Sr Marie Stella retires from her MMM role
NEW INDUSTRIAL ESTATE ON TERMONFECKIN ROAD
HUNDREDS attended a function in Dublin last Monday to mark the retirement of the Principal Tutor of the International Missionary Training Hospital (IMTH) Nursing School in Drogheda, Sr. Marie Stella Cunningham (right).
The function, which began with Mass in University Church, St. Stephen’s Green, was celebrated by her brother, Fr. Matthew Cunningham. This was followed by a reception in the John Field Room of the National Concert Hall.
She was Principal Nurse Tutor in the International Missionary Training Hospital from February 1957 to September 1967 before becoming engaged in the formation of novices in the Congregation of the Medical Missionaries of Mary.
She was Principal Nurse Tutor in St. John’s Hospital, Malawi, Africa, and finally Principal Tutor in Drogheda’s IMTH from June 1982 to January 1995.
According to an MMM spokesperson, Sr. Cunningham is a ‘person of extraordinary qualities’. ‘She worked very much in the spirit of Mother Mary Martin. She believed in people and always saw the good in them, which at times lay hidden.
‘For her the patient was the most important person and no sacrifice was too great to ensure the comfort of each one, particularly the gravely ill and helpless,’ said the spokesperson. AS A VOTE OF CONFIDENCE in co. Louth’s industrial future the Industrial Development Authority has announced the launching of a new industrial estate in Drogheda on the Termonfeckin Road. The site adjoins the Millex factory and extends over 16 acres.
The purchase of the land was just recently finalised and the IDA despite the many prognostications of gloom and doom, is hopeful of attracting its first industrial project there this year.
Several visiting foreign industrialists who have been invited to inspect the site have indicated a certain amount of interest although nothing concrete has emerged yet in the shape of a new factory. Full services are laid on, including water, sewerage, electricity and telephone.
With one of the worst years for jobs in recent times just behind us, the big push is now on by the IDA to attract new industry here and to the 15 acres still available at Donore Industrial Estate in order to halt the disastrous slide in manufacturing jobs. For it emerges from the IDA annual statement for 1980 published this week that last year actually saw a decline in the number of people working in manufacturing industry in this country.
The recession bit hard in Louth last year with lay-offs at such Drogheda firms as Centronics, Dorans, Premier Periclase and IMC Engineering and Ardee’s Castleguard.
An examination of the live register of unemployed shows a frightening increase in the numbers of jobless—1736 in Drogheda at the end of 1980 as compared with 1229 the previous year, 593 in Ardee as against 411. In addition there were 119 on short time working in Drogheda.