My Grandmother Escaped the Orphange

WHILE READING THE RYAN Report in Ireland, I realise that I'm very lucky that my grandmother entered the care of her aunt instead of beng entered in Irish institutional care . My granny (seen at left in her kitchen) was orphaned by six, following the tragic deaths of her mother and father. One of the options by her aunts included bundling up our Kitty for an orphanage--or worse, a laundry. Instead, Aunt Jane came into the picture and took young Kitty into her care. Across Ireland, hundreds of Irish children faced a more difficult existence when they were bundled off to State-subsidised industrial schools. The Ryan Report about this abhorrent parallel society writes an important parallel strand in 20th century Irish history. It would have been a major departure from the norm for Kitty to be removed to Ireland, but that's where many of her closest relatives lived and in the early 20th century, families stayed together. Fortunately for me, my Irish great aunt came to the States and helped raise my orphaned granny.

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