We would especially thank our Funders:

IFI - who paid for the building work

FAS Dundalk who supplied the worker

The District Partnership Board - who intend to meet the cost of the exhibition & video.

Additional support was received from Ulster Local History Trust,

Newry & Mourne District Council

and Community Relations Council which has helped to make ends meet.

We are also grateful to a number of individuals for their asssistance, especially to Mary Cumiskey, Kevin and Bridget McMahon who formed the rest of the team that put the exhibition together.

Once again we are grateful to all who have staffed the centre at weekends from June - September and shown visitors around. Especially the young people, members of Creggan Historical Society and Mr. John O'Neill who spent every Saturday here for four months. To all we say thank you for your help.

One of the benefits of doing guided tours is that you get to meet people you wouldn't otherwise meet. e.g. We had a bus load of 80 people in June. (Mostly women republican ex-prisoners from Belfast and Derry with their families who for their day out had chosen to visit Armagh jail so that they could have their photos taken at the door of the cells which they had formerly occupied.) Then on the two European Heritage Open Days we had 18 visitors including 3 from Carlingford and 3 protestant ladies from Bangor making their first visit to Crossmaglen.

Looking ahead, while the coachhouse remains to be restored, we hope that despite the considerable delay, work on the walled garden part of the Poets Glen is finally due to start within the next week! Its been a long haul and I wish to thank Assemblyman John Fee for his efforts on our behalf over the past two weeks, despite his own busy schedule.

We look forward to extending our links with Navan Fort Armagh, The Patrick Kavanagh Centre Inniskeen and Ti Chullain, Mullaghbawn. We also intend to have another series of concerts in the spring. - You can keep an eye out for details in the press.

"Ur chill a Chreagain" has a special place in the hearts of local people. In honouring the poets, we honour those who in their own day found themselves excluded because of language, religion and politics. The story that is told around these walls is the history of this place and its people, both good and bad, but mostly good. What we learn from it is:

• that we in Northern Ireland need each other.
• we must value and appreciate each other's culture.
• a community is impoverished when its minority disappears.

By preparing this exhibition jointly with Creggan Local History Society we have tried to show the spirit of Crossmaglen, which let me say, is much to be preferred to the spirit of Drumcree. As we continue to develop the centre as a shared venue, we look forward to welcoming a growing number of visitors to this lovely part of south Armagh.