event or a protest being organised in Dublin, what happens is the county chairperson contacts the branches and they get the members out - that’s how it works.”
He proudly notes Cavan’s role in national campaigns with greater numbers of protesters heading east down the N3 on for demonstrations than many larger counties. Does he think that the Cavan organisation is as strong as it was 60 years ago?

Difficulty
“It is, but the difficulty in getting farmers out nowadays is that you have so many part-time farmers - they are not going to be available. If you are a part-time farmer, you are not going to be able to take a day off to go to Dublin. That’s the practicalities of it. The road that I live on is four miles long and there’s about 16 or 17 farms and yet there’s only three full-time farmers. When I started farming, 30 years ago, three quarters were full-time farmers, maybe more.”
Does Declan think the IFA will be here in another 60 years?
“I have thrown out the challenge to get someone to write an article for the book looking 60 years forward,” he says, cleverly deflecting the question.
“We are looking for some young person, hopefully to write and article on how they see farming develop over the next 60 years.”
When Declan looks back at how many farmers there were in 1955 compared to now - is there going to be a similar drop-off in farmers in the future?
“Between the land I own now and rent, I would have owned three farms 60 years ago. I’m farming it on my own; that used to be three households and three farmsteads. With modern machinery nowadays you can do a lot - one man could farm three or four farms from years ago. So, if that trend continues, how many farmers would there be? In the 1950s there were something like 400,000 farmers - there’s 100,000 now or less and of that 100,000 there’s probably only 30,000 full-time farmers. That’s a massive.”
Does it not get you down?
“I love farming, that was all that I ever wanted to do. I often talk to people with a different view; people who own land and who are farmers, who haven’t a liking for it. For farmers you have to like it - you are not on duty for 24 hours but you’re there and you are living on the job - particularly this time of year when you have cows calving.”
What has been the stand out achievement of the IFA over the last 60 years?
“What the IFA has campaigned on over the years is price - price for their product, whether its dairy or beef or whatever. If there wasn’t an IFA would we be getting the same prices for our product now? It’s an unknown.
“To some degree I think farmers have got very good at farming in terms of technical stuff and production. But what’s happened the product when it leaves the gate, maybe that’s where they should be focussing more.”

To contribute to the book contact Declan Fitzpatrick on 049 9522 758. All pictures will be scanned within 10 working days and returned to sender, please ensure that you include your postal address.