From Turgesius to Enoch Burke: Castlepollard celebrated legends

The controversial former Wilson’s Hospital teacher was the subject of one of the floats entered in the St Patrick’s Day parade in Castlepollard, the theme of which was ‘Legends of Westmeath’.

“We had a great collection of floats this year,” says Cllr Alfie Devine, one of the organisers of the parade.

A source of amusement – and surprise – to Alfie was the fact that he was himself even featured on one float, which focused on “outgoing legends and incoming legends”. Happily for Alfie, who was elected to Westmeath County Council for the first time last year, he featured as an “incoming legend”.

Another float that got a lot of attention featured the Viking, Turgesius, who is associated with the north Westmeath area.

Great imagination went into the floats generally, always a hugely popular dimension of what has become an enormous parade, and the organisers believe that approximately 45 floats participated, some prepared by clubs and organisations, but the majority by local businesses.

“We also had all sorts of machinery and tractors, and Streete Vintage Club were there with their stuff as well,” says Alfie.

The parade in Castlepollard is always held at 5pm, in order to facilitate the participation of the much-loved Mullingar Town Band, who have an earlier commitment to the parade in Mullingar. The band were excellent, as usual, says Alfie, adding that another popular musical participant was a Samba band from County Louth.

“We had a huge crowd, probably one of the biggest ever,” says Alfie, estimating that as many as 2,000 attended.

“The Square in Castlepollard is ideal for a parade, and we went around it twice,” says Alfie.

The grand marshals were Paddy McCabe and Tom Egan, who arrived in a vintage Rolls Royce.

Former councillors Frank McDermott and Paddy Hill had the honour of raising the flag before the parade started, while another former political figure, Donie Cassidy, did his usual excellent job as compère for the event. Amhrán na BhFiann was sung by Mairead Kiernan, accompanied by PJ Kennedy.

As part of the festivities, families enjoyed a variety of food stalls and activities set up in the town centre, Castlepollard ABC-Bouncy Castles were on the green, as were Sweets and Treats by Abbie and Mammy. At the start of the day, there was a craft and farmers market hosted in the Castle Varagh Hotel.

While some areas find it difficult to muster up a committee to organise a parade, that’s not a problem in Castlepollard: “There’s a core committee of nine or 10, but then on the day, and, even before it, there’s 20 or 25 people involved,” says Alfie.

In addition, he continues, Ballycomoyle Football Club for the last couple of years have done the marshalling and the traffic management. “That makes a huge difference, because the core group then can do the organising, and getting the floats organised, and doing the little bit of a write-up on them for when they pass by.

“It can be fairly hectic in the hours coming up to the parade, so to have the lads doing the traffic management and stuff like that makes a huge difference.”

The parade was sponsored by Westmeath County Council, Decotek Automotive , North Midlands Credit Union and many more, which the committee gratefully thanked, saying the parade would not have been possible without the help of all their sponsors.

Prizegiving event

All is not yet done and dusted for this year yet, however: a special presentation night is to take place in the Hotel Varagh on March 30, at which the prizewinning entries from this year’s parade will be named and honoured.