Records from north Mayo agri bank are being digitised

RECORDS from a north Mayo agricultural bank established in the late 1800s are to be digitised and made available to the public online.

The Enniscoe Agricultural Credit Bank (EACB) was set up in 1898 and operated until the late 1930s, one of around 300 small scale, local lending and savings banks set up around the country by the Irish Agricultural Organisations Society.

The aim was to provide access to capital for small farmers and business people in the wake of land reforms.

While the EACB has faded into history, the complete archive has been preserved at Enniscoe House.

Documents include minutes of meetings and detailed loan books, members of Mayo County Council's heritage committee was told.

Many of today's agribusiness powerhouses, like Kerrygold and the credit union movement, are an impressive legacy of this early movement, county librarian Austin Vaughan set out in a report. The movement was an inspiration for President Teddy Roosvelt's new agricultural policy in the United States.

Now, North Mayo Heritage Centre propose to preserve the EACB archive by creating a digital archive comprising of images of every page of the bank’s records. They will also bring the EACB story back to life by publishing articles on the history of the bank in local publications.

Mr. Vaughan said the archive will be of particular interest to the diaspora, where a lot of people borrowed money to go abroad.