A Life of Dedication

Father Thomas Quirk

by David Parmer

Loveberry to Confluence

A horseman clad in black and astride a stout white horse was in no hurry as he descended Loveberry Hill. Although unhurried, the gait of the horse was purposeful and the rider assured as the green hills, reminiscent of the hills of County Cork, his native home, passed behind his back. It was Saturday and Father Thomas Aquinas Quirk was on his way to Confluence to give Mass the following day to the parish of St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church.

Following Loveberry Run at the bottom of the hill to its mouth, Father Quirk nudged his trusty horse up Sand Fork to Crooked Run, past the homes of many fellow sons of Erin. Sheep and stock dotted the green and lush meadows. The results of heavy toil were visible everywhere. Following Crooked Run eastward to the southern slope of Pine Knob, the padre ascended the hill opposite to the ridge overlooking Goosepen Run. It was a wonderful view. Well tended farms with placid sheep and fields of corn and wheat passed one after the other. Born in the midst of the Irish potato famine and the time of starvation, Father Quirk was relieved that this was a land of plenty and starvation was not a vexing problem to afflict his flock.

The ridge overlooking Goosepen Run was crossed by a tranquil country road which, within a few miles of his destination, began descending through the Farrell and Dolan farms on Grass Lick Run. The Farrell and Dolan families were faithful members of his St. Michael’s congregation. They looked forward to seeing the approaching Father Quirk on the familiar stocky white horse which that night would be boarded at the Dolan Hotel in Confluence. Ethel Doyle recalls that Father Quirk, even in his late age, followed this route of travel from Loveberry to Orlando, and she can see the stocky white horse in her mind’s eye to this day.

From 1884 until his death in 1937, Thomas Quirk was the pastor of St Michael’s Roman Catholic Church and two sister parishes: St Bridget’s and St Bernard’s. Until the end of his career when he grudgingly allowed himself to be chauffeured in autos, Fr. Donal O’Donovan, in his book, The Rock from Which You Were Hewn, wrote “he traveled his circuit on horseback with vestments, sacred vessels and altar stone strapped to his back.”

St. Michael’s

It was under Fr. Quirk’s leadership that both of St. Michael’s Orlando church buildings were constructed. The wooden church on the hill was erected in 1907. Built similarly to his home church of St. Bernard’s, this St. Michael’s church building celebrated but eight years of services, weddings, and funerals until it was struck by lightning and burned in 1915. The second St. Michael’s Church, built of brick, situated in Oil Creek’s bend, was dedicated in 1916. Fr. O’Donovan, quoting Fr. Quirk, on the choice of the brick church’s location on the flood plain, “The young generation has grown so infernally lazy that they hate to climb the smallest elevation.”

Left: Fr. Quirk in later years

Priestly Dedication

Fr. Quirk became a revered figure to his Orlando congregation as well as to the other churches in his charge during his long tenure as steward of the flock. In his funeral eulogy, Fr. Donal O’Donovan, who wrote the history of the Catholic Church in Lewis County, said of Father Quirk:
“This wonderful man worked unfailingly as a priest throughout his long years of priesthood-sixty-seven in all-and departed this life in a quiet and splendid death at the age of ninety-three. His life of priestly service was such that he has become part of our heritage. Indeed, one is inclined to make the observation, even long after they have placed his body in the earth, one is not quite sure that he is dead.”

In 1987, Martin Sweeney was in his ninety-third year and living in a nursing home in Morgantown when he was interviewed by Earl Heater for an oral history. Sweeney remembered Father Quirk’s dedication to his flock. “He would visit the sick and needy in all kinds of inclement weather throughout the country side.” Ethel Doyle confirms Sweeney’s remembrance. She recalls that she often saw Father Quirk on his trusty horse in the coldest of weather, gloveless, with his hands blue from the cold. His dedication was perhaps the source of the reverence in which he was held by his flock, members of whom would travel from church to church within the parish each Sunday to hear his consoling words of praise to God. Assigned to the wilds of central West Virginia, with far-flung parishes to tend and to nourish, Fr. Quirk unflinchingly served his call. Speaking of Fr. Quirk, Donal O’Donovan spoke of his dedication:
“In the winter of 1893, Father Quirk made eighty-three sick calls. On one occasion, he saddled his horse at midnight to ride thirteen miles to administer the sacraments to a dying young mother who had just given birth to her baby. He returned home on Easter Sunday morning in time to offer Mass for his congregation.”

Left: Ethyl Doyle

Martin Sweeney felt that his flock was as dedicated to Father Quirk as Father Quirk was dedicated to God. Helena McCudden was one of Father Quirk’s faithful who traveled from church to church to partake of Fr. Quirk’s sermons. A longtime teacher in southern Courthouse District, Helena lived below St. Bernard’s on Loveberry and was devoted to her pastor. She authored historical manuscripts about St. Bernard’s Church and Fr. Qurk which are archived with the National Park Service of the Department of Interior.

His Irish Background

During his lifetime, Fr. Quirk achieved a worthy reputation for his good works and dedication to the Catholic faith. There was substantial public interest in the priest who rode on horseback through the mountains, ministering to his congregation. To feed the public interest, news reporters sought out interviews of anyone who claimed to know Fr. Quirk. At various times, the “priest of the hills,” became someone even Fr. Quirk could not recognize because of the embellishments added to his resume by reporters.

