Category Archives: Irish America

More Americans move to Ireland to flee Trump

Rosie O’Donnell isn’t the only American who has emigrated to Ireland to escape the realm of Mad King Don the Con.

Nearly 100 US citizens (94) sought formal political asylum in Ireland last year, up from 22 in 2024. The figure was 18 in 2023 and 13 in 2022, according to Irish Department of Justice data cited by the Irish Times.

Citizensinformation.ie, an Irish government website, provides this information about applying for asylum.

Another 9,600 US citizens moved to Ireland without seeking asylum protection in the 12 months to April 2025. That’s nearly double the 4,900 who immigrated to Ireland in the previous 12 months, the Times reported, citing data from the Central Statistics Office.

Numerous media outlets have reported surges in the number of US citizens who have applied for Irish passports since President Trump returned to the White House last January. RTÉ appears to have been one of the first to use the term “Trumpugees.”

Of course, it’s difficult to fully escape from Trump. His tariffs and other policy decisions have economic and political consequences in Ireland and the rest of the world. In September the Irish Open will be at held at Trump International Golf Links Ireland, in Doonbeg, County Clare.

The Trump golf and hotel operation has sought planning permission to build-wait for it–a new ballroom. That’s right, why just erect such a gathering place adjacent to the White House in Washington when you could also add one to the Clare coastline. A permit decision from Clare authorities is expected by late February.

The entrance of Trump’s Doonbeg golf course in County Clare during my July 2016 visit, while he was campaigning for his first term as US president.

Best of the Blog, 2025

My thirteenth year of producing this blog was productive and rewarding. Highlights included the publication of several freelance pieces in scholarly journals or the popular press. The University of Galway accepted my family’s letters between the U.S. and Ireland from the 1920s through the 1980s for their digital immigrant archives. I was interviewed for a St. Patrick’s Day television program and gave a presentation about Michael J. O’Brien, my 2024 entry in the Dictionary of Irish Biography. I made my thirteenth visit to Ireland in 25 years.

This website was on pace for record all-time traffic, then rocketed over the top by a mid-November surge of AI content-scraping bots. Or maybe thousands of readers in China have suddenly become interested in Irish news and history. I object to the unauthorized grab of my intellectual property, but I’m happy if it eventually contributes to global knowledge, especially my work about American journalists in Ireland.

More details and links to some of this year’s best content follow below each of the photos:

The gate between the Museum of Literature Ireland courtyard and the Iveagh Gardens. “MoLI replaced the former Dublin Writer’s Museum.

Freelance pieces

The former London and North Western Hotel seen in April 2025. A group of American journalists watched from the top floor as Irish rebels and British forces fired on each other during the 1916 Rising. The dark glass building at right is part of the Salesforce Tower, which renovated the former hotel as office and meeting space. The red brick structure at left is the former railway and steam packet terminal operated by the L&NW hotel company. It was vacant during my visit. The building faces the River Liffey.

Two blog series:

Revisiting William Brayden’s 1925 ‘survey’ of Ireland

The Irish-born journalist wrote a summer 1925 series for the Chicago Daily News about the state of Ireland on both sides of the partition. His series, later compiled as a book, and follow up reporting about the end of the Irish Boundary Commission served as the conclusion to American newspaper coverage of Ireland’s decade-long revolutionary period.

Leon and Jill Uris in Ireland

The American husband and wife team, author and photographer, respectively, made several visits during the 1970s. They produced photobooks and a bestselling novel that perpetuated notions of “romantic Ireland” before the Republic’s economic modernization and the Good Friday Agreement at the end of the 20th century.

Family letters

Nearly 60 of my family’s letters to and from Ireland were accessioned and digitized in the Imirce (Irish for migration, emigration) project at the University of Galway. The searchable Joan Diggin Collection is named after my aunt, who either authored or was the recipient of most of the letters. The collection also includes a digitized copy of my 2013 book, His Last Trip, about Joan’s father, my grandfather. The letter manuscripts and a print copy of the book may be consulted in the Archives and Special Collections Reading Room.

This February 25, 1953, note from Ireland before St. Patrick’s Day is part of the Imirce collection. I kept the shamrocks, which also were included in several other letters.

Television interview

Watch my St. Patrick’s Day interview with FOX 8’s “News Now” in Johnstown, Pa. The conversation covers my Irish ancestry and historical research. Each segment is 5 minutes:

My remote St. Patrick’s Day television appearance for FOX 8 in Johnstown, Pa., included the obligatory bookcase in the background. But they are real books that I’ve actually read and use.

