Toome’s historical connections to be explored at Ballinascreen event

Ballinascreen Historical Society’s guest speaker will be Michael McConway from Toome on Tuesday, December 2.

Michael is currently Deputy Museum Manager at HMS Caroline but he is also a keen local historian who leads guided walking tours and community heritage projects around Toome and Lough Neagh.

As Heritage Project Assistant with Toome Initiative for Development of Art and Learning (TIDAL) between 2021 and 2022 he conducted twelve oral history interviews as part of the Lower Bann Voices project, digitising a selection of the recordings with written commentary and analysis.

Michael’s recordings have featured family history and farming traditions from the parish of Duneane; memories of the blacksmith’s shop; showband stories from the 1960s; the storytelling role of the pub; fishing on Lough Neagh and Toome’s one-armed ploughman.

The presentation will be illustrated by testimony and photographs offered by his interviewees and promises to be a great evening of nostalgia with many connections to, and parallels with, the parish of Ballinascreen.

The meeting, which is open to all, will start at 8pm with the venue being the Workspace Community Hub in Draperstown.

Those attending will have an opportunity to pay their membership fee for 2026. Members have free admission to the monthly meetings, while non-members pay £3.

As usual, the evening will conclude with refreshments.