Father Quirk spoke little about himself and his family. Some of the biographical information about Father Quirk given by his relatives appears incorrect and does not jibe with the well-researched biographical information given by Fr. Donal O”Donovan in his book referenced herein about the history of the Catholic Church in Lewis County.

Fr. O’Donovan gives Fr. Quirk’s place of birth as County Cork, Ireland in 1845. The family consisted of nine sons and five daughters. Beginning in local schools, Thomas was selected to attend a classical school directed by Cistercian monks at Mount Mellary in County Waterford.

This school emphasized classical studies and languages, offering Latin, Greek, French, and English. Apparently Fr. Quirk absorbed knowledge like a sponge and was a very successful student, earning a reputation as “an excellent classical scholar.”

.Left: map of southern end of Ireland, yellow dot is in County Cork where Fr. Quick was born & raised. Mt Mellary in County Waterford is just east of County Cork.

Left and Right: Photos not of the hills in central WV, but of the hills between young Thomas Quirk's home in County Cork and his school at Mt Mellarey Abby in County Waterford.

After his schooling at Mount Mellary, Thomas followed the Irish trail to America, arriving during the midst of the Civil War. It is believed that Fr. Quirk joined the Union army and was introduced to the Commonwealth of Virginia as a soldier wearing the blue uniform.

Many of the students at the Mount Mellary classical school furthered their education for the priesthood at the Seminary of St. Sulpice in Paris. With this in mind, Thomas returned to Europe and entered priesthood studies at the seminary. According to Fr. O’Donovan, in 1868, Bishop Richard Whelan of Wheeling, seeking recruits to serve the wilds of central West Virginia solicited his priesthood alma mater of St. Sulpice for volunteers to the cause. Fr. Thomas Aquinas Quirk responded to the call and spent the remainder of his life in West Virginia in service to his Lord.
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Lecturer, Lawyer, Doctor, Scholar and Horse Lover

Recalling in his oral history interview, Martin Sweeney observed that Dr. Rohrbaugh, President of Glenvillle State Teachers College, frequently asked the noted Fr. Quirk to lecture at the college. Sweeney recalls that Dr. Rohrbaugh was of the opinion that “Fr. Quirk was one of the most intelligent men in the world.” Sweeney also noted that Fr. Quirk wrote many deeds of conveyance for his parishioners and that a prominent lawyer in Weston said that Fr. Quirk wrote perfect deeds. Sweeney noted that Fr. Quirk was fluent in five or six languages, including Greek and Latin. Sweeney remembered that on one occasion Fr. Quirk was called as a witness during a trial. During the course of the trial, one of the lawyers, undoubtedly trying to impress Fr. Quirk with his own intelligence, asked him a question in Latin. Fr. Quirk promptly answered the question, but in Greek, leaving the lawyer dumbfounded.

Right: Dr. Rohrbach, President of Glenville College and admirer of Fr. Quirk

Sweeney also remembered that Fr. Quirk would frequently minister to the physical needs of ailing congregants by providing home remedies which he would prepare from native plants and that his church members relied heavily upon his medical advice.

Horses also were a great love of Fr. Quirk. Sweeney recalls how Father Quirk loved to ride and that he was quick to accept a challenge from anyone on the road to see whose horse was the fastest. Father Quirk’s four-legged traveling companions over the fifty-three years of his service to his churches were named Bob, Remy, Partnership, Trixy, and Prince. Donal O'Donovan said Father Quirk's favorite horse was Prince, his last one, and that Prince outlived his master.

Thomas Quirk's handwriting and signature, from the bottom a certificate of marriage.

The Fox Hounds Meet the Priest

Tom Pumphrey grew up on Goosepen and lived there during his early life. Tom recalls many years ago that a Mr. Brinkley who lived in the Roanoke area voiced to him a half-hearted complaint against Father Quirk. One evening, Mr. Brinkley was enjoying a lively fox hunt with his pack of fox hounds. The hounds had the wily, but exhausted fox cornered and was going in for the kill when Father Quirk, returning from a late night call, chanced upon the battleground. Deeming the odds unfair to the fox, Father Quirk got off his horse, found a club and beat off the frantic dogs, allowing the fox to escape. Tom could tell that Mr. Brinkley was not too upset with the padre who was held in the highest respect by the whole of southern Lewis County.

Visits to St. Bridget’s

Tom Pumphrey also recalls Fr. Quirk visiting his congregation at St. Bridget’s on Goosepen. Tom and his family lived in a house on property owned by Pat Fealey at the junction of the Three Lick and Goosepen Road. The Fealey family lived in the farmhouse on the same property and it was here that Fr. Quirk would stay when he was serving St. Bridget’s. Tom always looked forward to Fr. Quirk’s visits because he, along with his brother Jim, was eager to unsaddle Fr. Quirk’s large white horse, and tend to its needs in the Fealey stable.