Thanks archivists, librarians, and others

This year’s research included multiple visits to the Library of Congress, National Archives and Records Administration, and Catholic University of America here in Washington, D.C. I also spent time at the National Library of Ireland, Dublin, New York Public Library, and the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh Archives and Records Center. I received remote help from the Newberry Library in Chicago, the Catholic Diocese of Gaylord, Mich., and the Paulist Archives in New York City. As always, I am grateful to the professionals at these institutions who assisted my work. … I was delighted to contribute some research and materials to “The Irish Revolution in the African American Press” exhibition at University College Cork. It focused on how the US black press covered De Valera’s tour of America (1919–20), MacSwiney’s hunger strike death (1920), and the Anglo-Irish Treaty (1921-22). Dr. Jemima Hodgkinson, a Research Ireland postdoctoral fellow, curated the exhibit. … I enjoyed watching excellent presentations by Irish historians (and friends) Daniel Carey and John Dorney at the “Navigating War and Violence in Twentieth-Century Ireland” conference at Dublin City University in April. … On the same trip I was welcomed to Dungloe, County Donegal, by Patrick J. Dunleavy, chairman of the The Cope’s board of directors, who gave me a detailed driving tour of the Rosses region, and by Mark Sharkey and Emma McGarvey, Cope CEO and business support manager, respectively.

I hope to return to Ireland in 2026, and to visit two new domestic archives I’ve eyed for some time. Meanwhile, happy holidays to the site’s human readers, especially my loyal email subscribers. Sláinte!

Low tide twilight at Dungloe, County Donegal. The pier at left replaced the one constructed during the revolutionary period and detailed in 1922 by American journalist Redfern Mason.

More on Jill and Leon Uris in Ireland

I’m keeping my promise to follow up an earlier post, When Jill and Leon Uris went to Ireland. The couple first visited both sides of the partitioned island from May 1972 to January 1973, then published Ireland: A Terrible Beauty in November 1975. The book featured nearly 400 photographs by Jill and text by Leon, an established author.

Leon released his Irish novel, Trinity, in 1976. It became a best-seller. The couple returned to Ireland at least five more times over the next few years. Jill photographed places that represented the fictional locations in Trinity. She did a piece for the Ladies’ Home Journal magazine headlined “Connor and Shelly,” which illustrated the novel’s main characters. Jill and Leon traveled the River Shannon on a houseboat, “a lovely second honeymoon,” she recalled in a second book of photos, Ireland Revisited, published in 1982.[1]Jill Uris, Ireland Revisited. [Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1982], 1-2.

Of her half dozen trips to Ireland, Jill enthused:

I always arrive with anticipation, wanting to be haunted by her mysteries and teased by her fantasies. I travel through her tortured landscape wondering what it is about this place that entices me so. Is it ancient ruins, wild seascapes, the hundred shades of green? Or is it the verbal jousting and continual singsong of stories in a language that is something beyond English …yet not quite foreign? It is all of these and more; it is a people whose goal is only to be themselves, whose spirit retains a dignity which is rare in today’s world. It is the Irish refusal to be servants to anyone but their own minds.[2]Ibid.

The Irish Independent published this advert on Dec. 8, 1982. The image appeared on the book jacket and on an inside page. Titled “Man of Aran,” the figure was Dara Beag Ó Fátharta, the “Bard of Inishmaan,” who died in 2012 at the age of 92.

Revisited received mostly tepid reviews. John M. McGown of Gannett News Service noted the Uris’s first photo book had become “a staple on the shelves of Irish Americans” and the second was “likely to become a companion piece.”[3]”Two authors write varying views of Irish”, St. Cloud (Minn.) Times, Dec. 2, 1982, and other papers. But Doug Wells of the Des Moines (Iowa) Register compared paging through Revisited to sitting through a neighbor’s vacation slides as he rhapsodized about how much he “just loved Ireland.”  Wells continued:

To be sure Jill Uris is a much better photographer than the man next door. Most of her photographs are well done. … She has concentrated on the rural, older Ireland, the romantic image most Americans have of the country. … But just as your neighbor babbles on and on about how beautiful it all was, so Uris carries on about Ireland. Her dullish prose, combined with snips and scraps from Irish writers and poets, upset what flow and balance the pictures provide.[4]”Too much, too little”, Des Moines (Iowa) Register, Oct. 17, 1982.

In Ireland, Frank Miller of the Sunday Press described Revisited as “a headless horse of a book, a book of photographs based on an unreality, lost and wandering somewhere between the myths and mists of romantic Ireland.” He also complained that Dara Beag Ó Fátharta (image above) appeared “no less than four times through the book.”[5]”Lost between myths and mists of romantic Ireland”, Sunday Press, (Dublin), Dec. 5, 1982.

Historical context

Ireland Revisited appeared a decade after Bloody Sunday in Derry, Northern Ireland. As copies reached American bookshops in autumn 1982, the Troubles’ death toll climbed to 1,794 by year’s end. This turned out to be roughly half the total of number of people killed in the conflict.[6]”Year of the death” in Malcolm Sutton’s Index of Deaths from the Conflict in Ireland, found at cain.ulster.ac.uk. Sutton’s index ranges from 1969 to 2001, three years after … Continue reading

Jill Uris wrote that after each of her trips to Ireland “the headlines from the North became more piercing. The people in the Republic wish the ‘troubles’ would just drift away. After all, they are finally building their own country and who needs the continuing hostility and fanaticism of Ulster?”

In fact, the Republic in the mid-1980s was “crippled by political violence, mass emigration, mass unemployment, political paralysis and a sense of hopelessness,” Michael McDowell, an independent member of Seanad Éireann, wrote at the start of 2025. It would take another decade or so before the Republic began the economic modernization known as the “Celtic Tiger” and citizens confronted abuses by the Catholic Church that resulted in today’s militant secularism. More then 40 years after Ireland Revisited, Ireland faces “very real” new challenges, McDowell concluded, “but very different from the dark past we left behind.”

