SERVICES
‘This Place Owns Me’, celebrates the town’s history as a proud railway town and it’s equally proud association with the late Eugene McCabe. The “This Place Owns me” quote is taken from an interview given by Eugene McCabe in 1994. The full quote is “This place owns me. It has it’s tentacles round me, round my heart, my brain, my blood”. He was talking about his beloved Drumard, just out the road from the site of the mural, but we’ll proudly apply it to Clones too.
The images in this mural were inspired by photos in the O’Dea Collection in the National Library of Ireland. James P O’Dea travelled the country recording the railways before their dismantling and there are many very moving photos of Clones and the wider region available to view online at www.NLI.ie. There are Clones men shown as well as views depicted is those photos, including Sean McPhillips, Kevin McCusker, Dick Nicholl and Peter Fitzsimmon. The two scenes depicted in this mural are a merging of two iconic shots taken within meters of the site and serve to bring back to life what were once everyday common scenes.