We first brought you news about an old cuala Casements Newsletter back in 2015. At the time we anticipated bringing you more but somehow Cartlann Digiteach Cuala never quite got around to it. So we’re delighted to put that right and resume publication.  The next ones are compliments of Paul Hogan and Lorcan O’Raghailligh who we thank for taking the trouble to share them.

Two things strike us about these publications. Firstly, the great pride and enthusiasm shown by everyone who contributed to the magazines. Not much has changed, we hear you say.

Secondly, given todays digital/immediate publication capabilities, you can only be amazed at the effort that went into the production process. This was at a time when there were no word processors, no computers, no photocopiers, no clip art or image processing capabilities. You didnt even need electric power. The magazine would have been meticulously “typed as a drift” (oops, discard page and start over) “typed as a draft” to make sure the layout was right and then re-typed onto wax-coated Stencils. Illustrations were hand drawn, even individual fadas had to be added by hand. The page stencil was then mounted on a pre-inked Roneo machine which would be cranked onto as many blank sheets as the intended circulation required. Stacks of pages where then compiled and stapled. (See more on Roneos here ).