The Gallaghers of Ballinrobe

wedding, Aunt Delia had to be rousted out of bed to get
ready for the early ceremony. Her comment was, “Who gets
married at 8 o’clock in the morning!” Her own wedding,
three years later, began at 8 o’clock – in the evening.
After their nuptials, Uncle Pete and Aunt May
hopped in their Essex and drove to Niagara Falls for their
honeymoon. Their daughter Mary can remember a painting
of Niagara Falls, on velvet, they always kept in the house
as a reminder of that trip.
Uncle Pete and Aunt May absorbed a great deal
about America from their employers. Both worked for a
time with the Sexton family in Delaware, Aunt May before
their marriage and Uncle Pete a little later.
The Sextons were originally from Virginia and
made their fortune building bridges in the South after the
Civil War. By the twentieth century, the Catholic family
had relocated to Delaware. Aunt May worked for a brother
(John) and two sisters (Isabel and Dora). They had the first
gas stove Aunt May had ever seen. John Sexton taught her
how to light the stove. More importantly, he shared his
knowledge of finances and the stock market. He always
advised them to invest in good companies for the long haul
and not to try and time the stock market. His most vigorous
counseling was against the practice of “buying on margin,”
which led to tragic losses for investors when the stock
market crashed in late October 1929. The market lost more
than 40 percent of its value in a few days. A concerned
John Sexton asked Aunt May if she was going to be OK.
She replied, “Oh, yes, Mr. John, I will be fine. I paid cash
for my stock.” Pretty calm for a 24-year-old single woman
in a new country, who may have seen half of her
investments wiped out.
Aunt May was in it for the long haul. She
continued to invest and heeded Mr. John’s advice against
borrowing from a broker to buy more stock than you could
otherwise afford. The conversations about finance with the
Sextons helped cement the notion to never buy on credit.
Her daughter Mary can remember Aunt May encouraging
her to invest in the stock market by opening a brokerage
account and setting aside a little money each month from
her paycheck. She was not to make a purchase until enough
money was set aside.
Aunt May was fond of the Sextons. Mary can
remember visiting the family into the 1940s and 1950s.
Dora married a dentist, J. Draper Brown, and they had a
daughter named Isabella. Eventually, the sister Bella
became wheelchair bound because of rheumatoid arthritis,
and the family installed an elevator in the house for her.
Aunt May only left their employment, when she and Uncle
Pete were expecting their first child.
The ship manifest from May Tierney's trip to Ireland
in 1933 lists her as 5 feet tall, with a fair complexion,
brown hair and blue eyes.
Sometime in the mid-1930s, probably through
Aunt May, Uncle Pete began working for the Sextons as a
chauffeur. He would travel as a companion with John
Sexton and other male friends of his employer to famous
horse-racing tracks, such as Aqueduct in New York or
Pimlico in Baltimore. They also visited the famous Palmer
House hotel in Chicago and the 1939 World’s Fair in New
York, where the theme was “The World of Tomorrow.”
Uncle Pete would be invited to eat with the group, and John
Sexton would often give him money to bet at the various
tracks. Uncle Pete was a stylish dresser on his own, but he
would have picked up even more fashion tips from being
exposed to these wealthy gentlemen. Along with all the
high life, Uncle Pete played an important role related to the
trust put in him by John and his sisters. Uncle Pete
apparently had the OK to take away John’s wallet if the
spending on gambling and drinking went a little too far.
Before his wedding, Uncle Pete had worked for
the Spruance family. They had a house on 17th Street in
Wilmington but were building a large home in Centerville.
Uncle Pete worked on the construction of the new home,
but unlike his brothers Pat and Jim, that was not his
preferred sort of work. At the time, Uncle Pete had a room
directly opposite the entrance to St. Anthony’s Church at
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