Galway’s most elite club votes to lift 200-year ban on females

Galway City Tribune – Galway’s most exclusive club, which had exercised a strictly male-only policy since its inception almost 200 years ago, has finally voted to permit female members.

This is one of the more interesting changes made by the Galway County Club, located at Weir House on the banks of the River Corrib, originally established in the mid-1800s to provide accommodation to rural members visiting the city for legal and other purposes. Club President, Dr Michael Coughlan, says that the latest review is a long time coming.

“Every 20 years or so, the club has been in the habit of reviewing the constitution and rules, and trying to update the club in line with change,” he told the Galway City Tribune.

“So, over the past three years, a sub-committee, headed by a solicitor, has been looking at all of the rules – 38 of them – reviewing them, and seeing that they are in line with present-day thinking. This sub-committee proposed the introduction of a new rule to allow for junior members, between the ages of 18-30, at a special rate.”

“In the course of reviewing all the rules, the committee thought it was time to study two particular rules that had to do with the gender issue, and bring them into modern day thinking as well, conscious of the fact that similar clubs had opened up their doors to ladies.

“This was done cautiously to begin with, but gathered momentum as time went on over the three years. It became apparent that there was a growing wish among the members to address that issue. So, finally it was brought to a special general meeting, to discuss the changes to all the rules. A proposal was put forward to remove the word ‘male’ and include the word ‘ladies’ and that happened very recently, to one’s surprise that it was absolutely almost a unanimous decision to do so.”
This is a preview only. To read the rest of this article, see this week’s Galway City Tribune. Buy a digital edition of this week’s paper here.