Browsing Category

People

Helping to Make a Difference in the World

Born in Jenkintown and presently residing in Villanova, Emily C. Riley is creative, multi-faceted and generous with her time and connections.

She has been a trustee for a number of significant organizations in such disparate fields as services for the homeless, arts and culture, and higher education. Besides spending happy times with her three adult children and four grandchildren, she loves to travel and has an appreciation for world culture and history.

Emily C. Riley

Today, with her sister Josephine Mandeville as president, and a board of trustees comprised of family members and civic leaders, Emily heads the Connelly Foundation (she is executive vice president) whose mission, simply stated, is to “foster learning and improve the quality of life in the greater Philadelphia area.”

To that end, the foundation gives grants to non-profit organizations working in the fields of education, health and human services, arts, culture and civic enterprise. Its special focus also is providing scholarships to parochial school students to attend archdiocesan high school and developing initiatives in collaboration with the high schools and elementary schools of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

The Connelly Foundation, established in 1955 by her parents, John and Josephine Connelly, both children of Irish immigrant parents from Counties Waterford and Tyrone, is the financial legacy of John Connelly’s extraordinary business acumen and work ethic.

Forced to leave school after the eighth grade to help support his family, John Connelly went on to engineer the turnaround of a company, Crown Cork and Seal, that is now literally a textbook example of brilliant business management.

In their lifetime, John and Josephine Connelly raised six children and donated more than $70 million including major grants to Villanova, La Salle, Gwynedd-Mercy and Thomas Jefferson Universities, and Roman Catholic Archdioceses of Philadelphia and Newark, largely to fund Catholic education.

Emily Riley considers herself “fortunate to be able to continue this work.” Though she has a degree in English literature from Rosemont College, philanthropy “was what we were preparing for all our lives.”

“Our parents led by example,” she says. “They both came from modest backgrounds and were very giving people—of their time, resources and compassion. And we trekked along behind them.”

“My work has been rewarding in many ways,” she says, and the word “fortunate” comes up again. “I’ve been fortunate to have the experiences I’ve had and to meet the people I’ve met, like Sister Mary Scullion, who has been a friend for 20 years. It’s part of the pleasure of working in philanthropy to know people like her and to see the difference one person can make in the world … with a little help from their friends.”

May 13, 2010 by Jeff Meade

Dance, People

A Heart as Big as Her Smile

Rosemarie Timoney and daughter Mairead.

A native of Clady, County Derry, Rosemarie Timoney began Irish dancing the age of four and won the South Derry Championship at the age of 17. In 1961, she came to the United States and five years later, she founded the Timoney School of Irish Dance in Glenside in 1966 as a way to share her love of dance—its fun, camaraderie, and its place in the history of the Irish culture.

Her classes are not just about teaching dancing, but about giving the children the confidence to always be and do their best. Her students don’t compete, but they do support the community. Her dancers have performed at nursing homes, hospitals, for handicapped children and school assemblies, as well as festivals all over.

The 1997 Grand Marshal of the Philadelphia St. Patrick’s Day Parade who also does color commentary during its broadcast on CBS3, Rosemarie is wife, mother of five, grandmother of nine, and has been described as “a virtual library of all things Irish in the Delaware Valley.”

She’s also tough—that must come from her years of playing camogie, the ladies’ version of the Irish game hurling, once described as a cross between hockey, lacrosse, and assault with a deadly weapon. She has traded that for much tamer bowling—she now plays with the St. Luke’s Mother’s League.

Rosemarie Timoney also has a heart as big as her smile. As someone who knows her once said, “It’s useless to try to give Rosemarie anything. She just gives it to someone else she thinks needs it more than she does.” She collects donations of clothes and other items for her thrift shop which benefits her hometown church in Ireland.

And though it will make her blush to hear it, she is beloved. In fact, when you talk to her her family, her dancers, or even the children she crosses to safety in her crossing guard job at Copper Beech Elementary School, the one phrase that comes up again and again is, “we just love her.”

May 13, 2010 by Jeff Meade

People

Don’t You Just Love Us?

Nearly everybody reads the Bulletin.

That was the advertising slogan of the late, lamented Philadelphia Bulletin. I mean the Bulletin Sandy Grady wrote for, not the Bulletin in its most recent incarnation.

Number me among the ranks of “everybody.” I delivered it, and when I got home I read it all, beginning to end.

