Sr Olivia celebrates 100

 

She emigrated to America more than 60 years ago, but Westmeath’s latest centenarian, Sr Olivia Murray, still keeps up with goings-on in her native county.

The Emper native celebrated her landmark birthday with a Mass and party on June 1 at the Sisters of St Joseph convent in Hartford, Connecticut, where she is the most senior resident.

More than 100 guests attended the event, including Ballynacargy native John Deane, who travelled from Ireland, and took a number of cards from local well-wishers, including her cousin John Seery from Milltown.

Sr Olivia’s fellow Emper native, Agnes McCullough (nee Hogan), travelled from her home in Texas with her husband Cecil, while the Mass was said by another person with strong Lakeside connections, Sr Olivia’s cousin, Fr Robert Powers, a parish priest in Brooklyn.

Sr Olivia was born at Churchtown, Ballynacargy on May 31 1913. She emigrated to the USA in 1952 and two years later she joined the Sisters of St Joseph.

Most of her active ministry was spent at St Thomas Seminary, Bloomfield, Conn, and at St Francis Hospital and Medical Centre in Hartford.

John, whose late mother, Frances, forged a lifelong friendship with Sr Olivia through a shared interest in knitting, said that the woman of the moment is still a proud Lakesider through and through.

“She enjoys excellent health and reads the Westmeath Examiner every week. She never lost her Westmeath accent and enquires about her Emper neighbours all the time,” he said.