Dublin Opinion was a satirical magazine published in Ireland from 1922 to 1968. Founded by Arthur Booth, Thomas Collins and Charles E. Kelly (CEK), it lampooned Irish society in the decades after independence. Both Collins and Kelly were also civil servants while publishing cartoons, though it’s not clear which was the avocation.
Charles Kelly, incidentally, is the father of the actor Frank Kelly, best known for playing Father Jack in Father Ted. The publication fell into financial difficulties in 1968 and ceased its monthly editions, though an annual was released for several years. An attempted 1987 revival, in part by Frank Kelly, was unsuccessful.
In the bitter years of the Civil War and thereafter, Dublin Opinion provided some much needed comic relief. Several cartoons are mooted as its most ‘famous’. One from the 1920s entitled ‘The night the Treaty was Signed’ depicted a hoard of Corkonians filling the road to Dublin in search of government jobs. Another before the closely defeated refrendum to remove proportional representation had De Valera writing on Broome Bridge “FF-PR=FF^n”. T.K. Whitaker has often cited Dublin Opinion’s view of decline and stagnation of the 1950s as an inspiration. But despite been closed for half a century, its humour can still be appreciated.
Source: Cormac O Grada, ‘Five Crises’, T.K. Whitaker Lecture (2011): https://www.centralbank.ie/press-area/speeches/Pages/AddressbyProfessorCormacO’Gr%C3%A1da,oftheSchoolofEconomics,UCD,totheCentralBankWhitakerLecture,29June,2011.aspx
A view of the Irish Times in the 1920s, from their ‘Grangegorman correspondent’
‘Ceilidhe in the Kildare Street Club’
Source: Cormac O Grada, ‘Rocky Road: The Irish Economy Since the 1920s’
“The Night the Treat was Signed” (1931)