YEATS, JOHN BUTLER 1839-1922

John Yeats was born in Tullylish, County Down. He was educated at Athol Academy, Isle of Man, and Trinity College, Dublin. He was called to the Bar in 1866, but did not practise. He studied at Heatherley's Art School in London to become a painter, exhibited at the Royal Academy and returned to Ireland in the 1880s to exhibit in the Royal Hibernian Academy, to which he was elected in 1892. His studio was a venue for literary people. In 1901 he had a joint exhibition with Nathaniel Hone. Several of his portraits of leading Irish personages are exhibited in the National Gallery of Ireland, including 'The Artist's Wife' and portraits of John O'Leary and William Butler Yeats. In 1908 he went to America and wrote essays for Harper's Weekly, collected in Essays Irish and American. His autobiography Early Memories: A Chapter of Autobiography was published posthumously. He died in New York. His Letters to his Son, W. B. Yeats, and others was published in 1944, and further editions were edited by Ezra Pound and Lennox Robinson.

YELVERTON, BARRY 1736-1805

Barry Yelverton was born in County Cork and was educated at Trinity College, Dublin. He was called to the Bar in 1764, and ten years later was returned as Member of Parliament for Donegal. In 1776 he became Member of Parliament for Carrickfergus, County Antrim. In 1783 he was appointed Baron Avonmore, and in 1795 he became a peer of the realm. He supported the Union.

YOUNG, ELLA 1865-1951

Ella Young was born in Fenagh, County Antrim, and took a degree in Political Science and Law at University College, Dublin. She was encouraged in folklore research by George Russell and belonged to his Hermetical Society and later to the Irish Theosophical Society. She had a firm belief in reincarnation. She lived in Connaught for many months and learned to speak Irish. She retold the Irish legends. In 1912 she was involved in gunrunning for the Irish Volunteers. She lived for a period on Achill Island, but eventually went to Connemara and returned to Dublin in 1919. She went to America to lecture in 1925, studied Mexican and Indian folklore, and lived in Calfornia, where she died. She wrote children's fiction, such as The Unicorn with Silver Shoes, and poetry that she published in periodicals. Her autobiography is entitled Flowering Dusk.

YOUNG, JAMES d.1974

James Young lived at Ballywalter, County Down and worked in an estate agent's office in Ballymoney, County Antrim. His artistic talents were discovered by Sir Tyrone Guthrie. He became a comedian and actor and Mr Harold Goldblatt, Director of the Group Theatre, offered him work. He played George in Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men and was enrolled in the Festival of Britain Company. He played the part of Derek, the window-cleaner, in Joseph Tomelty's radio series, The McCooeys, which ran from 1949 to 1955. Many of the shows in which he appeared at the Belfast Empire Theatre were broadcast, and eventually he had his own television programme. From 1960 to 1972 he was manager of the Group Theatre. He toured in the United States and Canada, and after the Group Theatre closed, he gave many performances throughout Ulster.

YOUNG, MARY ALICE (nee MacNAGHTEN) 1868-1946

Mary Young was born at Dundarave, Bushmills, County Antrim. When she married she went to live at Galgorm, Ballymena, County Antrim. She was an enthusiastic and accomplished photographer. She took over a thousand photographs between 1890 and 1915, and she often experimented with chiaroscuro. Most of the photographs are of her family, and life on the Galgorm Estate. During the Second World War she was heavily involved in voluntary work for the armed forces.

YOUNG, ROBERT 1822-1917

Robert Young was born in Belfast and was educated at Belfast Academy and Glasgow University, where he studied mathematics. He assisted Sir Charles Lanyon, County Surveyor of Antrim, on the construction of the Ballymena Railway. He designed the three-arched viaduct in Glendun Valley, County Antrim. In 1849 he moved to Athlone to work on the Midland Great Western Railway, where he designed the bridge that spans the River Shannon. He returned to Belfast to practise as an architect and civil engineer in the 1850s, and his firm was responsible for the design of the Presbyterian Assembly block. In 1907 he was created an Irish Privy Councillor, and in 1909 a Senator of Queen's University, Belfast. He was interested in archaeology and was convinced that there was evidence for Paleolithic habitation in Ireland. He was a talented watercolour arist and had a wide knowledge of traditional Irish music and frequented Feis Ceoil meetings.

YOUNG, ROSE MAUD 20th century

Rose Young was born in Galgorm House, Ballymena, County Antrim. She was educated at home by a governess and then trained as a teacher in Cambridge. Although she came from a unionist family who were linen merchants, she was committed to learning the Irish language, and kept diaries charting her progress. While in England she visited the Bodleian Library to see their collection of Gaelic manuscripts. She attended Irish classes run by the Gaelic League in London, and on her return to Ireland in the early 1900s, went regularly to Shan O'Cahan's Irish College in Belfast. She was a close friend of Margaret Dobbs, and supported the Glens of Antrim Feis. She published three collections of Irish songs, and observed the keening tradition that was on the decline.

YOUNG, ROBERT MAGILL 1851-1925

Robert Young was born in Athlone and was educated at Queen's College, Belfast. He trained as an architect under his father, Robert Young. He was a member of the Royal Irish Academy and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland. In 1895 he became co-editor for the Ulster Journal of Archaeology, 2nd series. He compiled Fighters of Derry, and edited the Town Book of Belfast and Belfast and Ulster in the Twentieth Century. He wrote Ulster in '98; and Historical Notices of Old Belfast. He was a Justice of the Peace.