Left: Tom Pumphrey

Right: Agnes and Tom Murphy, the parents of Ethyl Doyle, two of the many parishioners who traveled to Loveberry to say their goodbyes to their beloved pastor

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A Buggy Ride to Loveberry

As Fr. Quirk was reaching his last days on earth and unable to visit his churches, his devoted friends and parishioners made visits to the ailing prelate at Loveberry to express their fealty. As if it were yesterday, Ethel Doyle remembers her stepfather Dan Murphy readying his horse and buggy for the long trip to Loveberry. “My step-father Dan Murphy and my mother Agnes (Wanstreet) Murphy thought the world of Fr. Quirk. Father Quirk was a quiet man, but even as an old man, had a twinkle in his eyes, when visitors came,” Ethel reminisced. “He lived in a plain, simple, humble cottage, without a sign of wealth or material things,” Ethel reflected on her solemn visit to his home over seventy years ago.

Even the Good Must Die

For over fifty years, Fr. Quirk ministered to the spiritual needs of his Orlando brethren and became a part of its history for the ages. Even today, the name of Fr. Quirk is a recognized and beloved name to Lewis County Catholics born years after his death. A short time before his death, Fr. Quirk was elevated to Monsignor by Pope Pius XI, adding to his legend. True to his religious and personal modesty, Fr. Quirk referred to the high honor as “ballyhoo” and as “throwing high honors on an old bag of bones.”

Thomas Aquinas Quirk, pastor of St. Michael’s of Orlando, passed away quietly in September 15, 1937 and was laid to rest at his beloved Loveberry home in the cemetery of St. Bernard’s.

left: The burial of Thomas Quirk at St. Bridget's Cemetery

Fr. O’Donovan, concluding his praise of the earthly works of this simple, dedicated man, stated:
“We give thanks to Almighty God for the gift of Thomas Aquinas Quirk to this Wild Wonderful West Virginia. We give thanks to his wonderful parents and family for a wonderful son who gave his life for the Glory of God in a foreign land.

Well could he utter at the end of his life those beautiful thoughts expressed by a fellow countryman, Padraic Pearse, poet and patriot:
. . . . . Lord, I have staked my soul
. . . . . I have staked the lives of my kin,
. . . . . On the truth of Thy dreadful word,
. . . . . Do not remember my failures
. . . . . But remember my faith.
''Deep peace of the Son of Peace to You,' Father Thomas Aquinas Quirk.”

Please see also This Day in West Virginia History

comment 1: Donna Gloff

The monastery at Mt Melleray was built in the 1830s, not long before young Thomas attended school there. Mt. Melleray was the first monastery to be built in Ireland since the Reformation in the 1500s. It is active today and is available for individual retreats. Telephone:+353 (0)58 54 404

The seminary of St. Sulpice in Paris dates back to the 1600s. "The Sulpician seminaries, above all the one in Paris, were famed for their solid academic teaching and high moral tone." -Wikipedia (Today St. Sulpice is noted for its role in the movie The Davinci Code.)

Left: The pulpit at church of St Sulpice in Paris, attached to the seminary where Thomas Quirk prepared for the priesthood.

comment 2: Donna Gloff

This map of Ireland shows the counties Galway ("G"), Roscommon ("R"), Sligo ("S"), the home counties of most of St. Michael's parishoners, and Cork ("C"). Fr. Quirk's home county and Waterford ("W"), where his school Mt. Melleray was located.

Father Thomas Quirk Remembered, part 1

Jim Mullooly, cousin to many of Orlando's Irish, has done extensive research on Fr. Thomas Aquinas Quirk. Jim even portrays Fr. Quirk in Living History enactments. The following story is taken from an article he wrote in 2004 for The Catholic Spirit, a publication of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.
This is the first of two articles in The Catholic Spirit published by the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston in 2002.

by Jim Mullooly

In deepest night, in that final hour when myriads of stars in the Milky Way manifest God’s promise to Abraham’s spiritual progeny now and forever, a nineteen year old stood watch somewhere in the great Valley of Virginia, scene of recent Civil War skirmishes, battles, indeed slaughters. He fingered a windfall apple in his pocket. It was too soon to release its crisp goodness, a certain clue in the stillness of the night to those abroad to his presence on the outskirts of camp. Nonetheless, he anticipated the dawn and his relief.

Right: Thomas Aquinas Quirk's 1870 ordination portrait.
Left: Fr. Thomas Quirk and is horse Barney
Left, below: Detail from photo of Fr. Quirk with his horse Barney.

Lewis County’s last resident living Civil War veteran (Union) died peacefully at 2:45 P.M. September 12, 1937, fifty-three years to the day of his arrival in central West Virginia. He was surrounded by his brother Patrick, nephews Tom and Howard, loving friends, neighbors and parishioners. The Right Reverend Monsignor Thomas Aquinas Quirk (pronounced "Kerk") was 93 and the onset of pneumonia following a severe fall on the day of his last Mass, one week previous, was simply too much for him to bear. He had been a priest in the diocese West Virginia for 67 years, actively so until his final illness,

He was a soldier, scholar, priest, editor, educator, practical farmer, oil boom enthusiast, historian for the diocese, seer-like prognosticator. Often associated with the Barry Fitzgerald-like posed photo in 1934, with his horse Barney, the man behind the image is more extraordinary still. As we view the reality of a lifetime, he is beyond ordinary measurements of greatness.

