Culture Night card game event planned for Mayo village

For more than 30 years, the card game 25 was played in the Clogher Community Centre as a fundraising event for community activities but, more importantly, in later years as a social engagement for like-minded people who had learned the game at their parents’ knees around an open fire.

Indeed, the game was played in the school before the hall was built and previously the many games which took place in private houses still live in the memory of many people.

This year, the community in Clogher and particularly the card game committee have decided to celebrate playing 25 by participating in Culture Night on Friday, September 23.

The community hall will be transformed to replicate a rural Irish home pre-rural electrification. There will be an eclectic mix of turf fires, oil lamps, children’s cradles and a cat on the hob. The weather will be determined by whether or not he turns his back to the fire!

There will also be a display of photographs, excerpts of local interest from the Schools Folklore Collection of 1937-38 and excerpts from the Clogher book Down Memory Lane, which was published in 2001. There will be a playlist of traditional music of the time in the background.

The exhibition will open for the schoolchildren and interested parents from 2 to 3.30 p.m. and will reopen at 7 p.m. for interested members of the public. The night will finish up with a standard 25 game, at which it is hoped locals will see all their old friends and make some new ones.

The exhibition will also be on display on Wednesday, September 21, for the benefit of the Active Age Group. Hopefully it will bring back many good memories.

Even if people have no great interest in cards, there may be something there to catch the eye. A word of thanks and appreciation goes out to all who helped put the exhibition together, to the hall committee, and to all who have loaned artefacts for the displays.