So, too, “Romantic Ireland’s dead and gone. It’s with O’Leary in the grave.”[7]”September 1913” by William Butler Yeats.

References

References
↑1 Jill Uris, Ireland Revisited. [Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1982], 1-2.
↑2 Ibid.
↑3 ”Two authors write varying views of Irish”, St. Cloud (Minn.) Times, Dec. 2, 1982, and other papers.
↑4 ”Too much, too little”, Des Moines (Iowa) Register, Oct. 17, 1982.
↑5 ”Lost between myths and mists of romantic Ireland”, Sunday Press, (Dublin), Dec. 5, 1982.
↑6 ”Year of the death” in Malcolm Sutton’s Index of Deaths from the Conflict in Ireland, found at cain.ulster.ac.uk. Sutton’s index ranges from 1969 to 2001, three years after the Good Friday Agreement.
↑7 ”September 1913” by William Butler Yeats.

On press reports of Ireland’s ‘first’ president, 1938

(My next post will be the eve of the election, Oct. 23, with updates through election day until the winner is announced, probably Oct. 25 or 26. MH)

Irish voters on Oct. 24 will elect the country’s tenth president under the constitution their ancestors adopted in 1937. Irish language scholar Douglas Hyde was nominated as the first president in 1938 by the country’s two main political parties, avoiding a contested election.

“Not a word of English was spoken at the inauguration of the Protestant as the head of the Catholic state,” the Associated Press reported to American newspaper readers. Americans in several markets such as New York/New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Washington, D.C. also were able to listen to a radio broadcast of the Irish language inaugural from Dublin.[1]”Dr. Hyde Inducted As Irish President”, Philadelphia Inquirer, June 28, 1938, and other papers. Radio program listings in multiple papers.

Statue of Douglas Hyde in Co. Roscommon.

Nine of every 10 Irish citizens in 1938 were Catholic, and many aspects of the country’s political and social life were certainly influenced by the Church. But the new constitution that began to transform the 26 counties of southern Ireland from the Irish Free State, created in 1922 as a dominion of the United Kingdom, “did not declare Catholicism the state religion, to the disappointment of my zealous Catholics.” The 1937 constitution also did not declare an Irish republic, though the document defined the state as having 32 counties.[2]Diarmaid Ferriter, The Transformation of Ireland. [New York: Overlook Press, 2005], 369-70.

Some American news analysts framed Hyde’s selection as an olive branch to the six partitioned counties of North Ireland, which was roughly two thirds Protestant at the time.[3]In 1937, 30.5 % Presbyterian; 27% Church of Ireland; 4.7% Methodist. “Breakdown of population in Northern Ireland according to Religion, 1861-1991” at CAIN Archive. Catholics now outnumber … Continue reading But Hyde’s ascendance to the new figure head position of president did not reassure northern hardliners. The Ulster Unionist Party of Sir James Craig solidified its hold on power in the north during an election earlier in 1938. The Anglo-Irish Trade Agreement of that year, which ended a five-year dispute over tariffs and transferred control of several naval ports from Britain to Ireland, further reinforced northern recalcitrance.

Hyde’s religious affiliation was not the only thing that made him an unconventional choice. “Politicians usually want a practical man as the head of the state, but Dr. Hyde is a poet,” observed Milton Bronner of the Newspaper Enterprise Association. “The dominant cry in Europe is for young men as leaders, but the Irish chose Dr. Hyde, who is 78.”[4]”Aged Poet, ‘Enemy of None,’ To Be President of Ireland”, Pittsburgh Press, June 5, 1938, and other papers. For more on Bronner, see my post: “Could Maine potatoes have … Continue reading

Bronner’s analysis and other American press reports about Hyde’s inauguration noted his 1906-07 tour of the United States to raise money and awareness for the Gaelic League. These same stories mention that Eamon de Valera, as taoiseach, or prime minister, continued to hold the real political power in southern Ireland. But I have not found any American coverage that recounted de Valera’s 1919-20 U.S. tour as “president of the Irish republic.”

De Valera in 1937.

No such position or country formally existed at the time. De Valera’s real title was Príomh Aire, the chief minister or president of Dáil Éireann; the separatist parliament established in January 1919 by Sinn Féin candidates who won Irish constituencies in the December 1918 British general election. The title of president of Ireland was bestowed on de Valera by Irish American supporters to more easily convey his leadership position to American audiences.

In 1938, at least one letter to the editor writer in Ireland questioned the new title of Irish president, even if the American press missed the historical irony. The Dublin writer noted not only that de Valera had declared himself president in 1919, but also that Pádraic Pearse made the same claim at the 1916 Easter Rising. “Apparently we are now expected to forget that the Irish republic ever existed, or that the blood of Ireland’s greatest men was shed in its defense, and to regard the history of Ireland as commencing on the date of the enactment of de Valera’s new constitution.”[5]”President of Ireland” in “Our Readers’ Views On Topics Of The Day”, Irish Independent, June 27, 1938.