Beginnings

Thomas Quirk was born in the famine years in Ireland on his father’s 95-acre farm in the townland of Ballyhimock. Thomas Quirk’s story of emigration to the New World, joining the Union Army’s 69th New York Volunteer Infantry Company A, (“Irish Brigade”), experience of skirmish and horror of battle with it, especially in the Army of the Potomac in the “Great Valley of Virginia,” acquisition of citizenship as just recompense for service, was ultimately that of thousands of young Irish men of the period. These men, some with families, discovered a new world of opportunity, pride of ownership and other perhaps less tangible measures of success, but all contributing to America’s growth following divisive civil conflict. For the Irish in particular, there was immense opportunity, particularly in rural America, to develop talents of animal husbandry, prosperous crop cultivation, participation in trade and market economy, which were impossible to express under the British regime in Ireland.

Right, above: Thomas Quirk's family home in Ireland

Right: Ballyhimock

These two photos and more can be found at the website of the Diocese of Wheeling and Charleston.

Many of the Irish Brigade members acquiring the arts of war returned to Ireland to participate in the unsuccessful Fenian Rising in 1867. It was his own brother, Patrick, who reported the story of Father Quirk returning to Ireland after the American Civil War, “springing” a Fenian prisoner from jail, forever making him persona non gratis in his homeland.

Thomas Quirk alluded to a few skirmishes for his part of the war as a lowly adjutant, but never spoke about his battle experience. However, in his history of the Wheeling Diocese, completed in 1925 and serialized in the West Virginia edition of the (Pittsburg) Catholic Reporter, in describing the fear and familiarity of imminent death American soldiers in World War I battlefields lived with, one vividly senses that he was drawing from his own experience as a soldier. He describes “… that anguish of soul, that biting apprehension of death, the tremors that will visit the bravest heart during the lone night watches—the most priceless jewels of a soldier’s experience.”

Left: Tools of the trade- Fr. Quirk's chalice and paten.

The mournful cry of the whippoorwill at early light on the carnage fields of the war gave voice, for many, to their grieving, but the devoted male bird is noted for nurturing its young and infusing new life. All his life Thomas Quirk would attend to the first cry of the whippoorwill, not only as a predictor of weather, but, perhaps, as a symbol of his transforming war experiences, calling him to the priesthood of the Roman Catholic Church as well as continuing renewal of his commitment to compassionate service for those living out the victories and defeats of that war throughout the new state of West Virginia.

Education

Thus it was, upon his discharge from the war, he went to France to study for the priesthood at the Irish College and St. Sulpice Seminary- Alma mater of many Roman Catholic priests of the Irish Diaspora. This Seminary at Issy in the Parisian suburbs specialized in training of priest for the mission fields in piety, learning and physical exercise.

Left: The Irish College in Paris
Right: St Sulpice in the suburbs of Paris.

He took classes for his own interest at the nearby Sorbonne in medicine and law. The Sulpicians trained their missionaries to be as self-sufficient as possible in frontier regions, endowing them with many practical tools that would be needed where various institutions as yet did not exist or were very remote. At the seminary itself, he was particularly interested in mathematics and physics, completing extra summer studies in these fields. He studied also with some of the finest theologians and philosophers in Europe, then on the faculty of the seminary. His earlier education was of the “prep school” variety where he honed his Latin, Greek, and probably also modern European languages such as French and German. (He would readily quote Schiller in German in a letter to Bishop Donahue, considerately translating for the good Bishop.)

To this day you will find wills and other documents drawn up and witnessed by Thomas Quirk for his parishioners. He wrote impeccable deeds and wills. Protestants and Catholics alike sought him out for medical, legal and pending business decisions. At the time he was in France medically the French were on the frontier of the body/mind nexus. (Freud studied in Paris before developing his science of the mind) Many healings have been attributed to Father Quirk’s recommendations over the years. He kept on hand a variety of European homeopathic medicines as well as various herbal remedies. He was out vaccinating people against smallpox in the state’s last great scare at the turn of the last century.

Answering the appeal for seminarians from Bishop Whelan, newly appointed first Bishop of West Virginia, Thomas Quirk responded shortly before his completion at St. Sulpice. The plan was to complete any needed education at St, Vincent’s, the diocesan Seminary in Wheeling and be part of the next ordination class. He arrived in Wheeling in September of 1869.

A Young Priest

Father Quirk celebrated his first mass in the old cathedral Wheeling on September 1, 1870. He remained in Wheeling with other priests to minister to the Greater Cathedral parish. The following spring, May of 1871, along with Father Anthony Schleicher, he was assigned to St Francis Xavier Parish in Parkersburg and it outlaying missions in Wood, Jackson, Wirt and Calhoun counties.
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Right: Fr, Quirk in the doorway, 1905-1913

German and Irish immigrants had completed work on the Staunton-Parkersburg Turnpike (routes 33 and 47 today). The workers settled on lands along the road and required the Church’s ministrations. As a young curate (priest) he was mentored by one of the great priests of the diocese, Father Henry Parke. At some point Father Parke departed for France on the bishop’s work and left the actual running of the parish to the young assistants, who eliminated debt and collected parish dues with consistency.

During this time Father Quirk was the actual editor and chief contributor of West Virginia’s first diocesan newspaper, the Catholic Messenger. This newspaper was started by Father Parke and nominally edited by Wood County businessman Henry O’Brien. Its stated mission was “to counter anti-Catholic bigotry and positively promote the views of the universal church in the United States.”

