Joe Mahon with Margaret Murphy and Bertie McNeilly on the banks of the River Maine in Cullybackey.
Joe Mahon is continuing his travels around Northern Ireland with his new UTV series of ‘Mahon’s Way’ and his next episode brings him to Cullybackey.
Due to air on Tuesday 29th August at 8pm, Joe goes on a whistle-stop tour of the village.
It’s mid-winter in mid-Antrim and Joe Mahon is exploring the village of Cullybackey on the banks of the river to which it owes its very existence.
Joe visits the mid-Antrim village during the winter. We learn how the village developed and grew due to the River Maine. Records show that as early as 1705 local linen merchant John Dickey was the first man in Ireland to have a power-driven bleachworks and he did so by harnessing the waters of the River Maine.
Liz Hoy shows Joe Mahon some of the products of Cullybackey's clothing industry
The weather might be frosty but the welcome from the village’s extremely well-informed inhabitants is anything but.
Besides learning about Cullybackey’s industrial and railway heritage, Joe also discovers a strong penchant for public art, painting, craftwork and poetry among the local population. He gets a tour of some amazing sculptures in the town from the artist himself, visits the Hub, and finds out about the ‘Chatty Café’.
Joe Mahon and Joanne Brown Kerr in the Bann Maine West Coummunity Hub at Cullybackey
Mary Johnston Watterson gives Joe Mahon a little demonstration of living in the 19th Century at the Arthur Cottage in Cullybackey
To add to the warmth of the welcome, he feasts on what he describes as “the best potato bread” he’s ever tasted at the ancestral home of Chester Alan Arthur, who became the 21st President of the United States in 1881.
He also hears how local people were impacted by the famine, and learns how local ordinary people wrote poetry about any subject!
‘MAHON’S WAY is produced by Westway Film Productions for UTV, supported by Northern Ireland Screen’s Ulster-Scots Broadcast Fund. The series is sponsored by FirmusEnergy.
You can watch this episode on Tuesday 29thAugust at 8pm on UTV and on catch up on www.itv.com/utvprogrammes