Collecting memories is an integral part of the heritage and history of Westmeath. With thanks to Creative Ireland funding Westmeath Heritage offered a training course to assist individuals and communities in their collection of oral histories. with the assistance of Tomás Mac Conmara, participants were given insights in how to conduct and preserve recordings and also to how to navigate consents.
One of the participants on this course was Noel O'Callaghan. He has been working diligently over the last couple of years to record oral histories of retired defence forces members. Once these memories are recorded, he deposits copies in the library for local studies use. To access this collection please contact your local library.
At this stage he has over 60 interviews conducted.
Given the history of the army forces in the town, this is a fantastic resource to have locally, and to be able to share with the whole county.
Noel did a Heritage Week talk for us last year and the following article gives some further information on his project - Heritage Week: ‘Columb Barracks and Me’ oral history | Westmeath Examiner
