KILDARE OBITUARIES: Kathleen Wyer, Kill and Wicklow
A lovely lady, gentle and kind, she brought joy to many and will be hugely missed by her family and friends
The grand entrance of “Harry” — a huge Old English grey and white fluffy sheepdog whom she loved, moved the mourners for Kathleen Wyer from sadness to smiles.
He followed her pallbearers into the church and up to the altar for her funeral mass at St Brigid’s Church in the village of Kill.
It was a sunny Monday morning as more than 200 people came to the church for her funeral mass and then gathered outside in a long queue to sympathise with husband Dave and her family and friends.
Kathleen (née Jones), from nearby Glendara estate, died at the Beacon Hospital, Dublin following an illness which seemed to be under control. However, it came back with a vengeance, causing her untimely death which shocked and saddened hundreds of people who knew her from Dublin and across Kildare to her native Ballymorefinn in Co. Wicklow. Only two weeks before her death, she had been at the Horse Show in the RDS.
Her daughters, Alison, home from Perth, Western Australia, and Gemma living in Rathcoffey with husband Alan Cash, led “Harry” in her funeral cortege.
Her neighbours from Kill, her many friends in Grange Castle Golf Club, Clondalkin, old colleagues from Diageo Gilbeys (Baileys Old Irish Cream) and from Toyota Ireland Head Office were at her reposing at Gemma’s home and at her funeral mass.
Managers and staff from the motor trade from all over Ireland came to the church to pay their respects to ‘one of their own’ remembering her fondly as a member of the administration staff of Toyota Ireland Motor Company in Bluebell back to the time of its founder Dr Tim Mahony. She was personal assistant to a number of the directors of the company including the late Denis Fitzgibbon,
“Din Joe”, famed for his ceilidh music programme, ‘Take the Floor’ on RTÉ, then Radio Éireann in the 1950s and 1960s. She was later PA to David Parkinson, HR director of R&A Bailey/Gilbeys.
It was in Toyota in the 1970s that she met her future husband Dave from Donnybrook, distribution manager, and later a director of the company, who described to the congregation how in the early days he would introduce her to friends as “from somewhere up in the Wicklow mountains!”
They were married for 42 years.
Fr Willie O’Byrne, PP, laughed out loud with the congregation when, in addition to her golf glove and a towel and a medal of the beatified priest Fr John Sullivan, SJ, among the gifts presented at the altar was a Joe Dolan memoir.
Said he to rounds of applause: “She obviously had a great love for Joe Dolan”.
He said: “Kathleen was gracious in her battle against the illness for so many years. A lovely lady, gentle and kind, she brought joy to many.”
Dave Wyer told the congregation about his wife Kathleen’s life and her love of family, friends, animals and golf.
He thanked Fr Willie, doctors and nurses, neighbours, friends and community for their huge support which helped him and family to get through. He told the congregation how her illness came back with a vengeance in recent weeks. He thanked especially the medical staff in St James’ Hospital, Palliative care in the Beacon Hospital and her GP, Dr Catherine Gaffney. He thanked the wonderful singer Imelda Chawke and organist Austra Ribakoviene who transported people through hymns including Ave Maria, Amazing Grace, Hosanna and There is Nothing I Shall Want.
He said: “Kate hugged us daily. She was exceptional. We are going to miss her deeply.”
He invited the members of the congregation to come back following her cremation to the Old House in Kill to share their stories, as he said, “Kate gave a lot of people a lot of laughs.”
Kathleen will be dearly missed by Dave, their daughters Alison and Gemma, their son-in-law Alan, her brothers Paddy, Andy, and Jim, her sisters Margaret, Mary and Martina, brothers-in-law, sisters-in-law, nieces, nephews, extended family, and many friends and her fluffy friend ” Harry”.
- M.F.