Well, the Bulletin (that Bulletin) is long gone. P.M. newspapers are gone, or mostly. Morning newspapers are biting the dust. Those that remain are struggling. (As witness the recent epic battle over the Inquirer and Daily News.)

Some say that small local Web sites like ours are part of the problem. We do what we do (most of us) for free. We have no employees. We have no paper boys or delivery trucks. There are no presses. No paper or ink. Doing what we do costs us almost nothing. And today it might be fair to say: Nearly everybody reads (whatever they read) online.

On the other hand, many of us have no idea what we’re doing. 🙂 A lot of community sites are published by people with no journalistic training, and no understanding of professional journalistic standards. (We’re both Temple J-school grads, and we’ve worked in newspapers, magazines, books and the Web since the days of Ben Franklin. OK, maybe not that long. But long enough to remember editing stories with a pencil.)

Now the people at The Reynolds Journalism Institute at the Missouri School of Journalism want to know: What does irishphiladelphia.com mean to you? Do you like us? Do you trust us? Do we help build the community?

They asked us to post a survey, and of course we said “you betcha.”

Here’s the survey. It’ll take you less than 10 minutes:

http://rjisurvey.irishphiladelphia.sgizmo.com/s3/

May 6, 2010 by Jeff Meade

Dance, People

Meet the Dark Lord of the Dance

That's Adam McSharry at right, looking dark and evil.

If you’re going to see Michael Flatley’s “Lord of the Dance” at the Merriam next weekend, you’ll know Adam McSharry when you see him. He’s the bad one. The total loser.

Not a bad dancer, not a real loser, but The Dark Lord, “Don Dorcha,” who, no matter how well he dances, can never defeat The Lord of the Dance in this classic story of good and evil set to syncopated hard shoes.

“I never win,” admits McSharry, a native of Birmingham, England who’s played the villain on several continents. “But when I get out there in character during the battle between the two armies on stage, when I’m doing the final duel with the Lord of the Dance, we go to it on the stage and our duel brings each of us to our best. I’m completely focused. Even though I know I’m not going to win, I’m trying to convince audience members that I am going to win.”

A year ago, he considered leaving the troupe and putting Don Dorcha behind him. “I had job interviews ready but then. . . .” He joined Flatley’s other traveling show, “Feet of Flame,” which drew 80,000 people when it played in England and 20,000-30,000 for each of its eight shows in Taiwan. That changed his mind. “I said, ‘What am I thinking? I’m really happy here. This is the job for me.’”

So he took up his evil ways again. “I love it. I’ve been playing this role for eight years. I think it’s another side of me,” he says with a laugh.

Like many Irish dancers, McSharry started very young. At three, his mother had him in lessons and at four he was on stage at his first feis. “It came naturally,” he says. “My mother danced, my uncle danced. My father, when he moved over from Ireland (Leitrim) and was dating my mother (Downpatrick), he was picking her up at dancing class and one guy on the team that was going to the world championships had to drop out so they taught my father to dance, they went to the Worlds and came in second. My sister, Grace, is a great, great dancer. It’s in our blood.”

But he never thought of dancing as a profession until, ironically, he caught a performance by Michael Flatley on TV at the Eurovision Song Contest. “I must have been 14 or 15 and I thought, wow, would you look at that. But I just carried on in competition for a while, doing well [top three in every major competition in Britain, Ireland, the US, and the World Championships; in 2003, he performed for President and Mrs. George Bush] when I got a phone call an they said, ‘There’s a place in Lord of the Dance for you if you like it.’”

He was stunned. So, at the age of 18, he headed to Wembley, England, got fitted for a costume, learned the steps and went on stage. That year, “Lord of the Dance” entered the Guinness Book of World Records for most sold-out performances—19. Nothing like starting at the top.

He even danced opposite Flatley himself in the Taiwan production of “Feet of Fire.” He admits he was in awe.

“The whole cast agrees, he’s always going to be the one you look up to. If he says do it like this, or this will help you get the best out of your character, you listen. He gave me good tips on how to make the best of my bad guy routine. Being on stage with him is different from anything I’ve ever done before. The energy rush is incredible.”

When McSharry isn’t dancing, he’s doing whatever it takes to support his dancing. He and a few members of the troupe play soccer when they have time off. “It really keeps you fit.” And when he’s home. . . he works construction.

