Artist in the Community Scheme 2006

Twice yearly, the Arts Council offers grants to enable artists and community groups to work together on projects. The scheme covers all art forms. The Artist in the Community Scheme is managed by CREATE.

The aim of the scheme is to encourage intense collaboration between community groups and artists. The focus of the collaboration must be a project in which the members of the community group and the artists work together in order to realise an artistic project or an event. It is essential that consultation take place between the artist and the community group, so that both parties are involved in deciding on the nature of the project. Group ownership of the art should be maintained at every stage.

Phase One , the research and development award of up to €1,000, gives artists an opportunity to explore and develop a project in a community context. This work should constitute the preliminary stage of a project with the intention of eventually leading to a full length project. Any professional artist may approach a community group with a view to making an application for research and development. Equally, a group may approach an artist. However the research and development strand is an artist led initiative and as such artists make the application.

Phase Two is open to community organisations or groups who are planning a project of between 6 weeks and 5 months with a maximum award of €5000, and those who are planning a project of between 6 months and 9 months with a maximum award of €10,000. The artist and the community group must demonstrate that they have influenced each other significantly in the drafting of the project. It is the community organisation or group that makes the application to the scheme.

Further information Katherine Atkinson, CREATE Phone: + 353 1 4736600
Web: http://www.create-ireland.ie
Email: support@artsincontext.com

Eclectic trio of poets for October ‘Over The Edge’

Once a month Galway City Library hosts the 'Over the Edge' poetry reading evening. The October 2006 session takes place on Thursday the 26th between 6.30 and 8.00pm.
The Featured Readers are Yvonne Green, Brendan Murphy & Niamh Ní Lochlainn.
Everyone is welcome.

Yvonne Green lives in London, where she practised at the English Bar for 20 years before stopping to concentrate on her poetry. Her poems have appeared in leading UK poetry magazines such as Poetry Review, Magma, Modern Poetry In Translation, The London Magazine, European Judaism, The Jewish Quarterly and Arete. She has read her work at the The National Portrait Gallery, the Institute for Contemporary Arts and on BBC Radio 4.

Brendan Murphy was born in Liverpool to English parents and Irish grandparents. He is a graduate of Sheffield University, where he studied the History of Art, Film and Design. His first performance was a Saturday night slot with a friend at his local pub, with whom he developed an improvised repartee on the week’s news. Brendan has lived in Galway for the last eight years. He won the 2006 Cúirt Festival Poetry Grand Slam, and recently performed at the famous Green Mill in Chicago.

Niamh Ní Lochlainn grew up in Dublin with Irish as her first language, spending her summers in the West Kerry Gaeltacht. She has been living and teaching in Connemara for the last four years. She was a prize-winner in the 2005 Strokestown Poetry Competition and her first collection Guth ón dTobar, (A Voice from the Well) was short-listed for the Strong Award for Best First Collection by an Irish Poet at the 2006 Poetry Now Festival in Dun Laoghaire.

As usual there will be an open-mic when the Featured Readers have finished. This is open to anyone who has a poem or story to share. New readers are especially welcome.

The MC for the evening will be Susan Millar DuMars.

Over The Edge acknowledges the financial support of Galway City Council and The Arts Council

For further details contact Kevin Higgins on 087-6431748 or e-mail kphiggins@hotmail.com .

Children's Book Festival in Oranmore

Lots of New Children’s Books!
New Education Toys for use in the library!

Tues. 24th Oct. 11.00am
Inter Schools Table

Wed. 25th Oct. 4.30pm
Fancy Dress Competition

Fri. 27th Oct. 12.00pm
Special Preschool Storytime

Fri. 27th Oct. 4.30pm
Balloon Mania

Kindly sponsored by Supermac’s Oranmore

Youngest ever woman wins Man Booker Prize

At age of 35, Kiran Desai was named the winner of the £50,000 Man Booker Prize for Fiction for The Inheritance of Loss, published by Hamish Hamilton. The Indian-born writer has a strong family tie with the prize as her mother Anita Desai has been shortlisted three times since 1980 but has never won. This year, however, her daughter, Kiran, has won the acclaimed literary prize. Author of the 1998 universally praised Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard.

Desai is the first woman to win the Man Booker since 2000 when Margaret Atwood scooped the prize with The Blind Assassin. Her winning book, The Inheritance of Loss, is a radiant, funny and moving family saga and has been described by reviewers as ‘the best, sweetest, most delightful novel’. This is the first time that Hamish Hamilton has published a Man Booker Prize winner although they had two shortlisted authors in 2005.

