placenamesBeltra
Béal Trá
Beltra’s community hall preserves an unusual building material and a long record of agricultural shows, performances and local gatherings.
The name
These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
- Béal Trá · Irish · main form · validated name
- Beltra · English · main form
Place & story
The corrugated-iron hall
Beltra Hall at Tanrego West dates from about 1905. The architectural inventory records a five-bay, single-storey building clad in corrugated iron, with a small entrance porch and a roughcast western wing. Corrugated iron forms both its main roof and walls. The inventory identifies it as an increasingly rare example of this material used for a community building, preserving a modest form of public architecture alongside more familiar stone-built institutions. [2]
The agricultural show and other gatherings
The hall has been the home of Beltra Agricultural Show, whose centenary in 2011 was marked by a congratulatory letter from President Mary McAleese. A 2025 account of the building's history also records dances, concerts, amateur drama and children's dance lessons. Its uses extended to the weekly country market, scouting, a feis and local groups, making one building the setting for several different strands of community activity. [3]
Repairing a working community building
In 2025 a local committee sought funds for a new roof after leaks threatened the hall's fabric. The estimated cost was €30,000, with an accepted heritage-grant application expected to provide only part of the money. The appeal followed earlier work on windows, toilets, the kitchen and the main hall floor. These recorded repairs show how repeated community use also required sustained efforts to maintain the building. [3]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Population centre
- County
- Sligo
- Barony
- Tireragh
- Civil parish
- Dromard
- Within
- Tanrego West
- Coordinates
- 54.22617, -8.62871 (approximate)
- Logainm ID
- 134412 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Beltra. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- The Hall,Tanrego West,registration32401917 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
- Donations sought to save Beltra Agricultural Show venue,21May2025 · James Hanly,Irish Farmers Journal
- Former AJ's public house, Beltra, 2015 illustration: based on a AJ'S, Beltra, Co. Sligo by P L Chadwick. AI-assisted watercolour and ink adaptation; cream paper margins added, incidental clutter omitted and fine details simplified. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2025-01-10. How this page was prepared.