23 Facts About Agnes O'Farrelly

Agnes O'Farrelly was the first female Irish-language novelist, a founding member of Cumann na mBan, and fourth president of the Camogie Association.

Agnes O'Farrelly was to become the most vocal female within this club, which moulded her utopian, feminist and nationalist thought throughout adulthood.

Butler, who, like Agnes O'Farrelly, would go on to play major roles in the Gaelic League's development through the first two decades of the twentieth century, as literary figures, educationalists and language activists.

Agnes O'Farrelly graduated from the Royal University of Ireland, and spent a term in Paris studying under Henri D'Arbois de Jubainville, professor of Celtic in the College de France.

Agnes O'Farrelly was the first woman to have studied Celtic to such an advanced level.

Agnes O'Farrelly was appointed a lecturer in Irish at Alexandra and Loreto colleges, and taught Irish in the Central Branch of the Gaelic League.

Agnes O'Farrelly convinced Mary Hayden to apply for the Royal University's Senior Fellowship, in an effort to challenge the view that female scholars were ineligible for such awards.

Agnes O'Farrelly gave evidence to the Robertson and Fry commissions on Irish university education, arguing successfully for full co-education at UCD.

Agnes O'Farrelly was one of the most active and diligent language activists at this time.

In 1907, Agnes O'Farrelly became chairperson of Coiste an Oideachais [Educational Committee] of the Gaelic League, having relinquished her role as advising Intermediate examiner in Celtic.

Agnes O'Farrelly presided at the inaugural meeting of Cumann na mBan in 1914, supporting its having a subordinate role in relation to the Irish Volunteers.

Agnes O'Farrelly was a member of a committee of women which negotiated unsuccessfully with IRA leaders to avoid civil war in 1922.

Agnes O'Farrelly was defeated as an independent candidate for the NUI constituency in the general elections of 1923 and June 1927.

Agnes O'Farrelly was appointed honorary president, first of the Ulster Camogie Association and then the Camogie Association in 1934 alongside Maire Gill, who continued to chair central council and congress.

Agnes O'Farrelly opposed the divisive ban on hockey introduced by the association in 1934 and made several appeals for unity when the association became embroiled in several splits.

Agnes O'Farrelly was president of the Irish Federation of University Women and of the National University Women Graduates' Association.

Agnes O'Farrelly became a founder and President of the Dublin Soroptimist Club in December 1938.

Agnes O'Farrelly was a founder member, and subsequently principal for many years, of the Ulster College of Irish, Cloghaneely, County Donegal, she was associated with the Leinster and Connacht colleges and served as chairperson of the Federation of Irish Language Summer Schools.

Agnes O'Farrelly became president of the Irish Industrial Development Association and the Homespun Society, and administrator of the John Connor Magee Trust for the development of Gaeltacht industry.

Agnes O'Farrelly represented the Ulster Gaelic Union at Celtic Congresses in the 1920s and 1930s.

Agnes O'Farrelly wrote in both Irish and English, often under the pseudonym 'Uan Uladh'.

Agnes O'Farrelly recorded her experiences on Inis Meain which would later form the basis of her travelogue Smaointe Ar Arainn.

Out of the Depths is a collection of political poetry, composed in reaction to the Irish War of Independence, and it displays how Agnes O'Farrelly comes to terms with an Ireland far from her ideal.