Irish America October / November 2008

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IRISH AMERICA October / November 2008

Vol. 23 No. 5

FEATURES 40 THE BATTLE OVER ULYSSES Tom Deignan explores how the court case over James Joyce’s Ulysses set a precedent in the U.S. 44 THE REAL BILL Kelly Carlin-McCall talks to outspoken comedian Bill Maher about the state of America, his Irish heritage, his new movie Religulous, and his belief that religion is the rock upon all who believe will stumble.

53 STARS OF THE SOUTH Profiles of ten Irish and Scots-Irish individuals who have distinguished themselves in their respective fields.

62 BROADWAY’S IRISH COLLEEN Kelli O’Hara, star of South Pacific, talks to Mary Pat Kelly about her Irish ancestors who settled in Oklahoma.

76 THE LEGAL 100 In the inaugural Legal 100, we feature the top 100 Irish-American lawyers and lawmakers from across the country who would make their ancestors proud through their accomplishments in and out of court.

44

COURTESY HBO

68 THE LEGACY OF THE SAN PATRICIOS The courage of an Irish Brigade that fought under the Mexican flag is recalled by Robert Salas.

62

122 AMONG OTHER THINGS . . .

Kara Rota talks to first-time novelist Aoibheann Sweeney about Among Other Things, I’ve Taken Up Smoking, and the inspirations that shape her life.

122

40

DEPARTMENTS 6 7 8 10 14 114 116 118 119 125 130

Contributors Readers Forum First Word News from Ireland Hibernia Sláinte Crossword Roots Books Music Photo Album

119 Cover Photo: Courtesy HBO

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Vol.23 No.5 • October / November 2008

IRISH AMERICA

{contributors}

875 SIXTH AVENUE, SUITE 2100, N.Y., NY 10001 TEL: 212-725-2993 FAX: 212-244-3344 E-MAIL: irishamag @ aol.com WEB: http://www.irishamerica.com

Kelly Carlin-McCall talks to Bill Maher in our cover story. Carlin-McCall is a writer and performer of personal essays. She performs around Los Angeles, and some of her work can be found online at Fresh Yarn and The Huffington Post. She is currently working on a book about her father, the comedian George Carlin.

Mortas Cine Pride In Our Heritage

Founding Publisher: Niall O’Dowd Co-Founder/Editor-in-Chief: Patricia Harty Vice President of Marketing: Turlough McConnell Art Director: Marian Fairweather Assistant Editor: Declan O’Kelly Copy Editor: John Anderson Advertising & Events Coordinator: Kathleen Overbeck Financial Controller: Kevin M. Mangan Editorial Assistants: Bridget English Tara Dougherty Elizabeth Reilly Marketing Interns: Maeve Cummings

Irish America Magazine ISSN 0884-4240) © by Irish America Inc. Published bi-monthly. Mailing address: P.O. Box 1277, Bellmawr, NJ 080995277. Editorial office: 875 Sixth Avenue, Suite 2100, New York, NY 10001. Telephone: 212 725-2993. Fax: 212-244-3344 E-mail: Irishamag@aol.com. Subscription rate is $21.95 for one year. Subscription orders: 1-800-5826642. Subscription queries: 1-800-582-6642, (212) 725-2993, ext. 16. Periodicals postage paid at New York and additional mailing offices.

Postmaster please send address changes to Irish America Magazine, P.O. Box 1277, Bellmawr, NJ 08099-5277. IRISH AMERICA IS PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

6 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Mary Pat Kelly, a long-time contributor to Irish America magazine, interviews South Pacific star Kelli O’Hara. She wrote and directed the feature film Proud, which played in theaters last spring and is now available on DVD. Her novel, Galway Bay, an epic story based on the life of her great-great-grandmother Honora Kelly, a fisherman’s daughter born on the shores of Galway Bay, will be published by Grand Central Publishing (Hachette USA) in February 2009.

Jimmy Ryan, whose photos of Kelli O’Hara’s wedding and Lincoln Center performance grace the O’Hara feature, began his award-winning photography career by opening his own gallery in Vermont in 2004. (For more information see www.jimmyryanphotography.com).

He has since become one of the most sought after wedding and portrait photographers in New York City, photographing weddings from the east end of Long Island to the west coast of Mexico. His grandfather came from Boher, County Tipperary, and his grandmother hailed from Sligo.

In her first piece for Irish America, Kara Rota talks to Aiobheann Sweeney about her debut novel. While working on her own fiction, Kara is finishing her last year as an undergraduate at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, NY, focusing on creative writing and technoethics. She is Irish on her maternal grandmother’s side.

Robert Salas, who writes about the San Patricio Battalion in this issue, was born in California and raised in New Mexico. His Hispanic ancestors became U.S. citizens in 1848 after the Mexican War. A veteran of the Korean War, Salas was employed for over 30 years in the aerospace industry. His primary interests are collecting old books and the history of the Southwest.

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{readers forum} ROBBERS, NOT BANKERS

IRISH SOVEREIGNTY

CLARIFICATION

How about more stories on the Irish who didn’t make a lot of money on Wall Street but were very interesting characters anyway? Someone like the great bank robber Willie Sutton who grew up in the very poor section under the Brooklyn Bridge which was called Irishtown at the beginning of the 20th century. When asked by the police why he kept robbing banks, Willie gave the obvious answer, “because that’s where the money is.” This neighborhood is now affluent and carries the acronyn DUMBO. You could also do a story on my great ancestor James Lundrigan who along with a guy named Butler were the last two people to receive the lash in Canada. That was around 1820 in Newfoundland. It was a very big legal case centered on the prejudice facing Irish Catholics at that time.

I read Sharon Ní Chonchúir’s article on the Lisbon Treaty, and the No vote handed down by the Irish people. She seemed to adopt an elitist tone throughout. It started, in the third paragraph, where she inferred that because Ireland had benefited in the past from the European Union, the Irish should feel obliged to vote yes on the treaty. The elitist tone further manifested itself when she used the word “motley” to describe the diverse groups that made up the Vote No alliance. The fact that the alliance was so diverse should be an indicator of widespread concerns about the treaty, across all socioeconomic groups.

Ms. Chonchúir seems to be dismissive about these concerns.

I visited Ireland in May of this year, a

One of the criticisms leveled at my article on the Lisbon Treaty was that it inferred that Ireland should have accepted the treaty because the country had benefited from membership of the EU. This is not a personal opinion of mine but it was an opinion that was bandied about by government representatives and EU officials in the run-up to the referendum.

Another criticism is that I dismissed the ‘no’ campaigners by referring to them as a “motley crew.” This was not meant to be disparaging; it was merely meant to communicate just how varied the groups opposing the treaty actually were. They ranged across the entire political spectrum – from Catholic groups through Sinn Féin to free-market advocates.

Nor did I intend to dismiss the Irish people’s reasons for voting against the treaty. I didn’t analyze the reasons because they were so varied and, according to general consensus, stem-med from the fact that the treaty was too obscure. Few of us could understand the legal jargon of the treaty so how was anybody supposed to know what impact it would have on Irish life – much less on such complex issues as sovereignty and tax harmonization?

In my personal opinion, it was this obscurity that defeated the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland. And it is my personal hope that the people who drafted the treaty go back to the drawing board and compile a document that people can read and digest and finally arrive at a considered conclusion.

After all, it concerns the future of Europe and the role Ireland will play in it.

Both of those are vital questions in today’s IA volatile world.

Jim Lundrigan New Haven, Connecticut

THE PAST BUT NOT THE PRESENT I enjoyed reading your “Irish Eye on Hollywood,” your Sinn Féiners book reviews and “Slainte” celebrate the section, but I feel that a outcome of the greater portion of your Lisbon Treaty Referendum June/July issue was uninteresting. The cover [photo. of a Sikh] would have been more appropriate month before the vote. I found that many had it featured a holy well or an ancient people had concerns about the sovereignty stone circle. issue. I think we need to remember that the We need features such as “The 100 Republic of Ireland is relatively young, Ancient Irish,” and the “100 Most and as a nation that has a long history of Important Ancient Sites,” not articles on longing and fighting for home rule, it’s those who are seeking amnesty. They do going to be difficult to relinquish the not give a tinker’s damn about Ireland or power of self governance.

Kendall W. Smith Jr. the fabulous Irish culture, its language, or Rochester, Michigan its way of life. They want to change Ireland to fit the culture into which they As my Falls Road parents used to say were born and raised. to me when I was out of line, “catch yourIf you must deal with the present, then self on.” The benefits Ireland receives I suggest an in-depth article dealing with from the EU are nice and reciprocal given the travesty of what’s happening to the Ireland’s success. So don’t send the ancient site of Irish history – the Hill of wrong message that Ireland should have Tara, and how it is being destroyed, in gone along with a stupid document for part, to accommodate a highway! Why “shaping” Europe for the future. Let don’t some of your Top 100 IrishEurope shape itself. The Irish economy Americans use their influence to stop did not get where it is because of Europe. the desecration?

Patrick J.H. Durnin It got where it is through low taxes and a R.N., B.S., Retired CPT USA capitalistic approach.

Whitehall, Montana

Sean O’Connor Received by e-mail

Sharon Ní Chonchúir Irish America’s Correspondent in Ireland

Send letters to: Irish America, 875 Avenue of the Americas, Suite 2100, NY NY 10001. Or E-mail irishamag@aol.com. Please include name, address, and phone number. Letters will be edited for length and clarity.

OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008 IRISH AMERICA 7

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{the first word} PHOTO: KIT DE FEVER

Sharing the

American Dream “Being Irish manifests itself through my efforts to fight for justice.”

– Patricia O’Neill, Legal 100 honoree.

T

his issue is a feast of Irish-Americana. There’s something to suit every taste and even the pickiest reader. Some history, some humor, some of who we are today.

There’s the inspirational songbird Kelli O’Hara, whose Irish ancestors settled in Oklahoma during the Land Rushes, and Bill Maher who was born in New York to an Irish father and a Jewish mother.

There’s even a salute to the Year of the Potato.

No doubt, what Bill Maher has to say will find agreement with some and give others apoplexy. But hey, there’s nothing like a little diversity of opinion to stir the soup.

And today’s Irish are nothing if not diverse. The old stereotype of the Irish, confined to neighborhoods, churchgoing citizens in public service jobs, does not apply.

