Greetings!

 

We hope you will enjoy these bits and bobs of news  from all over the country. As with the headlines and news on our web site, we purposely avoid murder and mayhem, opting instead for whatever we can find  in the way of Irish traditions, customs and culture. We also try to avoid repeating news we've already published in our daily updates. Here's the URL if you aren't familiar with that feature on the site:

http://www.irishcultureandcustoms.com/01News/Home.html

We publish  links to seven stories gathered every morning from all the major Irish newspapers. These links are kept for two weeks just in case you can't visit the site every day.

 

Now - onwards with the county news:

 

 

The Olympic Flame is due to spend a number of days in Northern Ireland when it begins its journey in May 2012, and Ballymoney believes it has a good case for being included in the proposed route. According to Frankie Cunningham, chairman of Dervock Community Association, the inclusion of the town would acknowledge Dervock as the birthplace of Kennedy Kane McArthur. The athlete was the winner of the marathon at the Stockholm Olympics held exactly one hundred years before the 2012 event in London. An application for inclusion has been submitted by Ballymoney Borough Council, which has also cited cultural and historic reasons for the town’s place on the Flame’s route.

 

For the first time in almost one hundred years the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer is to close its doors to allow the internal phase of a restoration programme to be carried out. The church, which is attached to Clonard Monastery off the Falls Road in Belfast, will have new heating, electrical and lighting systems installed in addition to new flooring and the repainting of the ceiling. While the church is closed the congregation will use a temporary building in the grounds of the monastery which will have a capacity for some eight hundred people. The church’s famous Novena will be held in this building, with the overflow accommodated in the corridors and grounds of the monastery.

 

Lurgan Park, the first in Ireland to be awarded the Green Flag, a national standard for parks and green spaces, is now in line for a second award. The People’s Choice – Site of the Year Award is an online event by which people can vote for their favourite park from a list of more than a thousand locations. The park, run by Craigavon Borough Council and the second largest in the country after Phoenix Park in Dublin, has almost two hundred and sixty acres which include a lake, the Coalbrookedale Fountain and the famous lime tree avenue. The winner of the online vote will take part in the national event, with the overall winner to be announced in London in September.

 

The staff and pupils of a school in Crossmaglen came up with a novel idea to raise money and to have some friendly competition at school. St. Patrick’s Primary and St. Patrick’s Nursery Schools held a Great Balloon Race. The pupils and staff each attached a card with information about the competition and asking the person to return the card to the school; the balloons were then all released into the sky. The card sent back before or on the twenty fifth of June from the furthest location wins fifty pounds. Each balloon was sold by a seller who will also win a prize.

 

People living and working in the vicinity of Market Square in Armagh, as well as those who have memories of the area, are to be consulted by artist Eleanor Wheeler over a new art installation. Eleanor is to create a ceramic wall panel which will be installed at steps close to Armagh Market House. The panel, part of a new public art programme funded by the local council, the Arts Council and the Department for Social Development, will show life in the market area over the centuries. In a parallel community arts scheme a series of workshops are being run to enable members of the community to create their own ceramic wall tile panels.

 

International Week was celebrated all over the Republic of Ireland between May 24th and 28th, with the people of Ireland embracing the presence of the many cultures now embedded in the country. This was especially true at Holy Family GNS, which celebrated its own International Day during International Week. The ‘Green, White and Gold’ celebrated the 31 different nationalities represented by the students at the school. Presentations were given by parents and teachers, enabling the children to learn about all of the different nationalities at the school.

 

Carlow woman Selina O’Leary is trying to settle back to her studies at Carlow VEC after having made history with fellow student Liz Connors by becoming the first Traveller women to perform in New York’s Carnegie Hall. The invitation from the New York venue came after a video of Selina singing was posted on You Tube and she and Liz sang before an audience of six thousand. Next month Selina is due to appear on Miriam O’Callaghan’s radio show, while a record producer in California has also asked her to record a CD at his studios; she is already recording a CD in this country.

