Audiovisual show recalls Coole glories

An audiovisual show on Lady Augusta Gregory of Coole and Ireland's largest analemmatic sundial are among new attractions at the…

An audiovisual show on Lady Augusta Gregory of Coole and Ireland's largest analemmatic sundial are among new attractions at the site of the writer's old home, Coole Park, in Gort, Co Galway.

And there recently for their unveiling were her two granddaughters, Mrs Anne de Winton and Mrs Catherine Kennedy, now in their 8Os, and affectionately known in literary annals as Me and Nu.

The sundial, which measures six metres across, employs the shadow of a person standing in a prescribed position according to the month to indicate the hour.

It was designed by Owen Deignan, who has more than 100 sundials to his credit, and constructed in limestone by a Burren stonemason, Frank McCormack.

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It was commissioned by Duchas, the Heritage Service. Anne de Winton, whose book about her childhood at Coole is entitled Me and Nu, declared the sundial "most wonderful and extraordinary", and said the flower garden had never looked lovelier.

It was all part of the fourth annual Autumn Gathering to honour Lady Gregory, organised each year by Sheila O'Donnellan. Never more felt than on this occasion is the tragedy of the demolition of Coole House, nine years after Lady Gregory's death in 1932.

The "horror", as Mrs Kennedy described the demolition, was felt most acutely by many watching the superbly researched audiovisual show which reveals Coole in its heyday.

Tourists and others interested will be able to see it for themselves at the visitors' centre at Coole in the summer season.

The exceptional story of Lady Gregory, born Isabella Augusta Persse, of nearby Roxborough, in 1852, has been fleshed out and brought to life thanks to material unearthed during extensive research by Sinead McCoole in museums, libraries and collections as far away as Atlanta, in the US.

Photographs for the sideshow were taken by Kinvara-based photographer, Nutan.

Some of the slides were being seen for the first time by Mrs de Winton and Mrs Kennedy, who were moved by images of themselves when children with their brother, Richard, and their loving grandmother who reared them and called them her "chicks" after their father's death in the first World War.

Three box-hedged enclosures can still be seen in the walled garden, or flower garden as it used to be called, where the children were each given a little plot by their grandmother.

The Minister for the Arts, Ms de Valera, who was present, thought it would be a "wonderful project" to rebuild the house at Coole. There are many existing photographs of the interior and exterior and plans which were drawn up when the house was considered for use as a military hospital shortly before its demolition.

In the garden, Lady Gregory's beloved Catalpa tree is still there, though now decaying. Also still there are the famous autographed copper beech and the disappearing lake which is part of the world's most important turlough (dry lake) system.