St Mary’s fundraising diet is great success

FIVE former pupils from St Mary’s School for Deaf Girls who went on a week-long fundraising diet consisting of the same Spartan and unappetising meals their boarding-school counterparts ate 150 years ago have had a great response to their efforts.

Alvean Jones, Josephine O’Leary, Joanne Chester, Mary Moloney and Martina Doyle were determined to help commemorate the lives of a group of teachers and servants who lie in an untended grave in Glasnevin.

They decided to raise money to restore one of two plots in Glasnevin Cemetery where women who lived and worked in St Mary’s between 1931 and 1972 – teachers of the deaf, servants, and pupils – are buried.

The Dominican Sisters kindly agreed to fully cover the cost of renovating a large common grave with 47 bodies, while the five fundraisers took on the quest of restoring a second plot with eight bodies, and other relevant unmarked graves. So far over €18,000 has been raised for the restoration venture.

“We wanted to restore the plot, with the erection of two headstones, one on either side of the cross, with the names of each woman recorded, along with date of death,” said fundraiser Alvean Jones.

“The existing cross will be cleaned and restored back to its former condition.”

The group has set up an online fundraising page at idonate.ie/fundraiser/11359739_st-mary-s-heritage.html where donations can still be made where there’s more details about their cause.

The group can be contacted by email on [email protected].