The
BOSTON COLLEGE
Irish Famine Memorial Fund
Thomas Flatley at the Boston College President’s Circle Dinner in 1990. PHOTO CREDIT: Gary Wayne Gilbert
Peter G. Martin
BC’s Irish Famine Memorial Fund (IFMF) has been creating opportunity and changing lives all over the world since its establishment in 2010. The following several pages, adapted from the forthcoming history of the fund, describe the IFMF’s origins and illustrate the impact of several of its grants and scholarships.
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2010, the Irish Famine Memorial Fund, a gift to Boston College from Thomas J. Flatley (1931–2008) and his family, has supported the efforts of Boston College alumni and others to alleviate poverty, disease, famine, and illiteracy around the world. The fund has enabled nearly 200 students from 51 nations and six continents to study at Boston College and return to their home countries better equipped to help address various social, health, and educational problems. In addition, the IFMF has provided more than $3 million for projects to construct schools in impoverished communities, provide clean water and sanitation, and develop transitional housing in 17 countries, including the United States. The fund has also made grants to young alumni from Boston College and other universities, supporting them in their since
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c21 resources | spring/summer 2022
desires to engage the world and put Jesuit, Catholic ideals of “men and women for others” into action. Thomas Flatley came to the United States from his native Ireland as an 18-year-old with all of $32 to his name. After his own stint in the U.S. Army, he made use of the G.I. Bill to gain his plumber’s, electrician’s, and builder’s licenses. Thus began one of the most impressive real estate development careers in Boston annals. The Flatley Co. eventually accumulated assets of more than $1 billion, and Flatley became a significant figure in Boston’s business community and a legendary, if humble and quiet, philanthropist. Although he was immersed in business ventures and never pursued higher education himself, Flatley gained an appreciation for Boston College not long after he
