Nellie Ó Cléirigh:NELLIE Ó Cléirigh, (née Beary) who has died aged 81, was an authority on the Irish lace industry, and a historian who had published books on the establishment of that industry and also on influential 19th century female personalities, many of whom were associated with it.
She was also a warm and generous mentor to anyone who wanted to learn about these related matters, and an authoritative source for anyone writing about them.
A native of Clonmel in Co Tipperary, she was educated at the Ursuline convent in Waterford, later graduating in history and Irish at UCD. She also studied embroidery at the Dublin school of art.
Before her marriage to Cormac Ó Cléirigh she was a civil servant in the Land Commission, and, with the marriage Bar still in force, under which women who married had to resign their jobs, she later established a handcraft business.
She and Cormac had three sons, Conor, Niall and Shane. She wrote three books, Carrickmacross Lace - Irish Embroidered Net Lace, a Survey and Manual with Patterns, (Dolmen Press, 1985); Limerick Lace (With Veronica Rowe), and Valentia, A Different Irish Island, which reflected her love of the Kerry island where she had a holiday home. She also established a comprehensive collection of Irish lace and artefacts associated with it, including photographs and postcards.
Nellie was gifted with the ability to be both practical and academic - her book on Carrickmacross Lace is both a penetrating account of how the industry was established in 19th century Carrickmacross, what it meant to the local women who took part in it, and how significant the industry was in the growth and development of women's attitudes towards equality, a factor in the founding of the feminist movement later.
It also contains intricate and elegant patterns which could be used as a template by anyone wishing to learn how to make the lace itself.
Her historical assessment of the lives of significant Irish women from 1808 to 1923, Hardship and High Living (Portobello Press 2003), is an account of the lives of 11 women who left their mark on Irish society.
These spanned the social spectrum, from Lady Aberdeen, wife of the viceroy who was instrumental in the success of Irish lace at home and abroad, to novelist Maria Edgeworth, trying to provide Famine relief in Edgeworthstown in 1847.
She also sourced unpublished diaries of three unusual women: one was a tourist in Ireland in Connemara in 1808; another, Selina Crampton, wife of Philip, the surgeon, was a society hostess; and the third, Cecilia Saunders Gallagher, was a political prisoner in Kilmainham Jail in 1923. There is a scarifying chapter on the lives and conditions of Irish nursing sisters in the Crimea sourced from a book by a Sister of Mercy, Sister Aloysius, published in 1897.
To anyone with an interest in how the 19th century evolved, Hardship and High Living is a fascinating study, written in Nellie's stylish prose.
She was enormously kind and generous, with both her time and learning, to anyone researching an area in which she had an expertise. She took time to show how lace was made, using an unfinished piece from the early days of the industry, and would chortle gleefully over some of the ingenious short-cuts taken by the lacemakers in the production of their craft. She is survived by her sons and her sisters, Maura and Anna.
Nellie Ó Cléirigh: born January 29th, 1927; died October 16th, 2008