The annals of Maynooth College in regard to occasional, part-time or even full-time academic staff at lecturer level are sparse but Mary Cullen has a fair claim to be regarded as a historic figure in that she was the first laywoman to be appointed to the teaching staff in a secular faculty, having been introduced to the one-man Department of Modern History in the recognised college in 1968 by Professor Tomás Ó Fiaich. 'Is soiléir gur bhain sibh le glún ró luath i stair Mhaigh Nuad' he wrote in that year to a former student, reporting on the appointment in his usual informal way.

But in at least one of the meanings of that comment he was right: the scene, to recall the words of an early observer of Maynooth's original foundation, was a changed one, 'and of some consequence'. Three years later, the Bishops announce the appointment of five lecturers, including Mary, to permanent full time lecturing posts. She subsequently worked with Fr. Ó Fiaich's successors, Patrick Corish and Richard Vincent Comerford, to extend the footprint of the Department of Modern Hostory, as well as taking a leading part in the documenting and promoting of women's place in history and in historical research and education. 

Mary Dolores Cullen was born in Dublin on September 20 1929 and raised in Co. Waterford and Cork City. She attended University College Dublin, where she graduated in Arts in 1951 and was awarded the degree of MA for her postgraduate studies in History in 1952. She combined involvement in research and teaching with the raising of a young family, being employed as tutor in St. Catherine's College, Cambridge between 1956 and 1958, and as a lecturer in Modern History at UCD from 1964 to 1967. Following her retirement from Maynooth, she became a part-time lecturer at the Centre for Women's Studies at Trinity College, Dublin. In 2011 she was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Literature by the National University of Ireland/Maynooth. The citation is included below.