There is very little by the way of records about the old schools in the Clonmore area. The school prior to Clintyclay was known as Clonmore school and was situated where Tony and Ailsa McGeown have their current home and it is in
cluded in the Griffiths 1860 Valuation as ‘School House’. McGartlands lived in this house too at a time.
Clonmore school (at McGeown’s) was attended by both Catholics and Protestants. The Verner’s Papers which are housed in the Public Records Office in Belfast make reference to an ‘Application to Commissioners of Education Ireland’ in 1864 for salary of £28 for a teacher Charlotte Hyde (aged 16). She is listed as commencing work on 1st October 1868 and that on the school roll was 47 boys and 40 girls. The school had one long room 31 feet by 18 feet wide. The last teacher in Clonmore school was according to Jim McAlinden Snr (RIP), a Miss Thompson.
Dean Peter Byrne, Parish Priest of Dungannon is thought to have decided that the Catholic children should have their own school. There is said to have been a school for a short time in ‘Arthur’s Barn’ belonging to Arthur Dynes opposite Tom and Isa Donaghy’s (RIP) while the school at Clintyclay was being planned and it is suggested that the photograph below may have been taken outside this school. A Mrs McCusker is thought to have taught here.
