1998
Historic Times in Ireland
Irish America's publisher Niall O'Dowd wrote the following column on the occasion of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement on April 5, 1998. Every once in a lifetime or so comes an opportunity to reflect on truly historic news which affects all Irish Americans of whatever class or creed. The peace agreement signed in Northern Ireland on Good Friday after much burning of the … [Read more...] about Historic Times in Ireland
Mrs. O’Leary Exonerated
March/April 1998
The truth would have made a great story: Catherine O'Leary, successful Irish immigrant businesswoman. She had five cows in her dairy and her husband Patrick was gainfully employed as a lathe-worker. As Catherine and Patrick slept on that dry October night in 1871, someone started a fire in their barn. The blaze grew into the Great Chicago Fire, killing 300 people, leaving … [Read more...] about Mrs. O’Leary Exonerated
Flannery O’Connor’s
Irish Roots
How Flannery O’Connor’s upbringing and her Irish Catholic heritage impacted her writing.O’Connor’s great-great-grandfather, Patrick Harty, came to Georgia in 1824 from County Tipperary, settling in Taliaferro County. His Irish-born daughter Johannah, who became Flannery O’Connor’s great-grandmother, married Hugh Donnelly Treanor in 1848. Hugh had also emigrated from Tipperary, … [Read more...] about Flannery O’Connor’s
Irish Roots
The United Irishmen and the 1798 Rebellion
The Society of United Irishmen, founded in Belfast on October 26, 1791 by radical political thinkers, including Theobald Wolfe Tone, Hamilton Rowan, Samuel Nellson, Henry Joy McCracken and Thomas Russell, the organization's declared objective was "equal representation of all the people in parliament" and the establishment of a political system that would include all religious … [Read more...] about The United Irishmen and the 1798 Rebellion