O'Flaherty is as an archaeologist and surveyor at Rubicon Heritage in
Cork. During a work project four years ago, one of these empty
schoolhouses caught his eye. He soon found himself spending weekends
capturing images of old schoolhouses and posting them on his blog, where
they especially resonated with the Irish diaspora and caught the
attention of publishers Collins Press.
Sadly not all traditional schoolhouses were so fortunate. Abandoned school buildings, once so pivotal to generations of families, pockmark the Irish landscape. Some 240 of these hauntingly beautiful time capsules have been photographed by Enda O'Flaherty and feature in his new book, The Deserted Schoolhouses of Ireland.
"I literally went from Malin Head to Mizen Head during this pet project," he says.
"Every weekend, I'd pull out a map of, say, Monaghan, set up the satnav and search for these deserted schoolhouses. I did that for three years and there isn't a corner of the countryside I haven't been in."
Most are situated in isolated spots on the Atlantic coastline, on offshore islands, and in border counties.
They were abandoned thanks to a combination of depopulation, emigration abroad and centralisation in towns from the 1950s to the 1990s thanks to the arrival of public transport. Many originated from the relaxation of the Penal Laws which prohibited Catholics from formal education between 1695 and 1782. The First Report of the Commissioners of Irish Education Inquiry of 1825 concluded that separate education caused sectarianism and recommended public money for schools only when Catholic and Protestant pupils were taught together. Between 1833 and 1849, the number of new national schools surged to 4,300 and by 1900, there were almost 8,700.
"They are built with quite high ceilings, generally one-and-a-half storeys single leaf, with rubble and mortar construction used until the 1930s." The number of one and two-teacher schools had fallen by 1,100 by 1973, and the disused buildings began to fall into despair. The archaeologist is now calling for national coordinated efforts to document the exact number of schoolhouses across the country with a view to repurpose as many as possible before they are lost forever. An obvious solution is to offer them for conversion to private homes.
In the last two decades, house-hunters with a penchant for an unusual
property have given dozens of abandoned schoolhouses a new lease of
life as family homes, often by hiring architects to add a contemporary
extension.
In O'Flaherty's experience, those residential conversions typically take place in regions with thriving tourism industries where owners can rent them out as holiday lets.
"All abandoned schoolhouses are rescuable to some degree, apart from those on offshore islands where the weather from the Atlantic can reduce them to a shell," he says. "About 50pc are recorded in the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage. If they are afforded protection, the new owners are supposed to use materials that were originally used in the building and they can be very expensive, deterring a repurpose.
"I'd like to see an assessment of what could be done with all these buildings and a comprehensive record of the number of them out there.
"These buildings are not just bricks and mortar. People contact me through my blog to talk about a grandfather who attended a school until they emigrated at the age of 13 or 14. Those emigrants never came home again, and the school could be the last memory they ever had of Ireland."
Enda O'Flaherty visited 240 abandoned Irish schools on camera with striking results.
Deserted Schoolhouses of Ireland is published by Collins Press (€24.99)
Sadly not all traditional schoolhouses were so fortunate. Abandoned school buildings, once so pivotal to generations of families, pockmark the Irish landscape. Some 240 of these hauntingly beautiful time capsules have been photographed by Enda O'Flaherty and feature in his new book, The Deserted Schoolhouses of Ireland.
"I literally went from Malin Head to Mizen Head during this pet project," he says.
"Every weekend, I'd pull out a map of, say, Monaghan, set up the satnav and search for these deserted schoolhouses. I did that for three years and there isn't a corner of the countryside I haven't been in."
Most are situated in isolated spots on the Atlantic coastline, on offshore islands, and in border counties.
They were abandoned thanks to a combination of depopulation, emigration abroad and centralisation in towns from the 1950s to the 1990s thanks to the arrival of public transport. Many originated from the relaxation of the Penal Laws which prohibited Catholics from formal education between 1695 and 1782. The First Report of the Commissioners of Irish Education Inquiry of 1825 concluded that separate education caused sectarianism and recommended public money for schools only when Catholic and Protestant pupils were taught together. Between 1833 and 1849, the number of new national schools surged to 4,300 and by 1900, there were almost 8,700.
"They are built with quite high ceilings, generally one-and-a-half storeys single leaf, with rubble and mortar construction used until the 1930s." The number of one and two-teacher schools had fallen by 1,100 by 1973, and the disused buildings began to fall into despair. The archaeologist is now calling for national coordinated efforts to document the exact number of schoolhouses across the country with a view to repurpose as many as possible before they are lost forever. An obvious solution is to offer them for conversion to private homes.
In O'Flaherty's experience, those residential conversions typically take place in regions with thriving tourism industries where owners can rent them out as holiday lets.
"All abandoned schoolhouses are rescuable to some degree, apart from those on offshore islands where the weather from the Atlantic can reduce them to a shell," he says. "About 50pc are recorded in the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage. If they are afforded protection, the new owners are supposed to use materials that were originally used in the building and they can be very expensive, deterring a repurpose.
"I'd like to see an assessment of what could be done with all these buildings and a comprehensive record of the number of them out there.
"These buildings are not just bricks and mortar. People contact me through my blog to talk about a grandfather who attended a school until they emigrated at the age of 13 or 14. Those emigrants never came home again, and the school could be the last memory they ever had of Ireland."
Enda O'Flaherty visited 240 abandoned Irish schools on camera with striking results.
Deserted Schoolhouses of Ireland is published by Collins Press (€24.99)
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