An Educator

Father Quirk was always an active and enthusiastic educator, beginning with St Vincent’s Seminary, continuing such when he was in Huntington, where he established a school and was the only teacher. At Loveberry near Sand Fork he established a second school. He published articles and debates in the Catholic Messenger which were picked up by the Catholic Press throughout the country, earned him the praise of the Catholic polemicist Orestes A. Brownson as the “brightest young priest in America” in the 1870s. Years later, writing in his history of the Diocese of Wheeling his concerns are strangely contemporary:
“The present penchant for luxurious, palatial schoolhouses, guiding and prompting both the state and parochial boards of education, is but the reprehensible mania for universal extravagance, common in our current hour and must die out. The systems of education, not the houses, are most in need of improvement and advance. Educational fads and follies have fairly drowned out the young idea. It shoots no more for it is kiln-dried in the pod.” (1924)

Left: The school at Loveberry Hill

Further research confirms Father Quirk’s natural affinity for education. A late life portrait of Blessed Edmund Rice, lay founder of the Irish Christian Brothers, a teaching order, by common consent of those still living who remember him, bears an uncanny resemblance to our Father Quirk in later years. Catherine Rice, Father Quirk’s mother, was second cousin to the well-known educator and nurturer of orphans. It is also to be noted that Lord Monteagle (a Spring-Rice) one of the “good” landlords of the 1846 potato famine, was some family connection. Two separate reports indicate Thomas Quirk was twice offered the lordship of Monteagle, but declined because of his Catholicism among other reasons. This title, in later tines, was passed every few years to cousins collateral due to lack of direct heir. This Lord Monteagle was British Chancellor of the Exchequer in the late 1830s and one speculates that Father Quirk’s educational opportunities in the British school system (where he was a cadet in the sense of our ROTC) was promoted by the Rice connections. Several older priests in the diocese remarked upon his peculiar Latin pronunciation. Could he have the legacy of the British Public Schools Latin with its closer to the original Latin pronunciation rather than the more modern Italianate mode of speech?

Sand Fork and Oil Creek

At the age of 39 Father Thomas Quirk came to central West Virginia. He moved into the rectory Loveberry Hill, in the Sand Fork watershed, and he served three churches: St Bernard located there, St. Bridgit, located on Goosepen Road and St. Michael, first located south of Clover Fork toward Knawls Creek and later in Confluence/Orlando.

Over the years Father Quirk was assisted in his three church assignment by a number of priests, including Father Mueller, Father Swint, Father Mark Krause and Father James Tierney.

Right above the interior of St Bridgit

Left above: St Bernard with the rectory where Fr. Quirk lived behind it.
Left: Fr. Quirk with his assistant Mark Krause.

Right: St Michael at Knawl Creek
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From the Ordo

The Ordo is the liturgical calendar used by priests. It provides each day’s scripture readings plus other information such as feast days to be celebrated and instructions for the priests. We are fortunate to have in the diocesan archives in Wheeling Father Quirk’s ordo and daily instructions for masses and other services for 1898, 1900,1903 and 1905. Father Quirk often used the alternately blank pages in these as a diary. Sometimes he would write out daily happenings and thoughts in more expansive form on blank paper regular foolscap. In these more expansive diaries his sensitivity to the weather, raising and nurturing his own sheep, his extraordinary agricultural gifts from eons of descent from farming people in Ireland, was a certain connection with the people of his congregations and in those communities. In many ways he was deeply one with them.

In these diaries Father Quirk would jot down events ( Boer War, presidential campaigns) weather, sick calls and Mass attendance at the three churches in his care “The wine froze in the chalice this morning.” (1903) he wrote when a particular cold spell affected the dilapidated Civil War era structure full of wind and cold. He related on March 28, 1900, “My bees were actively at work on the peach trees that are just now in full bloom. In the evening it rained heavy showers. As I write 11 p.m, it is raining still and threatens to rain through the night. 72 degrees without a fire. If it does not turn cool there will be an abundance of peaches. The grass is growing fast and the wheat looks very well.”

He prayed to St. Anthony the Finder (Padua) to bring success to the oil well drilled in the Loveberry Ridge property in the late summer, early fall of 1900. His hope was to acquire profit, along with everyone else, in West Virginia at that time to build a new, solid church. The well was a dry hole for oil but one week later. One mile down the hill, the great Copley well No. 1 brought in the greatest gusher of that age. Indirectly the Irish and German owners of the oil lands of that well and others contributed to the construction of the present St Bernard’s Church in 1910.

A New Year

It was toward midnight New Years Eve, 1900, watching for the year 19-1, that he left us these thoughts, some of which he would expand into a formal lecture and eventually an article published in church journals. These musings jotted in the end pages of the 1900 ordo speak to us this very day.

“Monday 31st misty and very sloppy- 70 degrees. It grew windy but not cold toward evening. Mud is deep now. It is clouded and warm as I write- almost 12 a.m. And now the old year is gone and the old 19th century is ended.- goodbye! goodbye! A new year and a new age opens. I name this XXth century the century of magnificent promise. My natal century was rich in many things. But boasted much beyond its performance. It brought back popular liberty and with that, as ever a rejuvenesence of Catholicism. The century just opened must witness many, many revolutions- the greatest of these a social revolution, now a great desideratum. Courage you XXth century men! We have prepared the arena for you and when we are sleeping in the cold clay all alone and all forgotten, your battle will be raging and your shouts of victory ringing joyously.
Welcome, 1901 A.D. –Thomas Quirk.”

