Search Results for 'Killoran'

Last week we were writing about Cremen’s Health Spa and Sea Baths at Seapoint, and how the complex was bought out by Salthill man, Noel Finan in 1944. He closed down the baths in 1946. He realised that young Galway people wanted something more than the clean invigorating air and to be clean, so he sold the family pub (now Killoran’s) and borrowed heavily from the EBS to build a first class ballroom and restaurant. The restaurant was 4,000 square feet, had 90 tables and could seat 350 diners. Attached to it was a kitchen with the most modern steam and electric equipment. The ballroom had a floor area of 5,200 square feet and was laid with a specially sprung maple floor capable of accommodating more than 2,000 dancers. It also had a balcony which could seat a few hundred people and from which patrons could spot the talent and could, from a distance, comment safely about them.

This aerial photograph was taken c1945. On the left you can see the Eglinton Hotel which was originally built in the 1860s. Up to that time, Salthill was a small village that included Lenaboy Avenue and the area between what we know as Seapoint and the Bal. The construction of the Eglinton was on a scale not seen before in Salthill, and it extended the village to the west. It came at a time when locals were beginning to promote the village as a resort, a destination for tourists.