Documentary and exhibition: 'Michael Maurice O’Shaughnessy (1864-1934): Engineering the Promised Land'

Date: Wednesday 25 April 2018

Time: 09:30 - 11:00, including an informal reception

Venue: Room ENG-G047 Alice Perry Engineering Building, NUI Galway

The hugely popular exhibition that celebrates the acquisition of the personal archive of O’Shaughnessy, which was on display in the Hardiman library at NUI Galway since October 2017, is moving in April to its permanent display in the Alice Perry Engineering building at NUI Galway. The exhibition, entitled ‘Michael Maurice O’Shaughnessy (1864-1934): Engineering the Promised Land’, tells the story of O'Shaughnessy's career, and is illustrated with items taken from the archive. Selected extracts from his memoir add his distinctive voice to its narrative. This has inspired the creation of a short documentary, which will be shown in public for the first time at 09:30am on the 25 April in the Alice Perry Engineering building, NUI Galway.

According to Dr Jamie Goggins, who with Eamonn Cannon, directed the documentary “We have such a rich engineering history in Ireland. Michael O’Shaughnessy is one of the many great engineers to hail from Ireland that have had huge impact around the world by harnessing their innovation and creativity to be both practical and inspirational, creating infrastructure that has allowed societies to prosper. We are hoping that our short documentary will act as a catalyst for a greater acknowledgement of the global societal impact of such great engineers and scientists which will in turn inspire the next generation.”

The screening of the documentary will be preceded by a few words from the Prof Ciarán Ó hÓgartaigh (President of NUI Galway), Prof Peter McHugh (Dean of Engineering & Informatics at NUI Galway), Theresa Salazar (Curator of the Western Americana Collection at The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley) and the Directors of the documentary (Eamonn Cannon and Dr Jamie Goggins). Refreshments will be served after the screening, where people will also have the opportunity to browse the exhibition and a new engineering artefacts display area in the Alice Perry Engineering building.

You may also be interested in attending a public lecture on the prior afternoon (24 April 4-5pm) by Theresa Salazar, Curator of the Western Americana Collection at The Bancroft Library, at the University of California, Berkeley on 'The Bancroft Library’s Irish American holdings'. Free tickets at https://www.eventbrite.ie/e/the-bancroft-librarys-irish-american-holdings-tickets-44974678474