Afterward:

  • Full republic status came to the 26 counties of southern Ireland in 1949. The 1937 constitution’s claim on a 32-county state was amended in 1998 as part of the Good Friday Agreement.
  • De Valera transitioned from taoiseach to president in 1959. He held the latter position until 1973.
  • The Irish Times has ranked Hyde as second best among the nine presidents of Ireland, with de Valera placed at seventh. See their list.

The two candidates vying for the Irish presidency later this month are Catherine Connolly, who was raised Catholic but describers herself as areligious, and Heather Humphreys, a Presbyterian by religious affiliation who describes her politics as moderate Irish republicanism rather than Protestant unionism. Connolly is a fluent Irish speaker, while Humphrey struggles with the language. As mentioned in the previous post, whoever wins the election will become Ireland’s third woman president.

References

References
↑1 ”Dr. Hyde Inducted As Irish President”, Philadelphia Inquirer, June 28, 1938, and other papers. Radio program listings in multiple papers.
↑2 Diarmaid Ferriter, The Transformation of Ireland. [New York: Overlook Press, 2005], 369-70.
↑3 In 1937, 30.5 % Presbyterian; 27% Church of Ireland; 4.7% Methodist. “Breakdown of population in Northern Ireland according to Religion, 1861-1991” at CAIN Archive. Catholics now outnumber Protestants in Northern Ireland by 45.7% to 43.5%.
↑4 ”Aged Poet, ‘Enemy of None,’ To Be President of Ireland”, Pittsburgh Press, June 5, 1938, and other papers. For more on Bronner, see my post: “Could Maine potatoes have relieved Irish hunger in 1925?“
↑5 ”President of Ireland” in “Our Readers’ Views On Topics Of The Day”, Irish Independent, June 27, 1938.

Irish Embassy USA changes location; loses charm, history

The Embassy of Ireland USA in Washington, D.C. has relocated from an historic early 20th century mansion to a recently renovated 1966 office building steps from the White House. The old location was the home of the Irish republic in the American capital for 75 years.

New home of the Embassy of Ireland USA.

“We begin to write the next chapter in the great story of Ireland-U.S. relations,” Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Harris said during the Sept. 25 ribbon cutting at the new  embassy offices at 1700 Pennsylvania Avenue NW.

Known as The Mills Building, the 11-story building was renovated in 2022. It is across the street from Lafayette Park and the two-block portion of Pennsylvania Avenue closed to vehicle traffic, between 17th and 15th streets.

Access to the White House is highly restricted to guided tour groups, though Irish dignitaries are welcomed to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue every March. The grounds were officially closed by President Woodrow Wilson during the First World War. Fencing and other security measures began to appear during the 19th century.

The Munsey Building, shown in 1919, was demolished in 1980.

As many readers will know, the White House was designed by the Irish-born architect James Hoban. Fewer readers will know the first official offices of the Irish Free State in Washington were located in the Munsey Building, 1321 E. St. NW, between 13th and 14th streets, not too far from the new embassy. Timothy A. Smiddy represented the state until 1929. The Irish National Bureau produced the Friends of Irish Freedom’s weekly News Letter in the Munsey Building from 1919 to 1922. Éamon De Valera also kept an office there during his 1919-1920 tour of the United States.[1]See my November 2020 post, “Washington, D.C.’s Irish hot spots, 1919-1921“.

“This will be an excellent base from which to grow our vital political, economic and cultural ties with the US over the years ahead,” Harris said of the new Irish Embassy, according to an official statement. He emphasized that Ireland is the fifth largest source of foreign direct investment in the US, and that Irish companies have created more than 200,000 American jobs.

Leaving Embassy Row

The Irish Embassy was previously located at 2234 Massachusetts Avenue NW, on Sheridan Circle, part of the city’s historic “Embassy Row.” The semidetached limestone residence was designed by William Penn Cresson in the Louis XVI manner. Completed in 1909, it is known as the Henrietta M. Halliday House, after the widow of a wealthy businessman. It is unclear if she ever lived in the house, which was sold in 1911.[2]”Henrietta M. Halliday House (Irish Chancery)”, HABS No. DC-261, Historic American Buildings Survey, Office of Archeology and Historic Preservation, National Park Service, U.S. Department … Continue reading

The former Irish Embassy in October 1924, with Irish and EU flags at right, Ukrainian flag draped from balcony.

The Irish government purchased the property for $72,000 in August 1949. At the time, Ireland’s presence in Washington was still described as legation. Three months later Irish Minister to Washington Seán Nunan welcomed Irish Minister of Agriculture James Dillon, who was visiting the city for an international conference.[3]”Society News”, (Washington) Evening Star, Nov. 30, 1949. In March 1950, John Joseph Hearne became the first Irish ambassador to Washington.

The property is assessed at $6,548,040, according to DC tax records. It is being sold by the commercial real estate firm CBRE, which says it has not set an asking price. The adjoining 2232 Massachusetts Ave. is being co-marketed by residential real estate firm Compass for $2,995,000. See their Oct. 6 press release. (This paragraph was updated from the original post.)