Computers and Communications Course in Inishboffin Library

Coiste Gairmoideachais Chontae na Gaillimhe
(County Galway Vocational Education Committee)

Basic Computers and Communications

• Basic Computers including internet and email
  
• Improving writing, spelling and grammarWriting letters, forms, C.V.’s etc.
  
• Reading - for personal and work purposes
  
• Listening Skills
  

Venue: Inishboffin Library/Community Centre
Dates: Thursday 12th. October 2006
Time: Registration 7.30p.m. to 9.00p.m.

For more information contact: Teresa Gilligan at 091 555877

Murakami wins O'Connor Prize

Haruki Murakami has won the second Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award for Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, his third collection of short stories to be published in English.

The €35,000 (£23,000) prize, which is awarded to new collections published in English during the last 12 months, is the world's richest short story prize. The prize will be shared between Murakami and his translators, Philip Gabriel and Jay Rubin.

Rubin paid tribute to the famous short story writer as he accepted the prize.

"If you have read Frank O'Connor's Guests of the Nation you'll be familiar with his theme that people need to recognise each other's common humanity," he said. "Haruki's stories are similarly powerful. As a translator, I am overwhelmed and honoured and I am sure Haruki will be too."

Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman topped a shortlist which spanned three continents. First collections from Irish writer Philip Ó Ceallaigh and American author Rachel Sherman were nominated alongside entries from English writer Rose Tremain, Nepal-born Samrat Upadhyay and Peter Stamm, a Swiss author who writes in German.

The award, created in memory of the Frank O'Connor, is the highlight of the annual Frank O'Connor Short Story Festival, which ran from Wednesday to Sunday last.

Man Booker Prize Shortlist

The six authors shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2006, are Kiran Desai, Kate Grenville, M.J. Hyland, Hisham Matar, Edward St Aubyn, and Sarah Waters.

The six shortlisted books were chosen from a longlist of 19 and are:
Desai, Kiran The Inheritance of Loss - Hamish Hamilton
Grenville, Kate The Secret River - Canongate
Hyland, M.J. Carry Me Down - Canongate
Matar, Hisham In the Country of Men - Viking
St Aubyn, Edward Mother’s Milk - Picador
Waters, Sarah The Night Watch - Virago

The winner will be announced on Tuesday 10th October

The Harding Books Prize for Perfect Parody!!!!!

Due to overwhelming public demand and in advance of this year’s Public Libraries Conference (November 8th-10th at the Cavan Crystal Hotel, Co. Cavan), George Harding of Harding Books will once again kindly sponsor The Harding Books Prize for Perfect Parody!!!!!

To Enter:
Write the opening paragraph of a crime novel –entitled Murder at the Library in the style of your favourite (or least favourite) crime writer

The rules are as follows:
· The competition is open to library staff only
· All entries must include the following words –
Book-seller
Exhibition
Survey
Love Letters
Promotion
Inscrutable

The judges will include Val McDermid (award-winning author of Wire in the Blood and many other critically-lauded crime novels), Simon Brett (writer, actor, producer & broadcaster) and Mike Ripley (twice winner of the CWA Last Laugh Award, journalist & critic).

Now, most importantly, the money!
First Prize - €300 and a specially commissioned wood-carving by Sligo artist, Michael Quirke.
Second Prize - €200 and a specially commissioned wood-carving by Sligo artist, Michael Quirke.


Stop Press:
Details of a second competition for those of a gentler persuasion:
Write a paragraph entitled What I Did on my Summer Holidays in the style of any Irish writer, living or dead. Once again, the competition is open to library staff but as a special dispensation to non-crime lovers, you do not have to use the magic words as mentioned above. This competition will be adjudicated by academic and writer, Ruth Dudley-Edwards.
Prize - €100 and a copy of the Times Atlas of the WorldPlease send you entries to

Brenda Frawley, c/o Dooradoyle Library, Dooradoyle Road, Limerick or by e-mail to bfrawley@limerickcoco.ie before
Friday, 29th September, 2006.

All winners will be announced and winning entries read aloud at this year’s Public Libraries Conference at the Cavan Crystal Hotel, Co. Cavan after the Banquet dinner on
Thursday, November 9th, 2006.