 

Among those who attended the special anniversary Mass in Carlow Cathedral to mark the golden jubilee of Scoil Mhuire was Dan Carbery, whose construction company built the school in 1960. Dan was accompanied by his granddaughter Hannah, who is a pupil at the school. The Mass was celebrated by Father John Cummins and the pupils sang “Who Will Light the Lantern”, the song written by Father Liam Lawton to mark the school’s fortieth anniversary. 

 

Cavan will soon see its own version of Ballymaloe Cookery School, with the announcement that celebrity chef and Cavan native Neven Maguire will be opening ten new rooms and a cuisine school at the extremely popular MacNean House and Restaurant. Raised in the small village of Blacklion in a family of nine, Maguire left school after the Junior Certificate and went on to study at Fermanagh College. He is the author of seven cookery books and has two successful television series behind him, with another on the way. MacNean house is booked out every weekend for the rest of the year.

 

Rather than joining their classmates in beginning the Junior Certificate last week the golfing Maguire twins from Cavan were breaking another record in being the youngest players on a Britain and Ireland team to take part in the Curtis Cup. Lisa and Leona travelled to Massachusetts to take part in the competition, which pits their eight-strong team against a home team. They attend Loreto College in Cavan and the school has accepted the results of their mock Junior Certificate as it was agreed that the chance to play in the Curtis Cup was one not to be missed.

 

A new aspect to the annual Cavan Summer Festival this year was the inclusion of an International Hen Weekend which saw groups of up to twenty arriving to celebrate hen parties. Each of the twenty-one groups was assigned a hotel or pub and a competition was held for a wedding reception and honeymoon, jointly sponsored by Hotel Kilmore and Cavan Travel.

 

The oldest man in Ireland was surrounded by friends and family when  he celebrated his one hundred and sixth birthday recently. Paddy Gleeson of O’Callaghan’s Mills is the seventh-oldest person in Ireland, with six women ahead of him in the ranks, the eldest being one hundred and eight years old. Paddy is a resident in Raheen Community Hospital in Tuamgraney, where he lived independently until two years ago when he moved into the main hospital. He now has six presidential medals to mark each of his birthdays since he turned 100.

 

Minister Batt O’Keeffe was in Kilmichael recently  to perform the official opening of the extension and refurbishment of Dromleigh National School, one of the oldest schools in the country. Dromleigh school opened one hundred and seventy years ago with one teacher, Cal O’Callaghan, who had a total of two hundred and thirty two pupils in a two-room building. Now the school has seventy-one pupils under principal Anne Bradley.

 

When Colin Carroll from Fermoy suggested on a radio programme that he would organise the first Paddy Olympics to take place in Ireland, he was told it would never happen. The solicitor, who has already taken part in a number of unusual events including leading the first Irish team to victory in the world elephant polo championships, has confirmed that the event will take place in mid-August in the Mardyke arena in Cork city. Among events to be featured are a crawling race, a welly hop, a backwards running race and Irish dancing hurdles. Sky Sports is already confirmed as a sponsor for the event.

 

Recently,  Michael Carten made Limavady history when he succeeded Cathal O hOisin as mayor of the town. First elected to the Borough Council fourteen years ago, Michael will reach his eighty-first birthday in September and is the oldest serving mayor in the town’s history, and possibly the oldest serving mayor in the North. Michael,  lives in Glack with his wife Maureen and still takes an active part in tending to the stock on the family farm.  

 

The Danny Boy sculpture in Limavady, more properly known as the Jane Ross sculpture, is to be moved to the new Roe Valley Arts and Cultural Centre from its present position at the top of Catherine Street. In addition to its new location, the statue will also have repair work carried out to damage caused during the cold weather in January. This, with the cost of the relocation, is expected to come to a total of £6,000 but the expenditure has been defended by Councillor Gerry Mullan. He maintains that the sculpture will promote the borough and will increase footfall through the town.

