Archive material wanted in Britain.

Over the past three years work has been proceeding to collect and collate archive Comhaltas material. Items collected so far include recordings of Michael Daly (the person who first brought Comhaltas to London in 1957) and Edmund Murphy who was Provincial treasurer for many years. Other subjects include :

The West London branch 40th anniversary dinner / Luton Leagraves 25th celebrations / Leeds and Birmingham Provincial fleadhanna / Tribute to Mrs. Lawrie of Birmingham / Tribute to Pat Judge of St. Albans. / Tribute to Sean Mc Namara of Liverpool / Tribute to Kathleen Lord of Nottingham.

We have also collected lots of old photographs and documents which we have copied to CD Rom for printing and displaying at Comhaltas functions all over Britain and also in the Overseas Office at Fleadh Cheoil na hEireann. The eventual aim is to have all the archive material available on a website so that it is accessible by the general public. In this way the archives would be a valuable asset to:

2nd and 3rd generation Irish. / Student research. / Music reference library. / Audio visual library.

Literature reference. / Historical interest at local, regional and national level.

The archive team believe that an archive should consist of much more than audio visual tapes and are therefore interested to hear from anyone who may have memorabilia such as, music scripts, songs, poems and dance steps in written format, plus old records of ceili bands and solo performers etc., which they would like to donate to the archive or allow us to copy. All material sent to us for copying will be closely guarded, copied and returned to sender. We will reimburse you with any cost incurred in postage.

Please contact:          Jill Cafferkey, 42 Tillyard Way, Cambridge, CB1 8QU                                                                         01223 514805.

                                   Seamus Brogan, 483 London Rd, Grays, Essex, RM20 4AD.

                                                                        01375 380355

                           Pat Hannigan, 104 Crawley Drive, Grovehill, Hemel Hempstead. HP2 6BU.

                                                                        01442 250982