Was Michael Cusack wealthy?

bobbyss

Just reading about Cusack and his school for Civil Service entry. I gather he was earning 1500 pounds a year (at its height) which today is a quarter of a million euro. Yet I read he died penniless? Anyone know about what happened? Thanks

Peregrinus

Well, I'd be inclined to dig into the 1,500 figure. Is that his net profit from the school he ran, or the gross income of the school from fees? If the latter, after he's paid for rental of premises, the salaries of teachers, etc, his net profit might have been a fraction of 1,500.

The other point to note is that the school closed in 1886; Cusack didn't die until 1906. A lot could have happened in that 20 years to deplete whatever savings he might have hade. Cusack never owned a house and, after his wife died in 1890 his family was broken up and he moved from lodgings to lodgings, working as a journalist and private tutor.

bobbyss

Yes indeed. Fair points indeed. I have never read much about Cusack, and from little I have, it seems he was a difficult man who fell out with many of his former colleagues. His death from a heart attack is recorded at 5 pm on Wednesday 28 November 1906 at the age of 59 on Morning Star Avenue. How the reporting of that came about I have no idea.

I was looking at his grave in Glasnevin on TV and it is just a pity that the writing on it is indecipherable. To me at least. As far as I could make out it was in Irish in the old fashioned (and beautiful) script. His surname alone stands there as gaeilge.

Peregrinus

I found a photograph on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/burren__flicker/16880760244/in/photostream/lightbox/

I think the inscription translates as:

"At the initiative of the Gaelic Athletic Association as a memorial to Michael Cusack who founded the association. He was born in 1847. He died in 1906. Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord."

There's more writing on the other side of the monument, but I haven't found a photograph. However I think several of his children are buried there with him, so odds are that it's their names and dates.

bobbyss

Thank you for that. It seems his money ran out and he died penniless. In fact I read his children were placed in orphanages. This may heave been many years before he died. For such a national figure, I wonder how he was viewed at that point? In the standard school history textbooks I don't think this aspect of his life is mentioned at all. And to me this is more interesting than whatever rules he set up football or hurling.

Peregrinus

By all accounts he was a cantankerous bastard. He was a hive of energy, but absolutely convinced of the obvious rightness of his own views on every subject, and suspicious of the motives of those who disagreed with him. This meant he was very much not a team player (ironically, for someone who was instrumental in founding the GAA); he had a talent for falling out with people. The list of organisations that he founded or joined; worked tirelessly and very effectively for; and then left in some acrimony within a couple of years, is a long one. His employment career was similarly chequered; he never held any job for more than three years and when his civil service academy closed in 1887 nobody would employ him either as a teacher or as a journalist; for the reason of his life he freelanced as a journalist and private tutor.