Life & Times of Aodogán O'Rahilly, part 2 ....

Editor's note: The original version of Part 1 in this series was shortened by removing published text to Part 2 in order to incorporate additional information within the timeline of this recital, which also helps to explain motivation and raison d'etre behind the actions of Aodogán O'Rahilly.

In 1932, which is the same year that he registered the Weatherwell Tile Company Limited, Aodogán O'Rahilly who had been born at Hove in England, stood as a Fianna Fáil candidate for a seat to represent Dublin South in the dáil of the Irish Free State (1922-1937), without success.

During the following year of 1933, and prior to Aodogán's marriage to Marrion O'Connor, the Irish Free State created the Turf Development Board Ltd. [TDB] to develop Ireland's bogs. The TDB later asked Aodogán to join its board of directors, and because Aodogán could see that future development of the bogs could result in both economic self-reliance for Ireland, as well as a successful commercial venture, he became a key member of its organization.

In 1936, the TDB was renamed Bord na Móna, and that same year Aodogán and his wife Marion built a house now known as "Mooreen" in the townland of Mooreenaruggan near Dublin. "Mooreenaruggan is in the Electoral Division of Clondalkin, in Civil Parish of Clondalkin, in the Barony of Uppercross, in the County of Dublin."
See: https://www.townlands.ie/dublin/uppercross/clondalkin/clondalkin/mooreenaruggan/
The plans used to build their home had allegedly been promoted as the 1932 'House of the Year' and sold by Macy's Department Store in New York City.

During his year of house building near Dublin, Aodogán went in 1936 with the managing director of TBD / Bord na Móna to the USSR on a "fact-finding mission to see how those countries utilised their bogs." But his own inspection of Joe Stalin's Communist Russia ".... led to his disillusionment with Marxism and his rejection of communism as a whole." Aodogán then switched from being a communist flag waver, to pseudo-American-style capitalist, while waving Ireland's economic flag to further its capitalist commerce.

Then, still in 1936, Aodogán went with his Bord na Móna colleague to Meppin in Lower Saxony, Germany, and that visit convinced Aodogán ".... that Ireland could develop its bogs as a viable energy resource with the appropriate financial backing and machinery."

The year 1936 was a momentous period of time in Germany, because Adolph Hitler was both its Head of State and Chancellor, while being addressed as its Führer. In February, Nazi Germany opened the IV Olympic Winter Games; in March it invaded the Rhineland as it morphed into a total dictatorship by enforcing new laws against Jews and other minorities. In August it staged the Summer Olympics with the first live television coverage by any nation, and in November it signed the Anti-Comintern Pact with Japan as an alliance against the Soviet Union.

The years that bled from 1936 into the secretive German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact of August 23, 1939, that resulted in the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany from the west on September 1, 1939; which then triggered a declaration of war on September 3, 1939, by the United Kingdom against Germany; that was in turn followed by communist USSR invading Poland from the east on September 17, 1939; is a somewhat murky period of time when it comes to describing the activities of the O'Rahilly family.

We do know that these were the years when Aodogán's brother was both a barrister by profession, and cheerleader for the Nazi Germany, He hoped to see the defeat of the United Kingdom in World War II, because he was also hoping that a Nazi victory would lead to the total liberation of Ireland from control by the British Crown.

Meanwhile, on the O'Rahilly domestic front, Aodogán and his wife Marion brought several children into this world. They included a daughter named Nuala, who married and had children of her own. Nuala was followed by a son named Eoin, who also married and had children. Then, on May 21, 1940, came another son named Ronan, and thus began his own tale of total obfuscation which we are now stripping back to reveal just what was really going on in this person's life. Aodogán and Marion had two more daughters after the birth of Ronan. They were given the names of Rosin and Iseult, and both married and had children of their own.

We will continue to document the life and times of Aodogán O'Rahilly in tomorrow's Blog.