Moneygall Muine Gall (Irish) | |
|---|---|
Village | |
 Main Street | |
  Moneygall Location in Ireland | |
| Coordinates:52°52′48″N7°57′23″W / 52.879977°N 7.956313°W /52.879977; -7.956313 | |
| Country | Ireland |
| Province | Leinster |
| County | County Offaly |
| Government | |
| • Dáil constituency | Offaly |
| Elevation | 120 m (390 ft) |
| Population | 374 |
| Time zone | UTC+0 (WET) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC-1 (IST (WEST)) |
| Irish Grid Reference | S028811 |
Moneygall (Irish:Muine Gall, meaning 'foreigners'thicket')[3] is a village inCounty Offaly, borderingCounty Tipperary, in Ireland. It is situated on theR445 road betweenDublin andLimerick. There were 374 people living in the village as of the2022 census.[2] Moneygall has aCatholic church, motorway service station, a car sales and repair centre, anational school, aGarda station and a pub.[4] The nearestChurch of Ireland church, Borrisnafarney, is 2 km from the village beside the former Loughton Demesne.[5][6]
The village received international attention for being the ancestral home of Falmouth Kearney, a maternal great-great-great-grandfather ofBarack Obama. Obama visited the village in 2011.
Moneygall is in theDáil constituency ofOffaly. It was previously in the constituency ofLaois-Offaly and was one term in theTipperary North Dáil constituency.[7]
Moneygall is on theR445regional road and close to theM7 motorway, where Junction 23 provides access to the village.
Bus Éireann no longer provides a service to Moneygall.[8] As of 2019, bus service 854, operated byLocal Link Tipperary betweenRoscrea railway station and Nenagh, called at Main Street andObama Plaza. The service operates seven days a week.[9][10]
There is no train station in the village but the nearest stations are inNenagh,Cloughjordan andRoscrea, all on theLimerick-Ballybrophy railway line, a feeder service to the mainCork toDublin line, operated byIarnród Éireann.[11]
The closestairport with scheduled passenger services isShannon Airport inCounty Clare.
There is oneCatholicnational school in the village. The formerChurch of Ireland school (now used as a parish hall) was built in 1888 beside theR490Borrisokane turn-off, and closed in 1976, when its pupils were transferred to the neighbouring village ofCloughjordan. An earlier building,[12] constructed around 1800, was previously used as a school. It was then used by the local Church of Ireland community as a chapel of ease until the late 1970s. It has now been converted to a private residence.
Children travel mainly to eitherRoscrea orNenagh for secondary schooling. The nearestthird-level institutions areTipperary Institute inThurles or theUniversity of Limerick,Limerick Institute of Technology andMary Immaculate College, all of which are inLimerick.
While all of the village is located in County Offaly, theGaelic Athletic Association playing field is located in County Tipperary, andMoneygall GAA play in the Tipperary GAA Championships.
Moneygall FC opened its new grounds in 2017 in the centre of the village. The club, while based in County Offaly, compete in North Tipperary.[citation needed]
As of the2016 census, there were 313 people living in Moneygall.[13] The previous2011 census counted 310 people in the village (153 males and 157 females). This, in turn, was an increase of 12 people (4%) since the census of 2006.[14]
Falmouth Kearney, a maternal great-great-great-grandfather ofBarack Obama, 44thPresident of the United States,emigrated from Moneygall toNew York City at the age of 19 in 1850 and eventually resettled inTipton County, Indiana.[15] Kearney's father, Joseph, had been the villageshoemaker. The Kearney family emigrated toRoss County, Ohio, in the first half of the 19th century. Falmouth Kearney's youngest daughter, Mary Ann, moved from Indiana toKansas after her father's death in 1878. Mary Ann Kearney was the paternal grandmother ofStanley Dunham, President Obama's maternal grandfather.
On 23 May 2011, Obama and First LadyMichelle Obama, visited Moneygall as part of a visit to Ireland.[16] They were welcomed by 5,000 people and greeted upon arrival by the President's eighthcousin, Henry Healy.[17] Following a walkabout on the main street, where they shook hands with many local residents, the Obamas entered a house that had been built on the site where Falmouth Kearney had lived. Afterwards, they visited Ollie Hayes'spub to meet more of the President's distant relatives and to study the birth records of his ancestors. President and Mrs. Obama drank Irishstout to the traditional toast,sláinte (meaning "good health"), and Mrs. Obama went behind the bar to learn how to pull a pint.[18][19][20]
TheBarack Obama Plaza service area was opened at Junction 23 of theM7 on the outskirts of Moneygall in June 2014.[21][22][23]
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