A stage star, a championship dancer, doing construction? Really? “Really,” he says. “It’s a good workout. It keeps you active all day, it helps build upper body and leg strength and you’re killing two birds with one stone. I could sit at home and go to the gym, but this way I’m getting paid and getting a workout.”

He may be a professional bad guy, but stupid he’s not.

“Lord of the Dance” will be at the Merriam Theater, 250 South Broad Street, Philadelphia, for six performances May 14-16.

May 6, 2010 by Denise Foley

People

Ghost Story

The Irish Center's dining room: Site of a ghostly experience.

By Susan Spellman Burns

You may not believe in ghosts, but 22 percent of Americans assured CBS news pollsters that they’ve been up close and personal with the dead.

Paul Gallagher is one of them. It has been several months since the Irish Center bartender’s startling experience that Friday night as he closed up the Center, which included cleaning up the Texas hold-em game in the front dining room. At the time, Paul felt a cold breeze pass through his chest, though he had just closed and latched all the windows. Then he heard someone say. “What are you going to do now, Paul?”

I sat down with Paul, and we talked about the ghost he encountered, who he is fairly sure was the spirit of a late customer who made a very heartfelt gesture to Paul before his death.

Paul told me that he has been teased often by patrons and his friends after his previous interview about the ghost with irishphiladelphia‘s Denise Foley so he was hesitant to talk about it again. But we both agreed that his visitation was a gift, and a gift that can be shared to perhaps give others new insight on such a personal experience.

Q. Has your “secret admirer”contacted you in any way since that memorable night?
A. No. I really don’t look for it, or try to think about it. Yes it happened. I have moved on.

Q. Do you have a better understanding of who may have visited you?
A. I feel it was a patron that passed away last fall. My gut tells me it was him. I know it was him.

Q. Why do you feel this spirit chose you to contact?
A. It was probably just his way of saying good-bye. I feel honored.

Q. The ghost asked “What are you going to do now Paul?” Did this have anything to do with your own personal struggles?
A. No, definitely not. I have thought about this several times. I have my own personal struggles like everybody. It was again, just his way of saying good-bye.

Q. Has this experience sparked a greater interest in the paranormal?
A. Not really. Sometimes I watch one of the ghost hunter shows on television, but when it comes to choosing that or sports shows, I prefer watching sports.

Q. I know you mentioned that you think the ghost has moved on since that night, do you feel there maybe other spirits in the Irish Center?
A. I have not sensed this in any way myself, but there is certainly talk that there are other ghosts here.

The Burning Question:

As I stood in the front dining room after my interview with Paul, did I experience anything paranormal?

Nope. However, I did feel something quite normal. I could feel that this building was filled with dear memories, dreams, happy times, and that magical Irish love.

Do you have a true ghost story to tell? Contact Susan Spellman Burns via the “contact us” link on the home page. She’s on the trail of Irish spirits—of the other-worldly kind—and will be taking us on ghost tours periodically.

May 6, 2010 by Jeff Meade

Arts, History, People

How the Irish Maid Saved Civilization

The cover of Margaret Lynch-Brennan's landmark book on Irish domestic servants.

A footnote in a book she was reading while studying history and gender led Margaret Lynch-Brennan to a hidden trove of information about the group of Irish immigrants she now believes finally brought the Irish into the American melting pot: the Irish domestic servant.

She calls these young women who emigrated from Ireland between 1840 and 1930 “The Irish Bridgets.” She’ll be talking about them, the subject of her 2009 book, “The Irish Bridget: Irish Immigrant Women in Domestic Service in America, 1840-1930,” at the Ebenezer Maxwell Mansion in Philadelphia on Saturday, May 8, from 2-4 p.m.

The book grew out of her 2002 American History Ph.D. dissertation.

“I was reading a lot of books,” she explained, “and one of the books mentioned that most Irish women started work as domestics.”

Lynch-Brennan wondered why there wasn’t more written on the topic. “The importance of Irish women generally has been underlooked, not overlooked,” she says. “Most of the history that’s been written about the Irish focuses on the men, but unlike other immigrant groups, the women who immigrated actually outnumbered the men…that’s very different.”

She began digging, and what she found convinced her that it was these Irish women, some as young as 13, who helped bring the Irish acceptance in American society where “No Irish Need Apply” was a familiar sign in many urban areas.

“The typical middle class WASP wouldn’t know any Irish men on a first name basis, but they would know Irish women because they lived in the house. Most Americans during that time period only employed one servant, and that was a ‘maid of all work.’ She worked 10-12 hours a day, 7 days a week, taking care of their homes and their children.”

