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 Castlebar entrepreneur, hotelier and entertainment promoter Pat Jennings has been selected as the Mayo Person of the Year 2011. The proprietor of the 2,000-seater TF Royal Theatre, the TF Royal Hotel and the Harlequin Hotel, where he employs 220, will be presented with the prestigious award at the annual banquet of the Mayo Association Dublin in the Burlington Hotel on Friday, February 11.
At the same function members of the Mayo Mental Health Association will receive the Mayo Meithal Award.
Since the late 1950s the Jennings family has successfully operated in the hospitality sector in Castlebar.
Carrying on the proud family business tradition started by his parents, Pat Jennings has pushed out the boundaries of business bravura to provide his native Castlebar, Mayo and the west of Ireland with an entertainment, hospitality and shopping centre of truly magnificent dimensions.
The Travellers Friend was the foundation stone on which the Jennings business was built.
The 'TF', as it became more colloquially known, was augmented by the Royal Ballroom, which throbbed and heaved during the Showband era. It provided the town with a venue on which to build the International Song Contest that was to put Castlebar on the international map.
The collapse of the showband phenomenon left a trail of big ballrooms with the problem of how to reinvent them to meet emerging more sophisticated trends.
For Pat Jennings, the challenge was to have capacity to contract major Irish and international acts which would attract audiences large enough to sustain a viable concert venue. He was entering a market where the competition was well established and had the advantage of far greater population bases.
Undaunted, and with total support from his wife Mary, he proceeded to demolish the famous Royal Ballroom and to build a new state of the art theatre and event centre.
Mr. Jennings said he was 'genuinely humbled' by his selection.
Meanwhile, the chairman of the Mayo Mental health Association, Mr. P.J. Murphy, said the award was a great boost for the work of the association in Mayo and an endorsement of the voluntary effort, which was a key part of the Mayo Mental Health Association for the past 40 years.
He said: "The award is a vindication of the work that has gone into building the Mayo Mental Health Association, a tangible recognition that we have done, and continue to do, some good for the psychiatrically ill of Mayo by staying true to or two main aims - caring for the psychiatrically ill and promoting positive mental health."
From the Connaught Telegraph here.
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