1869 – 1921 (September 1)
John Francis Kennedy, son of Thomas Kennedy and Joanne O’Connor, was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, on August 19, 1869. He entered the novitiate at Villanova, Pennsylvania, on May 3, 1890, and professed simple vows the following year. He was ordained to the priesthood by Archbishop Patrick Ryan in the Philadelphia Cathedral on June 8, 1895.
After ordination, Father Kennedy served on the Province Mission Band for some years. He was later stationed at Saint Paul’s Parish, Mechanicville, New York, Saint Augustine’s, Troy, N.Y. and at Saint Augustine’s Parish in Philadelphia, Pa. In 1915, he opened a new mission in Flushing, New York. This later became the parish of Saint Nicholas of Tolentine in Jamaica. He built the first residence there, and said the first Mass in the Church on October 14, 1917.
Father Kennedy died at Saint Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin, Ireland, on September 1, 1921 at the age of 52, on the eve of his return to the United States after a tour of Ireland with Father John Nugent, O.S.A. His death was the result of an intestinal hemhorrage. Father Kennedy’s body was brought to Lawrence, where he was buried in Saint Mary’s Cemetery there.