It wasn’t an easy life, but these women found ways to have a good time.

“Going to church was a big part of their social lives. They could see people from their hometowns. The women who worked in domestic service didn’t live with other Irish people, so meeting and talking to others at church presented a way to keep up with the Irish community.”

Irish dances were another social outlet for the young Bridget. “The Irish counties associations were concerned with finding ways for the girls and boys to meet, so Irish set dancing was arranged. Most Irish women eventually married. It was an aspect of Irish culture in Ireland that one was not considered an adult until one married, and most wanted to get married.”

The name Bridget, or Biddy, became so associated with the Irish domestic servants that women actually changed their names to distance themselves from that stereotype. “For a long time, the name Bridget wasn’t used. There’s a period where you won’t find any girls being named Bridget. Irish-Americans today have forgotten that association,” and the name has become popular once again.

Lynch-Brennan’s book contains many personal letters, never before published, as well as photos. I was curious as to how she tracked down such hard-to-find treasures.

“It wasn’t easy,” she said. “They didn’t have time and leisure to leave important documents behind, plus so many of them changed their names. It was a challenge.”

Two historians in particular, Kerby Miller and Arnold Schrier, provided Lynch-Brennan with invaluable assistance.

“Both had gone to Ireland [Miller in the 70’s and Schrier in the 50’s] and put in a call for letters from Irish-Americans sent home to Ireland. They put ads in newspapers.”

Lynch-Brennan spent a week poring over Miller’s collection of letters, and he generously allowed her to quote from the ones that were relevant to her work.

Her husband told her she should advertise. “I had a card made up, and I would pass it around at talks I gave. I posted on genealogical websites, and found a treasure trove. One woman had her grandmother’s letters, and let me have them for the book.”

“Another historian, Hofstra professor Maureen Murphy, has written the most on the topic; she’s written all the articles. She’s known to all the historians, in America and Ireland. She’s a lovely person, and was very generous.” Murphy wrote the foreward to Lynch-Brennan’s book.

I had to know one final thing: Were any of Lynch-Brennan’s own ancestors an Irish Bridget?

“I have one,” she told me. “My mother’s great-grandmother’s sister, Jane Shalboy. She came over during the famine. She worked as a domestic. The family was from the village of Summerhill, in County Meath. Owen Shalboy left Ireland in the 1850s and brought his mother with him. There isn’t anyone left today in Ireland with that name, but a few years ago I went back there, and it was the first time in 150 years that descendants of two branches of the family had met. There was a memorial service in the parish while I was there, to honor all those relatives who had died. People came from all over Ireland to the home parish to remember their ancestors. I felt like the circle was complete.”

For information on Margaret Lynch-Brennan’s talk at the Ebenezer Maxwell Mansion, go to the Mansion Web site. Reservations are required.

For information on the book, “The Irish Bridget: Irish Immigrant Women in Domestic Service in America, 1840-1930,” go to the Syracuse University Press Web site.

May 6, 2010 by Lori Lander Murphy

People

Derry is Back!

"Irish" Joan Reed gets into the spirit with a cheek shamrock.

It’s been almost a decade since the Derry Society held a social, and if Sunday’s event at the Irish Center was any indication, they were sorely missed.

The family “party,” which featured the Shantys and Bare-Knuckle Boxers, face-painting and kids’ games, Irish dancers, and a buffet, was packed. “There ought to be more of these,” said Tim Murphy of the Bogside Rogues, who was just enjoying the music instead of playing it. “This is just plain fun.”

You can see how much fun everyone was having in our photos.

April 30, 2010 by Denise Foley

People

Four Women You’ll Want to Know

Opinionated, spirited, courageous: the inspirational Rosabelle Gifford.

One woman was an Academy Award winning actress who became a princess.

Another courageously left an abusive marriage and took her children across an ocean to safety at a time when society frowned on divorce and single parenthood.

One heads the major division of a multi-billion dollar company that’s an iconic giant in the food industry.

Another, a nurse on a heart transplant team, dealt with her husband’s history as an Irish political prisoner by working tirelessly for Irish reunification and with her son’s death at the age of 15 in a skateboard accident by creating a scholarship for other skateboarders.

These are just four of the women who will receive an Inspirational Irish Women Award on Sunday, May 23, at the Irish Center, 6815 Emlen Street, Philadelphia.

