by Aidan Arnold

The Lusk Heritage Group was founded by Pat Kelly and others thirty two years ago. The Group are unique in being the most prolific producers of local heritage videos in Ireland. Their Lusk Heritage Group website at luskheritage.com/ contains more than 130 videos on Lusk and Fingal. It also contains a substantial Audio Collection, capturing fascinating stories of people and places, local history and folklore, that otherwise would be forgotten. Their website is a veritable Aladdin’s Cave for future social historians to feast upon. It has achieved over 200,000 hits not only from local interest but from all over the world. Lusk Heritage Group can also be found on Facebook with a simple search for “Lusk Heritage Group.”Their selection of books about Lusk and Fingal include “Lusk through the Ages,” The Story of Lusk,” and “Thomas Ashe Community Group 100 Year Commemoration 1917-2017” a joint production with Lusk Round Towers GAA Club. Last year Lusk Heritage Group published two excellent books entitled “Forgotten Evidence on the Sack of Balbriggan” and “The Life and Times of John Rover McCann,” celebrating the rich history of Balbriggan and Rush. They have embarked on a major programme of work for the coming year. This includes a new book on the history of the Anglo Norman Barnewall family, owners of what was Turvey House, Bremore Castle in Balbriggan and also tenants of Baldungan Castle for some time. The Barnewall family owned vast tracts of property throughout Counties Dublin and Meath. Well known Lusk man Jim Monks, one of the Lusk Heritage Group founders, is at an advanced stage of publishing a book of short stories that are both entertaining and steeped in local characters, folklore and history. Aidan Arnold, another founder member of the group, has just completed a fascinating book for Milverton School, Skerries. Called “The Schools’ Collection, as written down for us by our Ancestors,” this is the first in a series of booklets about local folklore and history that was collected by the Irish Folklore Commission in the 1930s. Lusk Heritage Group have ambitious plans to extend this wealth of folklore information to the 5000 schools throughout Ireland that contributed to this major historic folklore collection. He has already almost completed his Lusk booklet which he intends to published soon.