Volume 8, Issue 6

St Brigid’s Church - A Landmark within Irish Immigrant History
By Sandra Ordoñez

St. Brigid’s Church, located in Manhattan’s East Village, is the one of the oldest standing churches designed by the famous Irish architect, Patrick Keely. Also known as The Famine Church, St. Brigid’s was constructed by Irish immigrants who had escaped the Famine in Ireland during the 19th century. Not surprisingly, St. Brigid’s is considered a historical landmark for New Yorkers and the Irish community at large.

Since 2003, however, the church has been at the center of an intense debate. The Archdiocese of New York claims that St. Brigid’s has experienced structural damage that would cost over $6.9 million to repair, and thus would be demolishing the church. Preservationist and the New York Irish community reacted to the news stating that the church was a cultural treasure that should be preserved at all costs. In 2006, the Committee to Save St. Brigid’s sued to block the Archdiocese’s demolition plans. While the State Supreme Court justice dismissed the lawsuit claiming it an “impermissible intrusion” into the Archdiocese’s authority, the Committee has appealed the decision. To date, the fate of St. Brigid’s has not been decided.

Read more: Subscribe!

Volume 8, Issue 6

In Newfoundland the old country is never forgotten
by James Tarrant

Photos courtesy of Newfoundland and Labrador Department of Tourism

You can't walk very far in Newfoundland before hearing an Irish dialect, seeing architecture that reminds you of Dublin or some other reminiscence of Irish culture. And Irish traditional music is no different. Ever since the provinces first wave of European immigration in the 19th century, it has more than made a significant stamp in Canada’s most eastern province.

For Newfoundland it's culture and history have always been defined by traditional music, namely shanties, and ballads sung by early European explorers and Newfoundland fishermen who entertained themselves in the bays, coves and inlets dotted along the coastline. This form of in-house entertainment also became known as kitchen parties because they were always located in that area of the home. Throughout the provinces history church hymns, military bands, fiddling, flute playing, bag piping, also accompanied vocalists, while new settlers wrote songs to reflect the everyday experiences of life on the rock (a nickname for Newfoundland, because of it’s rocky soil and its many geological formations).

Read more: Subscribe!

Volume 8, Issue 6

President Kennedy’s Trip to Ireland All About Family
By Michael P. Quinlin

When President John F. Kennedy made his famous visit to Ireland, June 26-29, 1963, he was enmeshed in significant global issues: the Berlin Wall, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the threat of communism in the nuclear age, and the very future of democracy itself.

But during that trip, President Kennedy also gave the world a remarkably intimate glimpse into his family roots and genealogy, and therefore into the man himself. In many ways it was Kennedy’s public enthusiasm for his ancestral homeland and his unabashed delight at meeting his Irish cousins that left the most lasting impression in the public mind, and helped to shape his persona as a world leader.

That impression – of Kennedy’s pride in family and heritage - endures today among many Irish and Irish-Americans, and is the focus of an exciting exhibit on display at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston.

Read more: Subscribe!

Volume 8, Issue 6

Oh Godot
By Pat-Ann Duncan

More often than not, the fame of a writer wanes after the writer's death. For Samuel Beckett, his popularity stands secure. To mark his centennial birthday, theaters everywhere are giving new life to his works as they celebrate the man who changed 20th century theater. Brooding yet insightful, Beckett draws in audiences because his words speak to the average Joe. Troubled by loneliness, death, and the meaning of life, Beckett gave himself to his characters. "I write about myself with the same pencil and in the same exercise book as about him. It is no longer I, but another whose life is just beginning," he told The New York Times. It was his play Waiting for Godot that first struck a nerve with theater-goers and took the Dublin-born writer from the world of the unknown into the spotlight.

Read more: Subscribe!

Volume 8, Issue 5

Travel Ireland: The Dunbrody House, County Wexford
Irish Hospitality
By Denise Dubé

The Dunbrody Country House is a 22-bedroom Georgian Manor hotel and restaurant in
Arthurstown, County Wexford. During the holidays Catherine and Kevin Dundon put it to good use—not for the wandering public, but instead purely for personal pleasure.

From Dec. 24 to Dec. 27 the Dundons, who have owned the former mansion since 1997, close the hotel and Harvest Room restaurant and open it to their loved ones. The result is an enviable 3-day one-of-a-kind holiday extravaganza.

Most people settle for a Christmas dinner crammed around a makeshift table in a small family home. Once the dishes are done everyone either goes to the pub, or goes home or spends a few hours cramped in a small living room.

But Christmas at Dunbrody is anything but cramped, and it’s not short-lived. About 25 relatives from England and Ireland find their way to the manor where there is a spacious dining room, a working restaurant kitchen and lots of room to roam—inside and out.

"For us it just means that you have the house,” Catherine said of the hotel. “It’s the only time of the year you have it entirely for yourself. It’s not a hotel, it’s a house. You have all your family and kids, it has an utterly different feel than when it’s a hotel.”

Read more: Subscribe!