Welcome to BADMINTON MUSEUM OF IRELAND.

The purpose of the Badminton Museum of Ireland is to preserve the great heritage of Irish Badminton and to make the general badminton public aware of it.

Welcome to the latest update to the site.

The historical piece is an interesting preview of the prospects of the Irish team due to meet Denmark in the first match ever played in the Thomas Cup. If Frank Peard had won the toss he would have had the distinction of hitting the first shuttle in this World Team Championships. Major J.D.M.McCallum was mentioned in an earlier issue and from this report it is noted that a group of visiting players known as The Strollers led by “The Major” were instrumental in establishing Badminton in Denmark. Fittingly Major McCallum acted as Referee for the match. Denmark proved too strong for the Irish and won the match 9-0

The Gallery shows action from the All-England Mens Doubles semi-final of 1952 featuring Ireland’s Frank Peard and Jim FitzGibbon against the famous Choong brothers from Malaya. The Choongs were the holders of the title and which they retained in this year and went on to complete a hat trick in the following year. Peard and FitzGibbon were following in the footsteps of other distinguished Irish Mens Doubles pairings. Frank Devlin and Curly Mack won the All England five times between 1926 and 1931 while Tom Boyle and Jim Rankin won the title in 1939.It has to be assumed that they would have had high hopes of further success were it not for the intervention of the war. The competition was not played for the following seven years.

This web site was set up to present many aspects of Irish Badminton from its earliest days. It is hoped that ongoing discussions with Badminton Ireland and Leinster Branch will lead to a real live Museum as opposed to a virtual one.

A reminder that I am very interested to hear of Badminton memorabilia from all sources and would welcome comments through the site.

Dick O’Rafferty, Curator, Badminton Museum of Ireland