Illustrated history talk on the Wexford O’Hanrahans
THE REASON why the brother and sister of executed 1916 leader Michael O’Hanrahan attended the 1923 funeral of one-time employee of the People Newspaper, printer, and founding Secretary of the GAA Leinster Council, Walter Hanrahan, will be revealed in an illustrated talk for Wexford Historical Society this week.
Walter’s print shop was at 14 South Main St., currently GameStop. Henry (Harry) O’Hanrahan, brother of Michael, was in the GPO during the Rebellion, and only escaped execution because of growing public and international outrage. Eily twice travelled by train to Enniscorthy with dispatches about the Rising, and on her return to Dublin from the second trip, insisted on climbing a ladder into the garrisoned Jacob’s Factory, to report back to Tomás MacDonagh.
After the Rebellion the family is documented as being involved in hazardous secretive work for Michael Collins.
Walter’s uncle, the writer and poet PR Hanrahan, was headmaster of the Lancasterian school in what later was the Third Order hall in School Street.
A related Wexford Hanrahan was president of St. Isidore’s College in Rome, and at age 60 set sail to successfully found a Franciscan colony in the Sydney suburb of Waverly. That man’s Jesuit brother was for years treasurer of Fordham University in New York. And let’s not forget Father Pat Hanrahan, parish priest of Lockhart in Australia. Two, possibly all three, passed through St Peter’s College.
Finally, where does Stephen Rea fit in?
These and related matters will be dealt with by Jim Cowman, in ‘Wexford Hanrahans and Connections’, an illustrated talk for Wexford Historical Society tomorrow (Wednesday, April 17), in St. Michael’s Hall, at 8 p.m.