railway museums clare

Visitors to the museum will be able to see there the inscribed spade with which Charles Stewart Parnell turned the first sod for the laying of the West Clare Railway. The west Clare project was initiated in 1883 and construction began in 1885. The railway, which opened for business in 1887, ran at first from Ennis to Miltown Malbay through Ennistymon. It was afterwards extended to Kilkee and Kilrush, serving Lahinch and other coastal towns on the way.

One of its engines, the Slieve C...