1838 – 1875 (January 25)
Timothy Donovan, son of Michael Donovan and Mary Leary, was born in Skibbereen, Ireland, in 1838. He entered the novitiate at Villanova on January 5, 1866, and made his simple profession on January 19, 1867. He professed final vows on January 20, 1870. After pursuing his philosophical and theological studies he was ordained to the priesthood at Old Saint Augustine Church, Philadelphia, by Bishop Becker of Wilmington, Delaware, on January 30, 1870.
Father Donovan's first assignment was to Saint Mary's Parish, Lawrence, Massachusetts. In 1871 he was sent as an assistant pastor to Saint Patrick Parish, Cambridge, New York. The following year, 1872, he was appointed pastor of Saint John the Baptist Parish in Schaghticoke, NY, where he also had charge of the mission at Johnsonville.
After a brief pastorate of three years at Schaghticoke he died at Schaghticoke, at the age of thirty-seven of pneumonia, on January 25, 1875. At the Solemn Requiem Mass which was offered on January 28th, present were Father Thomas Galberry, Prior Provincial, and a number of priests, both friars and secular. Father Charles Marsden, O.S.A. preached, singling out charity as the distinguishing characteristic of his confrere’s life. Father Donovan’s body was taken to Lawrence where it was buried in the Augustinian plot at Saint Mary's Cemetery.
Father Tim, as he was fondly known, was remembered for his kind, honest heart and pious zeal, together with his quaint humor and pleasant disposition.
