# Alice Ryan (Canadian heiress)

Alice Doheny (née Ryan; 16 July 1830 – 27 October 1906) was an Irish-Canadian heiress, suffragette, sister of railway magnates Hugh Ryan and John Ryan, and mother of heiress Margaret Isabelle McHenry. The daughter John Patrick Ryan and Margaret Conway, Ryan moved with her family to Montreal, Canada, after her father sold Gortkelly Castle to another branch of the Ryan clan in Tipperary.

## Background

Born on 16 July 1830, Alice Ryan was born into the wealthy Irish-Catholic Ryan family as the daughter of John Patrick Ryan and Margaret Ryan (née Conway); who owned Gortkelly Castle before her father sold the estate to another branch of the Ryan clan.
The family immigrated post sale to Montreal, Canada, in 1841, when Ryan was eleven years old. She had four siblings: prominent industrialist Hugh Ryan, railway magnate John Ryan, Patrick Ryan, and Catherine Ryan.

## Suffragette Movement

Alice Ryan was a supporter of the Canadian Women's Suffrage Association (CWSA), previously the Toronto Woman's Literary Club (TWLC). She was a family friend of the Attorney General of Ontario, Sir Oliver Mowat —later a pall-bearer for her brother Hugh Ryan— who oversaw the 1883 committee created to urge the Toronto City Council to petition the Ontario Government to pass a bill conferring the municipal franchise upon women. The committee was composed of members of the CWSA including Dr. Emily Stowe, Sarah Anne Curzon, Jessie Turnbull McEwen, Mrs. W. B. Hamilton, Mrs. Miller, and Mrs. Isabel Mackenzie (wife of William Lyon Mackenzie).
Ryan reportedly appealed to Mowat on the committee's behalf and, following the committee's impassioned presentation, he formally stated that "there was no doubt that the franchise would have to be extended to women." As a result of the committee's petition (which was passed by the Toronto City Council 20 to 5) and Mowat's legal support, Sir John A. Macdonald introduced a bill to the Parliament of Canada that same year which stipulated granting municipal franchise to unmarried women and widows possessing the required property qualifications. The bill, which Ryan argued should have also included married women, ultimately did not pass.

## Marriage, Children & Descendants

Alice Ryan married land developer Michael Doheny, a cousin of Irish-American oil tycoon Edward L. Doheny. The couple had six children together: Margaret Isabelle Doheny, Hugh Doheny, Michael Doheny Jr., William Doheny, Patrick Doheny and John Doheny.
Ryan's son Hugh Doheny (b. 1863) would, like his father and uncles, become a wealthy developer; with his most profitable building project being Section III of the New Welland Ship Canal competed in 1913 for a fee of $9.5 million (the equivalent of $297 million in 2024).
Ryan's only daughter, Margaret Isabelle McHenry (née Doheny), was a primary beneficiary of her mothers' estate. She married American-Canadian William John "W.J." McHenry, a professional lacrosse player turned businessman, politician and whiskey magnate on 5 November 1885.
Ryan's grandson Lt.-Cmdr. Hugh Doheny (b. 1914) married Harriet Katherine Lucinda Erskine (b. 1924), daughter of Lt.-Col. Sir Thomas Erskine, 4th Baronet of Combo, and Dame Magdalen Erskine (née Anstruther).
Ryan became a widow on 2 February 1886 when her husband Michael Doheny died suddenly in their Point-Saint-Charles townhouse. The funeral was attended by the Governor General of Canada, Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne, and over 400 people from Canada, America and Ireland; with chief mourners including Massachusetts politician, P.J. Kennedy (father of Joseph Patrick Kennedy and grandfather of President John F. Kennedy); U.S. Congressman, John G. Carlisle; Canadian Senator, John Costigan; and Member of Parliament, J.J. Curran.
Alice Ryan was a second cousin, once removed, of famous horse breeder Anne Blunt, 15th Baroness Wentworth; known for buying Arabian horses from a Bedouin princess, recorded to be the daughter of Emir Fendi Al-Fayez. In 1904, Ryan visited the Baroness at Sheykh Obeyd estate near Cairo with her sister-in-law Margaret Catherine Ryan (née Walsh), daughter Margaret Isabelle McHenry, and nieces Mary Alice Ryan and Marguerite Teresa Ryan.

## Inheritance

Ryan, who was reportedly close with her younger brother Hugh Ryan (declared "Canada's wealthiest railroad contractor" at the time of his death in 1899), received a generous sum in his last will and testament; along with all of his landholdings in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

## Death & Burial

Alice Ryan died on 27 October 1906 in Brockville, Ontario, with her body being transported by private train to Montreal, Quebec, where the funeral service was held at the Irish-Catholic St Ann's Church. The requiem mass was attended by the entire extended Ryan-Doheny clan, as well as Gilded-Age society women; including Mrs. Mary Augusta Kennedy (wife of P. J. Kennedy), and Mrs. Mary Inez Cloran (wife of Senator Henry Joseph Cloran).
Ryan was laid to rest in the prominent Cimetière Notre-Dame-des-Neiges on 29 October 1906, alongside her late husband Michael Doheny (d.1886) and her late son Patrick Doheny (d.1890).