In December 2023, the Irish government purchased the nine-bedroom mansion at 2221 30th Street NW as its official ambassadorial residence. The $12.25 million sale price shaved more than $4 million off the $16.5 million list price. The state began renting the 15,000 square-foot mansion as it sold its former ambassadorial residence at 2244 S Street NW, known as the Frederic Delano House, after an uncle of U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. That property sold for $8 million in March 2024.

Exempt & delinquent taxes

The new Irish ambassador’s residence had an outstanding District of Columbia tax bill of $33,502 as of Sept. 30. A notice of $153,910 in delinquent taxes and penalties was sent by the District to the Irish government in April. More than $30,000 in late fees and interest had been assessed since the property was purchase in December 2023. The most recent statement, dated Aug. 4, shows that no new assessments or penalties have been levied against the property, which suggests an exemption is now in place. The Irish Embassy could not be reached through its general telephone number.

Irish ambassador’s residence.

The former embassy property was exempt from taxes. More than 600 properties in the District owned by foreign governments accounted for $50.2 million in foregone tax revenue in 2019.[4]Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, May 2019, citing District of Columbia Office of the Chief Financial Officer 2018. The U.S. government owns some 2,800 properties exempt from District taxes, with an estimated market value of $52 billion, or $917.7 million in foregone property tax revenue annually. And then there are religious institutions, schools, and assorted non-profits, in addition to the District government’s own property, also exempt from taxes.

The Irish government’s tax-exempt status on other properties does not mean it automatically received a discount on a commercial lease, which I assume is the arrangement at The Mills Building. The U.S. State Department’s Office of Foreign Missions regulates such matters, which are more complicated than can be addressed here. Reciprocal treatment in the foreign country–in this case, the U.S. government in Ireland–is certainly a factor.

Personal note

On a personal note, I enjoyed visiting the former Irish Embassy on several occasions since I moved to Washington nearly 12 years ago. These opportunities came through my membership in Irish Network-DC, a professional and social group. The place certainly had the elegant feel of an earlier age, when the Society pages of DC dailies regularly reported the comings-and-goings of diplomats and other special guests. I visited the new ambassador’s residence once for an IN-DC event.

I live barely a five-minute walk from the now former embassy location. I enjoyed walking Irish visitors past the exterior, then continuing a few blocks further up Embassy Row to the small park centered by a statue of Robert Emmet.

At least Irish patriot remains in place.

References

References
↑1 See my November 2020 post, “Washington, D.C.’s Irish hot spots, 1919-1921“.
↑2 ”Henrietta M. Halliday House (Irish Chancery)”, HABS No. DC-261, Historic American Buildings Survey, Office of Archeology and Historic Preservation, National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, 1978.
↑3 ”Society News”, (Washington) Evening Star, Nov. 30, 1949.
↑4 Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, May 2019, citing District of Columbia Office of the Chief Financial Officer 2018.

New murals at St. Pat’s, NYC, depict USA immigrants, Knock

New murals depicting the 19th century arrival of Irish and other immigrants to America will be dedicated Sunday, Sept. 21, at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. The 12-panel installation by the Brooklyn-based artist Adam Cvijanovi also includes a representation of the 1879 Marian apparition at Knock, County Mayo.

“It’s a celebration of a city that has been built by immigrants and where immigrants have been welcomed,” Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, retiring archbishop of New York, told the New York Times. He led a 2015 pilgrimage to Knock, and in 2017 presided over the reburial of one of the 15 witnesses, an Irish immigrant laborer in New York.

I’ve requested authorized images of the murals from the Cathedral and will update the post if they are provided. Meanwhile, to honor the new artwork and mark “Half-Way to St. Patrick’s Day,” I reprise these earlier posts:

What you need to know about Knock’s vision visitors, 2017

My pilgrimages to St. Patrick’s churches, 2022

The new murals are the first major art commission in the cathedral since bronze doors were installed at the Fifth Avenue entrance in 1949. Shamrock detail from the doors.

The twin spires at night, October 2018.

Detailing the US deaths of Donegal’s ‘Tunnel Tigers’

In April I visited the Donegal Tunnel Tigers Memorial on the grounds of St. Crona’s Church in Dungloe, County Donegal. The statue and information panels honor nearly six dozen emigrants from the county who died in overseas in tunnel and mine accidents. The list includes seven men who were killed in the United States, a small subset of the Irishmen who died below the American landscape in the 19th and 20th centuries.

A few details about these seven workers from US newspapers and other sources are found below the monument photo. They are listed in chronological order with each man’s age and place of birth and death.

The monument was dedicated in 2019.

James O’Donnell, 29, B: Crolly, D: Butte, Montana

Killed with eight other miners on November 3, 1891. The cage in the Anaconda mine shaft was overloaded with 18 to 20 men.[1]“Hurled To Eternity”, Butte (Mont.) Daily Post, November 4, 1891.

Hugh Carney, 42, Glebe, B: Mountcharles, D: Butte

Was dislodged from the cage being lowered into the shaft at the Diamond mine on January 6, 1909. Seven other miners were in the cage when the door, said to be bolted, was torn off. Another man sustained right hand and arm injuries. The accident occurred about the 400 level of the 1,600-foot shaft.[2]“Falling Of Gate Remains Mystery”, The Anaconda (Mont.) Standard, January 9, 1909.