Nowadays, A Portrait of Irish America is more likely to include a photo of Eileen Collins, the space shuttle commander, as it is an Irish laborer.

We have spread out across the U.S. and have found success in every segment of American society. Yet we still carry the traits and characteristics of hardscrabble ancestors. Handed down from generation to generation, is a love of politics, education, the church, and yes, a good argument.

Maher has inherited the mantle of the late great contrarian George Carlin who said, “As long as I have sound ideas, a sound underpinning of argument and analysis, then there’s nothing I can’t or shouldn’t talk about.”

In this issue Bill Maher sits down with Kelly Carlin-McCall, George’s daughter, to discuss among other things, God (he has a new movie out,

8 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Religulous), the state of America, and his Irish father.

He’s not “proud” to be Irish, but he’s not “ashamed” either.

Like George Carlin, he thinks that it’s ridiculous to be proud of something that you had no control over, but at the same time he’s glad to have inherited his father’s humor which he says has helped him in his choice of career.

Humor is the great leveler. It’s a great communication skill. It’s an Irish specialty, honed on the horns of adversity as a way of coping. And God knows, we Irish have had enough grievances to make us very funny indeed.

“Humor” was also a way to keep us down. The stupid Paddy jokes, as told by the English, the offish cartoons in Harper’s magazine, which the publishers now ruefully admit were “some of the worst humor ever to reach print.”

But who’s laughing now?

As writer Pete Hamill says, “The Irish won all the late rounds.”

We are top of the heap. But the slurs haven’t gone away. They have just been redirected – today they are aimed at the newest immigrants, in particular the Latinos, and it’s ugly.

“I’ve heard things like, ‘We don’t want to send our kids back to school because we’re afraid people don’t like Mexicans,’” said Mayor Thomas O’Neill of Shenandoah, Pennsylvania.

O’Neill was speaking in the aftermath of the recent brutal beating that resulted in the death of Luis Ramirez, an undocumented immigrant. Four teenage members of the high school football team have been charged in his death. One of whom, sad to say, is Colin Walsh – Irish, at least in name.

Would Colin have raised his boot had he been more aware of his own history?

Shenandoah is coal country where the

“papes,” the Irish Catholic famine immigrants, labored and lived under ethnic slurs that followed them out to the coal fields. They were given the worst jobs, bringing the coal to the surface where children as young as seven worked on the slag heaps.

Back then (it’s not that long ago – just two lifespans) not only were the Irish miners discriminated against, they were unprotected by the law. A congressional act of February 27, 1865 authorized the formation of private police forces, the armed Coal and Iron Police who were brutal in suppressing any labor organization.

Not far from where Ramirez was killed, on December 9, 1875, Charles O’Donnell, a miner who was thought to be involved in the labor movement, his daughter and young son were murdered by an armed vigilante group. No one was arrested for the crime.

Knowing our history gives us a deeper understanding of who we are, and it should be the key to understanding the struggle of others.

We triumphed through hard work, education, the church, politics, and military service. Most immigrants are only looking for the same opportunities.

The Irish-American story is an inspiration to those struggling today. Now that we have a platform, we can bring a voice of reason to the debate. Here’s one fact that is often hidden: the economic contribution of the undocumented.

According to a New York Times story, Social Security receives up to seven billion a year from undocumented immigrants – money they can never reclaim.

The American dream is not ours alone. We cannot separate ourselves from our past or pull the ladder up after us.

IA Mortas Cine.

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{ news from ireland}

By Frank Shouldice

Vigil Honors Omagh Victims

A

PHOTOCALL IRELAND

dignified memorial ceremony on August 15 marked the tenth anniversary of the Omagh bombing, which killed 29 civilians, including a woman pregnant with unborn twins. It was the worst single atrocity in the history of the Troubles, tearing the Co. Tyrone town asunder in the middle of a Saturday shopping afternoon.

The 1998 bombing was attributed to the Real IRA, a breakaway republican faction opposed to the power-sharing strategy adopted by Sinn Féin and the Provisional IRA. A decade later, relatives of the victims remain incensed that nobody has ever been found guilty of the bombing. A prosecution case against two alleged bombers collapsed earlier this year as a result of a botched police investigation. The absence of justice has deepened the sense of grief in this rural market townland.

Relatives of the victims have taken up a civil case against those they believe responsible.

Speaking at the ceremony, Northern Ireland’s Deputy left at the shops in Omagh Town where 28 people were killed by a First Minister Martin McGuinness supported calls for a Flowers Real IRA car bomb on August 15,1998. full inquiry into the bombing. He expressed “very serious concerns about how the police handled this investigation from blast, rejected Cowen’s stance and demanded immediate supbeginning to end,” adding that he would “support the calls that port from governments in Dublin and London. “Let the governare made by families here for the establishment of an independments at least give us a commitment that we can work towards ent tribunal. They obviously have lost all faith and we have seen that public inquiry,” he told reporters. debacle after debacle in terms of the investigation of this terriAt the ceremony the mourners stood for a minute’s silence at ble atrocity. What we need to do is support the families in the 3.10 p.m., the same time that the bomb exploded. Children demands they now make.” placed red petals on the roadside in a poignant and difficult Taoiseach (Irish prime minister) Brian Cowen also attended remembrance of a tragedy that has offered no closure to grievthe service but cautioned that a public inquiry might jeopardize ing relatives. The following day, families who did not wish to either criminal proceedings or the civil case still pending. participate in the “official” ceremony held their own private However, Michael Gallagher, who lost his son Aiden in the commemoration.

Gas Pipeline Continues Despite Protests ONSTRUCTION on the gas pipeline continued in north Co. Mayo despite continued opposition from local residents.The pipeline, which will take gas ashore from the Corrib gas field, is being constructed onshore at Glengad, near Belmullet.The pipeline will supply a refinery currently under construction at Bellenaboy some five miles inland.

Residents are concerned that a high-pressure gas pipeline would put the surrounding community at risk. Local opposition has formed into an action group known as the Shell-to-Sea campaign, demanding that the exploration company, led by Shell E&P Ireland, establish a refinery at sea instead of taking the gas ashore.

By way of compromise, the campaigners have also proposed that the pipeline be relocated to an unpopulated location further inshore from Broadhaven Bay. The consortium behind Corrib exploration insists its previously untried design for the retrieval of gas reserves is safe and secure.With major construction already underway at Glengad and Bellenaboy, investors are not prepared to significantly amend

C

10 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

the proposed supply route.

It has angered Shell-to-Sea campaigners that construction at Glengad and Bellenaboy has proceeded without full planning permission or due clearance by environmental authorities.The campaign has already aroused strong local opposition with five local men, dubbed “The Rossport Five,” serving 94 days in jail for refusing to allow Shell to construct the pipeline across their lands.

Locals and environmental activists continue to protest at the construction sites both at Bellenaboy and at Glengad, where deep water dredging will prepare the proposed route for the pipeline.

Private security guards have been posted to block access to the beach at Glengad in the interests of public safety. However, as the Corrib gas project moves slowly towards completion, the Shellto-Sea campaign has refused to accept the refinery as a done deal. In August protesters disrupted construction by swimming in Broadhaven Bay waters around the pipeline site. Eight protesters were arrested by gardai (Irish police) but later released without charge.

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Tension Grows Within NI Executive

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stalemate on the transfer of policing and justice powers from the United Kingdom to Northern Ireland has precipitated a stand-off between Assembly partners Sinn Féin and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). Sinn Féin TD Caoimhghin Ó Caoláin, who is elected to the Dáil (Irish parliament) in Dublin, warned that the delay in devolving key responsibilities to the Northern Ireland Executive would prompt Sinn Féin to walk out of Stormont and collapse the Assembly.

The Executive, which has not met since June, reconvened on

September18, but Ó Caoláin’s remarks have raised the temperature between the Executive partners. First Minister Peter Robinson, who succeeded Rev. Ian Paisley as leader of the DUP, said his party would not be “blackmailed or threatened” by Sinn Féin and that he expected the September 18 meeting to go ahead as scheduled.

Although the NI Executive continues to function, cross-party agreement has yet to be reached on a number of issues, including policing, justice, Irish language, education and the future use of the now disused Maze Prison.

NEWS IN BRIEF •

FACTORY closures in Co. Cork and Co. Offaly nudged unemployment levels to 5.1 percent, the highest rate in nine years. The closure of U.S. medical devices company Boston Scientific cost 240 jobs in Taoiseach Brian Cowen’s midlands constituency of Tullamore and served as a warning on employment previously considered secure. With jobs drying up, particularly in construction, net migration (38,500) has fallen to half of last year’s levels (67,300) according to the Central Statistics Office (CSO). However, an increased birth rate has pushed population in the Republic of Ireland to an estimated 4.4 million.

• TIPPERARY Rose Aoife Kelly emerged from a field of 31

competitors to be named winner of this year’s Rose of Tralee. The 23-year-old occupational therapist succeeds last year’s winner, New Yorker Lisa Murtagh. Plans are already underway to pull out all the stops for next year’s festival, the 50th year of the competition.

•

COLLEGE student bodies have reacted strongly to the suggestion that fees will be reintroduced at university level. Education Minister Batt O’Keeffe said that government cutbacks meant his department needed to review its finances and that college fees was part of that review. The Union of Students in Ireland (USI) warned it will protest any tampering with free education. “Reintroducing fees would be a drastic, retrograde step,” said USI deputy president Dave Curran. “We need to encourage more people into third level and to expand education as a central part of a knowledge economy. We’re organizing ongoing demonstrations throughout the year, drawing the public’s attention to this, until the government says fees are not on the agenda.”

•

Fr. AIDAN Troy, the parish priest in Belfast’s Ardoyne district, is set to take up a new post in Paris. Fr. Troy played a central role in the highly contentious Holy Cross primary school dispute in 2001 – when local sectarian tensions escalated violently into loyalists attempting to prevent Catholic children from getting to school. A native of Bray, Co. Wicklow, he spent seven years working in North Belfast. “I’ll miss the place enormously,” said Troy. “We are going out on a quieter summer and I know the amount of hard work which went into that. I stood beside people from every side of the divide working towards that.”

Cellbridge, County Kildare on Saturday August 9.

Summer Rains Cause Havoc

F

ollowing the wettest August on record, the Irish government has announced a climatechange adaptation strategy. Serious flooding has caused extensive damage to property around the country but Carlow, Limerick, Belfast and Clonmel were hit particularly badly.