The Harding Books Perfect Parody Prize is kindly sponsored by George Harding of Harding Books, supplier of high quality, low cost paperback collections to libraries throughout the U.K. & Ireland

Teenage Reading in Galway City Library

The Teenage Book Club has been meeting every second Tuesday during the Summer in the City Library and after much debate they have come up with the following titles as their favourites of 2006:

Boy Soldier, Payback, Avenger ……………………Andy McNab

Small Steps …………………………………………………….Louis Sacher

Elsewhere ……………………………………………………….Gabrielle Zevin

Faerie Wars, The Purple Emperor……………..Herbie Brennan

The Secret Hour, Touching Darkness,
Blue Noon (Midnighters Trilogy) ………………Scott Westerfeld

Mister Monday, Grim Tuesday,
Drowned Wednesday, Sir Thursday…………Garth Nix

The Road of Bones ………………………………………Anne Fine

And the perennial favourites

How I Live Now …………………………………………..Meg Rosoff

Alex Rider (series) …………………………………..Anthony Horowitz

Stargirl ………………………………………………………Jerry Spinelli

The Amulet of Samarkand, Golem’s Eye,
Ptolemy’s Gate (Bartimaeus Trilogy)……Jonathan Stroud

Noughts and Crosses, Knife Edge,
Checkmate…………………………………………………Malorie Blackman

Eragon, Eldest …………………………………………Christopher Paolini

Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2006 Longlist

The judging panel for the 2006 Man Booker Prize for Fiction announced the longlist of books for this year.
The longlist of 19 books was chosen from 112 entries; 95 were submitted for the prize and 17 were called in by the panel of judges.

Chair of judges, Hermione Lee, comments: "Judging the Man Booker Prize puts you through almost as many emotions as there are in the novels. We’ve tried to be careful and critical judges as well as being passionately involved. We have many regrets about some of the novels we’ve left off, and we could easily have had a longlist of about 30 books, but we’re delighted with the variety, the originality, the drama and craft, the human interest and the strong voices in this longlist. It’s a list in which famous established novelists rub shoulders with little known newcomers. We hope that people will leap at it for their late summer reading and make up their own shortlist.”

The longlist for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2006 is as follows;

Carey, Peter Theft: A Love Story (Faber & Faber)
Desai, Kiran The Inheritance of Loss (Hamish Hamilton)
Edric, Robert Gathering the Water (Doubleday)
Gordimer, Nadine Get a Life (Bloomsbury)
Grenville, Kate The Secret River (Canongate)
Hyland, M.J. Carry Me Down (Canongate)
Jacobson, Howard Kalooki Nights (Jonathan Cape)
Lasdun, James Seven Lies (Jonathan Cape)
Lawson, Mary The Other Side of the Bridge (Chatto & Windus)
McGregor, Jon So Many Ways to Begin (Bloomsbury)
Matar, Hisham In the Country of Men (Viking)
Messud, Claire The Emperor’s Children (Picador)
Mitchell, David Black Swan Green (Sceptre)
Murr, Naeem The Perfect Man (William Heinemann)
O’Hagan, Andrew Be Near Me (Faber & Faber)
Robertson, James The Testament of Gideon Mack (Hamish Hamilton)
St Aubyn, Edward Mother’s Milk (Picador)
Unsworth, Barry The Ruby in her Navel (Hamish Hamilton)
Waters, Sarah The Night Watch (Virago)

The judging panel for the 2006 Man Booker Prize for Fiction is: Hermione Lee (Chair); Simon Armitage, poet and novelist; Candia McWilliam, award winning novelist; critic Anthony Quinn and actor Fiona Shaw. The 2006 shortlist will be announced on Thursday 14th September

Oscailt Gairdín Cuimhneacháin in ómós don scríbhneoir cáiliúil Liam Ó Flaithearta

As part of Heritage week which runs from 26th August – 3rd September 2006, The Minister, Éamon Ó Cuiv will officially open a Garden of Remembrance in honour of one of the Aran Island's most famous and prolific writers Liam Ó Flaherty. The event takes place in Kilronan at 2.00pm on the 28th of August.

Beidh an tAire Éamon Ó Cuiv ag oscailt an Gairdín Cuimhneacháin in ómós don scríbhneoir Liam Ó Flaithearta ag 2.00 i.n. Dé Luain 28ú Lúnasa 2006 i nGort na gCapall. Is é Pádraic Reaney a dhear an gairdín agus a rinne an obair ar an dealbh agus ar an leac eolais. Beidh leabhrán le fáil ar an lá agus beidh chuile eolas ann.