 

Patsy McHugh  has had his latest catch submitted to the Irish Specimen Fish Committee for a possible award. Patsy  who has been a keen fisherman for some thirty years  recently  beat his own previous record by landing a salmon weighing thirty-two pounds four ounces. According to an angler on the opposite bank of the river near to Lifford bridge, Patsy spent three quarters of an hour landing the fish. The Loughs Agency arranged to have two moulds of the fish made, one for display at the Riverwatch Aquarium and Visitor Centre in Prehen; the other one Patsy will give to his local tackle shop with the fly he used to land the forty-two and a half inch long fish.

 

For the past twenty-five years book dealer Michael Herron from Carndonagh has been searching for a first edition of a book on his area of the county, entitled “Inishowen, Its History, Traditions and Antiquities” by Michael Harkin. The book was originally written in the 1860s though it has been reprinted twice since, in 1935 and 1985. Mr Herron had almost given up hope and then his son-in-law, Peter Doherty, traced a copy of the book to a book dealer in Milwaukee in the United States. No value has yet been put on the leather-bound book but several people have expressed an interest in it, including local historians from Inishowen.

 

A week of prayer and fasting undertaken by two men from Killybegs to raise money for a number of causes has drawn to a close. James Gavigan from Ballyara and Johnny Paul McGuinness have spent a week on Inishduff, an island eight kilometres south west of Killybegs with a total of five acres. James and Johnny are raising money for Our Lady’s Hospital for Sick Children, Crumlin, the Donegal Hospice, and the restoration fund for Our Lady of the Visitation Church. Limiting themselves to one meal a day, the two men suffered most from intense heat in the early part of the week. With only grass and nettles growing on the island they had nowhere to shelter from the sun.

 

In what has become standard practice, an artist is to hold a public discussion in relation to a piece of public art to gauge the response to his proposed work. Barry Linnane has been commissioned to create the Newry Navvy, a sculpture featuring a typical navvy with his tools, luggage and musical instrument. The navvy took his name from the term Navigator used to describe those who worked on canals, and a cast bronze plaque and bench will also be installed outlining the history of the navvy and the construction of the Newry canal. The finished piece will be located at Sugar Island bridge.

 

Fifty-five years ago Valerie O’Hare was one of the first pupils at St John’s Primary School in Glenn, Donaghmore, and last week she was the last person out of the school as it closed for the last time. Valerie was the school caretaker, as was her mother Maggie before her, and she it was who locked all the classrooms and the front gate for the last time. Valerie’s two sons also attended the school, which has been closed due to falling numbers. However school principal Brenda McCreesh made sure that there were celebrations rather than mourning to mark the end of an era.

 

A seal pup which was washed up on Skerries beach in March in an emaciated state has now been returned to the sea. What was unusual about the female pup was that it had a tag bearing the words “Inform London Zoo”, but the zoo said it had no knowledge of such a tag. According to Sarah Harmon of the Irish Seal Sanctuary it was eventually confirmed that ‘Mighty’ had come from Wales and they are now hoping that she will make her way back there. The seal was released from the sanctuary in Garristown, the very last one to be rehabilitated from that location before the facility moves to Courtown Harbour in Co. Wexford.

 

The city council has given permission for the construction of four giant umbrellas over Meeting House Square in Temple Bar, in order to facilitate events taking place when the weather is bad. The twenty-one metre tall umbrellas, to be provided at a cost of €2m, will each cover an area of approximately fourteen by eleven metres and it is hoped that the canopy will be in place by the spring of next year. According to Julie Momboisse, communications executive with the Temple Bar Cultural Trust, work should begin on the project later this year. The four umbrellas will only be put in place at night or during rain, hail or snow during the day.