On a visit to Carlow town, where the River Barrow burst its banks and deluged the town center in six feet of water, Minister for the Environment John Gormley announced that the strategy would need to be introduced quicker than planned.

“We are going to see more flash flooding and more storms and we need to plan accordingly,” he told reporters, referring to meteorological predictions that wet conditions will become a regular feature in the coming years. “There will be a 20 percent increase in precipitation in the future,” he said.

“There will be increases in wind speed and more storms. When it does rain it will rain more heavily.”

The strategy will focus on planning by authorities carrying out risk assessments, especially in areas that are vulnerable to flooding. “It essentially means the end of any major construction on flood plains,” added the Minister.

The midlands suffered severe flooding, with major difficulties reported in Tipperary, Galway, Laois, Carlow and Offaly. Farmers have also warned that the grain harvest is at serious risk, and unless drier conditions prevail in September grain growers will face “grave difficulties.” Other winter crops including barley, oats and rapeseed oil have also been disrupted, with the Irish Farmers’ Association saying that some of its members are now looking to salvage some of their annual crop instead of taking in a full harvest.

Heavy rain also washed through a bogland in the Stacks Mountains, Co. Kerry, where construction had taken place on a wind farm development. A huge land mass of peat bog began to drift steadily downhill, polluting local waterways and wiping out stocks of young salmon and trout in the Smearlagh River. The water supply for some 30,000 was put at risk, and the county council will now investigate whether construction of the wind farm was connected to the landslide.

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{news from ireland}

Heroes’ Welcome for Irish Boxers

I

reland’s amateur boxers salThe episode certainly damaged the vaged some pride from a highly standing of Irish show jumping, and it disappointing national team perwas hoped that the Beijing Olympics formance at the Beijing would provide a step towards restoring its Olympics. Dubliner Kenny Egan reputation. It remains unclear how Lynch (pictured below) took pride of place and the Irish team were unaware of the by winning the silver medal in the risks associated with using the drug. light-heavyweight division while “I am deeply ashamed of what hapPaddy Barnes (Belfast) and Darren pened,” said Pat Hickey, president of the Sutherland (pictured right) (Dublin) Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI). “I collected bronze medals at midhave even been subjected to snide dleweight and light-flyweight. remarks from my colleagues (in the Enthusiastic crowds at Dublin airInternational Olympic Committee) sayport welcomed the victorious trio ing that Ireland is at it again.” home with an open-bus parade ferryLynch insists he did nothing wrong, ing Kenny Egan to a big neighborbut the fallout of this controversy could hood party in Clondalkin, west of the have far-reaching consequences. Hickey, city. who is also president of the European Egan’s heroics on the last day of the Olympic Committee, appears to have lost Olympic Games saw him outscored patience with show jumping, and relaby Chinese champion Zhang tions between the OCI and Horse Sport Xiaoping, although Irish team trainer Ireland have clearly deteriorated. Hickey Billy Walsh could not disguise a deep hinted that the sudden elimination of four frustration at what he saw as fight teams from a top event might even lead judges influenced by a home crowd. to the sport being dropped completely “It’s a joke,” said an emotional Irish boxer Darren Sutherland who won a bronze from the Olympics program. at the Olympics. Darren was born in Dublin to Walsh immediately after the bout medal “We want to cut this dead,” said a mother from Finglas and a father from the which left Egan trailing by 11-7 and Carribean.

Hickey, calling for an investigation into denied him the chance to claim the matter. “There seems to be something Ireland’s first boxing gold since Michael and Norway were disqualified for the wrong in the equestrian movement and Carruth in Barcelona 16 years ago. same offense. they just have to get their act together.

Despite widespread frustration over Lynch, clearly perplexed by the deciThis sport could be in very serious diffihow the fight had been judged, the Irish sion, maintained that he has used capculties for next year’s vote, whether they boxers’ achievements lifted the gloom on saicin in the past for pain relief and had remain on the program or not.” a generally below-par Olympic performnever been in trouble with the equestrian Damien McDonald, chief executive of ance by Team Ireland. Galway sprinter authorities. “I’ve been using it for years Horse Sport Ireland, acknowledged that Paul Hession finished a creditable fifth in on horses,” he said, following the ban. events had shaken public confidence. the semi-final of the 200 meters and “It’s been effective. If I thought it was a “Obviously we’d like to see show jumpOlive Loughnane of Cork achieved a threat to me, there’s no way I would have ing remains as an Olympic sport,” he told personal best in the 20km walk to finish used it. I’m shattered. That’s it.

The Irish Times. “Would I be afraid? I’d in seventh place overall.

Shattered.” be concerned. But leaving the sport out of But, many of Ireland’s other competiWith a top ranking as world number the Olympics would be a mistake.” IA tors in track and field failed to perform one, Lantinus was widely anything near their best, and team tipped for honors. events such as rowing also ended in disDisqualification brought Dubliner Kenny Egan appointment. to mind previous disgrace won a silver medal. for the Irish team in the DOPING SCANDAL TAINTS same event. Four years IRISH RIDER ago in Athens, Cian These setbacks were eclipsed by a dopO’Connor won the gold ing scandal in the equestrian event in medal on Waterford Hong Kong when Tipperary rider Denis Crystal only to subseLynch and his mount Lantinus were disquently fail a drugs test. qualified for failing a drugs test. It was Ignominiously, O’Connor found that capsaicin, a drug derivative of had to hand back the chilli pepper, was applied to Lantinus Olympic gold and was and under Olympic rules this merited a banned from competition ban. Competitors from Brazil, Germany for three months.

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{ hibernia }

PEOPLE

| HERITAGE | EVENTS | ARTS | ENTERTAINMENT

CONVENTION COVERAGE:

Red and Blue, With a Hint of Green Abdon Moriarty Pallasch reports from the Democratic and Republican conventions.

AP PHOTO/RON EDMONDS

I

reland was in the background at this year’s Democratic and Republican National Conventions, but it was there.

On the eve of the Democratic Convention in Denver, Senator Barack Obama appeared in Springfield, Illinois, to introduce his candidate for vice president, Senator Joe Biden of Delaware.

Biden has long been an outspoken advocate for IrishAmerican issues and Obama has struggled to win over IrishAmerican voters, so part of the calculus that went into the choice of Biden was the hope that Biden can bring voters in places like his home town of Scranton, Pennsylvania into Obama’s column. Between them, they mentioned “Scranton” five times and “Catholic” three times during the speech.

“He was the son of a single mom, who struggled to support herself and her kids and raised him to believe in America,” Biden said about Obama. “I was different. I was an Irish Catholic kid from Scranton.”

When he got to the convention and gave his speech on Wednesday night, Biden pointed to his mother, Catherine Eugene Finnegan Biden, sitting in the audience. Some conservative bloggers criticized Biden for referring to her as a great “American” in Denver when in the past he has complimented his mother – of Derry heritage – with being “quintessentially Irish.”

“Biden 08 plagiarizes from Biden 06 – transforms his mother from Irish to American,” one anti-Obama website railed.

Returning to his hometown of Scranton the Monday after the convention, Biden recounted that when he grew up there, “To be Irish was to be Catholic was to be Democrat.”

Back at the convention, Senator Edward Kennedy, recovering from cancer treatment, made a surprise appearance and was greeted with a tumultuous ovation.

“I have come here tonight to stand with you to change America, to restore its future, to rise to our best ideals and to elect Barack Obama to the presidency of the United States,” Kennedy said to a standing crowd.

TOP: Barack Obama and his running mate Joe Biden wave after Obama’s acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Aug. 28.

LEFT: Sen. Edward M. Kennedy addresses the convention.

RIGHT: Kennedy embraces his niece Caroline at the convention.

AP PHOTO/JAE C. HONG.

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AP PHOTO/PAUL SANCYA

AP PHOTO/PAUL SANCYA

{hibernia}

Sarah Palin, right, is joined by John McCain at the end of her speech at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota.

“Together we have known success and seen setbacks ... but we have never lost our belief that we are all called to a better country and a newer world,” he said. “I pledge to you that I will be there next January on the floor of the Senate.”

His brief speech marked only the second time he has been seen in public since undergoing surgery for a brain tumor on June 2. His appearance came at his own insistence, a source close to the Kennedys said.

The 76-year-old senator compared Obama to his brother, the late president.

“We are told that Barack Obama believes too much in an America of high principle and bold endeavors,” Ted said.

“But when John F. Kennedy thought of going to the moon, he didn’t say, ‘It’s too far to get there – we shouldn’t even try.’

“Our people answered his call and rose to the challenge, and today an American flag still marks the surface of the moon.”

He added: “This November, the torch will be passed again to a new generation of Americans. So, with Barack Obama and for you and for me, our country will be committed to his cause. The work begins anew. The hope rises again. And the dream lives on.”

John McCain is joined by his wife, Cindy, on stage after his acceptance speech at the convention on Thursday, Sept. 4.

“[Ted Kennedy has] been a powerful force around the world for human rights and human dignity, for refugees and the dispossessed; he helped end apartheid in South Africa and bring peace in Northern Ireland,” his niece, Caroline Kennedy, told delegates.

On Monday night of the convention, Senator Dick Durbin and U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel held a party at Fado’s Irish pub which filled a city block. Maryland’s bodhrán-playing Governor Martin O’Malley repeated the feat on Wednesday night at the convention. O’Malley grabbed a guitar and Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, a runner-up to Biden in the Veep-stakes, joined him on harmonica.

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n Minnesota’s Twin Cities at the Republican National Convention, Irish-American Republicans and Carribean-American Republicans held a joint celebration at the Minneapolis City Hall where the corned beef overwhelmed the jerk chicken. Former Taoiseach (Prime Minister) John Bruton; Irish Ambassador Michael Collins; former Reagan cabinet secretary and ambassador to Ireland Margaret Heckler; IrishAmerican Republicans Director Grant Lally; and others were on hand to push the Irish agenda.

Republican nominee John McCain backed a plank in the Party platform supporting a special envoy to Northern Ireland.

