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- Daniel O'Connell (1849 – January 23, 1899) was a poet, actor, writer and journalist in San Francisco, California, and a co-founder of the Bohemian Club. He was the grand-nephew of Daniel O'Connell (1775–1847), the famed Irish orator and politician. O'Connell was born to distinguished lawyer Charles O'Connell in 1849 in Ennis, County Clare, Ireland. He attended Belvedere College, a Jesuit school in Dublin, but was called home at the deaths of his mother and sister in a coach accident. Afterward, he was transferred to Clongowes Wood College for three years, then served in the Royal Navy as a midshipman. He traveled around Cape Horn to California in 1868. O'Connell took a position as professor of belles lettres at Santa Clara College, then accepted an offer from St. Ignatius College in San Francisco to teach Greek. O'Connell worked for a number of periodicals in the San Francisco Bay Area. He edited the Morning Herald, the San Francisco Times, the Bulletin, the Chronicle, the Wasp, the Bohemian and the Portico. His best work includes "The Thrust in Tierce," a short story written for the Overland Monthly, and a yearly Christmas piece, "quaint, grotesque or poetical" usually describing the serio-comic antics of would-be San Francisco aristocrats with little claim to fame. In 1872, O'Connell helped form the Bohemian Club. "Dan," as he was called by his friends, was very active, and was described as the "Prince of the club". O'Connell took part in many Bohemian poetry readings and stage plays, including a turn as King Macbeth of Scotland in the witches' scene from Macbeth. In 1894 he wrote the libretto for a Bohemian opera entitled Buff King Hal, working with Humphrey John Stewart who composed the music. He was elected honorary life member in the late 1890s and was made club historian. In 1874, O'Connell married Annie Ashley, called Mabel, the daughter of California Senator Delos R. Ashley who had died the previous year. The marriage produced seven children including a daughter named Gipsy. In 1878, O'Connell worked for The Mail, an early newspaper in San Francisco. With his adroit editing, O'Connell helped make famous the "Town Crier" column for the San Francisco News Letter, written by Ambrose Bierce, then by Ashton Stevens. O'Connell wrote an Irish-themed play, The Red Fox, which was staged in San Francisco. In 1876, he edited a book of stories by William Henry Rhodes (a Bohemian who wrote under the pen-name "Caxton") entitled Caxton's Book, and wrote the preface. In 1881, O'Connell published Lyrics, a book of poetry. Gipsy O'Connell's favorite poem of her father's was "Sing Me A Ringing Anthem" from that book. O'Connell wrote "Ghoul's Quest" for The Argonaut. In 1891, he published The Inner Man: Good Things to Eat and Drink and Where to Get Them, a collection of anecdotes and advice for the epicurean who finds himself in the San Francisco area, and a cautionary description of common 19th century food adulterants such as chemical dyes and powdered lead. After his sudden death in 1899 from a cold that turned into pneumonia, The New York Times printed one of O'Connell's quatrains: In 1900, Ina Coolbrith, Bohemian Club librarian, edited a collection of O'Connell's poetry, entitled Songs from Bohemia. Coolbrith ended the book with "The Chamber of Sleep", the last poem by O'Connell, written ten days before his death. William Greer Harrison wrote in a memorial foreword that O'Connell was an avid outdoorsman of eternally sunny disposition. He mentioned his appreciation for good food and his fine chef's skill in delicate cookery. Harrison wrote of his flair for swordsmanship and his pleasure in fishing, and noted that during any of these activities, O'Connell could be seen pausing to write down on a scrap of paper an idea for a story. Mabel Ashley O'Connell, following the death of her husband, "lingered here only long enough to say farewell to her many friends, and then joined her husband in the land that is hidden from material eyes, where love and life are one."
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- Daniel O'Connell (1849 – January 23, 1899) was a poet, actor, writer and journalist in San Francisco, California, and a co-founder of the Bohemian Club. He was the grand-nephew of Daniel O'Connell (1775–1847), the famed Irish orator and politician. O'Connell was born to distinguished lawyer Charles O'Connell in 1849 in Ennis, County Clare, Ireland. He attended Belvedere College, a Jesuit school in Dublin, but was called home at the deaths of his mother and sister in a coach accident.
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