Documentary on Newstalk, presents a new documentary by J.J. O'Shea “The First Hundred Years: Albert Dryer and the Irish National Association”.

In “The First Hundred Years: Albert Dryer and the Irish National Association” producer J.J. O'Shea explores the aims and achievements of an important Irish Cultural organisation founded in 1915 in Sydney, Australia, and the life of the man who was the driving force behind the association. The story of the Irish in Australia remains a relatively unexamined aspect of the Irish emigration story and this programme shines a light on some surprising aspects of that story.

Albert Dryer established the Irish National Association (INA) as a vehicle to promote Irish culture and to re-connect Australia’s Irish-descended population with their roots. This large group of Irish-Australians needed, in his view, to be given a counter-narrative to the predominant and powerful Anglo story which had captured the heights of Australian culture.

“The First Hundred Years: Albert Dryer and the Irish National Association” will premiere on Newstalk, on Sunday September 10th at 7am, repeated on Saturday 16th at 9pm, and will be available as a podcast on GoLoud and all major platforms. 

The INA also adopted a radical Irish Republican stand which set it at odds with official Australian attitudes to events like the Easter Rising and the First World War and saw Albert Dryer and his associates jailed over a failed plot to buy arms from Germany to assist in the republican cause during the First World War.

Excerpts from the writings of Albert Dryer and contemporaneous newspaper articles underscore commentary from historians Jeff Kildea, Richard Reid and Perry McIntyre together with Karl Kissane, the current President of the INA. We follow the highs and lows, the twists and turns taken by the INA to the present day where it remains a significant cultural and social support to Irish Australia.

"The First Hundred Years" was Produced by J.J. O'Shea.

Excerpts from the INA Centenary Oral History Project were used with the kind permission of the National Library of Australia.

This programme was supported by a grant from Coimisiún na Meán as part of the Sound and Vision Scheme.