Ballyclare

A World-Wide Culture

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The walkway along the Six Mile Water below Main Street, Ballyclare, has been painted with biblical quotations which are transcribed below, replacing the inspirational messages seen in 2025’s Let Your Light Shine. There is also a comment suggesting that the religious art is a form of re-imaging or beautification (see Visual History 11): “Graffiti is a world-wide culture – please stop covering our culture”.

“I lift my eyes to the mountains – where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and Earth. – Psalm 121”
“We love because he first loved us – 1 John 4:19”
“Praise the Lord, proclaim his name, make known what he has done. – Isaiah 12:4”
“How wide, how long, how high, how deep is the love of Christ! – Ephesians 3:12”
“Greater Ballyclare Youth For Christ [Fb]”

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Copyright © 2026 Paddy Duffy
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Attack Of The Ulster Division

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“Lest we forget.” JP Beadle’s painting “Battle Of The Somme: Attack Of The Ulster Division” shows soldiers of the 36th Division bravely going to their death on July 1st, 1916. The original painting hangs in Belfast City Hall (militaryprints.com). In the board shown here, a foreground of poppies has been added, along with the Ulster Tower in Thiepval, France, on the right.

Grange Drive, Ballyclare

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The Loyal 36th

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“To the memory of the loyal 36th”. The emblem of the 36th (Ulster) Division – shown in close-up above – is a modern one, perhaps from the 2000s. The 36th’s emblem in WWI was a simple red (left) hand, while this one involves a crest combining a Union Flag, Maid Of Erin harp (emblem of the Royal Irish Rifles), and a red (right) hand on a field of nine shamrocks, below a crown and flanked with UVF flags. These are flags of the modern UVF; according to Sam’s Flags, the flags of the Ulster Volunteers (1913-1914) looked like regimental flags.

Grange Drive, Ballyclare, replacing We Band Of Brothers

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Let Your Light Shine

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“How cool is it that the same God that created oceans and mountains and galaxies looked at you and thought the world needed one you too”, “Be the light”, “God is love”, “Let your light shine”.

Uplifting religious messages in Sixmilewater Park, below Main Street, Ballyclare.

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Ballyclare Remembers

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Modern UVF volunteers in balaclavas stand with heads bowed on either side of the Ulster Tower in Thiepval, standing among orange lilies and red poppies.

On the left the 10th Scottish Rifles (AWM) commence a raid, below the emblem of the Ulster Volunteer Force, and on the right, the Royal Fusiliers appear to march off to war in a press photograph (Flickr), below the emblem of the 36th (Ulster) Division.

In Grange Drive, Ballyclare, on the same as wall, and using part of the frame from, a previous UDA board: Young Guns.

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VE Day 80

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The memorial wall in Erskine Park, Ballyclare, marked the 80th anniversary of VE Day – May 8th, 2025 – with a pair of printed boards wrapping around the corner of the low wall.

For views of the gable and the low wall with armed-forces emblems and plaques to Girvan and Erskine, see The Men From Ballyclare.

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Six Mile Water

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A grey heron (above) and a kingfisher (below) sit along the banks of the Six Mile Water. The river rises west of Larne and flows through Ballyclare on its way to Lough Neagh.

Abercorn Drive, Ballyclare, but best viewed from the Main Street bridge. Artist unknown.

See also: a street-art tribute to the river Braid in Ballymena.

Nearby in Ballyclare: Dandelions | The Auld Meetin’-Hoose Green.

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Greens And Yellows

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These painted dandelions can be found outside the Cedar Tree florist in Ballyclare but their real counterparts can presumably not be found inside: According to Biodiversity Ireland (pdf), the dandelion is found almost everywhere on the island and is a species of “least concern”.

By Imogen Donegan (ig) in Main Street, Ballyclare.

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The Auld Meetin’-Hoose Green

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The Auld Meetin’-Hoose Green was an 1898 collection of tales from Ballyclare and surroundings as retold by by Archibald McIlroy, who grew up in the area before moving to Belfast, Drumbo, and Canada. McIlroy died travelling on the Lusitania, when it was hit by a German submarine in 1915 (Ulster Biography | Ulster Biography). The stories have been brought to life in a podcast.

This new street art is by Zippy (ig) in Main Street, Ballyclare.

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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