ROVER 75 & MG ZT CLUB TRIP TO THE ULSTER AMERICAN FOLK PARK - 21ST JULY 2012

With the car loaded up with the barbecue and other essentials for the for the day, my husband, son and I left arrived at the rendezvous point at 10.15am, 15 minutes ahead of schedule.


2 cars were already there. A Rover 75 with 2 occupants and a MG ZT with 2 occupants.  Shortly afterwards another 75 with 4 occupants arrived.  The tourer and driver didn't arrive until 10.45am  - 15 minutes late as usual!  After chatting for about 15 minutes it was time to move on.  We headed of in convoy, with our 75 leading the way.


Within 5 minutes of setting off, my husband noticed that there
were only 2 cars behind him instead of 4. We’d lost the two 75's at the first roundabout! A quick phone call ascertained that both cars had turned onto the motorway towards Belfast instead of towards Dungannon!  We pulled off the motorway and waited for them to catch up before continuing our journey.  The rest of the drive was uneventful and we eventually arrived safely at The Folk Park just after 12.15pm. 


We were an MG ZT with it's 4 occupants, who had travelled from the North West to be with us.  As soon as we parked up, people started talking about food, so it was decided that we’d barbecue before we took the tour.  The barbecue was assembled and lit. 


While we were cooking a couple from Ballycastle arrived in their 75, quickly followed by a MG ZT with 5 occupants from Larne.  Shortly afterwards another Rover 75 with 4 occupants arrived.

There was the usual car talk and banter as we cooked and stuffed our faces; it was like feeding time at the zoo!  Given the amount of food that was cooked and eaten, I think some people have hollow legs or worms!

By then it was 3pm, time to go on the tour. The first part
of the tour consisted of houses and buildings from Ireland,
dating from the 1700’s and early 1800’s


The first house was a one room house that had been moved
stone by stone from the Sperrin Mountains and rebuilt at the Folk Park. The house was inhabited by 10 people (2 adults and 8 children) and they lived and slept in the one room.

The other buildings included a blacksmiths forge, a weaver’s cottage, a church, a mass house and a school.

The Forge - The is a typical blacksmiths forge from the 1800s. The blacksmith was a vital part of the countryside in years gone by, they shod horses and made the farm and home like ploughs and griddles.  A boy would start working in the blacksmiths from the age of 10 or 12 and serve as an apprentice for 7 years.

Inside the weavers cottage - Many homes doubled up as a home and a place of work. The weavers cottage is one example of this. One room held the handloom which was used to weave the tweed. The man of the house would spend the evenings weaving, while the wife would spun the flax yarns into yarn and the young children combed the flax in preparation for the spinning wheel.

School house

Inside the school house - This one room school house was removed from the nearby townland of Castletown. The building is dated 1845 although records show that there was a school there from the 1790s.

Then we entered Ulster Street. This is the type of street that emigrants would have passed through before boarding the ships to America. The shops have been dismantled from surrounding towns and villages and rebuilt at the Folk Park.

Ulster Street - Blair's Printers - from Strabane.

Inside the print shop.

This brought us to the quayside where there is a Merchant’s Office and a house from the 1700’s where emigrants would have bought their ticket and lodged until it was time for the ship to sail. These are both original buildings. Across from the Merchant’s Office is a replica of an early 1800 emigrant ship, which was modelled on the

Brig Union.

The Merchant's office and a house from the 1700s  - These are both orginal building which have been moved from their original locations to the folk park.  The Merchant's office is from Great George's Street in Belfast and the house is from Bridge Street in Derry. 

This is a replica of an early 1800 emigrant sailing ship. It was modelled on the Brig Union which carried members of the Mellon family to Baltimore in 1816.

We entered the ship via one route and viewed the sleeping quarters below deck. We were astounded by the cramped conditions that had to be endured during the crossing. The noise and smell would have been horrendous.

Lower deck - These are rows of bunk beds.  It is impossible to imagine the living conditions that the emigrants had to endure down here during their 6 to 12 week crossing.  It is so cramped, the ceilings are so low and so warm down here.

We exited the ship by a different route and entered an American street. This street scene is typical of those that would have greeted the many thousands of emigrants in ports such as Baltimore, New York and Boston. After the street there are a number of homes that emigrants built.  

The Log Cabin - This small, 2 room log cabin is the type of house built and occupied by early emigrants such as the young Thomas Mellon and his family when they first arrived in America. They would have spent years living in a house like this until they had the time and the money to build a more spacious and permanent home.

Pennsylvania Log Barn - This multi-purpose outbuilding on the frontier farm was used to house animals and store animal food and crops. Its large central area allowed wagons to be moved easily.

Western Pennsylvania Log House - This house was originally built on the Cox family farm, Greene County, Pennsylvania by Uriah Hupp in the 1800s, before it was transported back to the Folk park.  
One Uriah Hupp's descendants, Benjamin Franklin Hupp married Clara D. Kelley whose family emigrated from Armagh in 1719.

We spent just over 2 hours on the tour, but you could easily spend the whole day looking around and still not take everything in. During the tour, 2 things struck me; the first was the difference between the homes of the lowest in society and the wealthy landowners in Ireland at the time. The second thing was the differences in the construction of the Irish homes and the American homes. The Irish homes were all built from stone whereas the
American homes were all wooden structures.  


After the tour we reconvened at the cars and chatted until  6pm, when it was decided to call it a day and head for home.


This was a super venue, with very knowledgeable tour guides, who gave demonstrations and told us the history of the buildings and answered our questions. This was a truly fascinating and very educational tour. It was great catching up with the regulars and meeting the new members. As always my husband, son and I had a fantastic day.