In 2007, architect Áine Ryan set out to document the remaining handball alleys in Ireland and to compile oral and textual sources on the architectural and cultural history of this building type. Research grants from the Heritage Council in 2008 and 2009 and the Thomas Dammann Junior Memorial Trust in 2011 allowed her to spend time visiting alleys with the generation who knew them best.
Many other people quickly joined in the effort, taking to the road to search out alleys and the personal memories and shared stories they carried. Some of them never stopped – especially Enda Timoney, Michael Geoghegan, Gerard Loughran, Paul Fitzpatrick, Siobhán Ryan, Róisin Ryan and T.J. Ryan. Countless others have provided information on local alleys. Each and every contributor is acknowledged under the relevant alley post on this website.
Between 2019 and 2023, Áine investigated patterns in the distribution of 570 alleys documented by then. This resulted in an explanation for the emergence of this building type and its diffusion across the island. She began working on
an online map to show this information, finishing it in August 2024 in time for National Heritage Week with support from GAA Handball as part of their celebration of 100 years.
A special project running from August until October 2024 attempts to collect outstanding knowledge of the alleys remembered by the most elderly generation. Their living memories can be uploaded to the online map in audio, image or text formats. The online map shows the more than 650 alleys already found and the rough locations of some not yet found but known to have existed.
The project has featured in the following media over the years.
Newspaper articles
July 2020
March 2018
February 2011
January 2010
September 2008
This Handball is no Racquet
Radio Interviews
October 2018
Limerick Community Radio,
John O'Carroll interview with Enda Timoney
June 2009
RTE Radio 1 Derek Mooney Show
June 2009
Tipperary Midwest Radio Seamus King Show
August 2008
Kildare FM
August 2008
Clare FM
Websites
April 2009
Building of the Month feature National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
June 2008
We Love Irish Handball Alleys, post on landscape design blog
Publications
forthcoming: Atlas of Irish Sport
2015
Royal Irish Academy Volumes on Art and Architecture of Ireland
Volume IV Architecture 1600-2000 – Rolf Loeber, Hugh Campbell, Livia Hurley, John Montague and Ellen Rowley
2011
2nd edition Atlas of Rural Irish Landscape, .H.A. Aalen, Kevin Whelan and Matthew Stout
April/May 2009
History Ireland Magazine
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