The Boys' Brigade in Dunmanway

The Company is called the 1st Dunmanway, Saint Mary's, Company, and it began in October 1989 catering for boys between 5 and 12 years of age. It meets from October to April on Monday nights between 6.45 and 8 o'clock in the Cox Memorial Hall, Dunmanway. At present we have sixteen boys divided into two groups - Anchor Boys (5 - 7 years) and the Junior Section (8 - 12 years). The Company is run by three officers and three teenage helpers. Our activities each night include Craft, which they can take home with them, games, and some badge work.

The uniform which we adopted during the past year comprises red sweatshirts for the Anchor Boys and blue sweatshirts for the Junior Section. The boys wear their jumpers on Monday nights and their full uniform for their annual enrolment service.

The Junior boys have been away on Adventure Weekends with other companies in Kerry, Skibbereen and Cork. Some of these included a Regional Service, and were enjoyed immensely by the boys

We hosted our first Regional Service here in Dunmanway this year and it was held in conjunction with an International Games Competition held on the Saturday afternoon . Four Companies (six teams in all) took part with the highest team achieving 5th place and the lowest 94th place when the scores of all the international teams were collated. The visitors stayed in Cox's Hall on Saturday night and attended our service on Sunday morning following their breakfast in the hall!!!

The Anchor Boys were not forgotten as they had an afternoon out on Saturday, 20th October organised by Clonakilty Company. We visited the Model Village and Lis na Gun Animal Park returning to their hall for a feast of chips,etc. We are grateful to Joyce Buttimer and her Company leaders for a wonderful evening.

Liz Patterson (Company Captain)

NEWS UPDATE

As this year's session is over, a few photos and notes of our last night's party to finish off until we return in October. As you can see in the photos it was a fun night. We started by making Chocolate Tophats, followed by a game. Then we put the money that was gathered by the boys in the letters of The Boys Brigade. This money was collected for the C.M.S. project in the Congo and totaled 40 Euro

When this was fInished, we had the presentation of a Shield that was given to the Company a few years ago by the 1st Cork Company on their centenary. We decided to give it to the boy, in the Junior Section, who scored the highest points in doing 4 or 5 different tasks. The tasks this year included their Scripture Exam Results, A Craft Item, A Game and their Attendance during the year. The Shield was won this year by Roy Beamish who also won it last year and our company chaplain Canon Patrick Hewitt presented it to him.

The last two photos show the boys working at the craft items mentioned above which involved making something out of pipe cleaners with some interesting results

One last thing to finish with: I would like to thank most sincerely Dorothy, Caroline, Helen, Heather and Elaine my leaders and helpers for all their help and support during the year. I would also like to thank the parents who kindly gave of their time on nights to help us out. This is all for now but I look forward to meeting you all again in October.