More on the Angel of Rathcoole

MORE ON THE ANGEL OF RATHCOOLE

I’m grateful to Mark Langhammer from Newtownabbey council for an update on the Angel of Rathcoole, the large female sculpture that used to hang on the wall of the old VG supermarket in the Diamond.  Mark tells me that like myself, ‘I spent a bit of my youth looking up at this thing and wondering….  But grew to like the bloody thing.’  He - like me and many others - had thought that it had been done by the same sculptor who did the two similar figures on the Ulster Bank at Shaftsbury Square in Belfast.  However, after doing some research into the statue he found out that it was made in 1966 by a man called Stephen Toogood.

 
Mark goes on to say that; ‘when the Housing Exec were planning to pull down the shops, I did intervene - got the Angel safely stored, and set about finding a home for it.  To cut a long story short, a small grant from the Council's Arts fund will see the Angel restored - looking out at the Diamond in the same direction, from the gable wall of the Rathcoole Churches' Dunanney Centre.  I'll check on timescale and get back to you but, in short, the Angel is saved!’  Great news! When I get the details, Kerr's Corner readers will be the first to know.

 
Thanks also to James McDonald for pointing out that the banana flats were in Derrycoole Way and not Rathcoole Drive.  I actually meant to type Rathmore Drive, but you’re right, Mr McDonald. Please keep your letters coming to kerrscorner@ulsteronline.org.uk