 

Lord Mayor of Dublin Emer Costello and Mick Duff, Mayor of South County Dublin, performed the official opening of a new Green Route, assisted by officials from the ESB and Waterways Ireland. The new route for walkers and cyclists begins at the third lock at Davitt Road in Inchicore and continues to the twelfth lock at Lucan. Fishing stands, and boating and berthing areas have been included, while sixty-six CCTV cameras and more than three hundred computer-operated lights will ensure safety along the Grand Canal route. The new route links into the existing path from Inchicore to Grand Canal Basin.

 

When the North’s US Consul General visited the county recently she vowed to return soon since she had been advised that it was the best place for kayaking. Kamala Lakhdhir was first given a tour of Belleek Pottery and then attended the Policing with the Community Awards at the Manor House Hotel. Ms Lakhdhir was also given a tour of the Impartial Reporter newspaper by deputy editor Brian Donaldson before going to Crom Castle for dinner.  

 

After selling out in both New York and Boston, The Saw Doctors return to their home county to announce that they have added two more summer shows as a result of popular demand. The intimate gigs can cater for an audience of just two hundred. The legendary local band, enjoying a deserved revival over the past few years, were forced to add two more dates at Kelly’s of Bridge Street, Galway, previously The Living Room.

 

The statue of Pádraic Ó Conaire, which has been a centrepiece of the Galway City Museum since its opening, is to stay in its new home and Eyre Square will continue to be without the familiar figure which was located there for seventy years. Councillor Padraig Conneely had asked the city council what had happened to the replica which was promised when the original was removed prior to the renovation of the square six years ago. At the meeting Director of Services Tom Connell confirmed that there were insufficient funds in the budget to pay for a replica. He also confirmed that the original will remain in the museum to protect it from further acts of vandalism.

 

At a peace conference held in Galway last weekend plans were outlined for the construction of the city’s first mosque to serve the estimated three thousand Muslims. Hosted by the Ahmadiyyua Muslim Association of Ireland, the conference was addressed by Waterford-born Imam Ibrahim Noonan, the first Irishman to hold the title of Imam. At present Muslims in Galway meet for prayers in the Wellpark area of the city but they have recently received planning permission for the construction of the mosque in Ballybrit. Plans of the new place of worship were on display during the conference.

 

 

Patrick Frisby, whose father and grandfather were both publicans in their time, has taken over The Auld House in Killamery and it had its official opening last recently . More than forty years ago the pub was the first to be granted a dance licence, with a strict limit of twenty-eight couples allowed into the dancehall. At the turn of the last century Patrick’s grandfather, William, was the licence holder of the pub and his father, Michael, ran the premises until the early eighties. 

 

While the Irish team didn’t make it to South Africa for the World Cup one Graiguenamanagh man has an important task throughout the tournament. Richard Hayden, operations director of the Sports Turf Research Institute in Britain, was originally taken on by the English Football Association to ensure their pitch at Rustenberg was in good condition. This led to him being asked by FIFA to become a consultant on the state of all the pitches being used. Richard enlisted the help of Aidan O’Hara, grounds keeper at Mount Juliet, for whom he worked while studying for his agricultural degree. Richard and the Institute have now been hired by UEFA for the Euro 2012 tournament.

 

Following a number of complaints from landowners, anglers and members of the local community the county council has removed controversial pillars and gates which were blocking access to the River Barrow. The public laneway near Ballymorris in Portarlington has been used for generations for access to the river for walks and general recreation, and it has also been an access point for farmers. The decision to close it was taken on grounds of safety after concerns about a silt pond near the waterworks but this has now been addressed and the laneway reopened. The road was also used by people to cross from the Portarlington Road to the Mountmellick Road.

 

Work to restore the lychgate at Oakvale Cemetery in Stradbally, which has been carried out by Delaneys building contractors, was completed during the week in time for the cemetery evening. The canopy, gates and stone centre were built by Robert Crosby of Stradbally Hall one hundred and eighty years ago and the gate was traditionally used to rest coffins on the centre stone to be blessed by a clergyman. A plaque has been commissioned to mark the restoration and an ecumenical blessing took place after evening prayers on Thursday last. The original lychgate is believed to have been constructed by Maurice Murray, who also built the Cosby Cottages.