Heritage Week is part of European Heritage Days, a joint initiative of the Council of Europe and the European Union. In Ireland Heritage Week is co-ordinated by the Heritage Council with support from the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government.

Ask About Ireland?

Ask About Ireland is a website designed to find answers about Ireland, our countryside, our heritage, the way we work and play. It offers access to new information, rare images and documents from Irish public libraries, museums and archives.

Ask AboutIreland and the Cultural Heritage Project is an initiative of public libraries together with local museums and archives in the digitisation and online publication of the original, the unusual and the unique material from their local studies' collections to create a national Internet resource for Irish culture.

The participating organisations have selected material of particular public interest from their holdings within a variety of common topics ranging from sport, transport and architecture to flora and fauna and Irish writers and set in a narrative context. In particular, Galway Public Libraries have contributed material on the Lawerence Family Album & Lisreaghan House and The Samuel L. Maguire collection (He was the County Librarian at the time.) of Irish language books published during the nineteen twenties and thirties and now housed in Carraroe Library.

AskAboutIreland is a constantly growing resource with content being added to the website on an ongoing basis.

Ask About Ireland is an initiative of An Chomhairle Leabharlanna, funded by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government through the Information Society Fund and The Heritage Council.

2006 Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award

The second Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award will be made in September 2006 at the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Festival in Cork, Ireland. The prize is for 35,000 euros and as such it is currently the world's richest prize for the short story form.It is organised by the Munster Literature Centre

Eligible books are those by living authors, published for the first time, in English anywhere in the world, between October 2005 and September 15th 2006 .


The 2006 Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award Shortlist:

Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman - Haruki Murukami, Harvill, London (translated by Philip Gabriel and Jay Rubin)
Notes from a Turkish Whorehouse - Philip O Ceallaigh, Penguin, Dublin
The First Hurt - Rachel Sherman Open City Books , New York
In Strange Gardens & other Stories - Peter Stamm Other Press , New York (translated by Michael Hoffman)
The Darkness of Wallis Simpson - Rose Tremain Chatto , London
The Royal Ghosts - Samrat Upadhyay Houghton Mifflin ,New York

The winner of the inaugural award in 2005 was Yiyun Li of China and the United States for her debut collection A Thousand Years of Good Prayers published by Random House US.

The Summer Reading Mission continues at your library

Galway County Libraries are inviting all children to embark on a Reading Mission this summer. The mission for children of all ages is to read and enjoy at least six books during the summer.

The Summer Reading Mission is being held in all our Branch Libraries and Mobile Library during July and August.

It is free, and all children have to do is go along to their local library and pick up the details and the Reading Mission card.

Find the opening times of your nearest library here

The moment we persuade a child, any child, to cross that threshold into a library, we've changed their lives forever, and for the better. Barack Obama

Readers may be interested in the following books which have been added to stock at Galway City Library:

Kamishibai Man, by Allen Say, Houghton Mifflin

The Kamishibai man used to ride his bicycle into town where he would tell stories to the children, but gradually fewer children came. They were all watching television. Aging, cultural change, the way humans seem to lose warmth with technological advances-the story gestures toward all of these. This beautifully evocative tale will attract even the most jaded kid away from the TV to enjoy a good, good book.





The Little Engine That Could, by Watty Piper , Grosset & Dunlap

The classic tale of the determined little engine that, despite its size, triumphantly pulls a train full of toys to the waiting children on the other side of a mountain. Loren Long has brilliantly re-illustrated this classic story, bringing it exuberantly to life for today’s child. Both faithful fans and newcomers will enjoy this triumphant ride and eagerly climb aboard for repeat excursions. Ages 3-up.




Beyond the Great Mountains: A Visual Poem About China, by Ed Young, Chronicle Books

Ed Young's spare prose describes in measured detail the beautiful and mystical land that
the author so clearly loves. The unique format and gorgeous paper-collage illustrations, highlighted with Chinese characters, combine to convey the many facets of China to form a poetic picture of the land’s grace, depth, and majesty. The textured illustrations are breathtaking, as Young invites readers to glimpse a world of stunning beauty.

