'A remarkable woman': Limerick Inn's Betty Ryan fondly remembered

WARM tributes have been paid to a loving mother and a successful businesswoman who tackled adversity to run a successful local hotel.

Elizabeth ‘Betty’ Ryan, who has gone to her God in her 97th year, was known by generations in the city and the county as the face of the Limerick Inn hotel at Ennis Road.

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Her husband Thomas had bought the complex and opened it in 1974.

But his sad passing at the age of just 51 in 1978 left Betty taking the reins of the landmark premises.

Born in Cappamore on October 3, 1928, to Justin and Julia McCarthy, Betty was the third of six children.

After finishing school in Doon, she then went onto University College Cork, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce.

Speaking at her funeral Mass, which took place in Christ the King Church in Caherdavin earlier this month, her daughter Liz said: “She always had regrets that she didn’t study English, but - as her mother had insisted - there were no real jobs for English graduates at the time.”

Betty followed her mother into the teaching profession, one she loved. She met Thomas, the love of her life at a dance in Dromkeen.

They married in 1954 and went on to have six boys and two girls.

Sadly their union spelt the end of Betty’s teaching career, as were the laws at the time.

Thomas and Betty began their married life in Murroe, where she was really supportive of her husband’s garage business.

“There was plenty of business, but no cash - farmers at the time were slow to pay,” Liz said.

It was because of this that Thomas moved into hospitality - “a cash business at the time”.

He built the Two Mile Inn and opened it in 1970, before buying the nearby Limerick Inn, now the Radisson Blu Hotel four years later.

Tragedy hit the Ryan family, first with Thomas’s passing in 1978, then the death of their first born son Rory only 11 months later, at the young age of 23. She lost a second son, Noel, who died at the age of 53 in 2011.

One of Betty’s six surviving children, Tommy said despite having little experience of the hospitality trade, she threw herself into running the Limerick Inn, continuing to do so until 2001 when it was sold.

“She immersed herself in it, while at the same time still rearing a young family,” he recalled.

Despite the hard times visited upon her and her family, Tommy said his mum was always upbeat.

“She would have always been very generous with sharing her experiences. If she could mentor or help anybody, she would have been generous like that,” he said.

Tommy remembered his mother had an impeccable way to remember people’s birthdays.

“If a card wasn’t delivered before the birthday, or on the birthday, it wasn’t worth delivering at all,” smiled her son.

Now living in the city where they moved, their home in Caherdavin was always busy.

Eight children spread across a 20 year age range ensured there were plenty of comings and goings.

“It was a happy, busy home. My mum was always trying to achieve the work-life balance with a young family. She pulled it off,” he added.

A devout religious woman, and a daily Mass-goer, Tommy spoke of how his mother often shunned the limelight.

“Even for birthdays, she didn’t want anything to be about her. She was happy to sit back, take it all in, and see what was happening in the room,” he said.

At her funeral, Betty’s daughter Liz captured the essence of “a remarkable woman.”

“She was smart, she was funny, she was very direct - you could call it blunt sometimes! And she was great company. For those of us who knew and loved her, we are consoled knowing that until the day she died, sleeping in her own bed and in her 97th year, she was as sharp, alert and as loving as she always had been. We will miss her,” Liz concluded.

Betty died peacefully last month. She’s wife to the late Thomas, and mother of Justin, Marianne, Kieran, Liz, Tommy, Conor and the late Rory and Noel.

She is survived by her youngest sister Anne.