This is a picture of my grandfather, John Thomas Hughes, born January 1891 in Dundalk, Co. Louth. He died in May of 1954, so I never had the pleasure of meeting him, but I have garnered information through stories from my father, my visits with relatives in Ireland, and from my own genealogical research. My dad and I spent a very poignant day in October 2003 at Calvary … [Read more...] about Family Album: John Hughes
Photo Album
Family Album:
Denny-Fitz and Hanna
Our grandfather Dennis O’Connor was born in 1864 near the town of Abbeyfeale, in County Limerick. He and his 10 siblings were raised in a four-room cottage on a small farm bordering the River Feale. Dennis and his younger brother Michael immigrated to America in 1888. They stepped off a Rock Island freight train near the small town of Grayson, Missouri to begin their lives in … [Read more...] about Family Album:
Denny-Fitz and Hanna
Family Album: Grandma Ellen Heaney
This is a photograph of my grandmother, Ellen Heaney, who immigrated to New York City in 1900 from Drumlish, County Longford. She was a maid and from her meager salary she saved up to purchase this dress from Macy’s. She married Michael Kane from Esker, County Longford in 1908. They lived on the Westside in St. Bernard’s Parish where they raised six children, one of whom was … [Read more...] about Family Album: Grandma Ellen Heaney
Photo Album: The Wealth of the World
At rest, this picture belongs to a wedding album from 1966. Plain, awkward even, it was composed by the photographer whose job it was to snap the parents of the groom. It doesn’t speak of small Galway farms disappearing over shoulders, the ride over the sea, their names. They are Edward Donohoe and Winnie, who was first Una Ryan, then Winnie Donohoe and, for an afternoon, Jane … [Read more...] about Photo Album: The Wealth of the World
Photo Album: Mother Moriarty
Photo Album: Family Pictures Mary O’Connell and her six siblings were born in Abbeyfeale, Co. Limerick, Ireland. They were orphaned at an early age. Under the guardianship of their aunt Mary Hartnett Smith and uncle Rev. John Hartnett, pastor of St. Cecilia’s Church, they immigrated to San Francisco during the early 1920s. The young family finished their education at St. … [Read more...] about Photo Album: Mother Moriarty