Nationality: Irish
Congregational Register No: 359
D.O.B. 31.08.1919
First Profession: 03.12.1956
Died: 27.02.1997 Aged: 77 years
Maeve, later to be known for some time as Sr. Marius, was from Cork and came to MMM as a qualified doctor on 27 September 1953.
Nationality: Irish
Congregational Register No: 51
D.O.B. 04.10.1922
First Profession: 06.01.1945
Died: 21.01.2007 Aged: 84 years
Mary Rose Pierse was born into a farming family in Ballinonig, Tralee, Co. Kerry, Ireland. She had four brothers, two of whom became priests, and one sister. Mary Rose was educated by the Presentation Sisters in Tralee and did her leaving certificate, which she passed with honours, at the Loreto School in Killarney. In May 1941, when she was nineteen years old, she left her family to travel to Dublin and join the relatively new Congregation of the Medical Missionaries of Mary.
Sister Andrew was born Helen Joyce Phillips in Conway, Michigan in 1929. The third of eight children and the only girl, she grew up in a Protestant family in rural northern Michigan. In his eulogy at her funeral Mass, Brent, her nephew, explained that in her early years there were limited opportunities for women. It was not until World War II that women had an opportunity to enter the workforce. After the war women were expected to return to being homemakers to ensure that jobs were available for returning veterans.
Nationality: Irish
Congregational Register No. 187
D.O.B. 03.03.1925
First Profession 07.03.1951
Died: 01.01.2001 Aged: 75 years
Patricia Phelan was born in Tarbert, Co. Kerry, the eldest daughter of her parents, Nora and Robert. After attending Loreto Convent, Killarney, she began medical studies in University College Cork. As a fourth year medical student, she came to Dublin to meet Mother Mary, and Sr. Stella, as she became known, began her MMM story at this point. She transferred to Dublin to finish her medicine, entering MMM in September 1947. Even her initial formation period was entwined with the early MMM story as she travelled to USA with Mother Mary in 1950 when she established our first house in the USA.
Nationality: Irish
Congregational Register No: 46
D.O.B. 07.01.1915
First Profession: 08.09.1943
Died: 25.02.1971 Aged: 56 years
Mary Peters of Mountrath, Laois, entered MMM on 2 January 1941. After her novitiate, she did her general nurse training in St. Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin and Part I of her midwifery training in Drogheda.
Congregational Register No. 459
D.O.B. 23.01.1923
First Profession 26.04.1960
Died: 29.05.2005
Aged: 82 years
Maria Pia Parlato was born in Gragnano, Naples, Italy. She had three brothers, one of whom was a doctor, and one sister. Maria Pia studied medicine at the University of Naples. She had some initial difficulties with her studies, as she was also running the household. She was still a medical student when she met Mother Mary at the Clinica in Naples and became interested in joining MMM. She was drawn to both Mother Mary and the MMM focus on mother and child.
Sister Maureen (Paul) was born in Limerick in 1920 and spent her early years in Cork. When her family moved to Booterstown, Co. Dublin in 1934, her new home was only five minutes away from Rosemount, the property Mother Mary Martin had acquired through her brother Desmond, and which was to become the MMM House of Studies.
Nationality: Irish
Congregational Register No. 160
D.O.B.: 17.01.1920
First Profession: 07.09.1952
Died: 05.11.2010 Aged: 90 years
Born in Killarney, Sister Fidelma was a bright student and on leaving school won a coveted place in London at the nursing school of Saints John and Elizabeth Hospital. In 1949, she met Mother Mary Martin and soon afterwards entered MMM.
Nationality: Irish
Congregational Register No: 3
D.O.B. 15.11.1909
First Profession: 15.12.1937
Died: 11.11.2008 Aged: 98 years
Brigid (Bridie to her family) O’Rourke grew up in the small townland of Glenague in the Glencar Valley of Co. Leitrim. According to an article she wrote in 2002 for the Leitrim Guardian, she had a very happy childhood in a loving, spiritual family. She attended the local primary school but there was no secondary school in the area and her parents could not afford to send her and her sisters to boarding school.
Sister Ancilla Domini was born Kathleen O’Reilly in Bruskey, Co. Cavan in 1914. She received her early education in Cavan and joined the Medical Missionaries of Mary in 1951.
Her first assignments were in catering and hospitality in MMM houses in Ireland, beginning with three years in Drogheda. She next spent twelve years in catering in Rosemount, the MMM house of studies in Dublin. She was noted for her kindness to the students. No matter what time they arrived back from lectures, she gave them a warm welcome and had a hot meal ready. Following this she worked for nineteen years in the kitchen in Drogheda.
