Francis O'Neill Author & Editor

Francis O'Neill was born to a farming family in County Cork in Ireland in 1848. He left home in 1865 and died a true Chicagoan in 1936. Ellen Skerrett is currently writing a history of Loyola University Chicago. She is the co-author and editor of a number of books on Catholicism and Chicago. Most recently she edited At the Crossroads: Old St. Patrick's and the Chicago Irish. Mary Lesch is Francis O'Neill's great-granddaughter. She is now retired and divides her time between Chicago and Harbert, Michigan.