Names such as Kelly, Murphy, O'Brien and Ryan are distinctively Irish and are widely known to be so. However, there are many names which are Irish but this fact is far from obvious. Names such as Holland, King, Waters, Rabbitte, Woods, Smith, Kidney, Bird, Salmon, Moore, Traynor, Moss, Fox and Dean and many others can be of Irish origin due to some strange evolutions of … [Read more...] about Roots: That’s Not an Irish Name!
July August 1993
(Un)lucky Strike
The Comstock Lode provided over half the silver ever mined in the United States but the Irishmen who discovered it weren't quite as lucky as one might think. By Jim Sullivan. Between 1850 and 1860 the numbers of Irish arriving on the shores of America rose from 206,041 to an incredible 1,611,304! Packed into the slums of New York City's East Side and Boston's North End, many … [Read more...] about (Un)lucky Strike
An American in Ireland
Denise Hall, an American journalist, gave up the fast-track for the briar paths in a remote corner of Ireland. I lived in Los Angeles for ten years. For three of those years, I worked for the legendary National Enquirer, and I was definitely ready for a change. It wasn't just the lurking behind palm trees in expensive Beverly Hills restaurants that eventually got to me. I … [Read more...] about An American in Ireland
Blazes Boylan
Twenty-two years in the music business, three previous songs in Ireland's National Song Contest and suddenly it was all happening for Jimmy Walsh, who kept on plugging until he made it. Walsh's song "In Your Eyes" won the Eurovision Song Contest, the biggest competition of its kind in Europe which is broadcast live via satellite. Over three hundred million people watched Niamh … [Read more...] about Blazes Boylan
The Vision of Mary Robinson
On her recent visit to the United States President Mary Robinson (49) became for Irish Americans the embodiment of a new Ireland, an Ireland in which the Irish diaspora – those 70 million worldwide who can trace their roots to the Emerald Isle – were once again welcome. Perhaps it happened as she gave her magnificent speech at Ellis Island, commemorating the first immigrant to … [Read more...] about The Vision of Mary Robinson