A video shown at the convention touted the Irish roots of aspiring first lady Cindy McCain. Republican National Committee members held court at the Liffey Pub across the street from the Excel Center in St. Paul where the convention was being held. The Illinois delegation, led by State Rep. Jim Durkin and Republican National Committeeman Patrick Brady, plotted ways to bring John McCain on a fact-finding tour of Ireland should he win. IA

OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008 IRISH AMERICA 15

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{ irish eye on hollywood}

By Tom Deignan

PHOTO: KIT DEFEVERDEFEVER

Liam Cunningham is an Irish actor to look out for as fall approaches. He has built up an impressive resume of Irish and British movies, including Ken Loach’s provocative Irish Civil War Epic The Wind that Shakes the Barley as well as Breakfast on Pluto, in which Cunningham co-starred with fellow Irish actor Cillian Murphy.

Cunningham’s most recent appearance was in the summer horror movie The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor starring Brendan Fraser.

Keep an eye out for Cunningham in Hunger, director Steve McQueen’s riveting depiction of the Northern Ireland hunger strikes which made a global icon out of Bobby Sands (played by German-born, Irish-reared actor Michael Fassbender). Cunningham plays a priest in Hunger, which has been a smash hit on the cinema festival circuits – including Cannes, where it picked up a top award for first time movie makers – but does not yet have a U.S. release date.

In October, Cunningham is also slated to appear in Blood: The Last Vampire, set at a U.S. military compound in Japan, which has been taken over by vampires.

Believe it or not, Colin Farrell is currently shooting a film which also has a military as well as vampire angle. Farrell will star in Triage, which is shooting in Dublin. The film also stars Paz Vega, and it is about a war photographer sent to Kurdistan, only to watch his best friend die. While attempting to cope with this loss, he befriends his girlfriend’s grandfather, who may have a dark war secret of his own in his past. Farrell is also serving as a producer on Triage.

What could possibly be the vampire angle to Triage? Well, among the film’s co-stars is horror veteran Christopher Lee, who played the most famous vampire of them all, Count Dracula, in a 1950s version of the bloodsucker story. A final Colin Farrell note: the much-anticipated New York Irish cop epic Pride and Glory, featuring Farrell and Edward Norton and directed by Gavin O’Connor, is slated for an October 24 release.

Another release to look out for which will surely get lots of promotion during the summer season of silly cinema is The Race to Witch Mountain, featuring sophisticated Northern Ireland stage and screen veteran Ciaran Hinds alongside former wrestler Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

The film, about magical kids trying to escape from dastardly villains, is a revival of the 1970s Witch Mountain franchise, which included Escape to Witch Mountain and 16 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Above: Ciaran Hinds stars in The Race to Witch Mountain.

Top left: Steve McQueen, the director of Hunger.

Bottom left: Newcomer Ailish McCarthy stars as 13-year-old Maeve in 32A.

Return from Witch Mountain. No exact release date for this Hinds“Rock” collaboration has been set.

On to independent Irish film news, September 19 is an important date for Kilkenny-based director Tomm Moore. On that date his animated feature The Secret of Kells – already granted an award by the Screen Directors Guild of Ireland – will be showcased at the Directors Guild of America Theatre in Los Angeles. Movie bigwigs will be on hand, giving Moore a shot at an American film deal. The Secret of Kells tells the story of the boy behind the famed Book of Kells. According to the film’s producers: “Twelve hundred years ago, an orphan named Brendan meets Brother Aidan, the keeper of an extraordinary, but unfinished book of illuminations. Aidan sets Brendan a great task, to complete the Book of Kells. With the threat of invading Vikings all around and with the help of Aisling, a mysterious young girl, Brendan faces his deepest fears to

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complete the task.”

Another independent film to look out for is The Greening of Southie. Produced by Curt Ellis, the documentary explores efforts by environmentalists to create the first completely “green” building in the famous Irish enclave in Boston. Aside from its educational aspect, part of the film’s appeal is its depiction of the efforts to win Irish-American laborers over to the environmental cause, which is spearheaded by a wealthy (and quite young) real estate heir. The film has been shown on the Sundance channel and festival.

(Go to greeningofsouthie.com to order a DVD.) Finally, Marian Quinn’s 32A is building buzz on the festival circuit. The coming-of-age drama was written and directed by Quinn and stars her famous brother Aidan, as well as acclaimed Irish actress Orla Brady.

Set in 1979 Dublin, 32A revolves around 13-year-old Maeve (played by newcomer Ailish McCarthy), who is having trouble entering womanhood. All her friends seem at ease with boys, but not Maeve. So it is all the more surprising when Maeve starts dating the local heartthrob.

Aidan Quinn, of course, has amassed a highly impressive body of Irish and American film work. Most recently, he completed shooting a film called A Shine of Rainbows in Ireland. Orla Brady, Colin Farrell

The building at the center of The Greening of Southie.

meanwhile, is probably best known to U.S. audiences for her work in the TV shows Shark and Nip / Tuck.

The Quinns are not the only members of the 32A cast with good connections. The film also features up-and-com-

ing star Jared Harris (son of Richard Harris) as well as Kate O’Toole (Peter O’Toole’s daughter).

In Irish-American documentary news, Thomas Maier’s excellent book, The Kennedys: America’s Emerald Kings, is being made into a two-hour Warner Brothers documentary.

The film will be shown in select theaters and then released on DVD. Screenings in New York will begin in November.

The big news when it comes to television is that it appears The Sopranos are going Irish.

One of the more anticipated TV shows of the fall season is Life on Mars, which stars two Irish actors, Jason O’Mara and Colm Meaney.

O’Mara plays Sam Tyler, a modern-day detective transported back to 1972. Meaney plays a detective who actually worked in the early 1970s. Life on Mars is a remake of the acclaimed BBC detective series. Former Sopranos star Michael Imperioli has joined the Life on Mars cast.

Another Sopranos star is hoping an IrishAmerican character will be good show biz luck next year. Edie Falco – Tony Soprano’s longsuffering wife – is slated to star in Nurse Jackie, in which she plays Jackie O’Hurley, a brilliant nurse who has personal problems. Set in a bustling New York City hospital, press reports about Nurse Jackie – which should air on Showtime next year – also play up the fact that Nurse O’Hurley struggles with her Catholicism. The series also stars Eve Best, Peter Facinelli and Paul Schulze.

Finally on the TV front, Rhode Island native Michaela McManus, best know for starring in One Tree Hill, has been added as a new assistant DA to the cast of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

If today’s TV and movies are not your thing and you want to go back to Hollywood’s golden age with an Irish-American star, 20th Century Fox has just released a boxed DVD set titled The Tyrone Power Matinee Idol Collection. A star through the 1930s and 1940s, Power was a great-grandson to the acclaimed Irish actor of the same name.

Power’s films include The Luck of the Irish, in which he plays a newspaperman who becomes pals with a leprechaun (played by Cecil Kellaway). The film was made with a green tint to lend authenticity to scenes set in Ireland.

The Tyrone Power Matinee Idol Collection also includes early films such as Love Is News, Café Metropole and Second Honeymoon (all with Loretta Young) and later films such as Prince of Foxes and Nightmare Alley.

Sadly, Power died in 1958, following a heart attack, when he was just 44.

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Harrington Is a Major Winner

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hen Irish America featured Padraig Harrington on the cover of the October/ November 2007 issue after his first win of a major at the British Open, it was to celebrate one Irishman’s entry into the elite club of major winners.

A little over 12 months later, Harrington moved into the super league of that club, by not only repeating the British Open triumph but also winning the U.S. PGA three weeks later at Oakland Hills in Detroit.

Only Tiger Woods has matched this feat in the same year this century.

If Harrington’s second British Open win was due to a dream backnine performance, his win at the PGA was testament to his mental fortitude. With leader Sergio Garcia playing beautiful golf in his final round, it was Harrington who willed himself to victory. The 37year-old Dubliner kept close early in the round with amazing bunker play before holing huge putts in the final holes to clinch victory.

“I love the idea of the back nine

majors the last two years. My whole schedule is built around majors. And definitely I’ve turned up at other events, and unless I get into contention, you know, sometimes it feels like a race, like a sprint. Whereas a major feels like a marathon.

“I really do like the fact that no other European has won two majors consecu-

the greatest Irish sports figures of all time, and praise for his accomplishment was effusive.

“Coming so soon after his brilliant win in the British Open, this was a fantastic achievement by Padraig,” said Irish President Mary McAleese of him winning the Wanamaker trophy. “Padraig just goes from strength to strength. The

PHOTOS: PHOTOCALL IRELAND

Top left: Padraig Harrington holds the Claret Jug after winning the British Open at Royal Birkdale.

Above: Harrington sinks a huge putt on the sixteenth hole at Oakland Hills In Detroit.

Left: Harrington cradles the Wanamaker trophy.

of a major on a Sunday,” Harrington said after winning the PGA. “I love it so much that I’m actually disappointed I’m seven months away from the next major, and I don’t know what I’m going to do.

“I’ve really focused hard on the 18 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

tively, because obviously I hold a lot of European players who I grew up watching in high esteem. To believe that I achieved something that they hadn’t is very special.”

Harrington now takes his place among

whole country is immensely proud of him.”

Taoiseach Brian Cowen also congratulated the Dubliner. “To win two British Opens back to back is quite an achievement, but to win two majors back to back is absolutely incredible. To become the first Irishman to win a major in the U.S. ensures his place in sporting history and legend.

Yet again Padraig’s performance on the back nine of a major epitomized everything about the man – skill, courage, IA determination and sheer class.”

– Declan O’Kelly

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Swimmers Shine in Beijing

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asked for anything more.”

These successes bring Coughlin’s career Olympic medal count to eleven, building on the five she won in Athens.

She needs only one medal in London in 2012 to match the record of twelve swimming Olympic career medals, a women’s record held by teammate Dara Torres and former Olympian Jenny Thompson.

An Irish America Top 100 honoree in 2005, Natalie boasts Irish connections on both sides of her family. Her mother’s family, the McFaddens, come from Donegal, and her father’s side, the Coughlins and the Corcorans, hail from counties Cork and Limerick. Her grandfather played football for Notre Dame.

Another contributor to the women’s medal haul was Kara Lynn Joyce who won two silver medals along with Coughlin in the in the women’s 4x100m freestyle relay and the women’s 4x100m

medley relay. Joyce grew up in a competitive household and began swimming out of desire to beat her brothers, Sean and Kevin. At age 18 Kara made her Olympic debut at the 2004 Games in Athens, winning two silver medals in the 400 free and 400 medley relays. She also holds three American records as part of the U.S National team, including the short course (25) 400m freestyle relay, 400m relay and long course 400m freestyle relay.

