When the News Of The World was removed from Navan shops

The News of the World, closed at the weekend by News International as a result of a phone hacking scandal, was at the centre of controversy in Navan in 1969. The British newspaper created a storm in the town that year when it highlighted allegations of beatings being meted out by De La Salle brothers to pupils at the De La Salle school at Abbey Road. The two-page report on 'Children Under The Lash' was the first in a three-part series of reports on cruelty to children in Irish and British schools, and highlighted the concerns of local GP, Dr Paddy Randles, about alleged beatings being experienced by young schoolchildren in the town. However, the subsequent issues of the News of the World covering the story disappeared from outside shops in the town before proprietors opened up for their Sunday morning customers. Dr Randles made the brave move of speaking out against what he saw going on in the town in the 1960s. As a local doctor, he said he had many mothers in Navan bringing their young sons to him, having suffered injuries at the hands of their religious teachers at the primary school. The News of the World spoke to three of the youngsters at the time, as well as Dr Randles. One young boy, who had broken an arm while swinging on a tree a year earlier, was hit on the same arm six to 10 times a day by a rubber hosepipe. Dr Randles told the News of the World: "The boy's father was so annoyed he was going around to see the brother," he said. "I persuaded him not to go. "I went and saw the head brother and asked if he was aware that a rubber hosepipe was being used. He asked me 'Would you like to see what I use?' and produced a strap and threw it on the table." Dr Randles, an expert on children with a keen interest in child psychology, described it as a form of sadism. He said: "The majority of our 500,000 young boys are taught by men who were recruited at the age of 12 or 13 to become celibate teachers. I will do all in my power to highlight the obvious dangers inherent in this system, and to end it." Dr Randles said at the time the system of school management, mainly by parish priests, should be replaced by a more democratic system. "And corporal punishment must be abolished." It was over a decade later that corporal punishment was to be banned, and 40 years before the true extent of abuse and assault in Irish schools was to revealed in government reports. The News of the World reporter attempted to talk to one of the De La Salle brothers at the local showgrounds, where he was refereeing a boys' football match. He promised to talk afterwards, but cycled off and didn't appear as arranged. father at his place of work and tried to persuade him to have our report suppressed," the newspaper wrote. He wasn't the only one seeking to bury the reports. When they appeared on 4th May 1969, the newspapers were cleared out of the shops in town before Mass-goers emerged from first Mass. Over the following Sundays, deliveries of the newspaper left rolled up outside newsagents in the town disappeared in the early mornings. There were not that many newsagents in Navan at that time, apart from central town shops such as Delany's, Tierney's and McEvoy's, and it was easier to blitz them then. In his memoir of growing up in Navan, 'Short Trousers Days in Navan', Michael Sheils, a past pupil of the De La Salle school, recalled the reports. He wrote: 'A small number of people on their way to 8am Mass were able to buy a copy of the paper. During Mass, in a cover-up, the paper was removed from the shops, depriving the good people of Navan of their right to read about the abuse.' He claimed that the following week, the paper delivery truck was stopped at Old Kilcarn Bridge and copies of the newspaper removed, preventing them from reaching town. Founded in 1843, the News of the World holds the record for the highest print run of any newspaper in the English language, when on 18th June 1950, 8,659,090 copies rolled off the presses in Manchester and London. The fearlessness, and sometimes recklessness of its editors, made the News of the World the newspaper that actors, sportsmen and aristocrats learned to dread on a Sunday. It was this reputation for exposures that led Drs Paddy and Mary Randles to contact it in 1969, in an era when local and national newspapers in Ireland were much more conservative and slow to rock the establishment boat, as evidenced in the Meath Chronicle reporting of the situation at the time. A small front page story in the Chronicle on 10th May 1969 was headlined 'De La Salle Brothers' Work Appreciated' and read: "It was unanimously resolved at a meeting of Navan De La Salle Past Pupils' Union on Tuesday night (1) that we fully appreciate the work of the De La Salle Brothers for the past 52 years in Navan; (2) we reassure them of our continued loyalty and our confidence in their work for the boys of Navan, both inside and outside the school." In 1969, six months after the De La Salle story, a little-known proprietor of Australian newspapers, Rupert Murdoch, took control of News of the World at the age of 37, fighting off a rival bid from Robert Maxwell. It remained a broadsheet until 1984, when it dropped to tabloid size. Following a number of years of allegations of phone hacking of celebrities, the final straw came for the newspaper last week when it was revealed that the newspaper had hacked the phones of murdered schoolgirl, Milly Dowler; families of the Soham murder victims and 7/7 London bombing victims, and bereaved families of servicemen and women. The De La Salles order left Navan in 1976. In 1997, when a De La Salle school reunion was organised, controversy flared again as there were mixed feelings over remembering those against whom such allegations had been made. But there were others who had happier memories of their times at the De La Salle school, with football, hurling, scouts, and musical performances standing out.