 

The isolated ballroom made famous in William Trevor’s “Ballroom of Romance” is to become a museum dedicated to the showband era, and a tourist centre. The dance hall in Glenfarne was opened by John McGivern, an emigrant who returned from America in the 1930s, but its greatest days were during the showband years of the 1960s when bands such as the Royal Showband, the Clipper Carlton and the Capitol Showband played there. The idea for the museum came as a way of persuading those people who stopped to take photographs of the famous building to stay in the village a little longer.  

 

Clement Gaffney of Lough Rynn Castle is busy overseeing preparations for the wedding reception of rugby international Brian O’Driscoll and his writer fiancée Amy Huberman, which takes place this weekend. The wedding ceremony is set for St Joseph’s Church in Aughavas with the guests then adjourning to Lough Rynn Castle for the reception.  

 

Two museums in the county have decided to provide a bus service between the two sites in order to encourage visitors to go to both venues. The Hunt Museum in Limerick and the Flying Boat Museum in Foynes attract up to thirty thousand visitors each year and there is now a combined entrance fee of €17 which includes the fare for the fifty-mile journey between the two. The service, operating in the months of June, July and August, will include a visit to Mountrenchard on the Shannon estuary. It is also envisaged that a steam train service might be inaugurated between the two sites.

 

Stephen Heraty from Lanesboro took first place in the recent European Cup Fly Fishing competition with a trout weighing ten pounds four ounces. Stephen has been fly fishing for most of his life but this is only the second competition he has entered and he was up against locals on Lough Mask in Co. Mayo who have been fishing for up to sixty years. The son of Marian and Paul Heraty, Stephen had designed and made his own fly the night before the competition. He was in competition with more than one hundred other anglers and part of his prize was a boat complete with trailer, the first boat he has owned.

 

The people of Dundalk rejoiced recently with news of a new company taking the premises of the old Dreary’s building. The landmark department store was the main place of business on Clanbrassil Street for one hundred and seventy one years until it closed in July 2005. At the time of its closure there were high hopes that it would be reopened by a big company looking for a flagship location, but not until now, five years later, has a Dundalk-owned company decided to move into the location. 

 

It is believed that a new exhibit at the Highlanes Gallery in Drogheda will bring members of the Orange Order to the town. The gallery has put on display a three-hundred-year-old silver mace which was given to the town by King William some nine years after the Battle of the Boyne. Originally made by silversmith Thomas Bolton at the end of the seventeenth century, the mace has been restored and it will join other gifts from King William including a sword of state and a scabbard. The beaten silver mace, which was given to the town to replace an earlier one believed to have been melted down by King James, was put into safe storage in the early years of the last century.

 

The Cooley Peninsula Tourist Office is inviting applications from history buffs who would accept the challenge of living for a week under conditions experienced eight hundred years ago. Those brave enough for the undertaking will live in an original Merchant’s House in the town with the facilities available to its mediaeval occupants in 1210, and the venture is part of the celebration of the eight hundredth anniversary of the building of King John’s Castle. The initiative is part of National Heritage Week and Irish Walled Towns’ Day, which takes place at the end of August.

 

 

A druidic chant of joy heralded the sunrise on Rath Gráinne, one of the highest parts of the Hill of Tara, at the summer solstice last week. For once the typical Irish weather didn’t mar the occasion and those who had waited up all night were rewarded with the sight of the sun rising above the eastern horizon. Bodhráns were beaten and tin whistles played as the two hundred spectators enjoyed the experience. Among them were two members of the Wangkumarra people from Australia who have sought the help of the Tara campaigners in a bid to have their own lands restored to them.