A 2004 Irish America Top 100 honoree, Kara has a strong connection with her family and Irish heritage. Her ancestors came from Ireland to the U.S. in the prefamine emigration. There is even a window at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York that was donated by one of Kara’s ancestors, William Joyce. Coming back from a bout with mono in 2007 that threatened her Olympic hopes, Kara certainly finished strong.

– Bridget English

AP PHOTO/MARK J.TERRILL

wo of our Top 100 alumni, Natalie Coughlin and Kara Lynn Joyce, played major roles in the success of the U.S. women's swimming team at the Beijing Olympics.

Coughlin was one of the golden girls of the team when she won the 100m backstroke, successfully defending the title she won in Athens in 2004 and becoming the first woman ever to repeat in that event.

In a grueling week taking part in six events, she captured six medals (a record for an American woman at one Olympics) – one gold, two silver (in the 4x100m medley relay and 4x100m freestyle relay) and three bronze (in the 100m freestyle, 200m individual medley and 4x 200m freestyle relay).

“It’s pretty amazing,” Coughlin said after her final race. “I came here entered in six events and I wasn’t sure how I’d deal with the workload. I couldn’t have

The Women’s 4x100-meter freestyle relay team after receiving their silver medals in the National Aquatics Center at the Beijing Olympics, Sunday, Aug. 10.

From left: Natalie Coughlin, Kara Lynn Joyce, Lacey Nymeyer and Dara Torres.

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Wall Street 50 Celebrations Irish America’s 13th annual Wall Street 50 Dinner took place on July 17, at the New York Yacht Club. Brendan McDonagh, CEO of HSBC North America, delivered the keynote address.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen was the guest of honor.

The evening was co-hosted by FD-U.S.

The Wall Street 50 honorees pose for a group photo at the New York Yacht Club. Front Row from left: Consul General of Ireland Niall Burgess, Irish America Editor-in-Chief Patricia Harty, Declan Kelly, Chairman FD-US, Taoiseach Brian Cowen, Brendan McDonagh, CEO HSBC North America, Brendan McDonagh, CEO HSBC North America, Publisher Niall O’Dowd and Ireland’s Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Collins.

Honorees John Brown and Joe Manning from Merrill Lynch and James Hogan from HSBC.

Tom Moran, Chairman of Mutual of America and Michael Grealy from Bank of Ireland Group

Honoree Joe McAlinden of Catalpa Capital and Editor Patricia Harty.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen is pictured with NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly

Honorees Sean Kilduff and Hillary Cullen from UBS and Brian Sweeney from Marcopolonetwork.

Dr. Hugh Brady, UCD, Honoree John Duffy of KBW INC.

Brian Stack president of CIE Tours International and Paul O’Toole Chief Executive Tourism Ireland.

Patricia Cunningham, Continental Airlines and Joe Byrne, Vice President North America for Tourism Ireland.

Consul General of Ireland Niall Burgess, Honorees Ciaran T. O’Kelly from Marie Burgess, Chairman Emeritus of Bank of America, and John Mutual of America Bill Flynn.

O’Donoghue from SC Cowen.

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Brendan McDonagh CEO HSBC North America receiving his Waterford Crystal trophy from Niall O’Dowd and Declan Kelly.

Pete Cheyney Waterford Crystal’s director of communications, with the piece that was presented to Taoiseach Brian Cowen.

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50 Powerful Irish Women Celebrations Fifty of the most influential women in the Irish-American community were honored by The Irish Voice newspaper at an event hosted by the Irish Consul General Niall Burgess and his wife Marie at their Manhattan home on July 10.

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16 1) Honorees Anita Daly, Jacqueline Quinn, Anne Tarrant. 2) Honoree Glenda McGovern. 3) Consul General Niall Burgess, honoree Helen Maguire and Irish Voice/Irish America publisher Niall O’Dowd. 4) Honorees Josephine Tully, Dympna Tully, and Attracta Lyndon. 5) Honoree Nollaig Cleary, Eugene Collum, and honoree Eileen Mannion Collum. 6) Honoree Carol Moran Frohlinger. 7) Honoree Sheila Ryan.

8) Honoree Kelly Fincham. 9) Irish Voice marketing director Robert Hogan.

10) Meghan Sweeney, Irish Voice editorial and marketing director for the 50 Most Influential Women issue. 11) Honoree Colleen Kelleher Sorrentino.

12) Honoree Sheila O’Malley Fuchs. 13) Honoree Caroline Molloy. 14) Honoree Siobhain Walsh. 15) Honoree Liz Tiernan. 16) Eunan Doherty, honoree Orla Kelleher, honoree Kathy, and Jerry Hess. 17) Honoree Lisbeth McNabb, and Mary Raftery.

18)Honoree Audrey Hendley.

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Galway Arts Festival One of Max Streicher’s installations that was on view during the Galway Arts Festival.

PHOTOS: ANDREA M. MEEK

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This cat, a mural at the House Hotel in Galway, keeps a close eye on festival revelers.

You never know who you might bump into at the Galway Arts Festival.

26 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Music Artist

he 31st Galway Arts Festival, Estas Tonne which ran from July 14-27, plies his trade on the was another huge success for streets of both the city and lovers of the arts.

Galway.

Though Ireland was soaked with enough rain to dampen the most ardent optimist this summer, for 14 days the city of the Tribesmen was drenched with music, theater and art.

One couldn’t take a stroll down the quays without encountering some jovial interference from the many street performers that combed the winding streets of the packed city.

Festival highlights included an installation exhibit by Toronto-based artist Max Streicher, who has spent over 17 years working with largescale inflatable forms.

The Northlight Theatre Company from Chicago made its Irish debut at the festival with Better Life. John Mahoney, frequent visitor to Galway and co-star of TV’s Frasier, was lauded for his performance in the play by Larry Gelbart.

Music acts from Blondie to Tinariwen, and The Dandy Warhols to the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, graced the Festival Big Top at Two young buskers entertain passersby at the festival.

Fisheries Fields. Irish stars Ash, Damien Dempsey, Cathey Davey and Lisa Hannigan kept the home flag flying, while the likes of Lúnasa and Maigh Seola made sure traditional Irish music was well represented.

As well as the big names, scores of impromptu musicians and groups busked on the streets in the evenings. Roll on 2009!

– Declan O’Kelly

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Taoiseach’s Address to Irish America On his first visit to New York as Taoiseach, Brian Cowen addressed those gathered to celebrate the Wall Street 50 at the Yacht Club, New York, on July 17. He showed his appreciation for America and said that as Taoiseach he would make sure that America’s position in the world is given the respect it deserves. hank you very much indeed for that wonderful welcome. I deeply appreciate the goodwill that has been extended to me throughout my visit here to New York, my first official visit outside the country as Taoiseach of Ireland. I felt it was important to come here for a number of reasons. First of all I want to thank Niall O’Dowd and all the organizers of this event for the kind invitation to speak to you this evening.

I think that it’s clear as we face into some uncertain times, turbulence in financial markets and credit squeeze and all the difficulties and problems that people are trying to confront, increased commodity prices and oil prices, there is a sense that we’re moving into a different sort of an era.

And for Ireland today, certainly we are moving into a new era because we have consolidated progress that we have undoubtedly made. Where are we in the world in terms of both our relationship with the United States and indeed with Europe? And what are the prospects, what are the strategies, what are the ideas that modern Ireland has, to stay at the forefront as a progressive, democratic society that wants to play its role in the world?

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United States, there’s a deep sense of kinship with the United States.

And Ireland’s narrative, the political narrative of Ireland, is changing very dramatically from a political narrative in the past of grievance and injustice, a sense of missed opportunity, to now being a country that has redefined itself in the modern world in which we live and has opened up not only economically and socially but psychologically as well, a country which, a nation which was traditionally seen as one of the most dispersed nations has now in a very short space of time become one of the most diverse nations in the world, people from many nations coming to our shores now and finding a livelihood and a living in a far more diverse and pluralist society.

And that level of change has taken place in economic and social terms in the last two decades, that type of change has had to be allowed for when other countries have had to take that level of change over maybe a century.

And coming to the United States is always a great source of inspiration for me. My own family background has been one of great gratitude to this country for what it has done for my grandmother, for my mother, my uncles, my aunts, some of whom still live here and carved a life for themselves here.

And that’s something that’s very deep in all Irish people at home. It’s not a relationship of sentimentality with the 28 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Wall St. 50 dinner co-host Declan Kelly, CEO FD, and honorees Sean and Denis Kelleher.

Publisher Niall O’Dowd presents Taoiseach Brian Cowan with a Waterford Crystal memento of his visit.

Left: Brendan McDonagh, who gave the Keynote address, with his wife Kenane.

That sort of change has brought its own challenges but it has enabled us I think to flourish, to gain confidence in our own ability to dictate our own affairs in a very interdependent world. And the United States of America and the Irish in America, and the fact that you could come to this country and be what you wanted to be, is something that has always been a source of inspiration for the Irish at home.

And it is only in recent times, in the latest political generations, that we have been able to define ourselves in a paradigm that sees peace and prosperity coexist. And a great many people in this country can take a lot of pride in the very constructive role that they played in bringing about what has been effectively the transformation of the Irish reality at home.

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And on behalf of all those people at home, of all political traditions and persuasions, north and south, east and west, can I from this platform once again sincerely congratulate them, and all of those people who ensured that Irish America helped us overcome the limitations of our own history.

The great challenge in Ireland today therefore in this new place which now exists for us is how to harness that tremendous font of goodwill, wisdom and expertise that is represented by the Irish diaspora in the world today. How do we establish the new networks that are required, the new relationship that is required to make sure that your sense of participation, your sense of being Irish, is fully encapsulated as it now must be since we amended Article Two of our Constitution, which recognizes the Irishness of all of those people who not only reside at home or vote at home but all those who are dispersed throughout the world who have a great sense of Irishness and who remind many of us at home of the importance of what it is to be Irish, values that we sometimes take for granted at home.

So coming to visit New York particularly and coming to the United States has always been for me a great sense of replenishment, a great sense that when we go back home we have things to do, because there’s always a great sense of possibility here and of course there’s always been a great sense of achievement here and tonight Brendan McDonagh [CEO HSBC North America] is being properly lauded for his tremendous career thus far. He is one of very many in this city and in many other cities throughout America where the Irish have prospered and have excelled.

