Museum celebrates topping most visited list

CORK’S public museum was the most visited local authority museum in the country last year.

The Fitzgerald Park facility, which opened in 1910 and introduced limited weekend opening for the first time last year, was visited by 55,000 people — more than any of the country’s other 12 local authority museums.

Figures released yesterday showed that it pipped Clare Museum in Ennis, which was visited by 39,500 people, Kerry Museum with 35,000 visitors and Waterford Museum with 27,000 visitors.

Public museums in Donegal, Monaghan and Louth each attracted 10,000 visitors or less.

Cork museum curator Stella Cherry said she was pleased with the figures.

“It makes all the hard work worth it,” she said.

The figures have rocketed since 1992 when just 23,000 passed through the museum’s doors. The museum is still capitalising on the Cork 2005 event, when 60,000 people visited even though it was open for only eight months.

Ms Cherry said the Barrel Top exhibition of Traveller caravans, now permanently housed in the museum, was one of her highlights.

Other highlights included the Cork Days Exhibition featuring historic photographs of the city, the 1916 exhibition, the Behind the Mask exhibition of masks and puppets from Glasgow, and the Rhythm of Light Exhibition of Norwegian jewellery.

It was specially curated to mark the state visit to Ireland of their majesties, King Harald V and Queen Sonja of Norway.

Clare Museum’s curator John Rattigan said a number of factors contributed to their high visitor numbers.

“The highlights of 2006 included The Clare Embroidery Exhibition and The Ennis Bypass Exhibition, both of which helped to attract thousands of additional visitors to the museum,” he said.

“The continued development of the Clare Heritage Circle, of which Clare Museum is a founding member, also contributed to the museum’s growth.”