Roots Archive
Roots: The O’Briens
The O’Briens are one of the great Gaelic families of Ireland, and were the rulers…
Roots: Byrnes and O’Beirnes
The names O’Byrne and O’Beirne (or Byrne and Beirne) are often regarded as variants of…
Roots: The Burkes
Burke (or Bourke) is one of the most popular Irish names of Norman origin. The…
More Articles
Finding Our Roots
For many Irish Americans traveling to the Emerald Isle, the chance to track down family histories and conduct genealogical research is one of the largest draws. Failte Ireland, the National […]
How I Found My Elusive John Murphy
The Deadly Trail that Finally Revealed a Phantom Branch of My Family Tree My earliest American-born ancestor was my great-great-grandfather, Edward Murphy. It took a while to figure this out […]
Irish Roots and Rituals
Growing up in New York City, I lived in the heart of the American melting pot. There seemed to be a festival or parade celebrating the city’s nationalities and ethnicities […]
Connecting After a Half-Century
‘God bless Facebook’ That was the phrase that kept going through my head in Glasgow Crematorium. As I listened to the minister conducting the funeral service I was wondering if […]
Island Man
Q. What do Bob Marley and U2 have in Common? A. Chris Blackwell The founder of Island Records talks to Marilyn Cole Lownes about his Irish Jamaican heritage, U2, and […]
How Name Changing Hid a Heritage
Barry Manilow. Yes, I know, most think of him as a Jewish fellow from Brooklyn – and he is. But he’s also a quarter Irish, and due to certain circumstances […]