And it’s that commitment to excellence that has probably been the greatest contribution that America has given to modern Ireland. When you look at the industrial transformation, when you look at the foreign direct investment strategy that has brought so many of the frontline American industries to Ireland as a platform for the European market and indeed extended the reach of Irish exports beyond the traditional hinterland that dictated our trade patterns in the past, to be a truly global economy now and a place where you can trade anywhere in

the world from Ireland. It is American industry and American expertise that brought that to Ireland, in the main, and we are deeply grateful for extending that opportunity to a very flexible and educated workforce because we knew with the limitations of our resources that the greatest resource we had and have and will have is our people.

So Irish America for me is an untapped resource still. Despite its huge contribution we are only at the beginning in my opinion of what can be achieved between Ireland and America and I say very strongly that Ireland too must show its friendship in return to the United States.

It can’t forever be a call that we seek concessions and we seek more favorable treatment or we seek to play on the sentimentality of that link that’s been there for years and generations.

Ireland has to be proactive, proactive in ensuring that we are seen to be a friend of the USA.

that I have worked with for the tremendous time and effort and expertise that they provided for us as we sought to deal with our own what could have been termed “local squabble.”

But that squabble is over and we now have a leadership in all strands of Irish opinion that is focused on making the Republic a reality, on making [sure] in the centenary of 2016 that the vision of those who gave us the opportunity to shape our own destiny, political, economic and social, is something that we must live up to, that we expand equality of opportunity, that we ensure just as in America that anyone whatever their talents, whatever their background has a chance to go to the very top if they are prepared to work and be disciplined and

And I think Americans need to know that the new political generation in Ireland is not only deeply appreciative of what America has done for us thus far but we know there are things that we can do for America to make sure that America is better understood, that America’s position in the world is given the respect that it deserves, and you should be aware that under my leadership that will be a very important facet of my policy.

So tonight what I want to do is Irish America magazine’s event coordinator Kate Overbeck. to announce to this audience that there will be a strategic review of the relahave an ecosystem, in economic terms, tionship between Ireland and America that enables them to pursue excellence under the leadership of our ambassador to and achieve what they hope to achieve. the U.S., Michael Collins. He will report That’s the Ireland we want, and back to me by the end of this year. He will America and Irish America has been a seek out your ideas, your views as to how growing and constant inspiration for all Ireland and America can continue to partof us at home to seek out that sort of ner, can continue to work together, can vision for our own country. And now as continue to share the values that have we face into whatever the uncertain made that kinship real for this generation future may be, it is the societies that can as it was in the past. marry economic efficiency with environAnd I want to say to you as well mental sustainability and deal with enertonight that under my leadership as gy security, which will be the progressive Taoiseach of Ireland, I want to work with and successful societies of the future. everyone in Irish America and indeed We want to work with all of you to everyone in the American administramake sure Ireland is at the forefront of tion, this one and future ones. And I that transaction. thank each and every US administration Go raibh míle maith agaibh go léir. IA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008 IRISH AMERICA 29

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White-Tailed Eagles Return to Ireland A project to reintroduce the spectacular bird, which hasn’t been seen in Ireland since 1910.

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majestic-looking bird of prey circles overhead. With his twometer wingspan and razor-sharp beak, he might be a common sight in the wilds of America. However, here in Ireland, where these birds have been extinct since the early 1900s, such a sight is a cause for excitement.

So much so that I’ve been persuaded into the back of a jeep where I am jostled by boxes of slimy fish – all in order to find out about the white-tailed eagle reintroduction program.

As we trundle along a potholed track up the Killarney Mountains, Dr. Allan Mee, the project leader, tells me how it started.

“It began in June 2007 when 15 whitetailed eaglets (also known as sea eagles) were flown from Norway to Killarney National Park. They hadn’t been seen in Ireland since 1910 and this was the first step in bringing them back.”

Limerick-born Allan is enthusiastic about the project. So enthusiastic that it tempted him back to Ireland after 23 years working on similar projects abroad, the last five of which were spent in the U.S. working with the Californian Condor.

“This eagle is so important [to Ireland],” says Allan. “Ecologically, we are missing so many top predators from our eco system. All the larger animals – bears, wolves and birds of prey – have gone. The fox is our largest predator and we have fewer birds of prey than any country in Europe.

It’s great to have the white-tailed eagle back.”

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ulturally, the eagles are a living link with the past. Look at any map of the south and west of Ireland and you’ll see place names that refer to eagles. There’s Sliabh an Iolair – or Mount Eagle – in West Kerry and Gob an Iolair – or the Eagle’s Beak – in Waterford. There’s also an old Irish folktale about a contest to see which bird could fly highest. The eagle flew highest of all the birds but the wren who had hidden away in his feathers then soared just a little higher — winning the contest through stealth. (The tale connects up to Wren Day, which is still celebrated in Ireland, particularly in the West, on the day after Christmas). “By reintroducing the eagles we can restore that connection to

30 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

our folk memory before it’s lost forever,” says Allan.

The eagles are also expected to bring economic benefits in the form of ecotourism. Projects of this type have already been successful in Norway and on the islands of Mull and Skye in Scotland where the eagle population is now well established.

Despite these clear-cut advantages, not

everyone welcomes the eagles. When they arrived last year, farmers staged protests at the airport and were vehemently opposed to the project.

More worryingly, after the eagles were released into the wild, four were lost to poisoned bait. Investigations are continuing but the consensus is that the poisoning was deliberate and carried out by one or more farmers.

It’s now one year later. The second clutch of 20 eagles has arrived and there have been no protests. Does this mean progress has been made?

Allan is hopeful. “We have been through one lambing season without incident,” he says. “Once the farmers see the birds pose no problem, their concerns evaporate.”

However, Irish farmers remain to be convinced. “We’d be a lot happier without the eagles,” says Kevin O’Sullivan, who farms sheep in Caherdaniel, 20 kilometers

from Killarney National Park.

“We have enough predators to deal with without bringing in more. Only three eagles have settled in Kerry for now.

What will happen when we’ve got more?”

Is the eagle such a fearsome hunter that farmers need to worry for their lambs?

Allan prefaces his answer by describing the eagle’s diet – a mix of fish, carrion, birds and small animals such as rabbits.

“Farmers are frightened because of what happened in Scotland,” he says.

“Having reintroduced the white-tailed eagle in 1975, they now have 36 breeding pairs. There is speculation that two pairs killed lambs in Mull, but it hasn’t been proven. The eagles may just have been eating lambs killed by other predators.”

He cites the Norwegian example as justification for his argument. In a country of some two million sheep and 2,500 pairs of sea eagles, there has not been a single confirmed attack on farm animals in Norway.

By this stage in the conversation, we’re halfway up the hillside overlooking Killarney’s lakes in search for one of last year’s eagles that has set up home nearby. When Allan’s tracking system doesn’t find him, we assume that he is roaming further afield. This is confirmed later when Allan gets a call from a fisherman telling him he has seen an eagle out by the Skellig Rock.

The project depends on reports like this, and so far the public have proved cooperative. Thanks to them, it is known that three of the eleven eagles are in Kerry while others have been spotted as far away as Lough Neagh in Northern Ireland.

Higher up the mountain is the eagles’ temporary home – a series of boxes raised on platforms in the tree canopy. The eagles will be kept here until they are ready to feed themselves and fly away.

The enclosures have been constructed in such a way that the eagles never catch sight of the people who care for them. I spy on the birds through peepholes in the boxes while Allan feeds them. Instantly, I can see why farmers, and our forebears who hunted them to extinction, might have been wary. Although they are only three months old and not yet ready to

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the lake and remained there for several months.

“It mirrors the natural process,” says Allan. “We feed them twice a week or so, slowly encouraging them to feed themselves, just as their parents would.”

Having learned from last year’s experience, Allan intends to make one major Above: Dr. Allan Mee, the project leader, with his eagle tracking change. He hopes to device. Opposite page: A white-tailed eagle chick. minimize the risk of leave their makeshift nests, these eaglets poisoning by urging the birds to fish are impressive creatures. With fullinstead of relying on carrion. “We’ll be grown males weighing up to five kilos throwing fish onto the lake for them so and females up to six and a half kilos, that they learn quicker,” he says. they are the largest birds I’ve ever seen.

This should placate farmers. If the And with powerful talons and beaks, eagles are encouraged to fish, surely they they are also the fiercest. then pose even less of a risk to animals.

During the hour it takes Allan to feed Kevin O’Sullivan tends to agree. “It them, he describes the next stage of their shows our concerns are being listened to development. Once the eagles are now,” he says. released, they should follow the same Allan recognizes that such acceptance pattern as last year’s birds, which flew to represents a step forward. “We’d have

had a 100 percent survival rate last year if it weren’t for the poisoning,” he says.

“We’re trying to up our odds this year by lobbying the government to improve legislation, but if we’re going to succeed completely, we’ll have to win hearts and minds through education.”

He has already started to work with local schools and hopes that by the time a sustainable sea eagle population is established in Ireland – which should take up to 30 years – the general public will feel far more positive about them.

In the meantime, he will be busy. His next clutch of birds will arrive next June, followed by another in 2010 and 2011.

By that stage, 100 birds will have been introduced.

“I’m looking forward to seeing the first nest and the first breeding pair,” he says as the jeep lumbers back down the hillside. “What we’re doing now is donkey work as we prepare for that.”

Sitting in the back, surrounded by empty but still-stinky fish boxes, I can’t IA help but agree.

Story by Sharon Ní Chonchúir Photos by Richard Smallwood

Gregory Peck Remembered in Kerry

T

he legendary actor Gregory Peck, who died in 2003, was remembered at the 2008 Dingle Film Festival, where Gabriel Byrne was the first recipient of the Gregory Peck Award for Excellence in the Art of Film. The festival ran from September 11-14 at The Phoenix Cinema, in Dingle.

Festival director Maurice Galway said: “Gregory Peck said that the secret of film acting is complete candor with the audience; when you let them see the real you – and this perfectly captures the essence of Gabriel in his many roles and makes him an ideal choice for this new prestigious award.”

Byrne, who is nominated for an Emmy Award for his role in HBO’s In Treatment, said of Peck, “It is an honor to accept an award in memory of a great actor whose work transcends time and continues to inspire.”

