All the big Cork events planned to commemorate the centenary of Michael Collins's death

WITH Cork County Council promising the upgrading of the road by Béal na Bláth will be finished in time for Sunday’s commemoration, there are scores of events planned to mark the centenary of Michael Collins’s death. These are just a few.

Morning Ireland (7am, RTÉ Radio 1, today). To mark the centenary of the assassination of Collins, RTÉ’s flagship radio programme will broadcast from the Munster Arms Hotel, Bandon today, formerly Lee’s Hotel, where Michael Collins was photographed alive for the last time, 30 minutes before he was killed in the ambush at Béal na Bláth.

Centenary commemoration at Béal na Bláth (3pm, RTÉ’s digital news channel, Sunday, August 21). A historic joint address by Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Tánaiste Leo Varadkar at the site of Michael Collins’s death will see Mr Martin become the first Fianna Fáil leader to address the annual commemoration.

With a crowd of over 5,000 people anticipated for the event, a major crowd and traffic plan, involving An Garda Síochána, the Defence Forces, Cork County Council and the emergency services, is in place, and those wishing to travel to the event are urged to car share or avail of shuttle buses.

Who’ll take my place? A festival of Michael Collinses (Sunday, Newcestown). History does not record whether the real Michael Collins bellowed “If they shut me up, who’ll take my place?” as Liam Neeson did in Neil Jordan’s 1996 film Michael Collins, but when the legend becomes fact, print the legend.

Volunteers organising this year’s Newcestown Festival plan to bring together the world’s largest gathering of people named Michael Collins, in the hope of securing a place in the Guinness Book of Records.

Michael Collins TD will officiate at the event, alongside his son, also Michael.

Michael Collins Last Days Documentary Screenings (6.30pm, the Imperial Hotel, Sunday). Members of Michael Collins’s family will sit in for the screening of two documentaries which will be introduced by historian Bartle Darcy.

Spaces are limited to 100. Booking in advance on Eventbrite.

By a Treaty Divided – The Civil War in Cork (Cork Public Museum, Fitzgerald Park, opens Monday, August 22). Launched by Lord Mayor of Cork Deirdre Forde, this landmark new exhibition will include such items as Collins’s gun, his Mass card, his uniform, and many items related to Michael Collins never seen publicly before.

The Ryan Tubridy Show (9am, RTÉ Radio 1, Monday). Ryan Tubridy and guests will broadcast from the Imperial Hotel on the South Mall, where Michael Collins stayed the night before he was killed.

Micheal Collins Himself (6.30pm, the Imperial Hotel, Monday). Pól O Murchú, grand-nephew of Michael Collins, will give a unique and emotive talk on the centenary. Presented by the Imperial Hotel in partnership with Cork City Library. Bookings in advance on Eventbrite.

An Buachaill Gealgháireach (9.30pm, TG4, Wednesday, August 24). Cork-born poet Theo Dorgan looks at the untold story of The Laughing Boy, a song dedicated to the memory of Michael Collins, written by teenage rebel Brendan Behan, and its improbable afterlife as a Greek song of resistance.

Cold Case Collins (9.35pm, RTÉ One, Wednesday). Former State Pathologist Professor Marie Cassidy will chair a 21st-century cold case comprising forensic scientists, criminal investigators, military strategists, archaeologists, archivists and historians.

As viewers, we eavesdrop on the experts as they sift and filter through the evidence old and new, looking for answers to the questions that have ignited bar brawls for decades.