Dorothea Tunney Murphy - some Tunney History
11/28/98 Interviewed by J. Gary Fox during visit with with Michael Murphy and Dorothea Tunney Murphy.
Place – Their home at 208-43 30th Avenue, Bayside, NY
Mike was the Chief of Police of New York City before retiring. He then became the Station Master of Grand Central Station.
Interview
GF = J. Gary Fox, DTM = Dorothea Tunney Murphy
GF Your Aunt May is “M … A … Y”?
DTM Yes, but she is on my mother’s side. Her name was Hoag. She never was married
GF And your grandfather on your mother’s side was ....?
DTM James H. Hoag. He was born in Fall River.
GF And your grandmother on your mother’s side?
DTM Bridget Linskey.
Discussing John Tunney’s children
DTM All were born in Fall River.
Mary Timlin died July 19, 1897. I have her wedding ring.
GF John Tunney, your grandfather was born in England.
DTM I don’t know much about him.
GF Did he have brothers?
DTM I don’t know, I never heard.
A friend of my mother lives in Fall River. She has three sisters – Alice, Jennie (?), and Elizabeth.
(Discussing a friend who had done some genealogy work in Fall River).
Roy Gray was her father and she was Dorothea – the same name as mine. And she lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She was just friends of my mother.
My grandfather, John Tunney, did re-marry.
GF And he had 8 children. (From his wife’s first marriage.)
DTM He married a lady … Oh, gosh. … and they were very close as stepbrother and sister. He married this lady, and he bought a house … Stafford Road … along Wall St (?)
Dad and Uncle Pat were older than some of the children. So many children and they were all crowded in bedrooms. So Dad and his brother … Dad was 14 and Uncle Pat was 16 or 17. They decided that they would go to New York (City). They were going on a Fall River boat that went to New York.
They had their little bags packed and they went down to Aunt Kate (Catherine Timlin Morgan) and they said, “We came to say goodbye.”
And she said, “Where are you going?”
They said, “We’re going on the boat to New York tonight.”
She asked, “Why are you going to New York?”
“Because we want to get a job. There’s too many children in the family and there’s not enough room.”
And she said, “Oh no you’re not! You’re not going anywhere. You’re staying right here.”
She was on the second floor and upstairs was an apartment … two bedrooms, I think. So they had the bedrooms up there. She raised them with her boys … they were very close. Aunt Margaret (Timlin Morgan) lived there, too. So those two families were very, very close.
Dad was a godfather for Roy (Morgan). His name was going to be Roy, but the Priest didn’t like it. So he turned to Dad and said , “What’s your name?” So he became Daniel Roy at St. Patrick’s.
Discussing the second marriage of John Tunney.
DTM There was a girl I knew who married one of the boys of that family. Because it was the right name and Mother said they were related. … McGrivey. (2nd wife’s name)
GF It could have been that the younger children took the Tunney name.
DTM My Mother and Dad always called her “McGrivey”. They said she was a lovely lady, they didn’t dislike her … it was just that there were too many there.
GF In those days you had to earn a living and you had to do it early. To relieve the pressure on the family, they just left.
What did your father do when he got to New York?
DTM He worked for George H. Fuller, the builder. His first job was either the Empire State or the Waldorf. He was a carpenter. He used to draw plans. He worked at both of them.
GF What did Patrick do?
DTM He worked in the mills. He became “Head of Cotton” for a big manufacturer … Berkshire Manufacturing in Waring. They said that, “No one in New England knew more about cotton.”
GF Eileen (Tunney) you said married McDonough?
DTM George McDonough. He wasn’t from Fall River … Taunton or somewhere. He was very nice.
They lived in Oxbow (?) MA. He was a warden of a prison there … Waltham? They lived in Foxborough.
GF Your grandfather, John Tunney, was born in England. They probably went to England to work in the mills.
DTM Yes, because Ireland was going through some bad times. I never asked my father these questions. Now, you wished you had asked.
I don’t think that my Dad would have known too much since he didn’t live with his Dad when he got older.
End Tunney notes