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The Clogher Valley Railway New updated edition with more photographs

Category: Transport

The Clogher Valley Railway was a steam-operated narrow gauge roadside tramway which ran beween Tynan, co Armagh and Maguiresbridge, co Fermanagh. It opened in 1887 and closed at the end of 1941.

This is a new edition of Dr EM Patterson's famous book on the Clogher Valley Railway, first published in 1972. The Clogher Valley Railway was the definitive history of the line and this new edition combine's Dr Patterson's original text with a much expanded range of photographs of the line in its heyday.

In addition, the text has been updated to take account of developments since 1972, such as the restoration of Brookeborough station.

The Author

Dr EM Patterson, BSc, MSc, DSc, MPhil, MRIA, FRSE was born at Bangor, Co Down, in 1920 and educated at Bangor Grammar School and Queens University, Belfast. He was trained as a geologist but in 1941 he moved to Scotland to take up employment as a research chemist at ICI (Explosives) at Ardeer, Ayrshire. His interest in geology continued to flourish and in 1947 he moved to St Andrews University where he lectured in the Department of Geology and Mineralogy.  In 1953 he married Violet Kirk (neé Adams), a Queens graduate, and returned to ICI at Ardeer the following year, working there until his retirement in 1981. In Ireland his focus of interest was the railways in the north of the island. He wrote nine books, covering seven of the narrow gauge lines (two in his book The Ballymena Lines), as well as The Great Northern Railway of Ireland (recently reprinted) and The Belfast and County Down Railway (two books). His last book was The Castlederg and Victoria Bridge Tramway (Colourpoint 1998) published just after his death. The posthumous award of MPhil in 1997 by Queens University was for his work on the industrial archaeology of gunpowder manufacture.

 ©2008 Colourpoint Books