placenamesCrosskeys
Na hEochracha
A roadside inn in Ardnaglass preserves the fabric of a rural meeting place and memories of its everyday trade.
The name
A reliable full-name meaning has not been established here. The recorded Irish and English forms are given without an unsupported translation.
Recorded forms
- Na hEochracha · Irish · main form · validated name
- Crosskeys · English · main form
Place & story
The thatched crossroads building
Crosskeys Inn stands on Grange Road in Ardnaglass, on the road between Randalstown and Portglenone. The Department for Communities records an L-shaped building with whitewashed walls, a black base and a thatched roof between tiled gables. A small opening associated with the post office survives within a front window. The listed ensemble includes its piers, walling and a pillbox, placing this familiar public house within a wider group of historic roadside features. [2]
Post office and public house
The inn’s published history records its appearance as Crosskeys Post Office on the revised Ordnance Survey map of 1857. George Neeson, its nineteenth-century occupier, combined farming with work as a publican and grocer. The premises later passed through the Kennedy and Stinson families. Fire damaged part of the inn in February 2000; restoration allowed it to reopen in May 2001, preserving a building that had served several local needs. [3]
Bessie Quinn’s recollections
In an interview recorded at Toome Primary School in 1994, Bessie Quinn recalled more than thirty years working at Crosskeys Inn. She described a restricted selection of drinks when she started in 1964, an earlier closing hour, and children receiving sweets or soft drinks through a small window opening. Her testimony, preserved by TIDAL Toome, gives the inn a history of daily labour and local encounters alongside its architectural significance. [4]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Population centre
- County
- Antrim
- Barony
- Toome Upper
- Civil parish
- Grange of Ballyscullion
- Within
- Ardnaglass
- Coordinates
- 54.80163, -6.42925 (approximate)
- Logainm ID
- 135752 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Crosskeys. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Crosskeys Inn, HB07/09/011 A: historic building record · Department for Communities, Northern Ireland
- Crosskeys Inn: Our History · Crosskeys Inn
- Memories of Duneane: Bessie Quinn, recorded 1994, published 31 March 2022 · TIDAL Toome / Northern Ireland Community Archive
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2021-05-26. How this page was prepared.