Thomas Quirk Remembered part 2

Jim Mullooly, cousin to many of Orlando's Irish, has done extensive research on Fr. Thomas Aquinas Quirk. This is the second of two articles in The Catholic Spirit published by the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston in 2002.
Part 1 of this review of Thomas Quirk’s life discussed his early years in southern Ireland, his service in the Union Army during the Civil War, his studies for the clergy in Paris and his return to America to serve as a missionary.

After studying in Paris, he came to the Diocese of Wheeling and Charleston, to serve under Bishop Richard Whalen. Here he finished his studies for ordination and taught at St. Vincent Seminary. After that he was assigned to serve as a priest in the rural areas from Parkersburg.

by Jim Mullooly

It was on September 12, 1872 that Bishop Richard Whalen, having tested the young Father Thomas Quirk in the outback of Parkersburg, assigned him to a more remote frontier. Here he built two churches and literally built up the Catholic Church where only a handful of Catholics existed. Centered at Guyandotte and the newly established city of Huntington, Thomas Quirk was the bishop’s man to lay the foundation in all respects. This included opening a school with himself as sole teacher for several years. The school drew many Protestants. The few Catholic schools in the diocese at the time were of quality and were often the only educational institution available. In Father Quirk’s case, his particular skills could meet the needs of advance students aspiring to further college training.

Right above: Ordination portrait of Father Thomas Quirk.
Right: Msgr. Thomas Quirk and Bishop Swint
View these photos and many other items clearly at the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston website

He made his home with a prominent Catholic family, the Carrolls, and turned a cornfield into a substantial frame church and attached school at 20th Street and Seventh Avenue, after saying mass for a few months in a shanty near the C & O roundhouse.

Labors In the Vineyard

The opening of the state to industry and settlement had several disadvantages. In the decades after the Civil War, work building the railroads, harvesting lumber and coal and later gas and oil, brought in droves of settlers, many of them Catholic immigrants. There were countless industrial accidents associated with harsh employment conditions and a cheaper labor pool. Also the railroads, the river pack boats, in particular, brought outside contagions such as small pox, yellow fever, typhoid. The diocese at that time excluded the eastern panhandle of West Virginia but extended down to include the southwestern corner of Virginia. Father Quirk held faculties, at their request, for three dioceses, that of Kentucky, Ohio and his own. Constantly called to travel up the Tug, down the Sandy up to Point Pleasant and crossing the Ohio in a skiff to reach the outback of Gallipolis, he anointed people dying of those illnesses and injuries. Once he donned a rubber suit given by the attending physician to minister to the dying victim of yellow fever. “I had a chance to see the ‘black bile’ associated with that disease” he reported in his Diocesan History. It was during these years, riding up and down the steep hills of the region that the largely Protestant community, comparing him to the circuit riding preachers of the previous generation, titled him the “Little Padre of the Hills.”

Huntington was prone to flooding and he noted a section that the cyclical floods never touched. He undertook to build a newer, more substantial church there (1883) and out of his own pocket place the necessary down payments and contracts. The new bishop, John J. Kain, transferred him shortly thereafter to the Sandfork area of central West Virginia. He was responsible for three missionsof St Patrick's Church in Weston, St. Bernard’s on Loveberry Ridge, St Bridget's on Goosepen Road and St. Michael's in the Confluence/Orlando area. At first Father Quirk was not pleased.

Appeals to the Archbishop

Father Quirk appealed his assignment to the then archbishop of Baltimore arguing that it was a demotion, rather than a promotion, and that he was personally responsible for a period of the finances of the new church he had built in Huntington. There was ill-feelings between the bishop and Father Quirk, probably due to the fact that Bishop Kain identified him as the probable leader for a petition drive to replace Bishop Whalen with a local priest of the Wheeling Diocese, rather than an outsider, so that Whalen’s policies could continue uninterrupted. There was a sense of the bishop taking this personally and “retaliating” against the six signatories of the “Round Robin” petition (wherein the signatures encircled the text and no one signed first.) At the very least there was a clash of philosophy if not personality. This was only the first of several causes requiring the archbishop’s mediation between Father Quirk and Bishop Kain. His reluctance to move was also due to his connections in the area, particularly to several orphans he had taken under his wing.

Right, above: Bishop Whalen
Right, below: Bishop Kain

However, always faithful to the virtue of obedience, especially relating to the church, her moved to the Sandfork area, arriving on September 12, 1884, with orphans and students in tow. Had the 1890 U.S. Census not been destroyed by fire, we would have been able to recover the names of these children. He stayed with Thomas White on Loveberry Hill until a proper rectory could be built next to St. Bernard’s. Over the years he would seek permission to absent himself a few days to return to Huntington to visit with his erstwhile congregants and the Carroll family.

A Family Man

His interest in orphans would continue over time, placing many from St. John’s Children’s Home (then “Orphanage”) of Wheeling with families in his parish. We often note his sending extra money that he came by, for the support of these Wheeling orphans. He always requested the strictest anonymity when doing so. Some orphans he would reserve for himself, i.e. Henry Gill, Vincent Felton, Joe Ahern, Julia Benton and others unknown to us. He raised all of these mentioned, providing whatever secondary schooling was needed such as sending Julia to DeSales Heights on Parkersburg. Henry Gill married neighbor William McCudden’s daughter and moved to Pittsburgh. However his wife Ellen died suddenly on a visit home in 1911. Vincent Felton eventually moved to New Jersey and would return in later years with his wife to pass time with Father Quirk. Julia married Thomas V. Craft and raised a family in Weston. Father Quirk could be seen riding into Weston along Camden Avenue to have Sunday dinner with Julia, her husband and children. He would always bring a sack of candy.

