Vintage Máirín Hughes (108) samples park life in 1914 Model T

Máirín Hughes was wondering what all the fuss was about as she prepared to go for a jaunt in the Phoenix Park. The 108-year-old was being collected on Wednesday from Mayfield Nursing Home in Chapilizod by Maurice O’Keeffe who had struck up a friendship when he interviewed her for the Irish Life and Lore project he runs with his wife Jane.

“She has had an incredible life running the medical laboratory at UCC, even lived among the Blasket islanders and Peig Sayers at one stage,” he said. “We were delighted to be able to get her oral history and as I have a friend who owned a Model T which was built in 1914 we thought it would be good to take a 108-year-old lady for a drive in a 108-year-old car.”

Hughes who is now one of Ireland’s oldest women was born in Belfast on May 22nd, 1914, two months before the beginning of the first World War.

She spent her early years in Dublin where her father worked as a customs officer. Her parents met in London some years before and were both members of the Gaelic League. The family moved to Killarney in Co Kerry where she grew up.

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Living in a nursing home throughout the Covid-19 crisis was not her first experience of surviving a pandemic. In an interview with The Irish Times to mark her 108th birthday earlier this year, she vividly recalled the Spanish flu in Ireland in 1918 — her mother “used to look after people” who became ill in the neighbourhood at the time.

“She used to go over to an elderly couple and I would go with her to help carry food and things for them but I was made to stay outside the gate to avoid getting the flu,” she added.

Black and Tans

Other standout memories of her years in Killarney include the Black and Tans patrolling her area in 1921. She can remember them “driving around the road” and soon after the Free State soldiers arriving in 1922.

In the early 1930s, Hughes moved to Cork to study science in University College Cork, something which she acknowledges was “unusual” for women at the time, though she noted, “I wasn’t the first”.

She went on to work as a chemist in UCC’s medical laboratory for 16 years, observing first-hand the changes and advances in medicine at the time and occasionally lecturing. Hughes remained there until she married her husband Frank in 1950. The couple then went to Dublin where she became a teacher. Her husband was a clerical officer in what was Córas Iompair Éireann (CIÉ), the State transport company. The couple did not have children.

“She is in good from, she is wondering a bit what the fuss is all about,” said nurse manager at Mayfield Nursing Home Hayley Gibbons, as Hughes prepared for her outing.

• The Irish Life and Lore project including the full interview with Hughes can be accessed here: Irish Life and Lore | Oral History Archive