By Connie Bettison, Librarian, National Museum of Ireland
On Wednesday 17 September 2025, I was lucky enough to go to the 94th National Ploughing Championships in Screegan, County Offaly.
In my role as Librarian, I typically work “behind the scenes" at the museum so it’s a special occasion when I can leave the stores and meet visitors. I was eager to go, and since my work includes spending time at all the National Museum of Ireland’s (NMI) sites, I felt confident in my ability to represent the museum in its entirety.
The reason for my visit was to represent the Council for National Cultural Institutions (CNCI). The National Museum of Ireland is one of nine members of this group, alongside the Abbey Theatre, the Irish Museum of Modern Art and the Crawford Art Gallery.
On the day, after an early train to Tullamore, a shuttle bus to the entrance, and a muddy walk across the site at sunrise, I made it to my home for the Ploughing: Block 3, Row 14, Stand 274. This was part of the Culture, Creativity, Archaeology and Sport Marquee in the Government of Ireland Village. My neighbours in the tent included the Office of Public Works and their Lego model about flood defenses, Harp Ireland who were inviting visitors to try playing the Irish national musical instrument, and Ireland’s National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage who taught me about Loy Digging.
When I found the right stand, I met a colleague from the National Library of Ireland who was delivering all the stock for our stall. We had giveaways of pencils, postcards, tote bags and leaflets from all the NCIs. Then there were the prizes for the raffle: copies of Words of the Wave, a chimpanzee stuffed toy (representing the new Dead Zoo Lab) and one of the coveted Harry Clarke Christmas baubles.
Once our display was all set up and the visitors started to arrive, my responsibilities were to man the stall – alongside colleagues from the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport – and make conversation with visitors about the museum and the other NCIs: a great opportunity to share information about the NMI and its collections.
Some of the questions I received from visitors were responses to the literature on our stall: What’s happening with the closure of the National Museum of Ireland at Merrion Street? Where is the Seamus Heaney exhibition? What is the cute Netsuke monkey on a Chester Beatty postcard? The broad nature of these questions reflects the variety of the collections held at the museum and at the other national cultural institutions.
Some people who visited the stall wanted to know about career opportunities in culture and heritage in Ireland. Others had some very specific archaeological questions. As a librarian with no background in archaeology I felt fortunate to have my colleagues from the National Museum of Ireland at Kildare Street on another stall in the same marquee, to whom I could redirect the queries outside my area of expertise.
My job as Librarian at the National Museum of Ireland means I usually spend the day working with books, databases, budgets and shelving. Whilst facilitating access to information and sharing knowledge is part of my day job, my day at the Ploughing Championships was very different as it was full of conversation with people of all ages from across the country. The experience gave me a welcome new perspective of how much people care about the work of the museum and the position of culture and heritage in daily life.
You can also read about what colleagues from the National Museum of Ireland at Kildare Street were doing at the Ploughing this year here: https://www.museum.ie/en-IE/News/The-National-Museum-of-Ireland-at-the-Ploughing
