We look back at the stories that were making the headlines in the Andersonstown News this week in 1979
Pauline Ferguson from Gransha Green celebrates her 21st birthday with family and friends, including dad George 
Mackie’s policy: Keep the Catholics out
AN Andersonstown News investigation team has this week unearthed what seems to be a deliberate attempt by Mackie’s Foundry and Engineering Works on the Springfield Road to prevent Catholics from getting positions in the clerical side of the firm.
The investigation came about as a result of accusations made by a number of local parents with daughters of school-leaving age who had been continually refused employment although their educational qualifications were quite good.
“I know from personal experience,” retorted one angry parent, “that local girls haven’t a chance of a job, and that preference is given to young girls from East and North Belfast, who live miles away from the works and who have long distances to travel every morning to work.
“There are some excellent girls’ secondary schools in the West Belfast area with a high reputation for academic results, and I think it is a crying shame that the pupils are being denied an opportunity of being employed locally. I’m not saying that locals should get preference but they should at least be given a chance to compete on equal terms with others.”
The result of the Andersonstown News investigation seems to give substance to these accusations. Local school teachers and career officers admit that they have always had great difficulty in placing local girls in clerical positions in Mackie’s. An ex-engineering employee of some 40 years standing, stated that he personally knew only about three Catholics to have ever been employed in the clerical end in all the years he had been there.
Katherine Stephenson, Bernie Leonard, Tommy McGuigan, Mick McQuade and Mickey Bennett at St Matthew's Social Club
Vicious attack on young man
LAST Saturday night, just after midnight, a young man, who wishes to remain anonymous, was going home after leaving his girlfriend when he was approached by a man in a car who asked him for a light.
He walked towards the car to give the man a light, when he was pounced on by four other men in their mid-twenties who pulled him to the ground. They ripped his shirt off and scratched the letters UVF across his chest and stomach.
One of the gang then said “Let’s kill him now” and the young man managed to escape at this time and ran towards his house. The gang then jumped into their car and drove away in the general direction of Lisburn. The young man was eventually taken to the hospital for treatment.
Fortunately his wounds were only superficial and he was allowed home. This is the fifth attack on residents in Twinbrook with sectarian motives and the local Sinn Féin Cumann have distributed leaflets throughout the estate warning the people to be on their guard.
Jim Davey, Dessie McCrory, Ann Davey, Anne Marie Molloy and Kathleen Wright enjoying a night out at St Matthew's Social Club back in October 1979
St Michael’s Drama Group
IN 1973 a local man, Tim Wilson, wrote a three act play called The Thunder and the Singing. At that time the Andersonstown area was without a dramatic society, so in order to have his play produced, Tim founded the original St Michael’s Drama Group.
The play was a big success and the Group flourished for a couple of years. However, a number of the members moved away to different areas, and eventually through lack of support the Group disbanded.
Earlier this year, Tim was approached by other local men, Charlie Morrison, a past member of the old and very successful St Agnes’ Dramatic Society, which disbanded in the early seventies at the height of the Troubles, and William Stewart and Hugh McReynolds. Between them they contacted those they knew still interested in amateur dramatics, and with the kind help of St Michael’s Parish Priest Father Agnew, in providing a meeting place, the new St Michael’s Drama Group was formed.
After some advertising they were lucky to receive the services of a very talented local school teach Sean O’Doherty. He has got the group into shape and is now producing their first play which is Joseph Tomelty’s comedy Mugs and Money. This will be presented in St Joseph’s Training College on Friday November 16 and Sunday November 18 at 8pm.
The group are very interested in bringing drama to the area and can only do so as long as local people support them. Hopefully, they will go from strength to strength and establish themselves as a serious contributor to an area long devoid of amateur dramatics.
Alice Blaney, Caroline McDonald, Sally Dempsey and Edith Delaney during a night out at St Matthew's Social Club in Short Strand
