Education
Both she and her sister Beatrice attended Alexandra College, Dublin, and later the Ursuline convent, Waterford.
Both she and her sister Beatrice attended Alexandra College, Dublin, and later the Ursuline convent, Waterford.
Butler was one of the first women to get a pilot"s licence in Ireland. Born Katherine Bayley Butler, she was the eldest of two daughters of James Bayley Butler and Katherine Butler (née McWeeney). She used this time to undertake a degree in science at University College Dublin.
Butler had become interested in aviation after seeing Sir Alan Cobham"s Air Circus in the early 1930s, and so began to take flying lessons at Kildonan Aerodrome, with pilots such as John Currie.
On 15 January 1936 she became the third woman in Ireland to receive a pilot"s licence. She was given the name Senior Mary Alphonsus, though later reverted to Katherine Butler, remarking that "there were no nuns with double-barrel names."
Having finished her novitiate, Butler graduated as a teacher in 1938 and spent many years in the profession.
Butler spent time in England teaching during World World War II, and later studied in Rome in the late 1960s. Butler taught at the order"s secondary school in Mountjoy Street, Dublin, later helping to found new secondary schools in Foxford, County Mayo, serving as principal, and Walkinstown, Dublin.
She last taught in the order"s Marymount school in Harold"s Cross, before moving to the order"s Crumlin convent in 1977.
Whilst in Crumlin, Butler began an outreach programme, conducting home visits with her pupils. Following this publication, Butler referred to the "apostolate of the pen" and wrote a prodigious amount of letters to lonely people, prisoners, and occasionally to the national newspapers. Butler died on 8 August 2000 in Crumlin.
Butler was an active member of the Old Dublin Society, and wrote for their journal the Dublin Historical Record, winning the Society"s annual award for best paper three times.