Philip Boyle, 34, B: Calhame, Annagry, D: Butte

Lost his footing on a wall plate  of the Modoc mine shaft and plunged 50 feet to the sump on December 22, 1912. He had arrived from Ireland in October and only begun to work at the silver and copper mine a week earlier. He left a wife and newborn son that he had not yet seen in Donegal. “A cablegram conveying the sad news to the young mother was sent last night, bringing sorrow at the happy Christmastide.”[3]“Killed Before He Could See Newborn Babe”, The Butte (Mont.) Miner, December 23, 1912, and “Misses His Footing, Plunges To Death”  The Anaconda (Mont.) Standard, December 23, 1912.

  • Neil Doherty, 26, B: Mullaghderg, D: Butte 

Shortly before midnight June 8, 1917, fire broke out more than 2,000 feet below ground in the North Butte Mining Company’s Granite Mountain/Speculator shaft. A total of 164 (some accounts say 168) miners died as flames, smoke, and poisonous gas spread through the labyrinth of underground tunnels.[4]Michael Punke, Fire and Brimstone: The North Butte Mining Disaster of 1917, [New York: Grand Central Publishing (Hachette Book Group), 2007] Contemporary newspaper accounts list Doherty’s age as 46.

  • John J. McGuinness, 39, B: Molville, D: Butte

Also died in the June 1917 Speculator fire. In 2000, Stewart Norris of Molville visited Butte and located the weather-beaten wooden marker over the McGuinness grave at the Holy Cross Cemetery. Norris made arrangements for a stone marker, according to a newspaper report. The contemporary story says McGuinness was 49.[5]“Irish visitor finds grave of friend’s grandfather, who died in Speculator fire” The Montana Standard (Butte), November 12, 2000.

Up to one quarter of Butte’s residents were from Ireland at the turn of the 20th century. They came from Mayo, Cork, and Kerry in addition to Donegal. Irish leader Eamon de Valera visited the town in 1919.

Neil Doherty and John J. McGuinness were listed among the “Identified Mine Dead.”

Cornelius Boyle, 28, B: Dungloe, D: New York City

On Friday, April 13, 1928, he was struck by a dislodged boulder while working on a subway tunnel under the East River between 53rd Street, Manhattan, and Long Island City, Queens.[6]“Bayonne Man Crushed To Death” Bayonne (NJ) Evening News, April 14, 1928.

Niece McCole, 32, B: Keadue, Burtonport, D: New York

The memorial panel says he was killed in 1932 in New York, though it is unclear if this was the city or state. I could not find coverage of this fatality in US and Irish newspaper databases. A coal miner named Niece McCole is mentioned in a 1906 story about Pennsylvania mine owners blocking unionized labor from their properties.[7]“Whistles Will Blow But No Union Men Will Respond To The Summons”, Buffalo (NY) Courier, April 2, 1906.

References

References
↑1 “Hurled To Eternity”, Butte (Mont.) Daily Post, November 4, 1891.
↑2 “Falling Of Gate Remains Mystery”, The Anaconda (Mont.) Standard, January 9, 1909.
↑3 “Killed Before He Could See Newborn Babe”, The Butte (Mont.) Miner, December 23, 1912, and “Misses His Footing, Plunges To Death”  The Anaconda (Mont.) Standard, December 23, 1912.
↑4 Michael Punke, Fire and Brimstone: The North Butte Mining Disaster of 1917, [New York: Grand Central Publishing (Hachette Book Group), 2007]
↑5 “Irish visitor finds grave of friend’s grandfather, who died in Speculator fire” The Montana Standard (Butte), November 12, 2000.
↑6 “Bayonne Man Crushed To Death” Bayonne (NJ) Evening News, April 14, 1928.
↑7 “Whistles Will Blow But No Union Men Will Respond To The Summons”, Buffalo (NY) Courier, April 2, 1906.

The ‘Irish Literary Supplement’ says slán

This summer, Robert G. Lowery published the final issue of the Irish Literary Supplement, a biannual journal that provided readers approximately 2,000 reviews since 1982.

“I’m grateful to all those reviewers and editors who were with me from the start, and those who joined the journey at stops along the way,” the editor and publisher wrote on the American Conference of Irish Studies (ACIS) Facebook page.

Lowery’s message generated more than three dozen supportive comments and nearly 100 positive emoji reactions as of the date this story was published.

“You have rendered the world of Irish Studies, indeed anyone interested in this country, its diaspora and its rich cultural history, a dedicated and generous service,” wrote Piaras Mac Éinrí, lecturer in Migration Studies and Geography at University College Cork.

Lowery, 84, has been a member of ACIS since 1975. He is the author of six books on Irish dramatist Sean O’Casey (1880-1964). In the 1970s, Lowery was founder and editor of the journal The Sean O’Casey Review. Simultaneously, he was editor of the ACIS Newsletter for 10 years and the Irish Arts Center (New York City) magazine Ais-Eiri for five years. He organized numerous conferences and centenary celebrations about Casey, and in 1986 delivered his extensive archive of O’Casey memorabilia to the Boston College Library.

