The solicitor Moya O'Connor of "The Cottage", Swinford, Co Mayo, was admitted to the Roll of Solicitors in the Hilary term of 1941 and thereafter returned to her native Swinford to work with her father, Pat O'Connor, and her brother T.V. O'Connor in the family firm of P O'Connor & Son.
A quiet, unassuming, and almost shy person, Moya acknowledged pride in being a lady solicitor and a member of a profession that never discriminated on gender basis. While one of a small number of ladies who was admitted to the Roll of Solicitors in the early part of this century, she commented favourably in the trend evident in the past five years which shows more than 50 per cent of those qualifying as solicitors are female.
Moya O'Connor was born in 1917 into a family steeped in the legal tradition. She was the second child of Pat O'Connor who among his colleagues was known as "the father of the Mayo Bar". He was president of the Mayo Solicitors Bar Association for 10 years before his own death in 1942.
Her brother Val was president of the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland in 1972/1973, while her brother John W. was a barrister on the Western Circuit before his appointment as a judge of the Circuit and Special Criminal Courts.
A gentle lady who valued friendship, family and tradition, she worked until her death with her nephew, Pat O'Connor, the incoming president of the Law Society of Ireland, and their assistants and staff in Swinford and Kiltimagh.
She was very active in the community, particularly in the charitable, philanthropic and eucharistic areas. She was organiser of the collection for the blind in east Mayo for many years. She played golf until a few years ago and was lady captain in Swinford Golf Club in the past.
Following the death of her sister Cara in 1992, Moya ceased farming but continued with much pride to set, grow and harvest in her kitchen garden tomatoes, fruit and vegetables. She would have liked to have seen this year's harvest but the Lord had other plans for her in his own celestial garden.
The last of the second generation of solicitors in the O'Connor family, she was related to the Callan, Gordon, Dillon-Leetch, McLoughlin and Behan solicitor families and related through marriage to the Matthew, O'Connor of Wexford, Rochford, Casey, Browne, Prentice, Crowley, McGarry, Claffey, Hussey, Martin and other legal families throughout the country.
With considerable satisfaction she witnessed the qualification of all of the next generation of her family, her four nephews, Pat, Tom, John and Tony, as solicitors.
Moya died suddenly in July. Her nephew Pat, in a moving tribute at her funeral, suggested that she might be regarded as having been "one of the most efficient and cost-effective solicitors practising in the country." She did all her own typing, filing, interviewing and legal research in a practice which secured the quality mark from the IQA in 1993 and the national award for services from that association in the years 1995 and 1996. Integrity, honesty and straightforward advice and service given to her clients without aggression or dictation were her hallmarks.
While it is difficult to summarise the mission in life of Moya O'Connor, the words of Desire Joseph Cardinal Mercier are close: "We must not only give what we have, we must also give what we are."
A gentle lady, a solicitor trained in the old tradition of service and giving, who worked with the technological advances of this millennium, has passed to her reward of eternal peace leaving her four nephews, grandnephews and nieces, sister-in-law Kay, relatives, colleagues and friends to regret her passing but to rejoice in her life. May she rest in eternal peace.