Vida Keane broke the mould when becoming Mayor of Dartmouth

A GREAT story from the 1960s and I wonder what shape her career took.

A member of a distinguished Drogheda family. she was greatly honoured when she was installed as Mayor of Dartmouth in Devonshire.

Mrs. Vida Keane, daughter of Mrs. Phyllis Mathews and Mr. J. Stanley Mathews of Mount Hanover, who, on her being elected to the office, became the second lady to wear the Mayoral chain of Dartmouth and the 625th person to hold the office.

In securing the role, she also became the first Catholic Mayor to be installed since the time of the Reformation.

A doctor by profession herself, Mrs. Keane qualified in the Royal College of Surgeons, Dublin. She had been resident in Dartmouth for sixteen years, and was first elected a member of the town council in the early 60s. She was the only lady on the Council, which comprised sixteen members.

At the time, she had a pretty hectic schedule because Dartmouth was home to the famous Naval College to which distinguished visitors from all over the world flocked daily. Indeed, the college members were first to pay a courtesy call.

Incidentally Mrs. Keane was not the first member of her family to serve as Mayor of a town. Her great grandfather, James Mathews, served as Mayor of Drogheda for a number of terms, and actually held the office exactly one hundred years before her.

The life and times of Vida Keane would be a story worth telling.