The final issue of the ILS.

For most of its run the ILS was a cooperative venture between Lowery, ACIS, which provided mailing labels of its membership, and the Irish Studies program at Boston College, which provided sponsorship. Circulation fluctuated depending on ACIS membership, while at peak about 400 libraries subscribed to the journal.

“Before ILS, which most people can’t remember, there were very few outlets for book reviews on Irish subjects,” Lowery wrote in reply to my outreach. “The Times Literary Supplement would have one issue per year where Irish books filled the pages. And of course, the Irish newspapers carried book reviews, but this was before the internet and the only way to get Irish papers was at a few newsstands in New York City, Boston, and maybe Washington, D.C.

Before the internet … Today book publishers routinely bypass independent reviewers to promote their titles through web pages, email lists, and social media feeds. It seems to me that ILS readers and the Irish Studies scholars who wrote the reviews are shortchanged by these newer marketing strategies.

“Bob listened to many of us try out our work, which meant that he also had a sense of who might be able to review works that crossed his desk,” Timothy G. McMahon, Ph.D., associate professor of Modern Irish and British Empire History at Marquette University, Milwaukee, and a past ACIS president, wrote in an email. “A lot of us, therefore, got experience reviewing in the pages of the ILS, including learning how to deal with a tough-minded editor who cast a critical eye over the text.”

The final issue of ILS featured 21 reviews of books from 13 U.S., U.K., and Irish publishers, with a display advertisement from Wake Forest University Press, a supporter of the journal for decades. “I think it’s a strong ending,” Lowery wrote.

So what’s next?

Is there a future for the ILS?

Lowery, who owns the title through a Long Island, N.Y., entity called Irish Studies, said he hopes “an enterprising scholar” will pick up where has left off.

“The key to keeping such a publication going is to get the endorsement of ACIS,” he continued. “If you’re going digital, you can simply post the paper on the ACIS Facebook site; but I don’t know how you will fund it. It is too expensive to print, and print is somewhat passe anyway. When I started in 1982, first class postage for a 20-page paper to Ireland and England was 60 cents. Today, it’s $6.00. There is no 2nd or 3rd class postage.”

The endeavor also requires “a good strong Irish editor,” Lowery added. “I was lucky to have them.”

I reached out to ACIS and Boston College. I welcome members of the Irish Studies community to provide their thoughts about continuing the ILS in some format.

Will the Trumpistorians alter Irish American history?

UPDATE:

Read or listen to this Democracy Now! interview with Annette Gordon-Reed, a Harvard history professor and president of the Organization of American Historians.

ORIGINAL POST:

The Trump administration announced August 12 that it would begin a comprehensive review of current and planned exhibitions at the Smithsonian Institution, which describes itself as “the world’s largest museum, education, and research complex.” The administration said that it will examine museum display text and website and social media content “to assess tone, historical framing and alignment with American ideals.”

This is part of a broader effort by US President Donald Trump to stamp his gilded, white-washed view of American history on the nation’s 250th anniversary in 2026, and beyond. Earlier this year the Smithsonian removed, then revised, references to Trump’s two impeachments. Historians are alarmed.

Of course, Ireland and the Irish loom large in American history. Several signatories of the Declaration of Independence were born in Ireland or had Irish roots. Mass Irish immigration in the mid-nineteenth century provided soldiers for the US Civil War and labor for American commerce. Ireland’s struggles for freedom and equality have influenced American politics and culture throughout the twentieth century; from helping to scuttle the League of Nations in 1919 to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, with many St. Patrick’s Day parades in between.

The Smithsonian holds numerous objects and artifacts related to Irish American history. Some have been displayed in public, others featured in institution publications and platforms.

The all-time most viewed post on this site was inspired in 2017 by a display about immigration at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. The “Irish radicalism” addressed in the 1889 political cartoon seen below has been widely discussed by other online platforms, which probably has something to do with the digital traffic. I am not sure if the display I viewed eight years ago is still at the museum, and if so, whether it will survive the Trump scrub.

“Irish radicals were seen as too unruly to mix in,” the Smithsonian said in 2017.

Another item from the Smithsonian’s website details an 1882 banner honoring Irish American boxer John L. Sullivan. The April 2018 post notes the history of sports figures who wade into politics, including contemporary athletes who refused “to visit the Obama and Trump White Houses.” How will the Trumpistorians deal with this description:

“The Irish were never held as slaves in America, but into the late 1800s Irish Americans continued to battle long-standing prejudices that led many people to think of them as inferior to other European Americans. British and American writers blamed Irish people themselves rather than imperialism and bigotry for Irish poverty. They cited Irish allegiance to the Catholic Church, unsupported applications of Darwin’s theory of evolution, and the pseudoscience of phrenology—which wrongly claimed a link between people’s intellectual potential and the outline of their heads—to claim that Irish people were less independent and less intelligent than “Anglo-Teutonic” people from Northern Europe. Often, as the illustrations below demonstrate, the alleged differences were described in racial terms, with the Irish either not considered white or considered less human than other whites.”

