The Virginia Show may be in its 73rd year, but this year something is different. This is because the Rural Resource Centre, located on the show grounds, will be open for the first time. The centre is a huge community facility that has been built by the show for the town – and it’s not the first time the show society has built for Virginia either.

In the late 1940s, the society built a farmers’ ballroom which held dances four nights a week with the music provided by Joe Dolan among many others. Not only were funds from these dances used to build Virginia College (the Government was unable to provide a secondary school for Virginia town) but the ballroom was also handed over to be used as a building for the school.

And so the Lough Ramor Ballroom (named so because it overlooked the lapping waters of the shores of Lough Ramor) was now fondly christened by locals the University of Lough Ramor.

ADVERTISEMENT

When the Rural Resource Centre gets going, Virginia’s not going to know what hit it. A Men’s Shed has been set up (an organisation that encourages men to talk to other men while participating in an activity) and there are also plans for a Friday Morning Club (knitting club), tea and coffee mornings, Junior Foróige discos, yoga classes, and mindfulness and t’ai chi classes. There is also a café facility on the grounds.

Kathleen Duffy, former show society PRO and now treasurer of the Virginia Show Centre, who helped spearhead the construction of the centre, is also hoping to hold internet, email and Skype classes to help farmers and older people get online, as well as FETAC Level 5 and Level 6 courses in information and communications technology.

Afraid to say no

Getting the Rural Resource Centre built was a serious achievement, and the reason it exists, according to the current show society PRO Yvonne Kilkenny, is because “200 farmers would be afraid to say no to Kathleen Duffy”.

Irish Country Living doesn’t doubt this for a second. Kathleen’s commitment to the Virginia Show and all its projects is extremely impressive, but as Yvonne Kilkenny notes, the Virginia Show runs through Kathleen’s veins, particularly given she met her husband Ned, who is director of the Virginia Show Society, at the show many moons ago.

There were many hoops to jump through to get the centre built, not least funding. The centre cost almost €1m to construct. The show society used the resources it had and a €500,000 grant was provided by Leader. A long-term loan was also provided by Clann Credo, which is a social enterprise fund set up by the Loreto nuns to help communities that don’t have funds, and which lends at very keen rates. The building and architecture work was done by local builders Crossdoney Construction and Hanley Taite Design Partnership.

Kathleeen says the county council, Cavan/Monaghan Leader and the Department of the Environment “bent over backwards” to help them but getting things passed at European level was much more difficult, though their local MEPs kept the pressure on. Mairead McGuinness would ring Kathleen between 4pm and 8pm on a Sunday while Marian Harkin would call at 10.30pm on a Thursday night, both updating her on recent developments. Indeed the delay in funding from Europe was stressful to the point that Monica Farrelly, treasurer of the Virginia Show Society, says there were points where they were tempted to give up, particularly because of the “interminable delay in the funding”.

“It was so much time and energy,” Monica says. “Then it came through, then I forgot about it, and then I forgave it. I would have given up but we couldn’t give up. We’d given so much time at that stage. It would have been an awful waste of community energy to give up.”

The finished result certainly demonstrates it was worth all the effort. The facility has a very impressive 984m2 indoor arena, there’s a farm shop and a museum space to display agricultural artefacts from the area, while there is also a kitted-out kitchen with a combi oven that can cook 28 apples tarts at once.

Between the Virginia Show itself and a project like this, there’s no doubting the committee puts in hours equivalent to a working week, and more. But they are humble about their hard work.

“Every generation has to contribute to it. The first lot of farmers put in the school,” says Kathleen Duffy.

The fact there are many husband-and-wife teams on the committee also means busy volunteers have understanding spouses.

Ready for the show

The Rural Resource Centre is really going to be broken in at the Virginia Show. The Diageo Irish Champion Dairy Cow 2014 competition in association with Glanbia Ingredients Ireland is the Virginia Show highlight, with a prize fund of €10,000. Don’t underestimate what’s involved in acquiring such a title. Black polish is rubbed onto the black parts of the Freisian coat to make it blacker and talcum powder is used to keep the white bits white. This is not to talk of the backcombing and hairspraying of the tail and the fact that music is played to the cows.

Other events include Neven Maguire cookery demos, a dog agility show with stunts and jumps, and a dog showing class. Peter Skelly came to the committee years ago saying he wanted to sponsor a dog show. The committee told him there was no dog show, but he was adamant he wanted to start one and now it’s one of the most popular classes, with 400 dogs participating each year.

Irish Country Living is told the best thing about the Virginia Show is the atmosphere.

“It’s the welcome you get in Virginia – the meeting and greeting,” says Kathleen.

The strength of this welcome was encapsulated a few years ago when bad weather and heavy rain put a stop to almost every agricultural show in the country – except for Virginia – which emblazoned the road into the town with the sign: “Come, hell or high water!”