25 YEARS AGO/1982
Local man in Falklands crisis
A FIVEMILETOWN man, his wife and young son, are among the 1,800 people living on the crisis-hit Falklands Islands, where the invasion by the Argentine troops has sparked off the ugly threat of a military confrontation with British naval warships in the International territorial dispute.
Thomas George Beattie, who is in his thirties, and is a native of Derritoney, Fivemiletown, went to work on a large sheep farm in the Falklands in 1965, and later married Betty, a local girl. They have one child, Ian, who is eight years old.
Mr Beattie's brother, Robert, lives with is family on the Hospital Road in Omagh, and has received a telegram from Thomas assuring them that he and his family were safe and well. The telegram read: "Don't worry. All OK here. Tom, Betty, Ian." The urgent message was a comforting reassurance to Mr Beattie's relatives, who had been anxiously watching the news for developments since the crisis began.
Councillors attack GAA
AN attack by Unionist-Loyalist councillors on the GAA – accusing the association of practising "vocational apartheid" – was made at an Omagh District Council meeting, when they failed to block a grant to Beragh Red Knights Club. Oliver Gibson, alleging that the GAA supported "vocational apartheid," was referring to the fact that police and British Army personnel are not permitted to be members of the GAA.
The matter arose on a minute of the council's Recreation Committee which had recommended that a £90 grant be paid to Beragh after the claim had been considered by the Sports Advisory Committee. Payment was also recommended to ten other sporting bodies in the area.
50 YEARS AGO/1957
Bomb thrown at RUC barracks
COALISLAND police barracks has been damaged by a bomb explosion. Despite heavy barricades around the building, several windows were smashed and a hole blown in the wall. No one was injured.
A search was made over a wide area, and police and special constabulary questioned residents.
The following statement was released by police in Belfast, late in the day: "During the early hours of the morning a bomb was thrown at the married quarters of the Royal Ulster Constabulary Station at Coalisland, Co. Tyrone.
A number of windows were damaged.
Neither the sergeant's wife nor their two small children, who were in the quarters at the time, were injured."
Police and 'B' Specials took several men in for questioning in a series of raids throughout the district.
Later some of them were released.
Cookstown loses its gasworks
ABOUT 200 Cookstown housewives have cooked their Sunday dinners for the last time by gas, for the century-old local gasworks has ceased production owing to increased cost of manufacture.
Originally, upwards of 550 houses in the town used gas as a means of cooking, but since the works announced their impending closure, many have switched to electricity and bottled gas.
The furnaces were stoked for the last time by Nathaniel Cahoon, Monrush, who has been employed at the works for over six years. The company offered to sell the works to Cookstown Urban but the Council refused to take them over.
75 YEARS AGO/1932
Attempt to foil Easter parades
DESPITE extensive police precautions, over 400 men, described as IRA Volunteers, were present at Greencastle on Easter Sunday. Several contingents came in motor cars. After Mass in St. Joseph's Church, the entire party marched to the cemetery, where a wreath was placed on the grave of a man killed in 1921.
In the course of the speeches delivered, reference was made to the 1916 Rebellion, which was said not to have been in vain although they had a pro-British Government in the Free State for the past ten years. They had now over the border a government of which all felt proud.
About an hour afterwards, a police courier arrived in Omagh from Mountfield and interrupted the affair. A large force of police, in Crossley tenders, rushed to Greencastle and spent upwards of two hours in investigation without result. Tricolours in the area were pulled down by police.
Two small Tricolours on a grave in Dungannon Cemetery were removed by the police, who also destroyed Republican posters in various places. Republican posters were also torn down by police at Carrickmore. A force of police were drafted into Carrickmore for the purpose of preventing a demonstration, but no attempt was made, and the day passed quietly.
Shot pig instead of rats
SAM Morrison, farmer, Altmore, Pomeroy, finding his pig-sty infested with rats, went to a neighbour – Archie Morrison – who came with his gun, and after concealing himself for some time, had three of the pests covered with the gun. But, just as he was pulling the trigger, one of the pigs came into view and it received the full contents of the gun and died, while the three rodents escaped.
100 YEARS AGO/1907
Invention for culture of hair
THE Evans Vacuum Cap (pictured above) is a practical invention constructed on scientific and hygienic principles by the simple means of which a free and normal circulation is restored throughout the scalp.
The minute blood vessels are gently stimulated to activity, thus allowing the food supply which can only be derived from the blood, to be carried to the hair roots, the effects of which are quickly seen in a healthy, vigorous growth of hair.
There is no rubbing, and as no drugs or chemicals of whatsoever kind are employed there is nothing to cause irritation. It is only necessary to wear the Cap three or four minutes daily.
– NIGEL McDONAGH