The post goes on to explore Sullivan’s “empathy for the South in the wake of the Civil War and his desire to see the South and North reconciled in a nation that valued white supremacy.” Will the Trumpistorians remove the references to slavery and phrenology but keep the part about white supremacy?

Here’s a March 2015 post that details “four objects that reveal facets of the Irish American experience.” The opening section about early twentieth century St. Patrick’s Day postcards says that many were based on “unflattering stereotypes of the Irish as drinkers, fighters, or simple country bumpkins.” It says that Irish Americans used “protests, boycotts, and calls for the police to confiscate the ‘indecent literature’” as an example of how “both individuals and groups often use whatever power and resources they have at their disposal to push back.”

Was this “cancel culture?” Will the Trumpistorians allow content that speaks about protesting commercial interests, let alone an unpopular government?

These are just three examples. I imagine content that names Trump, such as the second item in this post (Obama and Trump in the same sentence, oh my!), will receive the most immediate attention. Trump seems to have a conflicted relationship with Ireland. He owns a golf course in Clare and has an affinity for Conor McGregor (both convicted in civil courts of sexual misconduct). But Trump has targeted Ireland’s tax schemes and High Tech and Big Pharma infrastructure in his overhaul of global trade, and he doesn’t care for its support of the Palestinians.

I’ll be watching this story over the coming year. I invite readers to send other examples from the Smithsonian or other institutions that could face Trump’s revisionism on Irish issues. And, of course, you are very welcome to visit the Smithsonian museums here in the city of Washington, D.C., now occupied by Trump’s troops.

Brayden on American tourists in Ireland, 1925

William Henry Brayden made several references to the Irish tourism industry in his summer 1925 newspaper series, later consolidated into a small book.[1]See my Brayden series introduction. German U-boats no longer threatened ocean travel. The smoke of more than a decade of world war and revolutionary gunfire and bombings had cleared to reveal Ireland’s verdant beauty and hospitality. Americans and other foreigners once again began to arrive.

Wm. Brayden

“It is now the settled policy of the Free State to attract visitors to holidays in Ireland,” Brayden declared in the opening installment of his 16-part series for the Chicago Daily News.[2]”Ireland No Longer Distressful Country”, Chicago Daily News, June 16, 1925; and William H. Brayden, The Irish Free State: a survey of the newly constructed institutions of the self-governing … Continue reading He continued:

“It is thought that the time has at last come when Ireland, besides its natural scenic beauties and facilities for sport, has much that is attractive and hopeful to exhibit. Any visitor will speedily recognize a change in the outlook of the people. Ireland is no longer a distressful country. People are beginning to think of the future over which they have some power of control rather than of the past where effort was so long checked because it seemed hopeless.”

Brayden said visitors would recognize the separation of the 26-county Irish Free State from Great Britain “by the examination of his baggage at the customs. He will note the promptitude and civility of the new officials.”

But Brayden also reported a significant problem with the new system “proved embarrassing to some visitors.” Before boarding eastbound ocean steamers, American travelers were required to buy a $10 visa from the new Irish Free State passport office in New York City. Great Britain offered a visa without charge. Travelers who disembarked in England or Northern Ireland could travel into the Free State without the Irish visa. But those who attempted to land in the Free State without the Irish visa were stopped.

This image is from Wallace Nutting’s 1925 photobook ‘Ireland Beautiful.’ Read my ‘History Ireland’ story, linked below, to learn how this American book helped to boost Irish tourism.

“All this passport business is still in an inchoate and unsatisfactory state,” Brayden reported. “Tourist associations complain of it as a hinderance to the movement for encouraging visitors to Ireland.”[3]“Ireland Now Deals With Other Nations”, Chicago Daily News, July 2, 1920, and Brayden, A survey, 23.

The correspondent observed many Americans in Cork city. “They were to be seen everywhere in the streets and in the stores.” A few were disappointed there were no “American bars” to offer mixed cocktails and “had to be content with the unmixed native product.”[4]“Cork Is Recovering From Its War Wounds”, Chicago Daily News, July 11, 1920; and Brayden, A survey, 33. Remember, prohibition had been US law for five years by 1925. Such measures were being discussed on the island of Ireland–more in the north than the south, Brayden reported–but did not pass. Some liquor laws were later tightened, such as sales on Good Friday and Christmas Day.

My article in the July/August issue of History Ireland magazine, Ireland Beautiful–How A 1925 American Photobook Boosted Irish Tourism, explores more about 1925 American tourism in Ireland. American who visit Ireland this summer are encouraged to share your impressions for a future post. Contact me through the blog.

References

References
↑1 See my Brayden series introduction.
↑2 ”Ireland No Longer Distressful Country”, Chicago Daily News, June 16, 1925; and William H. Brayden, The Irish Free State: a survey of the newly constructed institutions of the self-governing Irish people, together with a report on Ulster. [Chicago: Chicago Daily News, 1925], 4.
↑3 “Ireland Now Deals With Other Nations”, Chicago Daily News, July 2, 1920, and Brayden, A survey, 23.
↑4 “Cork Is Recovering From Its War Wounds”, Chicago Daily News, July 11, 1920; and Brayden, A survey, 33.