Extramural Activity

Donegall Road Memorial Garden

2024-10-022025-06-09Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This entry covers two steps in the development of the WWI memorial garden on Donegall Road at Barrington Gardens.

Previously, there were two boards on the gable wall (see The Road To The Somme), of the Covenant signing and soldiers in the trenches of WWI (a copy of a Carol Graham painting).

The images below (from November, 2023) show the latter board absent as the brick walls are being built and a roll of honour to locals who lost their lives being installed.

The images in the top half of the entry (from October 2024) show the gable and side-wall painted blue, with a large board showing the Ulster Memorial Tower in Thiepval, below a red hand, and (on the side-wall) the crests of the YCV, Inniskilling Fusiliers, Royal Irish Fusiliers, and the Royal Irish Rifles.

November, 2023:

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King Of All Birds

2024-10-012024-10-11Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This wren, in a “secret garden” of foxgloves and purple coneflowers, is by HMC (web) on the wall of the chippie on Fernagh Road at King’s Crescent, Newtownabbey.

With Daisy Chain (web) for A&N borough council (web).

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I Here Present Unto You Your Undoubted King

2024-10-012024-10-10Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The tribute to the new UK monarch King Charles III at the northeastern corner of Tiger’s Bay has been completed, with Ulster Banner and Union Flag on either side of a circular board showing a crown with the flowers of the “four nations” – thistle, shamrock, daffodil, and rose – both inside (in blue) and out (in red).

There is another piece using the same central board inside the estate – see I Will Plant Them.

The title of this entry comes from Charles’s coronation service, on May 6th, 2023 (pdf).

For ‘Loyalist Tiger’s Bay’ on the front wall, see the Stop The Boats; for the Orange Order symbols on the side wall (in the final image) – including the crown and Bible in the apex of the main wall – see Your Kingdom Will Endure Forever.

Limestone Road, north Belfast

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Three-By-Four

2024-10-012024-10-09Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Here are three ‘Four Loko’ hand-painted ads in Belfast, specifically Islandbawn Street, west Belfast (above), Little Donegall Street, city centre (immediately below) by Shane Ha (web) in August, and (final image) Legann Street, Ligoniel, north Belfast.

Four Loko was originally contained caffeine, taurine, and guaraná (as well as being 12% alcohol), and was marketed as an energy drink (or, “blackout in a can” (GrubStreet | Campus Times)). Now, it just has the alcohol and the fruit flavour (Four Loko FAQ | WP page on the 2010 ban).

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An Irish Goodbye

2024-10-012024-10-08Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

A mural celebrating the success of the film An Irish Goodbye has been painted in Belfast city centre. The film won both the BAFTA and Oscar for best Short Film in 2023. The quartet depicted at the top in their best gear for the Oscar ceremony in March, 2023, are (above) actors James Martin and Seamus O’Hara, and (below) directors Ross White and Tom Berkeley (BBC); in the bottom left is actor Paddy Jenkins as he appears in the film, as the priest, Father O’Shea (BBC). (IMDb | WP)

By Peaball (web) in Winetavern Street, Belfast city centre.

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John And Rab

2024-09-292024-10-02Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Cloughfern Young Conquerors flute band (Fb – warning: copious use of images of Eddie The Trooper) was founded in 1973, the same year as the UDA began using the name “UFF”. “John” and “Rab” on the arms of the emblem above are John “Grugg” Gregg (also known as ‘The Reaper’) and Rab Carson of the UDA’s Southeast Antrim brigade. The pair were killed together in 2003 by the lower Shankill (West Belfast C company) UDA. (See also Gregg & Carson for another local tribute.)

The gentleman in the panel on the right is “The General”; he celebrated a birthday in July of this year (2024) (Fb) and so is perhaps not (as this board might suggest) another of the “absent friends” held in “glorious memory”.

See also: 50 Years Unbroken and CYC 50th– celebrations from 2023 of the band’s fiftieth anniversary.

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They Fought Together As Brothers In Arms

2024-09-252024-11-09Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This is a smallish board in New Mossley, Newtownabbey:

On the left: “11th/12th Battalion Royal Irish Rifles (South and Central Antrim Volunteers) – The Ulster Memorial Tower, Thiepval, France. The Ulster Memorial Tower was unveiled by Field Marshall Sir Henry Wilson in Thiepval, France, on 19 November 1921, in dedication to the contributions of the 36th (Ulster) Division during The Great War 1914-1918. The tower marks the site of the Schwaben redoubt, against which the (Ulster) Division advanced on the first day of the Battle of the Somme.”

Specifically, the Central Antrim regiment (of the Ulster Volunteers) became the 12th battalion RIR, while the South Antrim regiment (of the Ulster Volunteers) became the 11th battalion RIR; both joined the 108th brigade in the 36th division.

The redoubt is also the site of the Thiepval Memorial.

JP Beadle’s painting “Battle of the Somme: Attack of the Ulster Division” hangs in Belfast City Hall (Royal Irish has a history of its purchase).

On the right: “The Great War 1914-1918. 32,186 killed, wounded, missing, 36th (Ulster) Division. They fought together as brothers in arms, they died together and now they sleep side by side. To them we owe a solemn obligation. They died that we might live.”

The sword-in-cross is a common war memorial but the one pictured is probably the Tyne Cot memorial to the Commonwealth dead of WWI (see Great War 100 Reads).

See also: The same boards (at larger size) next to the memorial garden – South And Central Antrim Volunteers. And from the historical record, True Heroes – which includes two small, painted, 36th Division boards from the street in 2009.

Ballyearl Drive, Newtownabbey.

Union Bears

2024-09-252025-02-20Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The “Union Bears” are a Rangers FC “ultras” supporters club whose web page currently features the giant tifo – “sign” or “banner” is too small a word, so the Italian word is used – unveiled at various games. This much smaller display (above) is on an electrical box on the Doagh Road next to the Iceland at the eastern edge of the Rathcoole estate.

For the Sons Of KAI flute band sticker, see Kai Johansen’s Bar | Sons Of KAI | Four Lads Had A Dream.

Welcome To the Bellevue

2024-09-252025-02-20Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The beer garden at the Bellevue Arms got a facelift in the summer (of 2024), including new a name-sign in the style of the “Greetings from …” postcards in the US, which would feature local landmarks within the letters of the place-name. (Here is a history from Smithsonian magazine.)

Within the letters of “BELLEVUE” we can see a Delorean, one of the H&W cranes, the Albert Clock, the Rise sculpture (the Balls On The Falls), the Titanic museum, Belfast City Hall, the Big Fish, the Beacon Of Hope sculpture (Nuala With The Hula).

The seating areas have also been decorated with paintings of flowers.

Antrim Road, Glengormley. Perhaps by Visual Waste (web).