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Miss Eibhlis Maher (International Miss Macra festival PRO), reports:-
This year (2015) celebrates the 44th anniversary of the International Miss Macra Festival. The festival is run annually by the Clonoulty/Rossmore Macra na Feirme club; held over the Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights of the annual August Bank Holiday weekend.
Click HERE to view Video in High Definition
(Video Music: Courtesy Richard and Linda Thompson – “I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight”.)
Once again this year’s festival will see young ladies travelling from all over Ireland and beyond and all converging on Co. Tipperary to compete for the honour of being crowned International Miss Macra 2015 (succeeding the much admired, 2014 winner Miss Bríd Cooney.).
History of the Miss Macra Festival
With regards to the history of this most prestigious of events, the International Miss Macra Festival is one real example of a ‘personality competition’. This festival was originally founded by Mr Paddy Heffernan, Mr Tom Horan and Mr Michael Slattery back in 1972 and has grown from strength to strength every year since conception.
In the very beginning after approaching Macra National Headquarters, the founding members received little enthusiastic support for their idea, however they were determined to succeed and decided to organise the competition ‘of their own bat’. Major success followed and by 1987, for the twenty-fifth anniversary there were thirty-two contestants, one from every county in Ireland. Also during the 1980’s the festival began to attract participation from rural youth and agricultural organisations abroad, such as the 4H clubs in America, the Scottish Young Farmers and many more.
The International Miss Macra competition is unique, due mainly to the fact that it is organised solely by a local Macra Club and not via any County Executive. The Miss Macra festival has a huge community base also, with the contestants staying with host families from around the locality for the duration of the festival period. The pinnacle point of the festival is that it is, perhaps, the best example within Macra of what a local club can achieve, demonstrating strong dedication and team-like commitment.
The local community play an important part in this festival, with many households taking on the role of a host family for each of the contestants, year after year. The tradition of the contestants staying with host families is very strong and contestants are adopted into the very heart of each host family’s home for the full duration of the festival, where a warm welcome is guaranteed. The host families are a very important part of this community based festival and Clonoulty/Rossmore Macra na Feirme club are very grateful each year for this support, generosity, commitment and loyalty.
International Miss Macra Festival Venue – Dundrum House Hotel, Tipperary
The luxurious Dundrum House Hotel (latter winner of a certificate of excellence in 2012) has once again been chosen as the prominent venue for this year’s festival. Described as an oasis in the Golden Vale; Dundrum House Hotel boasts the perfect setting for those seeking relaxation and fun. The historic, picturesque building was originally constructed in the early eighteenth century by the O’Dwyers of Kilnamanagh, as the centrepiece of their vast estate.
Continue reading 44th International Miss Macra Festival – Friday July 31st 2015
  
 The Hidden Tipperary Tourism Group, (Latter which includes Upperchurch Hill Walking, Upperchurch Climbing Wall, Lar na Pairce & Semple Stadium, St Mary’s Famine Museum, Cormackstown Heritage Centre, Cabragh Wetlands, Holycross Abbey Tours, Farney Castle, The Source, Templemore Town Park and Hayes Hotel) are inviting everyone to a Barbecue at Cabragh Wetlands, here in Thurles on Friday next July 17th.
This fund raising event will begin sharp at 6.30pm and run until 10:00pm with tickets costing €10 per person or €30 per family.
The event on the evening will include Food, Music and other entertainment; with those attending permitted to bring along their own beer/ wine.
This event is being held in order to raise funding for the publication of a Secondary Schools Brochure, latter which will highlight primary source educational opportunities here in Mid-Tipperary and thus encourage participating schools to visits the many educational primary source facilities now available in Thurles and surrounding areas.
For further information and tickets please contact the Cabragh Wetlands Office, Tel: 0504-43879, or Mobile: 086-3179919.
 Racket Hall Country House Hotel in Roscrea, Co Tipperary, which like so many other Munster based hotels, has spent time in receivership, is finally being offered for sale after eight years.
This 40-bed hotel goes on the market via agents Savills on behalf of KPMG receiver Kieran Wallace.
The popular venue, which today is trading successfully, has a history going back some 250 years as a former coaching house and popular roadhouse and is located just off Junction 21 of the Limerick-Dublin M7 motorway.
