Young, Rose Maud (Ní Ó hÓgain, Róis) (1865–1947), Irish-language scholar, was born 30 October 1865 in Galgorm Castle, near Ballymena, Co. Antrim, fifth daughter among seven daughters and five sons of John Young (1826–1915) and his first wife, Grace (née Savage). John Young was a founder and managing director of the large Braidwater spinning company, and as a director of the Northern Counties Railway was also important in the development of railways in the north of Ireland. He was prominent in philanthropy, in public life, and in the presbyterian church in Belfast and Ballymena; in 1886 he was the first presbyterian to be sworn of the privy council, and held strongly unionist opinions.
Rose Young was educated at home, and sat some of the Cambridge examinations that were open to women; in 1899 she entered Cambridge Training College and later briefly became a governess. She joined the Gaelic League in London, and in 1903 took classes in the Irish language there, and later in Belfast. In 1904 she was one of a number of protestant gentry on the committee that established the first Feis in the Glens of Antrim, and she was an enthusiastic supporter of the movement thereafter. In 1907–8 she travelled from Galgorm to attend classes and sit examinations in the Coláiste Chomhghaill on the Falls Road, Belfast; on visits to Dublin she became friendly with many of the Gaelic League activists, and was encouraged by Patrick Dinneen (qv) and Osborn Bergin (qv) to edit an anthology of old Irish poetry. The first volume of Duanaire gaedhilge appeared in 1921, with two others in 1924 and 1930; they contained folksongs and medieval and Ossianic poetry, most of which had already appeared in print. A few songs were collected by the editor from native speakers of Ulster Irish, and most of the English translations of the Ossianic poems in the third volume were her own work. The editor's scholarship and literary taste were highly commended. The appended notes, biographical details, and vocabulary made the volumes valuable teaching aids, and set a pattern for textbooks of Irish literature for several generations of schoolchildren. Young published an article on Rathlin Irish, and was interested in early Irish Christian spirituality. She lived for the last sixteen years of her life with her friend Margaret Dobbs (qv) in Cushendun, Co. Antrim; after her death on 28 May 1947, she was buried in the family plot at Ahoghill.
A number of protestant gentry women from Co. Antrim created their reputations in Irish-language circles, rather than in the society of the day. Women were freer to respond to Irish traditions and to contribute to Gaelic scholarship than the men of their class, who more often adopted the roles that were expected of them. Young's brothers, like her father, were influential in Ulster life and politics, and strongly unionist; her youngest brother, George Young (1876–1939), managing director of the Braidwater spinning company and Stormont MP for Bannside (1929–39), listed his recreations as ‘politics, Orangeism, and the Special Constabulary’ in his Who's who entry. Despite such apparent dissimilarities within the family, relatives state that Rose Young was never ostracised; she and her elder brother and sister had attended the first Feis in Cushendall together, before society became polarised and cultural traditions politicised in Northern Ireland.