RIP Eddie O'Connor

[Purple]

Eddie O'Connor, renewable energy pioneer, former chair of Bord Na Mona, founder of Airtricity and the co-founder of Mainstream Renewables and SuperNode died last week at the age of 76.
He should be regarded as a national hero and lauded as such in his passing by our great and good but the I've heard little from politicians and nothing from Micky D. How come wee Micky gets all choked up about musicians and such like (who, if successful avail of very generous tax breaks) but doesn't pause for comment at the passing of a man who improved the world, employed thousands of people and paid truly massive amounts of tax?

 

[redstar]

I suspect he doesn't fit the narrative of who should be celebrated 'officially' by the State.

 

[Purple]

I suspect he doesn't fit the narrative of who should be celebrated 'officially' by the State.

Exactly. Employing lots of people, paying lots of tax and actually making the world a better place doesn't make up for the mortal sin of becoming rich in the process.

 

[trajan]

I took someone's advice here and read Eddie O'Connor's book on his working life.
Till nearly 60, he worked in state companies ESB and Bórd na Móna. The wonder was how someone of his independent mind could have endured the state bureaucracy and still achieve anything. But that's how it was in the 60s, 70s and 80s - it was the state sector or the boat for most Irish engineers. Even the new dairy co-ops needed shareholder scale to provide the funds to start up. O'Connor had it a bit easier insofar as he had a suitable background for starting a wind generation electricity business. But I think it's fair to say he took it further than anyone expected. He sold out in the end. But he still reinvested a lot of his pile in new power generation ventures.

 

[trajan]

Here is young Eddie as a student involved in the famous UCD sit-in in 1969.

Easy to spot, despite the habit of students then to have a jacket and tie for lectures. If you finish the clip, you'll see a much nicer version of Ruairí Quinn at the end using reason and sense - and no political dogma - to argue his case for UCD management reform.

Might be an interesting study to determine as precisely as possible the year in which jacket and ties were no longer worn by most Irish university students . . . My guess would be 1971.

 

[mathepac]

Fags in evidence indoors and out.

 

[Purple]

Fags in evidence indoors and out.

I though you were being homophobic there for a minute

 

[mathepac]

Now now Ted, none of that auld 70's shtuff!

 

[trajan]

On the famed UCD sit-in, it seems it basically started with a small group from one course who got enough of the 1920s NYU style crammed lectures and staged a sit-in. Then the "official" SRC heard of it and organised a big sit-in at the Aula Maxima at Earlsfort. Eddie and Ruairí and Una were part of that operation's planning board. Along with prix comme Myers, 'Red' Feeney and that sort of crowd. They had bolted themselves in with limited grub and water. Eventually a group of moderate academics like Garret Fitz met with them and apparently despite one of Ruairí major gripes being the domineering arrogance of Garret's brother, Desmond, as a useless Head of Architecture, they hammered out a deal with the UCD admins. Desmond Fitz was soon replaced as Head of Architecture but as a tenured chap he had to have a whole new post created for him. I suppose you could say it was an early example of Ruairí doing good for himself under cover of the general welfare of others.

Frank McDonald - environment scribe at the Irish Times - was also involved. I don't know if he floated the notion back then but today he regards it as a major error to have moved UCD to Belfield rather than expand on the adjacent streets' buildings . . .

Just what sort of environment would have resulted from this from a student point of view (accomodation pressures, frish-frash food joints, pubs for country boys, etc) never mind the hassle for the plain folk of Dublin working near Adelaide Road, God only knows. Gimme Lr Rathmines Road on a Saturday night in the late 70s any day

 

[Purple]

All before my time (literally).

 

[trajan]

All before my time (literally).

Before mine too.

That collage of folk history was gleaned from bios of Ruairí and Garrett plus the odd recorded reminiscence from others involved. McDonald's "lost opportunity" for a large Earlsfort campus for UCD came only emerged recently, maybe the 50th anniversary of the 1969 sit-in. (Maybe even Frank himself missed it at the time?) This sit-in was a major historical event in the eyes of those participants who later took up juicy jobs with RTÉ and who insisted on basking in a celebration of the event. Although some did admit that the "revolution in Irish third-level education" they'd hoped would result from it didn't quite materialise thereafter . . . Those students coming through after them failed to pick up the standard, as it were . . .
The notion that real change isn't effected by students but rather by ex-students - now adults and in responsible positions, albeit with families and mortgages - seems forever to evade the consciousness of the RTÉ/UCD set.

Getting back to Eddie O'Connor, we can't accuse him of disappearing after UCD. It took a while but the windmills of energy generation were finally tilted in the right direction by him.