Agustin Maruri at Oranmore Library

Agustin Maruri and some of the audience that enjoyed his concert in Oranmore Library recently

Mary Carpenter, Agustin Maruri and Rosemary Finlay



Mary McConn,
Anne McDermott
and Mary McBride

GráinneO’Callaghan and Josette Farrell

Seán Magee and Mary McHale

Spiddal Public Library –a day in the life

A visitor to the library in Spiddal on Tuesday 2nd May would have had the opportunity of enjoying an exhibition by two artists, would have been absorbed by a series of mosaics in contemporary style by Siobhan Ní Fhloinn in which nature in its different forms and colours and pattern is finely captured, and would have reflected on a number of works by Geraldine Ní Churraoin in which the bog and waters and mountains of Connemara are revealed in vivid colours.

This exhibition of work by the two artists hangs in the Reading Room area of the library, where in addition to enjoying the art on the walls, it is also possible to just sit quietly and read from a newspaper or magazine, or browse a book from the library’s collection.

From the window of the reading room on that Tuesday, one was also able to enjoy a wonderful view of the Atlantic tide breaking over the rocks near the old Spiddal pier, with the sun glinting on the sea as one looks as far as the Aran Islands.

In the main library a number of library users were intently searching the Internet on the library’s free internet access PCs, while a young girl was busily photocopying from a number of reference books as part of a school assignment.


A father arrives with two young children and spends some time choosing books in the children’s area of the library.

And another man arrives with a young child in a buggy and sits in the reading room with his child examining a picture book. It turns out that this man is from Argentina, and is the son of the famous Argentine writer and poet Luis Ricardo Casnati. Casnati is a man who has written that:

"I cannot happen to be indifferent before the beauty which exposes the world to me. I have loved an infinity of things that have convinced to me of the glory to be alive. "

Casnati is a poet whose work uplifts love. He has said that his ambition is to rescue the rescueable with words that don't deserve to fade away. With the thundering Atlantic waves outside, here in Spiddal is a library space in which an expectation that the privilege of ideas, and the silence in which to consider them, will be cared for and exercised, and that its exercise will make us strong.

Among the books which the Spiddal Librarian, Máire Breathnach, has on this display on this Tuesday is a copy of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. This novel contains the lines:

"In the silence we listen to ourselves.
Then we ask questions of ourselves.
We describe ourselves to ourselves."

This is what happens in a library. We go to a library to find ourselves. We go to a library in the hope of sometimes finding the beauty which exposes the world to us.
___________________________________

The concept of the library providing the silence in which to consider the privilege of ideas is taken from the article "Silence, Please", by Sallie Tisdale. It was published in Harper's Magazine in March, 1997.

You may contact the artist Siobhan Ní Fhloinn by calling 087-9503340. Rince is the title of her mosica which illustrates the opening paragraph above.

You may contact Geraldine Ní Churraoin at 087-7747087.

Máire Breathnach is Librarian in Spiddal Library. You may contact Máire at 091-504028 or by e-mail at spiddallibrary@eircom.net.

a public library anywhere...

I can come in here.... no questions asked...no security on the door. I can sit down on a comfortable chair and read or write or study. Even if I live in the direst circumstances, and have just a small income, I can come in here and have a chair and a clean, unencumbered table all to myself. I have done it today.

I can check the catalogue of the entire library - should I say the catalogue of the universe - there must be thousands of books here - I can check the catalogue of the entire library on any one of six computer terminals... I see long lists of books by my favourite writers...Octavio Paz and Liam O’Flaherty and Joseph Roth.

On other terminals I can access the Internet without charge. The atmosphere here is so conducive to study... the range of books that people are looking at... the intensity of their searching. What a wonderful place of adult education this is. What an idea a library is...not driven by commerce or the market place...no pressure to buy... no need to buy another cup of coffee to retain my seat. And the light is good here. There is a faint sound of music coming from the music section of the Library..... the melancholic strains of Amalia Rodriguez, the Portuguese singer.. Why are libraries rarely mentioned when it comes to lifelong learning...? it is all around me here.... people taking notes..... or quietly talking to each other about their studies.

Taken from an EU Socrates report on Libraries and Adult Education.

“Everyone should have a library to love…………..”

