Harte of Longford: A voyage for global recognition in 'The Sailor's Dream'

Jack Harte, founder of Dublin’s the Irish Writers Centre and author, is returning to Longford for his play The Sailor’s Dream. Like his play, his own life and local roots have an enchanting story behind it.

His family moved to Lanesboro from Sligo in 1953 when Jack was 9, as poverty in the west of Ireland forced people out to England, America or Australia.

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However, his father, formerly a blacksmith, got a job in Bord na Mona and moved into one of the company’s new estates. As Jack says, he reckons half of his childhood was in Sligo and the other in Longford.

His writing passions started when he was in the old national school beside the church, when in 1957, the local bishop sent out two priests to Lanesboro for them to set up a secondary school in Ballyleague.

“It was all to do with religious politics. The bishop had heard that Longford was going to open a vocational school in the near future, so he decided to jump the gun for these priests to set up a secondary school to keep religious control,” reminisced Jack.

“They took over three schools in the parish hall in Ballyleague, and set up a school there with three rooms. I was in the Lanesboro-Ballyleague school for three years. By far the greatest educational experience I’d enjoyed. These two priests were amazing guys, 100 years ahead of their time! Advocates for vocational education, science, technology and practical things. This is what they were stressing. It was mad but brilliant stuff.”

Jack named Father Foy, one of the priests, as a great source of inspiration and direction.

“When the vocational school opened, after a few years, the bishop succeeded through sheer determination and lobbying to amalgamate their school with the vocational.

They were teaching in the new school in Lanesboro, which became the Community College when the convent joined. I’m interested in education because I began as a teacher, and then a teacher in Lucan. Education is something that always interests me.”

Jack’s interest in playwriting has only started in the past decade. He started with poems as a teenager as a teenager at 15-16. He wrote for the magazine, The Angelus. He did short stories between the 1970s-80s. Then he branched into novels in the 1990s. His first play was called Language of the Mute, which was also shown in Backstage Theatre back in 2016.

He is back in Backstage with The Sailor’s Dream, which has its own fascinating backstory as to how it has evolved. A friend of Kevin Cronin, Anthony Fox, director of the New Theatre in Dublin, recommended the book In Search of Franklin: The Irish Connection. Kevin’s story is that he and his friends set out from Westport to sail the north-west passage, Atlantic to the Pacific.

“I read it and was quite amazed by it,” said Jack. “With the passage over the years, the ice has retreated, but the first feat of sailing through the passage was only in 1904, by a Norwegian guy, who got his boat from the north Atlantic and landed in Alaska.

Now, only a small number of boats managed to do it between 1904 and around 2001. These lads, all obviously seasoned and experienced, built their boats to take on this task. And they sailed in one summer, right up across Canada and down to Alaska.

“They managed to do it in one summer. Quite an achievement. Then they had the boat over there and never thought about how to get it back, assuming they’d have to sail it down Panama and back to the canal, or back down the passage.
While they were debating this, someone said why not the north-east passage, and circumnavigate the whole Arctic.

"To come back along the coast of Russia was a far more formidable challenge. They tackled it in two summers, a much longer course.

"They did it in two steps and managed to circumnavigate the whole arctic. Kevin was one of the crew and this was his book about it. And I gave it back to Anthony and said it’s amazing, brilliant.

"Anthony said: “Would it make a play?” I said, “Would you want it?” The answer was Kevin is a friend of the theatre!”

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How this linked to Lord John Franklin’s story, Jack explained further. Once he accepted to write the play, he began researching Arctic and Antarctic exploration, narrowing it down to the north-west passage found by Lord John Franklin.

Franklin had two of the best ships, every provision required, and 129 men sailed away but disappeared without a trace.

“Franklin is what we’d call an eejit. Useless,” explained Jack. “His previous expeditions were fairly difficult assignments, going through frozen territory, but sometimes, if the going got rough, Franklin would have to be carried on a sleigh. He’d need his three meals. He was a bit of an eejit. His wife was brilliant.”

That is where this ensemble play focuses on. Lady Jane Franklin’s search, crowd funding, campaigning and media manipulation to thwart Robert McClure’s apparent achievement of finding the passage (which only happened because he was ironically one of the search parties looking for Franklin’s lost boat).

McClure got the prize money, but Jane’s changing of public opinion as people in the 1850s became more literate, continued for years.

Newspapers were now being mass-produced, and she wanted her husband recognised even though it was evident that he had died.

“She raised huge amounts of money to fill ships and hire sailors and captains. At this stage, it was obvious her husband was dead, but she wanted evidence that he found the passage.

If they could find some evidence like the logbooks of the ships, this might confirm it. She was keen to find them. That’s why she kept up the search.”

This play will intertwine the search for Franklin’s grave in modern exploration and the story of the past in search of Franklin. Kevin Cronin took interest in Franklin’s story.

There were small operations, with people going over the ice in certain areas with magnetometers to detect metal underneath, as the ships would have had a fair amount of metal.

However, the following year, Cronin and his comrades were not given a permit by the Canadian government, so the Canadians took over the search.

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Eventually and accidentally, just within one mile of where Kevin and the crew were searching, Parks Canada found the first of the ships. Then a few years later, the second was found. Jack said this was around 2002-2004.

“They got very little from them, but no written evidence that would be of any assistance to help clarify what happened to the crew. One of (Kevin’s) pals from that expedition was keen to keep searching for Franklin’s grave.

If he was buried on land, there would’ve been a canister with a lot of information in it. If they found it, they might have the answer to the long mystery of what happened.

So, Kevin has been looking since then for Franklin’s grave. The search goes on, and Kevin is involved. I’ve met Kevin and made good friends. When I started writing the play.”

Written in two eras, with five actors, The Sailor's Dream - An Irish Connection is on March 5 at 8pm. Tickets cost €18/16, and can be booked via the official Backstage Theatre website. It will run for 80 minutes with no interval.

https://backstage.ie/events/the-sailors-dream/