Mullingar Day could be on its way

A town councillor is calling for June 17 to be designated “Mullingar Day”.

The person behind the idea is Cllr Ruth Illingworth who says that she wants to turn “Mullingar Day” into an annual event “to celebrate all that is good and positive about our town”.

“It’s about boosting the town and giving it a feel good factor. I think St Patrick’s Day was a very good day and people enjoyed themselves. I thought it would be nice to have a day to celebrate all of the positve aspects of the town such as its talented people and its diversity.”

“After all of the problems of the last half a decade, I though it would be good to highlight all of the good things that Mullingar has to offer.”

The Fine Gael representative and historian said that she chose June 17 as the date for Mullingar Day as it is the feast day of St Colman of Lynn.

“The Life of St Colman is the first book in which Mullingar is mentioned and I thought that this would be an appropriate day. Also it’s close to midsummer, so hopefully the weather will be good and there will also be a stretch in the evening.”

Cllr Illingworth says that she is eager to get suggestions about what form the celebrations may take.

“I will be doing historical tours and maybe there could be a concert in the Market Square in the evening featuring some of the huge amount of musical talent in the town.

“The national schools won’t be on holiday and they might want to do something to get their students to celebrate the town. It’s about saying: ‘This is our town, we are proud of it and we want to celebrate it’.”

“I am throwing it out there and hopefully people will come back with ideas. They don’t have to be very big events events costing thousands,” she said.