Death
O'Malley's package of reforms made him one of the most innovative and popular members of the government and he was affectionately known as 'the School Man' for his work in the area of education. His sudden death in Limerick on 10 March 1968, before his vision for the education system was completed, came as a great shock to the Irish public. He was buried with a full Irish state funeral.
Following O'Malley's death, his widow, Hilda O'Malley, did not run in the subsequent by election for the seat left vacant by her deceased husband. That by-election was won narrowly by O'Malley's nephew, Desmond O'Malley. However, Hilda O'Malley sought the Fianna Fáil nomination for the 1969 general election but Fianna Fáil gave the party nomination to the now sitting TD, Desmond O'Malley. Hilda O'Malley ran as an Independent candidate in that election and after what proved a bitter campaign against her nephew, she failed to get the fourth seat in Limerick East by just 200 votes.
Read more about this topic: Donogh O'Malley
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“Life is in the mouth; death is in the mouth.”
—Hawaiian saying no. 60, ‘lelo No’Eau, collected, translated, and annotated by Mary Kawena Pukui, Bishop Museum Press, Hawaii (1983)
“So he with difficulty and labour hard
Moved on, with difficulty and labour he;
But he once passed, soon after when man fell,
Strange alteration! Sin and Death amain
Following his track, such was the will of Heaven,
Paved after him a broad and beaten way
Over the dark abyss, whose boiling gulf
Tamely endured a bridge of wondrous length
From hell continued reaching th’ utmost orb
Of this frail world;”
—John Milton (1608–1674)
“For in the word death
There is nothing to grasp; nothing to catch or claim;
Nothing to adapt the skill of the heart to, skill
In surviving, for death it cannot survive,
Only resign the irrecoverable keys.
The wave falters and drowns. The coulter of joy
Breaks. The harrow of death
Depends. And there are thrown up waves.”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)