Princess Grace of Monaco

Philadelphia’s favorite daughter, Grace Kelly, who earned her Oscar playing Georgie Elgin opposite Bing Crosby in “The Country Girl,” later became Princess Grace of Monaco who devoted her time to motherhood and charity until her untimely accidental death in 1982.

Rosabelle Gifford

Rosabelle Gifford was born in Gortward, Mountcharles, County Donegal, 90-something years ago. The mother of 5 was living in post-war London when she decided to leave her abusive marriage, spiriting her children out of the country than emigrating to America where she supported them by working as a nanny in Delaware County. Described as “opinionated, spirited, and courageous,” she was honored in 2009 with the first Mary O’Connor Spirit Award by the Philadelphia Rose of Tralee Centre, a major sponsor of the Inspirational Irish Women Awards. Not only did her large family come to support her, so did some of the children she cared for some 50 years ago.

Denise Sullivan Morrison

Denise Sullivan Morrison leads the Campbell USA, North America Foodservice, and Campbell Canada businesses, which represent approximately $4.9 billion of the company’s net sales and nearly 90 percent of the company’s profits.

But for Morrison, there’s more to it than profits. She has served on the board of the Food Industry Crusade Against Hunger and Leadership California and is a founding member and current board member of the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation, an initiative composed of manufacturers and retailers designed to combat obesity in the marketplace, workplace, and in schools through communication and education. She is also the mother of two daughters–with a great role model.

Liz Kerr

Liz Kerr, RN, is on the transplant team at Temple University, where she daily confronts life and death. When her own son, Patrick, died in a 2002 accident, she made the decision to keep his memory alive by establishing two scholarships—one for students at Roman Catholic High School where Patrick had been a freshman, and another for high-achieving students who share another of Patrick’s loves—skateboarding.

Her husband, Pearse, who grew up in Belfast, became a political prisoner at 17, released only when authorities learned he was an American citizen, born when his parents lived in the States. Kerr, who has Galway roots, serves as the Freedom for All Ireland officers of Ladies AOH Brigid McCrory Div. 25—the person charged with helping make the dream of a united Ireland a reality. Kerr has been lobbying local lawmakers to pass resolutions supporting Irish reunification: Last year, Philadelphia passed the resolution and Kerr and other AOH members are working with state lawmakers to have one passed at the state level.

Artist Patrick Gallagher, the son of Irish immigrants who grew up on the Main Line, is painting portraits of the women which will hang for several months at the Irish Center and then be on display at the Oscar Wilde House of American University Dublin.

Tickets to the May 23 cocktail reception and awards event are $35 and available at www.inspirationalirishwomen.org. They will not be sold at the door. Information on tax deductible sponsorships are also on the website. For more information, contact Denise Foley at 215-884-1936 or 215-779-1466 or email denise.foley@comcast.net.

Two great groups with strong links to the Philadelphia Irish community and the Irish Center in particular will provide the music: The Boyces and Shannon Lambert-Ryan and Runa. The Boyce Family (they include founding members of Blackthorn) and Shannon Lambert-Ryan literally “grew up” at the Irish Center. “That’s where I learned to dance,” says Lambert-Ryan.

Proceeds from the event will go to support the Irish Center, which has been the focal point of the region’s Irish community for more than 50 years. Ten percent has been pledged to Project H.O.M.E., a nonprofit organization founded by another of the winners, Sister Mary Scullion.

The other winners are:

Sister Kathleen Marie Keenan, senior vice-president of Mission and Sponsorship of Mercy Health System, the largest Catholic health care system in southeastern Pennsylvania
Rosemarie Timoney, founder of Timoney School of Irish Dance and a longtime promoter of Irish culture in the Delaware Valley
Kathy McGee Burns, Realtor, president of the Delaware Valley Irish Hall of Fame, vice president of the Philadelphia St. Patrick’s Day Observance Committee and mother of nine
Kathy Orr, CBS3 meteorologist, anchor of the Philadelphia St. Patrick’s Day coverage, longtime supporter of Alex’s Lemonade Stand and other charities
Emily Riley, executive vice president of Connelly Foundation, a nonprofit organization that supports Catholic education, the arts and other nonprofits.
Siobhan Reardon, first woman president of The Free Library of Philadelphia

April 23, 2010 by Denise Foley

Older Posts

Newer Posts