THE PERSONAL library of the late former taoiseach Charles J Haughey was officially opened to the public in Co Mayo yesterday.
The 3,800-volume library was donated to the State by the Haughey family last December and has been put on display at the National Museum of Ireland’s Country Life branch in Turlough Park, Castlebar.
The collection consists of books covering a wide range of subjects such as politics, economics, literature, arts and culture, architecture and history.
It includes signed biographies by François Mitterrand and Mikhail Gorbachev, as well as three volumes of The Papers of President John F Kennedy, which were presented by his brother, former senator Edward Kennedy, who died last month.
The collection also features a book of Haughey’s speeches and volumes presented to him by Nobel Prize-winning poet Séamus Heaney and renowned artist Louis Le Brocquy.
Minister of State Seán Haughey – Charles J Haughey’s son – said it was fitting that the collection of books was being housed in Castlebar, as it was where his father was born. “He was honoured as ‘Mayoman of the Year’ in 1978,” he said
