This webpage is dedicated to Hope Healy Koontz, my paternal aunt and my cohort in writing and publishing the History of the Hope and Healy Families of County Mayo, Ireland. She began taking notes on the family back in the 1970s; she made her brothers and sisters write up timelines of their lives; she traveled to England, Canada and Minnesota many times to visit relatives, do research on the family and gather old family photos which she brought home for me to copy. She wrote a book on the Swainson branch of our family in England. She spent years gathering family memorabilia, family group sheets, birth, marriage and death certificates; she taped conversations with relatives and then transcribed the tapes. Hope started using a computer in her research in the 1980s and still sends emails back and forth. She is the matriarch of our Healy family, loved by all, and is a true inspiration to me and all the family.

Anne Healy Field

Photograph of Hope taken by Anne Healy Field, December 2000, at the dining room table where we were hard at work on the book.