Situated on a roadside site containing some 2.85 acres, just two kilometres from Roscrea town; Racket Hall Country House was first developed back in 2003, when 40 guest bedrooms were added to an existing 18th century Georgian building which previously had operated only as a Licensed Hostelry and Restaurant business.
The premises currently operates as a Bord Failte three-star hotel, with 40 guest bedrooms, bar, restaurant, four conference rooms and banqueting facilities for up to 250 guests. The venue also boasts parking spaces for some 140 motor vehicles and an attractive garden space especially laid out for outdoor events and which in particular is highly regarded by photographers for weddings and other events.
Asking price via private treaty for Racket Hall Country House Hotel, in Roscrea is €800,000.
 Almost 300 years of Catholic Parish Registers, containing valuable information on births and marriages and held by the National Library of Ireland, are now currently available online, as and from today.
Dating from the 1740’s to the 1880’s, these records cover the entire island of Ireland and can now be accessed free of charge.
This new dedicated website [See http://registers.nli.ie/] now offers over 390,000 digital images of parish registers.
Parish register records are considered the single-most important source of information on Irish family history prior to the 1901 Census. Covering more than a 1,000 parishes across the island of Ireland, these registers consist primarily of baptismal and marriage records and typically includes information such as dates of baptisms and marriages and the names of key people involved, e.g. Witnesses or Godparents.
With the making of these records available, same will mean that those interested in research will now be able to trace their ancestry free and online from as far back as 1740.
For most genealogy researchers, parish registers provide the earliest direct source of family information making available real evidence of direct links between one generation and the next.
Those seeking details of persons known to have been born here in Thurles for just one example, can access all local registers at link http://registers.nli.ie/parishes/0280.
Please do take the time to watch the video uploaded once again below (First uploaded back in April 20th, 2013) and do read this current article in full.
June 1st to September 30th marks the annual summer vacation period for the vast majority of tourists visiting Tipperary; visiting both from here at home or abroad.
Since “The Gathering”, a tourism-led initiative which first began in 2012 in Ireland; same aimed at mobilising the Irish Diaspora; attempts at attracting tourism and creating much needed employment in Tipperary have taken a severe downward plunge. Lack of political support for tourism has most certainly impacted on our current catastrophic unemployment figures, which over the past two months alone have seen 835 Tipperary people lose their jobs. Prior to the most recent local county and general elections, selected TD’s and Co. Councillors gave ‘firm lip service’ only to supporting and encouraging tourism here in Tipperary, none more so than Fine Gael’s Mr Noel Coonan TD and Labour Party Deputy Leader and Minister Mr Alan Kelly, back then also given responsibility through the post of Junior Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport.
In an effort to boost Tipperary tourism and having met with both of the above named politicians, both in Thurles and Dublin, all efforts to return the Derrynaflan Hoard to Thurles, just briefly for just 3 months, were met by total silence and a refusal to even communicate via email.
Allow Me to Demonstrate the True Definition of Local and National Political Incompetence and Money Wasting.
Please click HERE to locate the website titled ‘Tipperary Tourism’. Next, scroll down to bottom of page one.
Note: This Tipperary Tourism website was designed in 2014 and confirms it was funded, no doubt handsomely, by European Regional Structural Funding, South Tipperary Development Company, Minister Alan Kelly’s Department of Environment, Community and Local Government, 28 European countries, better known by the abbreviation EU and finally through Tipperary County Council.
Having confirmed to yourself this undeniable fact, move your cursor indicator up slightly to the heading marked ‘Discover‘ (Positioned to the left on same page). Next click on ‘Attractions In Tipperary’. See all preferred attractions listed and available by striking the down arrow to the right in the box provided (marked ‘Angling‘), and then choose from the list of other popular attractions on offer. Once you highlight your chosen attraction; move across to choose your preferred Co. Tipperary town, by hitting the down arrow right of the box marked ‘Clonmel‘. Next click on Thurles.
What do you mean, you can’t find Thurles?
Seriously, is this prevailing situation not the most perfect definition of ‘Total Local and National Political Incompetence‘, at a time when our Live Register Unemployment Figures for Co Tipperary today are almost double the national average?
More ‘Definitions of Incompetence’ to follow.
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