Stranorlar. it was the 1seat of a Yeomanry c.O!'Ps in the lSth and early 19th centuri.es, of which the name of the Band Gqden, where their musicians played, is a survi1vaL Its Protestant Church is built on ian old Catholic foundation, with its graveyard still ,::)how- :ing heudstlones going back to the 17th century. Its Presbyterian Church dates from 1709, :while :of the old Catholic Chapel built before Emancipation in the present Catholic graveyard there only remains a ft'agment, enough to support the 1he~dstone of Black .nean Hugh Kerri1gan. Stranorlar always had all the 1a1pparatus of administT'ation,-the militar1Y, the revenue police, the courthouse, the schools, the pound and the local centre for the union area from over 100 years Higo was focused in the workhouse. It was the fir,st centre of the railway system in Donegal. It had the well known da!ssic school of Hugh Hatron; and its local industries included t.anners, hatmakers, fbx-spinners, wheelwrights, farmers 1and carpenters. BaJlybofey was of later development. It mainly started in the e'arly 19th ·century, 1with the growth of the Bleachgreens in Knock, and Sir Edmund Hayes' Ironworks in Drumboe, of which the names noiw remain, and its distin:ctivenes.s is, one may say, racial. S:tranor113r conformed ~o the average Plantation town; BaUybofey was essentially the return of the native Irish wh:o came baick from the .mountains, Done1gal and Glenfinwards, 1and in that 1way the Finn was truly a Rhine. For if you take an •ana1ysis of Ballybofey and compare it with Stranorlar you will find that about 95 per cent. nf its people cam~ either from the direction of Donegal or Glenfin, or the western part of the parish of Donaghmore (the 'Vards, Timoneys, O'Donnells, McNulty·s, Glackins, McMenamins, Cnlums, McGlinoheys, the Durnins, MtUlrines, Magees, Meehans) and even those of planter origin (the Kees, Magees, McGonigles) who moved in from Cappry or Doloish rema1ined there, a·nd :rarely, if ever, crossed the river. Stranorlar, on the other hiand, is peopled from its own side c·f the river, to the east along the valley, and a bit to the north. In its lay-out Stranorliar is MJider and less huddled. I know both spots intimately, and I can't remember a "spout lane" in Stranorlar. And its people 1are differ,ent. In Stranorlar you had a lot of the quietness and conservatism of an Ea·st Ulster town. In Ballybofey -well, you general1y hadn't ! I remember this atmosphere beinig nicely described by Micky Harrahy, whom most of us· remember. "In Strran:orlar, Dole.tor, if yoru fell down in the stre.et, the people migiht look at you from behind the curtains, but they'd never come out to li£t you up. In Ballybofey, you'd have a cvowd around you in a ,second." It was his way of describing the charncteristics which are really of race, for Bal1ybofey has that Irish horizont1al co:-iception of the petople whi:eh is so essentially Gaelic. In St~anor ... lar you 1were cnlled by your christian name and surname - and l1sual1y there wa~ n Mr. or Tvtrs. added. Ballybofey, being one big fnmily, where everyone kne,w everybody else, generally dispensed with a title and usually with a surname. They used instead, a 810
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