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Died 24 May 2010, Sainte-Foy, Quebec City, Canada Books Grosse Île: Gateway to Canada, 1832-1937 | ||
Marianna O'Gallagher, CM CQ (March 24, 1929 – May 24, 2010) was an Irish Quebecer historian from Quebec City. A former member of the Sisters of Charity of Halifax, she wrote extensively on the history of the Irish in Quebec City, was involved in the creation of Grosse Isle National Historic Site and the revival of the Quebec City Saint Patrick's Day celebrations.
Biography
O'Gallagher was born in Sainte-Foy, Quebec, in 1929, one of six siblings born to Norma (née O'Neil) and Dermot O'Gallagher, both Irish-Canadians; her father was a land surveyor and previous mayor of the city (now merged into Quebec City). Her paternal grandfather, Jeremiah Gallagher, designed the Celtic cross erected on Grosse Isle in 1909 by the Ancient Order of Hibernians; the twelve-meter monument is the largest Celtic cross in North America.
She entered the Sisters of Charity of Halifax in 1952 and taught in Nova Scotia and New England, before she settled back in Quebec City, where she taught for 25 years at St. Patrick's High School there. Over that time she earned a Bachelor's degree in History from Halifax's Mount Saint Vincent University, later followed by a Master's degree from the University of Ottawa. Her thesis was about Quebec City's St. Patrick's Church, and her interest in Irish-Quebecer history would continue for her whole life.
In 1973, O'Gallagher was allowed by the federal government (who had owned it since the establishment of the quarantine station) to visit Grosse Isle, which she found in a state of disrepair. This marked the beginning of her efforts to have the site federally recognized. She founded Irish Heritage Quebec the same year, an organization dedicated to the local promotion of Irish-Canadian history. She remained president of Irish Heritage Quebec until 2009.
The 1980s marked the beginning of O'Gallagher's community work. She founded bilingual publisher Carraig Books in 1981. In 1983 she started a committee for the designation of Grosse Isle; these efforts came to fruition with the 1984 designation of the island as a historic site, a designation augmented in 1988 to that of National Historic Site of Canada. Meanwhile, in 1985, she had left the religious community. She is credited with almost single-handed responsibility in the creation of the National Historic Site. In 1997, she spearheaded a series of events in Quebec City, the Irish Summer (French: L'Été des Irlandais).
O'Gallagher spent the rest of her life writing books and articles on Irish-Canadian history, for which she became a major figure in the Canadian Irish studies community. The Canadian Association for Irish Studies had, days before her death, established an annual lecture named after her. She was the recipient of the Canadian Catholic Historical Association's G. E. Clerk Award in 1999, of the Order of Quebec in 1998, and the Order of Canada in 2002. She was repeatedly included in Irish America's Global 100 lists, and was a member of the organizing committee for Quebec City's 2008 400th anniversary celebrations.
O'Gallagher was hospitalized in April 2010, upon which it was discovered that she had advanced lung cancer, despite not being a smoker herself. She died, having never married, on May 24, 2010, aged 81. A few months earlier, she had been Grand Marshal to Quebec City's first Saint Patrick's Days parade in 80 years, and she was at the time amongst the people featured in the exposition Being Irish O'Quebec at Montreal's McCord Museum.