Born in 1956

The IRA launched its Border Campaign in December, attacking installations in Northern Ireland. It would drag on for years with limited support and eventually collapse, but it kept the partition question alive. In the south, people were more focused on making ends meet.

Seán Lemass was beginning to push economic ideas — attracting foreign investment, modernising agriculture — that would transform the country within a decade. The seeds of the Irish economic miracle were being planted.