Bangor Carnegie Library wins award

Tonight I visited the new Bangor Carnegie Library for a reception to celebrate the library's success in the Public Library Awards 2009.  The awards focus on library building design, good practice, overall management and public usgae and the Bangor library was shortlisted in the 'Architecture meets Practicality' category.

The original two-storey library building was erected in 1909 as a joint Public Library and Technical School project and as the library part of it was funded by a Carnegie grant it became known as the Carnegie Library.  Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919) was born in Scotland and then emigrated from there to america as a child.  He made a vast fortune as an indutrialist and businessman and eventually gave away most of his money to establish schools, libraries and universities.

The project involved a major refurbishment of the old library building and the consttruction of a large modern extension.  The enhanced building is one of the largest public libraries in Northern Ireland and since reopening the number of people using the library has increased.  It is now the second most used library in Northern Ireland.

Since DCAL was set up ten years ago, eleven new libraries have been opened and there have been many other refurbishments, including Bangor.  The work is ongoing and Antrim will open to the public shortly.  Work is also underway on the Dungiven and Whitehead libraries.  Overall my department will invest around £17 million on library buildings over the current budget period and there will also be a large sum earmarked for a new Central Library in Belfast.

The other speakers at the reception were Irene Knox, the chief executive, and David Elliott, the chair of Libraries NI.  Afterwards I had a tour of the facilites, which are very impressive and attractive.  This is a good example of what a modern library should be like and also a good example of how the old can be retained and combined with the new.

Metropolitan Arts Centre

Work is due to start on a new £17.5 million Metropolitan Arts Centre in the Cathedral Quarter in Belfast.  The centre will house two theatres, three visual arts galleries, dance studios, rehearsal rooms, offices and a restaurant.

The Northern Ireland Executive, through my department DCAL, has allocated £10.76 million to the two-year project, which will provide employment for 420 people during the construction work.

The new MAC will appeal to a wide range of performers and the aim is to provide a building which will create entertainment, promote eductaion and inspire creativity.

The development is the latest capital project in a decade-long investment in new infrastructure venues in Northern Ireland, including a new home for the region’s only repertory company, the Lyric Theatre, and major refurbishments of Belfast’s Crescent Arts Centre and the Playhouse Theatre in Londonderry.  This is another good example of devolution delivering for the people of Northern Ireland.

A Birl for Burns

The following tribute to the influence of Burns and Scots in Ulster was written by the poet Seamus Heaney, who celebrated his 70th birthday earlier this year.

A Birl for Burns

From the start, Burns' birl and rhythm,
That tongue the Ulster Scots brought wi' them
And stick to still in County Antrim
Was in my ear.
From east of Bann it westered in
On the Derry air.
My neighbours toved and bummed and blowed,
They happed themselves until it thowed,
By slaps and stiles they thrawed and tholed
And snedded thrissles,
And when the rigs were braked and hoed
They'd wet their whistles.
Old men and women getting crabbèd
Would hark like dogs who'd seen a rabbit,
Then straighten, stare and have a stab at
Standard habbie:
Custom never staled their habit
O' quotin' Rabbie.
Leg-lifting, heartsome, lightsome Burns!
He overflowed the well-wrought urns
Like buttermilk from slurping churns,
Rich and unruly,
Or dancers flying, doing turns
At some wild hooley.
For Rabbie's free and Rabbie's big,
His stanza may be tight and trig
But once he sets the sail and rig
Away he goes
Like Tam-O-Shanter o'er the brig
Where no one follows.
And though his first tongue's going, gone,
And word lists now get added on
And even words like stroan and thrawn
Have to be glossed,
In Burn's rhymes they travel on
And won't be lost.

Copyright © Seamus Heaney

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The GAA, an Irish language centre and republicanism

On Sunday 6 December there was a series of events in Londonderry to mark the 25th anniversary of the deaths of four IRA men. 