“Feed My Sheep”

Father Quirk saw himself as a spiritual “caterer” breaking the bread of life in the wilderness for those who had none. Assigned to Sandfork area by the hand of Providence, he refused all opportunities to leave, to “advancement.” This was his true portion, his calling, feeding this particular community, being the hand of Christ in this wilderness. His habit of daily prayer, fasting often, frequent recognition for his need for redemption, his mindful service to all who sought him out, prepared him for the healing work associated with him. Those still alive today who knew him characterize him above all as a healer, a true mediator for God’s grace and healing love. There are continuing reports of breast cancer, skin diseases, goiters in his lifetime and speedy recovery from difficult medical procedures and other healings after his death. His powerful gentleness and convinced faith mediated local disputes and matters of conscience, even applying the unguent of God’s love to community traumas originating in economic, industrial and political assaults.

Right: Bishop Donohue

Bishop Donohue, successor to Bishop Kain, especially relied upon his keen insight and diagnostic ability, his sensitivity and compassion when he would send him out to minister to what we would deem today impaired clergy. His ministry there was full of support and encouragement for his fellow presbyters, but painfully direct when indicated. He was a man of strong opinions, often right, but escaping the mire of self-righteousness and ultimately taking his stand in Pascal’s dictum, “The heart has its reason that Reason knows not.” For years he was a member of the bishop’s Priests Council whose function was continuing evaluation of newly ordained clergy, in areas of theology and pastoral response. This earned him the respect of emerging clergy over the years. At the diocesan retreats the clergy would gather round him like chicks to a mother hen, feeding on every word.

Day to Day

An observer, climbing up Loveberry Hill “on a genial spring day”, as Father Quirk would term it, and in memory’s eternal present, in the late afternoon would quickly note the distinction of a farmer banging on an old tin bucket to gather various critters for feeding. On closer inspection, even in work clothes, he wears the white linen choker of his vocation. Neighbors in need, not members of the congregation, might have just left the rectory with sugar, flour, some money and a blessing from him. Earlier still, he may have gone over to the nearby schoolhouse to visit with and encourage the students. Some would stop by later for some milk and cookies, legendary treats of the long time housekeeper, Annie Doonan. They would have no doubt interrupted her baking of the upcoming Sunday’s hosts in a large double-sided iron held over the wood-fired stove. Later in the evening there would be visitors, friends, congregants gathering on the front porch discussing with Father Quirk the local news and the current events of that time gleaned from, perhaps, the Cincinnati Intelligencer, a gift subscription from his brother Patrick.
Nearby, hear the first cry of the ever-returning whippoorwill.

Jim Mullooly had the privilege of portraying Father Quirk as a living history character. Each year on the Sunday afternoon closest to September 12, there is a liturgy celebrating Father Quirk’s life at St Bernard’s with 60-80 persons in attendance.

St Michael's Church

This entry has been taken almost entirely from the book The Rock From Which You Were Hewn written by Father Donal O'Donovan and privately published 1987.

To the right is the brick church as it looked in the 1980s.

In the 1840s and '50s priests travelled the Virginia wilderness in what would become Central West Virginia, performing mass and providing the sacraments perhaps four times a year. One of the locations they used was the Braxton County Courthouse. St. Patrick's Church in Weston was the home church for these circuit riding priests.

We are interested here in the three parishes that began to form just south of Weston. The first, the closest to Weston, was St. Bridget's. The next was St. Bernard's and the third was St. Michael's. These three would comprise the three parish circuit that would be served by the priest who lived at the rectory on Loveberry Hill, located in St. Bernard's parish. St. Michael's, the furthest from Weston, was the last of the three to develop.

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St. Michael's Beginnings

St. Michael's began at Knawls Creek, (or Flesher's Run.) Shortly after the Civil War Michael and Margaret (Grogan) Griffin and several other Irish families moved to the Knawls Creek area. The Griffins were particularly instrumental in building a parish there and the records show the first services were held at their home. Agnes Carney, daughter of Patrick & Ellen (Naughton) Carney who lived on Clover Fork, was baptized at the Carney home in August of 1876. She was the first child recorded as baptized in the parish. Father John Tracy was the pastor. By 1878 the community that met at the Griffins' farm was called St. Michael's at Griffins.

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To the right is Margaret (Naughton) Carney, mother of the first child baptised in St Michael's parish.

Thanks to Bonnie (Brown) Neal for this great photo, below left, from the internet that shows the clapboard covered log church with its cupola and clapboard-siding.

The first building, a log structure, was built on land given by the Griffins, on the hill between Knawls Creek and Clover Fork. In 1882, records show, Father Tracy said mass at St. Michael's "every fifth Sunday and on Holy Days when convenient." According to the Pastoral Report of 1904, the parish at Knawls Creek had 145 souls: 8 were Irish born, 120 were of Irish descent, 3 were German and 14 were colonial.

