Galway Scrap Book

This article was written by Samuel J. Macguire and originally published in the 'Galway Reader' in the 1950s. The 'Galway Reader' is available from Galway Public Library.

All roads and paths in the County Galway countryside centre in the story of the churches abbeys, confiscations, and land tenure. From this story one can see Galway life, ethics, laws, ways of speech. In short, it was, and is the brief abstract and chronicle of the life of our people. The imaginative man of today passing through city, town or village, or along a Galway road, must see that thousands of years of human life lie behind so contracted an area as the county. Educators have been brought to the view that the best approach to history in general is through the history of the home town or village, and through the study of their national life and government from their origins to their present complex forms. The Galway Scrap-book is the searchings of historical text-books awards, biographies, pamphlets, and similar documents. A whole world of information is obtained in this way, and it is to be hoped that the results may be illuminating as well as useful.