On 2 December 1984 Ciaran Fleming and Anthony MacBride, who was a member of the Irish Army as well as the IRA, planted a landmine near Kesh in county Fermanagh.  A hoax call was made to lure the British Army into the area and three armed IRA terrorists lay in wait but the mine failed to explode and MacBride was shot by the SAS.  Another IRA member, Ciaran Fleming, drowned in the Bannagh River while trying to escape.

Two more IRA men, Willie Fleming and Danny Doherty, were shot on 6 December 1984 by the SAS as they were going into the grounds of Gransha Psychiatric Hospital in Londonderry, where they planned to murder an off-duty member of the UDR.  At their funeral Martin McGuinness said, 'We are an occupied country and those brave enough to fight repression deserve nothing but respect and unfailing support from us all. Only the IRA can bring Britain to the negotiating table.'

To mark the anniversary of the deaths of the four IRA men Martin McGuinness gave a lecture in the new Irish language centre, Cultúrlann Uí Chanáin, which opened recently at a cost of £4 million  in Great James Street. There was also an exhibition in the centre of photographs of the IRA men, their deaths and their funerals.

The republican commemoration also included a wreath laying ceremony at an IRA memorial and a Gaelic football match between Na Piarsaigh CLG and Séan Dolan's GAC at Celtic Park in Londonderry.  Celtic Park is the main ground of Derry County Board of the GAA.

Once again various forms of Gaelic culture have been aligned with militant Irish republicanism.  The main county GAA pitch, which is owned by the Derry County Board, was used to host a Gaelic football match commemorating four IRA men and a new Irish language centre was the location for a commemorative lecture and exhibition.  Is it any wonder that unionists do not feel any affinity with either the Irish language or the GAA?

The start of another week

On Monday I had meetings with representatives of the Caleb Foundation, Paul Mullan and Ronnie Spence from the Heritage Lottery Fund, and the Northern Ireland controller of the BBC, Peter Johnston. 

The Caleb representatives raised several issues including how we might mark the 400th anniversary of the Authorised (King James) Version of the Bible, which was published in 1611.

Later in the evening I attended a DUP 'At Home' in the La Mon Hotel.  There was a very large attendance and the leader and deputy leader answered questions from the floor.  It was an excellent meeting and there was a real sense of harmony in the party.

Lesser Spotted Ulster

Next Tuesday night on Lesser Spotted Ulster on UTV Joe Mahon continues his exploration of the Ulster countryside with a visit to the homeland of W F Marshall, the Bard of Tyrone.

Rev William Forbes Marshall was a Presbyterian minister, poet, author and historian.  He had a deep affection for his native county of Tyrone and was also a fervent unionist and Ulsterman.

He died in January 1959 but the 50th anniversary of his death passed almost unnoticed.  There were no television programmes or festivals to mark the occasion and there were only one or two newspaper articles.  It is important that Marshall and his work are not forgotten.

The following poem is one of his political poems and it appeared in the Northern Whig on the day that the Ulster covenant was signed in September 1912:

The Blue Banner 

Firm-leagued we face the future, tho’ the road be dark and steep,

The road that leads to honour is the lonely road we keep,
And, though all the world forsake us, this is the course we hold,
The course our fathers followed in the Cov’nant days of old.

We fain would look for comfort to the land from whence we came,
Where still abide our kith and kin and clansmen of our name.
Where lives were deemed of small account by valiant men and true,
For Christ, His Crown, His Cov’nant and the war-worn folds of blue.

Long years have been and faded since the old-time banner waved,
See! How it flashes once again ere dangers must be braved,
The Cov’nant oath we now will swear that Britain may be told,
We stand for faith and freedom and the memories of old. 

For all they died for gladly in the homeland o’er the sea,
For blood-won rights that still are ours as Ulsterborn and free,
For the land we came to dwell in, and the martyr’s faith we hold -
God grant we be as leal to these as were the men of old!