2016 – 2026

Remembering Colum

An engineer from a young age, a maker of wooden reindeer, and the inspiration for this tour.

Our Story

Colum's Story

In 2015, at eighteen and a pupil at St Colman's College in Newry, Colum McNally was named UK Young Engineer of the Year, beating more than 2,000 other entrants at The Big Bang Fair in Birmingham.

His winning Agri-Hammer was a safe, low-cost hydraulic machine that did the work of both a log splitter and a fence builder, two jobs that usually need two dangerous machines.

Colum went on to study Mechanical Engineering at Queen’s University Belfast, where he completed his first year. Following his passing in October 2016, the Colum McNally Scholarship was established in 2017 to honour his memory and preserve his legacy. Since then, it has continued to support engineering students at Queen’s, ensuring that Colum’s memory lives on through the opportunities it creates for future generations.

The Scholarship
Colum in an orange T-shirt standing on the steps of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.
Outside the Institution of Mechanical Engineers

In photographs

From the farm to UK Young Engineer of the Year

“I’ve been involved in engineering from a young age on the farm, just building bits and pieces as we needed them, and it’s amazing to think it’s taken me this far.”

Colum, quoted by Newry.ie, 2015

Two young boys on a homemade wooden go-kart with spoked wheels and a rope for steering.

01 / Early days

Where it all began

A homemade go-kart: a wooden box, four old wheels and a rope to steer it.

01 — 08

From the archive

The wooden reindeer

Colum built handmade wooden reindeer and sold them to raise money for cancer-related causes. These are scanned prints of reindeer he made.

  • A handmade wooden reindeer with a log body, stick legs and bare branch antlers, standing in a farmyard with hens around it.
  • A man in a high-visibility jacket standing beside the same wooden reindeer in the farmyard.
  • A wooden reindeer with a red nose and a knitted scarf, its branch antlers hung with Christmas baubles and lights, on display outside a café on a paved town square.

Ten years on

October 2026 marks ten years since Colum died.

To mark it, reindeer plaques in his memory are travelling from person to person and place to place around the world, gathering stories and raising money for cancer care as they go.

How the tour continues his legacy

Colum made things by hand and gave what they raised to others. Every host who welcomes a plaque, every hike, walk or race one joins and every story shared carries that on.

Alongside the tour, the Colum McNally Scholarship continues to support engineering students at Queen's University Belfast.

Legacy

The Colum McNally Scholarship

Since 2017, three scholarships each year have supported students at the School of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at Queen's University Belfast, in Colum's memory.

In the news

The scholarship

Supporters

Take it. Share it. Pass it on.

Many plaques. Many places. Shared impact. Host a plaque, join an event, share your photo or support the campaign.

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