Tom Farrelly
By Kathy McGee Burns
You’d never know by his accent, but Tom Farrelly is from Virginia. That’s the Virginia in County Cavan, Ireland, a small farming town of 4,000 people halfway between Belfast and Dublin.
It’s not without its celebrity. Jonathan Swift wrote “Gulliver Travels” while visiting there. But it’s also where the Farrellys, James and Margaret (nee Lynch), raised their 10 children. Fourth from the top was Tom, a successful businessman who will be honored this year at the 11th Annual Delaware Valley Irish Hall of Fame for his longtime work in the region’s Irish community where he serves on the Irish Center board and has been elected president of the Cavan Society five times.
Thomas Edison once said that “genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.” This describes Tom Farrelly—hard-working his whole life and successful at all he does. While at school, he worked on the family farm and at the Park Hotel, a 100-acre estate on Lough Ramor, as a “Jack of all trades:” growing flowers and vegetables, and working as a handyman, waiter, bartender, even a maitre’d.
Between school and his job, he walked miles every day. His boss, Mrs. McDonald, took pity on him and lent him a bicycle. He was then known as the “king of the students”– the only kid with a bike.
There is no telling how many miles you will have to run while chasing a dream.
Tom, who left school early, worked for a time at various bars in Dublin and, like every young man at the time, longed to go to America where his sister, Sarah, lived. At the age of 19, Tom left Ireland for Overbrook, Delaware County, where his sister lived. He recalled being shocked to see grass growing. All the postcards he’d seen at home showed only high-rise city buildings.
He took an astounding array of jobs: bookkeeper at Provident National Bank, landscaping with the Travers Brothers, night shift at the Acme, dairyman in Ardmore, after which he opened his own business, Shamrock Farm, a landscaping concern also known as Farrelly Brothers.
Tom met other Irish immigrants at the many dances that were so much a part of Philadelphia many years ago. (He told me a cute story about his car, a Crown Vic which he called Victoria. Someone once asked him why he never brought a girl to the local dances. He said he didn’t have a girl. The man said. “Well then, who’s Victoria?”)
It was at one of those dances that he met a pretty, petite blonde named Christine Scanlon, from County Galway. And it all unfolded like the song:
“So I took her hand and I gave her a twirl
And I lost my heart to a Galway girl.”
He and Chrissy have been married or more than 40 years. (A story they tell proves that it was meant to be: After they met, Chrissy agreed to let him pick her up from her job at Stouffers Restaurant. He sat in his car, out front and waited and waited and waited. She stood out back and waited and waited and waited! Fortunately, they finally figured it out.) They’re the parents of two children, a son, Tom, Jr., a daughter, Irene, and granddaughter, Kaitlyn Marie.
When I asked Tom who he admired most, he didn’t even stop to think. “My parents,” he said. “They had nothing for themselves but yet the children wanted for nothing! They might have been poor but they thought they had everything in the world.”
Tom’s story is the epitome of every immigrant’s dream—to create a good life in the land of opportunity. His business is thriving. His friend, fellow landscaping contractor and Irish Center President Vince Gallagher, says Tom has “built up an amazing business” and includes high profile clients such as Villanova University.
But even more, he says, “Tom has helping hands He would never turn anyone down. Whenever there is a benefit, Tom is the first to show up.”
He’s also a Gaelic Athletic Association supporter (for 35 years) and its honorary president in 1988; a longtime supporter of the McDade School of Irish Dance, president of the Old Timers group at the Irish Center and president of the Cavan Bowling League.
Tom is also emcee of everything—a job he earned by his quick wit. There’s only one problem. He’s been the emcee of the Delaware Valley Irish Hall of Fame awards dinner every year. This year, as an honoree, he’ll have to be replaced. But we’re looking forward to a very funny acceptance speech.
Tom Farrelly will be honored, along with Kathleen Murtagh (profiled last week) and John Donovan, at an awards presentation dinner on November 13 at the Irish Center, 6815 Emlen Street, Philadelphia.