Readers may be interested in the following books which have been added to stock at Galway City Library:

Beyond Glory: Joe Louis vs. Max Schmeling, and a World on the Brink, by David Margolick, Vintage
Fought with thunderclouds of war on the horizon, this book recounts a charged moment in boxing history: the 1938 heavyweight rematch between Detroit's Joe Louis and Germany's Max Schmeling. The African-American Louis's success and demeanour were an unsubtle rebuke to the Aryan theories of race; the affable Schmeling, for his part, would be shoehorned into the role of "Nazi Max," despite the uneasiness of the fit. One of the best sports books of recent years,



Tor! The Story of German Football by Ulrich Hesse-Lichtenberger, WSC Books
Germany did not have a national league until the 1960s, yet it became one of the most successful football nations in the world. Tor! (Goal!) traces the extraordinary story of Gertman football, challenging the myth that German football is ‘predictable’ or ‘efficient’ and brings to life the fascinating array of characters who shaped it: the betrayed pioneer Walther Bensemann; the all-conquering Franz Beckenbauer; the modern misfit Lothar Matthäus.




Pinocchio, by Carlo Collodi
If the only image of the wooden boy that children have is the Disney puppet, then perhaps it is time to introduce them to the original. Not sanitized by Disney, this Pinocchio is revealed as sometimes arrogant, often naughty, very disobedient, but with an underlying desire to do what is right. From the rich buff pages to the exquisite paintings of 19th century Italy, this is a work of art. Here is a classic that belongs on every bookshelf.

We invite you to visit your library in Athenry, Ballinasloe, Ballygar, Carraroe, Clifden, Dunmore, Eyrecourt, Glenamaddy, Gort, Headford, Inishbofin, Inisheer, Inismeain, Killimor, Kilronan, Leenane, Letterfrack, Loughrea, Moylough, Oranmore, Oughterard, Portumna, Roundstone, Spiddal, Tiernea, Tuam, Westside, Woodford, and the Mobile Library.

80th Anniversary of Galway County Libraries

Town Councils were allowed by an Act of 1855 to levy a rate not exceeding one penny for library purposes and the produce of this rate could also be used to meet the expenses of a museum or school or art and science. The council could delegate the business of managing the library to a committee. However, as Town councils were slow to adopt the Act by the latter part of the 19th century only a few municipal libraries had been established, otherwise there was no public library provision at that time over the greater part of the country.

Andrew Carnegie, an American entrepreneur, encouraged the library movement by presenting buildings and shelving if a free site was made available and a full rate levied but the absence of trained librarians and the limited rate levied made satisfactory development difficult. When the rural district councils were dissolved in 1925 the county councils were given power to adopt the Libraries Acts for the rural areas, and enabled urban district councils to hand over their powers to county councils. The Carnegie United Kingdom Trust, created in 1913 by Carnegie, abandoned the policy of presenting library buildings but instead gave financial assistance to the county councils to establish libraries.

In 1923 the Carnegie Trust established the Irish Central Library for Students in order to supply books other than fiction that may not have been available locally. In 1948, under the Public Libraries Act, 1947 an Chomhairle Leabharlanna was established. This body resumed responsibilities for the Trust’s functions. The functions of An Chomhairle include the improvement of the library services, mobiles libraries and book stocks, and to make recommendations regarding library matters to the Minister.

Prior to the adoption of legislation empowering County Councils to establish countywide library services a Library Schemes Committee for county Galway was formed under the aegis of the Carnegie Trust. It was the fifth such scheme established in Ireland. Lennox Robinson, secretary to the Irish Advisory Committee of the Carnegie Trust, took the Chair at the inaugural meeting held on 2nd August 1924 at the Courthouse in Galway. When this Committee ceased to act in May 1926 the library scheme was transferred to Galway County Council. It in turn delegated its power as Library Authority for the county under the Public Libraries Acts (Ireland) 1855 - 1902 and the Local Government Act, 1925 to a County Library Committee. The Committee was made up of elected representatives (County Councillors) and co-opted members, such as local clergy and members of the teaching profession.

Samuel Maguire coordinator of the Galway Carnegie scheme continued to act in that capacity, with the title later amended to County Librarian.
The first meeting of the Galway County Libraries Committee was held in the County Book Repository, Bishops Court, St. Augustine Street, Galway on 22 May 1926. Subsequent Committee meetings were generally held in the County Council Chamber and occasionally in a branch library. Galway County Council took over official control of the Carnegie Libraries on 1 July 1926. Change in the structure of local authorities at the end of the 20th century resulted in the dissolution of the Library Committee in 1998.