The Finn Valley Voice In Brief
Established in 1994 the Finn Valley Voice is one of the two oldest
independent newspapers in the county, the other being the Tirconaill
Tribune. It is also unique in being one of the few, if only, Irish
newspapers to be owned and directed by an all-female group. We're the oldest
paper with the youngest directors.
Local papers like ours are strong on good news, light on lurid news, and
only bearers of bad news when people need to hear it. You'll know people in
our paper. Almost every one of the Finn/Deele Valley's 15,000-odd faces has
appeared or will appear in our pages.
Win a medal, start school, attend a dinner, cheer a football team, turn 100
years old, give birth to triplets, graduate, marry, celebrate an
anniversary, shave your head for charity, cycle to Dublin, find a coin in
the attic, lose your dog, dance, work in Africa, catch the biggest fish,
search for your roots, swim on New Year's Day, or just smile at us and wešll
show the other 15,000 how well you looked.
Wešll also tell you what's going to happen, no matter how small the event,
and keep you posted on what's changed and changing. And we'll try to find
out, and print, what you feel needs saying, and what valuable memories are
out there.
Over the past 12 years , we have managed to amass what amounts to a social,
factual, and community-based history of the Finn and Deele Valleys. The When
We Were Young series, the Home From Home series, the First World War series,
and hundreds of one-off interviews with people who may since have passed
away now form an irreplaceable archive. Fascinating histories which would
have died with their narrators are in the public domain.
We are also a forum for the recognition of success. Many a youthful picture
on the sports or community pages will hang framed on somebody's wall long
after the winners have grandchildren themselves.
Remarkably for a small paper, the Finn Valley Voice has world-class arts and
science departments. The Arched Window has uncovered a wealth of artistic
talent, past and present, and the science page interprets scientific
discovery from a community angle. Our sports pages, too, in a valley which
plays a wider range of competitive sports than anywhere else in Ireland,
have never missed a beat and form another unique record.
Perhaps the most important contribution the Finn Valley Voice has made and
will make, however, is in community cohesion.
Our Your Community Choice Your Community Voice, mission statement is an
ever more important one. The local church, the local pub, the local corner,
the local shop, the local team, all have declined in their ability to hold
community together. New supportive forces are needed to bind us into a
community, and nothing is more powerfully binding than a widely-read local
paper.