 

Tricia Ní Mhaolagáin has been appointed as the first teacher for the new Gaelscoil Ráth Tó which is due to open in the coming academic year. Although the new school has not yet received recognition from the Department of Education the founding committee has received support from a number of national Irish language organisations. The committee has now reached agreement with Ratoath Community Centre for the school to be located in the centre for the coming academic year. According to committee member Seán Ó Buachalla the school is due to open at the end of August this year.

 

Many Irish towns have twin towns in other countries, but Carrickmacross has another take on town twinning with what they hope is a new record for the Guinness Book of Records. Last weekend the local Lions Club managed to encourage two hundred and thirty-one sets of twins to assemble in the town, with participants coming from England, France and Spain as well as Ireland. The twins paraded through the town centre led by Lions Club president Paddy Gollogly accompanied on a tandem bicycle by his twin brother Jimmy.

 

Two descendants of General John O’Neill took part in a ceremony last weekend to mark the birthplace of the US general in Drumgallon near Clontibret. O’Neill was born at Beth’s Lane and was active in the American Civil War before taking part in the Fenian invasion of Canada in 1866. Attending the unveiling of the granite plaque was Gerry O’Neill from Wicklow whose great-grandfather was a brother of the general, while a wreath was laid by another descendant, local man Pat Flanagan.  

 

Boating enthusiasts visited Daingean, Ballycommon and Tullamore on a recent weekend to view the 51M trading boat which made its final journey from St James Harbour in Dublin fifty years ago. On that occasion it was carrying a consignment of Guinness to Limerick and the journey was being re-enacted for “The Final Farewell”. The man at the helm in 1960 is no longer with us but his sons, daughter and two grandchildren were on board, as well as some of the original crew members, as the vessel made its way along the Grand Canal.     

 

The county recently honoured one of its own when outgoing mayor Tony Ward bestowed the Freedom of the County on singer Brendan Shine. Brendan, who lives and farms at Taughmaconnell, has been in show business for the past forty years and many of his songs have promoted his native county.  

 

A guided walk in the Strokestown area last year proved so successful that this year Strokestown Community Development Association has decided to organise the Bogtrotters Marathon to raise money for Bothar, the charity which gives farm animals to needy families in third-world countries. The route,will run from Strokestown Park House and will follow minor roads and bog tracks to the finishing point in Rooskey. In addition to the marathon there will be a Fun Run for children . a traditional music session and the Bogtrotters Bash.

 

On July 23 a train arriving at Birdhill railway station will mark the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the station in 1860 and the Tidy Village Committee are organising an appropriate celebration. There will be a formal ceremony to mark the occasion, including the unveiling of a plaque, while the official opening of the new Pollagh Walk will also take place. A Birdhill Song competition, a Fancy Dress Parade featuring nineteenth century costumes, and a set dancing competition will also feature in the programme for the weekend event.

 

Parish priest Father Pat Malone was in attendance at celebrations to mark the one hundredth anniversary of the opening of the Sisters of Mercy Convent girls’ primary school in Nenagh.   Also in attendance and contributing her memories was Anne Culloo from Tulla, who taught at the school in 1945.

 

 

‘As dead as a dodo’ is a phrase that was once used to describe the fate of the Red Kite in Ireland, but as Minister John Gormley found out recently, that phrase no longer applies. In 2007 a project was launched to re-introduce the Red Kite to Ireland- the bird of prey had been extinct in the country for over two hundred years. The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, on a trip to the project’s headquarters, heard that the re-introduction of the Red Kite bird has so far met with no obstacles, although four birds have died from accidental poisoning.

 

It is fitting that conservation work on the original Asgard is being carried out by Arklow shipwrights, since it was in Arklow that the Asgard II was built. After it was decided that the Asgard should be conserved rather than restored, five Arklow men took on the job led by project manager John Kearon. He has been assisted by shipwrights John Proctor and Brendan Tracey in addition to joiners Patrick Kirwan and Oliver Ward. Work on the vessel is expected to continue for at least another six months, including work on the interior, and then the vessel will go on permanent display in the National Museum.