Peck’s wife, Veronique, who traveled to Ireland with her daughter Cecilia, son Anthony and grandchildren Daniel, Harper and Ondine, told Irish America that her husband would have approved of the choice.

“Gregory admired Gabriel’s work,” she said. Mrs. Peck added that she and her family were delighted to be back in Ireland, her first trip since her husband passed away. “We feel that Greg would have loved [the award in his honor] because he was so proud of his Irish heritage and of his grandmother Catherine Ashe and his great-uncle and Irish patriot Thomas Ashe who were from Dingle.”

The actor created the Gregory Peck Scholarships in 1993, which continue to benefit Irish film students. He also created

The Gregory Peck Reading Series in 1995. Gabriel Byrne was one of the first actors to participate in the series that features acclaimed actors who read aloud from their favorite plays, poems, short stories, novels, essays and letters. The readings, which benefit the Los Angeles Library system, continue under the direction of Veronique who produces the series.

The award presentation to Mr. Byrne took place after a screening of A Conversation with Gregory Peck, a documentary by his daughter Cecilia.

Gregory Peck and his wife Veronique.

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{hibernia}

Those We Lost Michael Joseph Daly

.

-

g

n

Michael Joseph Daly, 83, died July 25 of pancreatic cancer in his home in Fairfield, Connecticut. A lieutenant and later a captain in the Army’s Third Infantry Division, he was awarded the Medal of Honor from President Harry Truman on August 23, 1945. Credited with single-handedly fighting off and killing fifteen Germans as well as demolishing three machine-gun emplacements – one from ten yards away – during the battle for Nuremberg in the Second World War, he was evacuated the day after the heroic event after sustaining injuries from a bullet to the face in a separate firefight.

He was also awarded three Silver Stars, a Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts during his time in the army. On the day after Daly was awarded his Medal of Honor, a parade was held in Fairfield for both Daly and his father, a colonel who had been injured in France.

Daly was born in New York City in 1926, the son of a highly decorated WWI veteran. He attended the United States Military Academy at West Point but did not graduate, instead enlisting in the Army as a private. He worked as a salesman for an oil company and as a real estate investor after the war.

Daly leaves behind his wife, Margaret Wallace Daly, a son, Michael, and a daughter, Deirdre Daly, as well as two sisters, a stepson and stepdaughter, and three grandsons.

Joseph Dwyer Pfc. Joseph Dwyer, 31 years old, died on June 28 in North Carolina in the tragic aftermath of his time in Iraq, another casualty of a war that the American public has long lost faith in.

Dwyer enlisted as an Army medic right after 9/11 and suddenly became the face of America’s heroism in 2003, at the beginning of the invasion, when a famous picture of Dwyer carrying a small Iraqi boy to safety was plastered in newspapers, TV footage, and magazine covers.

With a brother in the NYPD and another serving in the U.S. Air Force, Dwyer felt compelled to join the Army two days after 9/11, needing to do something to protect his family and his country. When he came home to El Paso, Texas a few months later, he was a 32 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

changed man. Paranoid and gripped with fear and shock from his experience, he began what would become years of sporadic treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder and, eventually, addiction. He became a Baptist, trying to find peace in scripture, but also sought comfort from drinking and inhaling spray fumes from cans of solvent. His wife eventually left him, afraid to expose herself and their young daughter any longer to his delusional and violent episodes. Despite countless efforts from his friends and parents to help him recover from the war, there seemed to be no cure. In October 2005, after an attempted intervention by friends failed, Dwyer shot up his apart-

Private Joseph Dwyer carrying an Iraqi boy to safety.

ment in a fit of delusion, insisting he could tell the SWAT team where the Iraqis were. He was arrested but discharged after the incident, and eventually moved to Pinehurst, North Carolina.

On June 28, police discovered Joseph Dwyer alone in his apartment, surrounded by pill bottles and aerosol cans. He was already dying.

Close Army friends expressed frustration with the military for allowing Dwyer to slip through the cracks of programs designed to help veterans in emotional recovery post-deployment. Dwyer had recently begun peer counseling with a fellow Iraq veteran who could relate to Dwyer’s fear and trauma, the only treat-

ment that seemed to help, but he was already too far gone. Dwyer was included in Irish America’s Top 100 Irish Americans of the Year list in 2004 for his contributions to public service.

David Herbert Greene David Herbert Greene died July 9 of pneumonia at the age of 94 in Boynton Beach, Florida. A professor at New York University for almost forty years, Greene was a well-recognized scholar of Irish literature credited by some with pioneering the field in American education.

Born in Boston in 1913, Greene earned three degrees from Harvard’s literature department over four short years between 1936 and 1939. After accomplishing his Ph.D. there, he served as a Navy intelligence officer in Britain during World War II, then was hired as an English professor at NYU. Officially retiring in 1979, Greene went on to work as an emeritus professor there for six more years.

Greene made a name for himself through several books including J.M. Synge: 1871-1909, an authorized biography written with Edward M. Stephens. He also worked on television and edited An Anthology of Irish Literature. Three years ago Greene donated to NYU decades of correspondence with Irish playwright Sean O’Casey, the result of a friendship begun when Greene was a Harvard student in the 1930s.

David Greene is survived by his wife, formerly Catherine Healy, to whom he had been married for sixty-nine years, a son, three daughters, four grandchildren, and a great-grandson.

Red Foley Red Foley, a scorer in major league baseball for nearly four decades, died July 7 at age 79 in Flushing, Queens. He scored games from 1966 to 2002, and worked in ten World Series between 1981 and 2001, a record number. Foley also wrote sports stories for The Daily News for 34 years, until 1981, and a question-and-answer column in the New York Post after that.

An officer of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America for years, he served as chairman of the New York chapter in 1969-7. Foley’s death was made known to the public by the family lawyer, Kevin Brosnahan.

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{hibernia} William P. Ford.

William P. Ford, 72, died of esophageal cancer June 1 in his home in Montclair, New Jersey. He was a former Wall Street attorney who became an influential activist and leading advocate for justice in El Salvador after his sister Ita Ford and three more women, including two other Maryknoll sisters and a missionary, were murdered in Dec. 1980 during the civil war in El Salvador. In a 2002 civil trial in Florida, the federal court jury found José Guillermo García, El Salvador’s past defense minister, and Carlos Eugenio Vides Casanova, its past National Guard commander, liable for $54.6 million of injuries due to pain and suffering undergone by three Salvadoran immigrants to America who the two military officials had ordered to be tortured.

While the verdict was not expressly tied to the murders of Ita Ford and the other churchwomen, it was clear that William Ford’s perseverance in the case was directly linked to the conviction. At the time of the trial, the two generals were living in Florida under U.S. permission.

Ford was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1936 to William and Mildred O’Beirne Ford. He earned his B.A. from Fordham University in 1960 and his law degree from St. John’s University in 1966. He began his law career as a clerk to a federal judge and later became a founding partner of Ford Marrin

Esposito Witmeyer & Gleser.

Ford is survived by his wife, the former Mary Anne Heyman, to whom he had been married for 47 years, two sons, William Ford III and John, four daughters, Miriam, Ruth, Elizabeth, and Rebecca, a sister, and eight grandchildren.

Ford’s daughter Ruth is now the director of the Maura Clarke – Ita Ford (MCIF) Center in Brooklyn, NY, named for Ford’s sister and another of the women murdered. The organization seeks to assist immigrant women in learning English, discovering ways to support their families, and participating actively in their community.

John R. Moran John R. Moran, 82, of Plainfield, New Jersey, passed away peacefully on August 21, 2008 at home. He and his wife, Lillian, were married for 59 years.

Born May 9, 1926 in Bayonne, New Jersey, he and his family had a summer home at Cedar Grove Beach Club, on Staten Island, N.Y., where he met his future wife, Lillian Quaranta, at the age 5.

John was educated by the Jesuits, at St. Peters Prep in Jersey City, before enlisting in the Navy at the age of 17. He served aboard the U.S.S. Auburn, where he saw action on Iwo Jima and Okinawa. He also served aboard the U.S.S. Siboney, during the Korean Conflict. Following his distinguished war service, John served as a

director of the Navy League, New York Council. He married and raised his family on Staten Island, where he became involved in the Democratic Party and served on various campaigns including the Presidential Campaign for President John F. Kennedy. His commitment to his faith and the education of his children was seen in his active involvement in the St. Joseph Hill Academy Fathers Club and the St. Charles Church Holy Name Society. He served as the President of the St. Joseph Hill Academy Fathers Club during the 1960s.

John enjoyed a successful career in the insurance industry, working for 33 years with the Continental Insurance Company. During his career with Continental, he held several senior level positions including President of Marine Office of America Corporation, in New York City; Chairman and President of First Insurance Company of Hawaii; and a senior officer of the Continental Corporation.

In addition to his wife, Lillian, John is survived by his sons John R. Moran, Jr. and his wife, Kathy, of Succasunna; Tom Moran and his wife, Joan, of N.Y.C.; his daughter, Bess Moran Zampella, and her husband Tony of Plainfield; his brother D. Perry Moran and sister Joan Cornell, and three grandchildren, Lisa Moran, John R. Moran III, and A.J. Zampella; and two great-grandchildren Kevin and Molly.

Carlin’s Last Stand he last week of July George Carlin's ashes were dispersed. He had asked his daughter, Kelly Carlin-McCall to deal with them within 30 days of his death in a manner that would respect his philosophy and outlook on life. With about 25 old friends from his old Irish NYC neighborhood (Morningside Heights), his daughter Kelly with his brother Patrick, his nephew Dennis and his son-in-law Bob McCall, started the dispersal at 120th and Riverside Dr., a spot called The Question Mark where George and his group of friends used to hang out in their youth. Kelly and the family then took him to Bleecker St. in Greenwich Village to a tree in front of the club The Bitter End to honor his creative beginnings, then to Lake Spofford in New Hampshire (Carlin went to camp there as a child and won many drama awards that were precious to him), then onto the family's property in Woodstock, and then finished with the remainder of the ashes in the Pacific Ocean underneath the Venice Pier.

T

Kelly Carlin McCall spreads her father’s ashes in front of the apartment where he grew up at 519 121st St. between Broadway and Amsterdam.

More ashes were spread at 120th and Riverside Dr. - The Question Mark is what Carlin and the gang called it.