About ten years after the log church was built it was sided with clapboard and painted white. Although St. Michael's congregation moved in 1907 to Orlando, the old white church remained and was a beloved landmark for neighbors and parishioners until it was removed in the 1970s to the Bulltown interpretive park and restored to its log exterior.

Thomas Quirk (to the right) came to pastor the three church circuit and live at the rectory on Loveberry Hill. For a little more on this fascinating may see the entry Oct. '06, Orlando's Priest Father Quirk.

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A Pretty Church on the Hill

"By the end of the nineteenth century, the center of population had moved from Knawls Creek to Confluence (which would be renamed Orlando). Confluence had become the center of the oil and gas drilling industry for southern Lewis County and northern Braxton County. The new industry brought about a marked decline in the farming industry itself as a source of livelihood. Much more money could be earned working for the oil and gas companies. Father Quirk gave us an insight into the situation: "'There is a restless flocking hither and thither to the towns.'"

In 1901 Father Quirk purchased land in the The Rusmisell & Fury Addition (the lot where John Moran later built his house). The new St. Michael's, a frame church on the hill, was dedicated in July, 1907. .

On the left is a wedding photo: a couple stand in the center of the photo, she in a long white gown.

Eight years after the new church was dedicated, in July of 1915, it was struck my lightning during a storm and it burned to the ground. In his 1915 Pastoral Report Father Quirk wrote, "St. Michael's Church burned down last July. We saved about $600 worth of furnishings The new church will be of brick with stone trimmings."

A Brick Church on the Floodplain

Moving to the lower ground, in the floodplain, did not meet with the approval of Father Quirk. He had some unkind words to say about the younger generation. "The new generation has become so infernally lazy that they hate to climb the smallest elevation."

The first mass was celebrated in the brick church on December 13, 1917. In August of 1918 Father Quirk wrote, "The flood recently played havoc with the furnishings of the building which we are now trying to repair and replace." -pg204

Above, right: St Michael Parishioners all, this 1921 family photo shows: 1.unkown 2. John Vincent Carney 3. Winifred Frances (Arkle) Carney 4. Mike Moran 5. Margaret Catherine Carney 6. Joe Eddie Moran 7. Mike Carney 8. Jim Carney 9. Pat Carney 10. Catherine (Moran) Carney, Mike's sister 11. John Carney (the donor of this photo) 12. Patrick Lee Arkle Carney 13. Rose Angela Moran 14. Ann Dolan

To the left is detail from the brick church.

See the Feb '07 Orlando Floods.

The parish of St. Michael's was officially disbanded after Father Quirk died in 1937. Orlando was already beginning to doze as the trains moved their passenger services out of Orlando.

.The young people of St. Michael's community were leaving the area, but their allegiance to the community remained. A parishioner had left money in his will to have the property maintained and every summer one of St. Michael's sons, Father McDonald, officiated at a mass in the old clapboard-sided log church and parishioners brought their children and grandchildren to share in their heritage. See the Dec '06 entry, The 13 Minute Mass.

Today

The yellow poplar log church has been restored and moved to an historic park along with a number of buildings which reflect the area's heritage. St. Michael's community continues to gather at the tiny log church in its new location. In the summer of 2006 another son of St. Michael's parish said mass to the two- and three-great grandchildren of the original Irish settlers who came to Knawl's Creek and Clover Fork.
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When the United Brethren denomination and the Methodist Episcopal denomination merged into the United Methodist Church, the brick church was purchased to house a joined congregation. As it turned out, the denominations may have chosen to merge, but Orlando's congregations congregations did not merge. Next, a Baptist congregation purchased the building and is at home there today.

The Padre Meets the James Gang

Jim Mullooly, cousin to many of Orlando's Irish, has done extensive research on Fr. Thomas Aquinas Quirk. Jim even portrays Fr. Quirk in Living History enactments. The following story is taken from an article he wrote in 2004 for The Catholic Spirit, a publication of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.

The missionary Fr. Thomas Quirk came from his service in the developing town of Huntington, WV in 1884 to serve the area which included St Michael's at Knawls and later Orlando. In Huntington he had built a church, where he presided over mass. and a school, where he taught. From his time in Huntington, the following is a story he loved to tell.

by Jim Mullooly

When Fr. Quirk was in his early 30's, sometime during the first week of September, 1875, there was a Methodist Church conference in Huntington and many strangers were about. Father Quirk, one day at school recess, caught sight of some fine looking horses that several well dressed men had hitched near the church and school. He hurried over, got down in the street to examine the steeds, expressing his admiration for a particular sorrel, a blooded, spirited animal, only heeding his owner, and wisely declined the owner’s suggestion to trot him down the street.

Right, above: detail from Thomas Quirk's ordination portrait.
Left: Some of the James Gang

In the course of the conversation, the owner of this admirable horse asked him how much he would give for it, if for sale. “$800” was Father Quirk’s immediate reply, “but I’d have to rob a bank for that kind of money.” Previously he had given these men directions to the Huntington National Bank, not but a block away.

An hour later school was disrupted by shots fired and shouts. He sent to ask what “all the hubbub was about,” as he put it. Later he discovered that the “gentlemen” were none other than Jesse James and his brother Frank, who had just robbed the bank described. He always enjoyed recounting the story on himself but added, characteristically, “the James boys were good boys, but just started wrong.”