Events from the year 1951 in Ireland. Incumbents President: Seán T. O'Kelly Taoiseach: John A. Costello (FG) (until 13 June 1951) Éamon de Valera (FF) (from 13 June 1951) Tánaiste: William Norton (Lab) (until 13 June 1951) Seán Lemass (FF) (from 13 June 1951) Minister for Finance: Patrick McGilligan (FG) (until 13 June 1951) Seán MacEntee (FF) (from 13 June 1951) Chief Justice: Conor Maguire Dáil: 13th (until 7 May 1951) 14th (from 13 June 1951) Seanad: 6th (until 25 July 1951) 7th (from 14 August 1951) Events 2 February – Éamon de Valera visited Newry for the first time since his arrest there in 1924. 11 April – Minister for Health Noel Browne resigned and his Mother and Child Scheme was overturned. 19 April – The Attorney General for Northern Ireland, Ed Warnock, referring to the Noel Browne's resignation, said that Ireland is really ruled by Maynooth. 24 May – Gardaí exchanged shots with two men after they threw a bomb at the British Embassy in Dublin. 30 May – 1951 Irish general election: Fianna Fáil won most seats but lacked an overall majority. 13 June – Members of the 14th Dáil assembled. Éamon de Valera became Taoiseach with one of the smallest majorities on record (74–69), forming a Fianna Fáil government with the support of independents. 1 July – Taoiseach Éamon de Valera paid his first visit to Derry in 25 years. 15 November – The Nobel Prize for Physics was awarded jointly to Professor Ernest Walton of Trinity College Dublin and Sir John Cockcroft. Arts and literature 18 July – The Abbey Theatre in Dublin was burnt to the ground. 30 July–22 September – The now-homeless Abbey Theatre company performed a season at the Rupert Guinness Hall in the Guinness Brewery before moving to the Queen's Theatre, Dublin. 15 August – Donagh MacDonagh's ballad opera God's Gentry opened at the Belfast Arts Theatre, transferring to the Gate Theatre, Dublin on 26 December. 21 October–4 November – The first Wexford "Festival of Music and the Arts", predecessor of Wexford Festival Opera. The first national festival of the folk music of Ireland was held in Mullingar. Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann was established in Mullingar by a group of uilleann pipers to promote the folk music and language of Ireland. Samuel Beckett's novel Molloy was published in French. Sinéad de Valera's collection for children The Emerald Ring and Other Irish Fairy