Francis O'Neill

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Francis O'Neill
August 28, 1848 - January 26, 1936
Chief Francis O'Neill, CPD
Place of birth	Tralibane, Co. Cork, Ireland
Place of death	Chicago, Illinois, USA
Rank	Superintendent
Commands	Chicago Police Department

Francis O'Neill (1848 - 1936), a native of County Cork, Ireland was a well-known collector of Irish traditional music.

O'Neill was born in Tralibane, near Bantry, in 1848. At an early age he heard the music of local musicians, among them Peter Hagarty, Cormac Murphy and Timothy Dowling. At the age of 16, he became a cabin boy on an English merchant vessel. On one of his voyages, he met Anna Rogers, who he married in Bloomington, Illinois. The O'Neills moved to Chicago, and in 1873 O'Neill became a Chicago policeman. He rose through the ranks quickly, eventually serving as the Chief of Police from 1901 to 1905. During this time he recruited many traditional Irish musicians into the police force, including Patrick O'Mahony, James O'Neill, Bernard Delaney, Patsy Touhey, John McFadden and, James Earley. He also collected tunes from a wide variety of sources.

O'Neill retired from the police force in 1905. After that, he devoted much of his energy to publishing the music he had collected, and edited several important volumes of musical scores, including:

O'Neill's Music of Ireland (1903), containing 1,850 pieces of music
The Dance Music of Ireland (1907), sometimes called, "O'Neill's 1001," due to the approximate number of tunes included
400 tunes arranged for piano and violin (1915)
Waifs and strays of Gaelic Melodies (1922), 365 pieces
Irish Folk Music: A Fascinating Hobby (1910). Appendix A contains O'Farrells Treatise and Instructions on the Irish Pipes, published 1797-1800; appendix B is Hints to Amateur Pipers by Patrick J Tuohy.
Irish Minstrels and Musicians (1913), biographies of musicians from whom he collected