News on July 19th 2000

The Patrick MacGill Summer School
The 20^th Annual Patrick MacGill International Summer School will be held in Glenties from 13^th – 18^th August. The Theme this year is “Women of Ireland”. Official opening is by Ms. Joy Mc Cormick, Member of the Commission on the Status of Women, Represents National I.C.A. on the Equality Committee of the Dept. of Justice, Equality and Law Reform. Among the well-known names on the guest list are, Senator Joe O’Toole, Bernadette McAliskey, Sr. Consillio, Ms. Olive Braiden, Rev. Professor Enda Mc Donagh, Sr. Stanislaus Kennedy, Dana Rosemary Scallon, Alan Dukes, Mary Coughlan and many more. As well as the Lectures at night there will be lots of things to do during the day, Art Classes, Painting and Sketching Courses for adults and children, Exhibitions, Walks, and Tours. A Family Concert will be held in the Highlands Hotel on Sunday evening at 10p.m. featuring Vincent, Jimmy and Peter Campbell, Master Fiddlers and Aussie Bryson, Entertainer. There will be entertainment in ‘The Club’ in the hotel on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday nights. Weekly Admission Ticket is £20.00. This does not include painting & sketching course. Programmes are in the shops and business houses now.

Patrick MacGill was born in 1889 in the Glen of Glenties, and was the first of eleven children. After a mere three years schooling, Patrick left school at ten and after two years’ work on the home patch of land set out at twelve as one of a party of Donegal youngsters for the hiring fair in Strabane. MacGill’s literary career began in 1910 when he asked ‘The Derry Journal’ to print some poems. At the time he was working as a plate-layer on the Glasgow – Greenock line of the Caledonian Railway. Shortly afterwards he moved to London and had ‘Children of the Dead End’ and the ‘Rat Pit’ published. They were best sellers. MacGill wrote more novels, some with an Irish setting and some with an English background, but never again did he achieve the intensity of these two novels, that really form a single work.
He married and English lady, Margaret Gibbons, niece of Cardinal Gibbons, Baltimore, U.S.A. and they moved to America where he died in November 1963. They had three daughters, Patricia, Chris and Sheila, who died suddenly last year. They have come regularly to Glenties since the inception of the Summer School. The following is a verse from a poem by Patrick MacGill.
I’m going back to Glenties when the harvest fields are brown,
And the autumn sunset lingers on my little Irish town,
When the gossamer is shining where the moorland blossoms blow,
I’ll take the road across the hills I tramped so long ago –
‘Tis far I am beyond the seas, but yearning voices call,
‘Will you not come back to Glenties, and your wave-washed Donegal.

Engagment
Angelene Conefry, Mill Road, Glenties and John Ashford, Laytown, Co. Meath got engaged on July 2^nd.
Angelene also received her B. A. in Social Science at Queens University, Belfast on Thursday July 6^th 2000. Congratulations Angelene on both counts. Angelene is the eldest daughter of Noel and Bridie Conefry Mill Road, Glenties.

Wedding
Congratulations to Michael Boyle, Ard Patrick and Grainne Boyle, Ardconnell, who were married in St. Connell’s Church Glenties on Saturday 15^th July2000. Former Glenties Parish Priest Fr. James Friel officiated. Michael is a son of Mick and Anne Boyle, Ard Patrick and Grainne is a daughter of Dee and the late Neil Boyle, Ardconnell, Glenties.

Congratulations
Congratulations to the Glen Tug-O-War team who won 1^st Prize in the 680 kilo All Ireland Competition in Stradbally, Co. Waterford on Sunday last.

Death
The death took place recently of Miss Ellen Lafferty, Creeslough. Miss Lafferty taught Commerce in The Mc Devitt Institute, Glenties, (now part of The Highlands Hotel), for a number of years. The Mc Devitt Institute was the local secondary school before the Comprehensive School was built.

Graveyard Mass
This year Mass will be celebrated in Glenties Graveyard on Sunday 30^th July and in Edeninfagh Graveyard on Sunday 13^th August. Both Masses are at 3.00p.m.

Houses
Eight more houses have been built on The Rock. This makes a total of eighteen houses built on The Rock in recent years.