Today in History

On this day in 1869, eight Irish laborers joined forces with a group of Chinese laborers to lay ten miles and fifty-six feet of track in under twelve hours for the Central Pacific Railroad company. It was a record in track-laying never to be equalled. The feat was the result of an ongoing rivalry between the Union Pacific and Charles Crocker’s Central Pacific. Each rail handler … [Read more...] about April 28, 1869

Clan Na Gael, the American counterpart to Ireland's revolutionary Irish Republican Brotherhood, was founded on this day in 1867. John Devoy, Daniel Cohalan and Joseph McGarrity help form the brotherhood in New York, with the purpose of securing an independent Ireland. … [Read more...] about June 20, 1867

Nellie Bly, American journalist, was born Elizabeth Jane Cochran to Irish immigrants in Pennsylvania. Born in Cochran Mill's, an area named for her father Michael who began as a mill laborer and ended up owning the mill. Bly once faked insanity to expose inhumane practices in the Women's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island. In doing so she spawned a new form of "investigative" … [Read more...] about May 5, 1867

Renegade Irish American Fenians invade Ontario, Canada from the U.S. and successfully capture Fort Erie. Their purpose was to disrupt the transportation network in Canada until Britain would recognize Ireland's freedom. Approximately 1,000 Fenian brothers, under the command of Colonel John O'Neill, crossed the Niagara River. They defeated the inexperienced Canadian militia at … [Read more...] about June 1, 1866

William Butler Yeats, Ireland's most famous poet and one of the leading literary figures of the 20th century, was born in Sandyhurst, Co. Dublin on this day in 1865 to an upper class Protestant family. He spent much of his childhood in Co. Sligo, which heavily influenced Yeats's natural themes, and he read classics like Shakespeare, Donne, Alighieri and Shelley. With Lady … [Read more...] about June 13, 1865