Rick Maher’s Professional Notes

My name is Richard Riley Maher (I go by Rick Maher). Sure I’m no red headed Patrick O’Sullivan, but my geneology traces rather directly back to the Gaelic Ireland, Tiperrary to be specific.

While in Tucson this past weekend at my grandparent’s house I came across the “Irish Family Names and Seals Map” by John Bartholomew & Son. I decided to do a little research on it and here are a few of the things that I found.

It turns out that the name Maher was has evolved somewhat from around AD200 as O Meachair to O Meagher in the 1600s to Meagher and finally, as recently as the late 1800s transitioned to Maher. The roots of the word Maher come from a Gaelic word meaning “hospitable,” and in fact were in an early “census” described as “being all descended out of the house of O Meager” translated to modern day english meaning that the clan was very family oriented. The Maher family was throughout the Gaelic times known as Maher of the Sword.

The Maher family coat of arms shown here, is “Azure two lions rampant combatant or supporting a sword argent pommel and hilt of the second, in base two crescents of the third.”

Also very interesting to me were many of the other coats of arms that were on the map and their obvious influence of current corporation logos.