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{hibernia}

The Brilliance of Beckett

KEVIN DHANIRAM

Left to right: John Rockwell, Michael Colgan, Barry McGovern, and John Collins.

O

n Wednesday, July 23, as part of Lincoln Center Festival’s stunning Gate|Beckett series, an audience of some 75 Samuel Beckett devotees gathered in Lincoln Center’s Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse to listen to Gate Theatre director Michael Colgan, actor Barry McGovern (I’ll Go On), and John Collins, Founder and Director of New York’s Elevator Repair Service (Gatz and The Sound and the Fury) in conversation with music critic, editor, and dance critic John Rockwell. In addition to talking about the works of Samuel Beckett, the men discussed their experiences with adapting his novels and novellas for the stage. Excerpts from that discussion follow.

On making changes to a writer’s work: MICHAEL COLGAN: Barry and I got to know Beckett and he was very precise. If an artist wants his canvas to be four feet off the ground on a grey background it’s arrogance not to do it the way the author wants it. But then, when I made the films of all the Beckett plays, some of the religious fans said they should not be done as films, just as plays.

BARRY MC GOVERN: Beckett was a great experimenter. He was always tinkering with his plays. Krapp’s Last Tape was made into an opera with his blessings. There is a lot of nonsense talked about Beckett and crossing genres.

QUESTION FROM JOHN ROCKWELL: You’ve done all of the official stage plays by Beckett. Now you are doing material not meant for the stage. Why? MICHAEL COLGAN: Lust for Beckett is the answer. When I took over the Gate in 1983 I wrote to Barry and we talked about Barry doing something at

the Gate. There were one-man shows in the 1970s and 1980s by actors but they would take pieces out of context.

We decided not to take the pieces out of context. So Barry decided to do the

Samuel Beckett in an undated photo.

adaptation with Gerry Dukes.

BARRY MC GOVERN: We were reading the canon of Beckett deciding what to do. I said, “Why not go with these three great novels? There’s a load of something we could mine.”

Gerry Dukes and I worked on the text over a number of months. We came up with the formula. Three months to the day we came up with the final script.

QUESTION FROM JOHN ROCKWELL: There is a ton of humor in I’ll Go On. Did you stress the humor?

BARRY MC GOVERN: We wanted to find a balance. The essential story is the search for identity and the search for self. He is seeking release and peace but he can only find these by speaking words. The play is a meditation on what it means to be alive in the world.

QUESTION FROM JOHN ROCKWELL: Do you have any other Beckett projects in view?

BARRY MCGOVERN: We will do a tour of Waiting for Godot in the 32 counties in Ireland in September and October this year. But I have done more Shakespeare and Yeats than Beckett. I see myself as a working actor, not as a ‘Beckett’ actor.

IRISH AMERICA 35

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{hibernia}

NYC’s First Irish Theater Fest I

t’s the biggest thing to ever hit the Irish theater scene in New York, the first ever Irish theater festival held throughout the month of September at the prestigious 59 East 59th Street Theatre in Manhattan, an unprecedented rollout for such a fledgling festival.

Called “1st Irish,” it’s the brainchild of Irish actor and director George Heslin, 36, whose Origin Theatre Company has introduced the works of over 26 new European – most of them Irish – writers to America since 2002. With admirable nerve, Heslin has programmed the entire festival as though it’s been running for years, and in the process he’s attracted many of the biggest names in contemporary Irish theatre.

“What inspired me to do this is that I’ve worked on a personal level with a lot of these great new playwrights in Ireland and I never saw their work being produced in America. That was the first spark behind it,” Heslin told Irish America.

A graduate of Trinity College in Dublin, and an actor, director and producer, Heslin has starred on the West End and OffBroadway. Back in Ireland, he paid his dues working for all the major theatres including the Abbey, the Gate, the Lyric, and Galway’s Druid before coming to New York to study with the legendary theatre coach Uta Hagen, until he eventually decided to stay.

“Enda Walsh and Mark O’Rowe were the playwrights I knew from home and I Chris Henry, Brianne Berkson and Hal Fickett in Mission by Gary Duggan at the 1st Irish Theater Festival.

saw they hadn’t been presented here in the States before so one of our first Origin Theatre Company shows was a production of Enda Walsh’s Mister Man. That ran Off-Broadway for five weeks and then we took it back to Dublin for the theatre festival. That was our second play project and the rest just followed on from there.”

What’s remarkable about 1st Irish is that the organizers seem to have taken Oscar Wilde’s advice about success to heart: just start at the top and then sit on it.

Heslin has curated a major international festival – bringing together the most important Irish theatre makers in the U.S. and Ireland – and he’s pulled it off on his first attempt.

As for the plays being staged this year, Origin took an imaginative approach to festival’s first show, End of Lines, by inviting five prominent new Irish playwrights to come to New York, ride the subways, then write twenty-five minute plays inspired by their experiences.

Says Heslin: “All of the writers we invited are award winning and I wanted to be very strict on including women writers and writers from all four corners of Ireland. So we have one each from Derry, Belfast, Dublin, Cork and County Clare.

The project opens the entire Irish theatre festival, and it kind of reflects what we want the festival to be – as inclusive and diverse as the nation itself.”

– Cahir O’Doherty

September 25, 2008 7:00 P.M. The Irish Arts Center

Irish American Writers & Artists in conjunction with the Irish Arts Center Present

A Night of Words, Music and Song in tribute and support of Danny Cassidy Musician, Labor Activist, Writer, Author of the groundbreaking How the Irish Invented Slang: The Secret Language of the Crossroads PERFORMERS INCLUDE Pete Hamill, Malachy McCourt,T.J. English, Ashley Davis, Mick Moloney, Maureen Dezell, Michael Patrick MacDonald, Dan Barry, Larry Kirwin,Terry Golway, Peter Quinn, and surprise guests.

After years as head of the Irish Studies Program at the New College of California, Danny was left without benefits when the college closed. He is now fighting a serious illness.

Please join with Danny’s many friends throughout the country in showing support and appreciation for the pioneering work he’s continuing to do in uncovering and documenting the influence of the Irish language on American speech and culture.

TICKETS: Supporter: $100.00 Friend: $250.00 • Patron: $500.00 Checks payable to Irish American Writers & Artists. Seating is limited.

The Irish Arts Center 553 West 51st Street. New York, NY 10019

36 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

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Quote Unquote “I’ve heard things like, ‘We don’t want to send our kids back to school because we’re afraid people don’t like Mexicans.”

Mayor Thomas O’Neill of Shenandoah, Pennsylvania speaking of the death of Luis Ramirez, a Mexican immigrant. Four teenage members of the high school football team have been charged in his death. Ramirez’s death has reignited a regional debate over immigration that began two years ago when the town of Hazelton, about 20 miles from Shenandoah, enacted an ordinance that sought to discourage people from hiring or renting to illegal immigrants. – The New York Times

“Have fun and do things together.”

Advice from Peter S. Lynch, vice chairman of Fidelity Investments, to Tommy Hilfiger and his fiancée Dee Ocleppo.

Lynch, who has been married for 40 years and has three daughters, attended an engagement party in New York for the couple and urged Hilfiger to spend a lot of time with Ocleppo. Lynch added that his wife, Carolyn, chairwoman of the Lynch Foundation, “never played golf, and now she plays golf. I never played bridge; now I play bridge. She never went to a hockey game, now she does hockey.” – The New York Times

PHOTO: KIT DEFEVER

Kay Ryan, who was named the country’s poet laureate on July 17, talking to Patricia Cohen.

– The New York Times

“Going through that traumatic time of being heartbroken and then being pregnant turned my whole life upside down and inside out and just knocked the wind out of me. But I got so much out of that.

It’s golden and it’s tough and it was f---ed up. But now I have a child, and it’s the best thing in the world.”

Bridget Moynahan talking to Marshall Heyman about finding herself three months pregnant but no longer in a relationship with football star Tom Brady. Her son Jack turned one in August.

38 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

“It’s just one of those countries that I’ve always felt, hey, I belong there.There’s a sense of humor that I relate to instantly.

And, sure enough, it hasn’t let me down.

Me and Rob went out on the town last night, had quite a few Guinness – 12 is quite a few, right? – and I haven’t laughed so hard in a long, long time.”

Adam Sandler who made a trip to Ireland to promote You Don’t Mess with the Zohan.

Sandler is Irish on his mother Anne Meara’s side. – The Irish Voice

PHOTO: CHRISTINA KOCI HERNANDEZ

“I so didn’t want to be a poet. I came from sort of a self-contained people who didn’t believe in public exposure, and public investigation of the heart was rather repugnant to me.” But in the end “I couldn’t resist. It was in a strange way taking over my mind. My mind was on its own finding things and rhyming things. I was getting diseased.”

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{hibernia} “Postville, Iowa, May 12: Federal immigration agents raided the Agriprocessors factory, arresting nearly 400 workers, most of them men, for being in the U.S. illegally. Within minutes of the raid, with surveillance helicopters buzzing about the leafy street, the wives and children of Mexican and Guatemalan families began trickling into St. Bridget’s Church, the safest place they knew. St. Bridget’s parish, which has only about 350 members, is spending $500,000 in the relief effort. . . . Sister Mary McCauley, the pastor administrator at St. Bridget’s, received an unsigned letter stating ‘You are as far as possible from being the image of Mother Teresa. May you rot in hell.’ “… [They] filled the rotunda and social hall of St. Bridget’s. They occupied every pew, every aisle, every folding chair, every inch of floor. Children clutched mothers. One girl shook uncontrollably.

PHOTO: AP

“You’re devastated if your wife or one of your kids is terminally ill. I was not devastated last year after that game.

Maybe I used a poor choice of words. People thought it didn’t bother me. It was just my perspective. . . I won’t be devastated if I find out my career is over.”

Tom Glavine, on why he chose not to use the word “devastated” to describe his feelings after his last game for the Mets which ended in defeat and caused them to miss the playoff last season, or the possibility of an elbow injury ending his career. Glavine has since had successful surgery on his left elbow and is expected to be ready for spring training next year with the Atlanta Braves.

– The New York Times

“We [Jon Stewart and I] often discuss satire – the sort of thing he does and to a certain extent I do – as distillery. You have an enormous amount of material and you have to distill it to a syrup by the end of the day.

So much of it is a hewing process, chipping away at things that aren’t the point or aren’t the story or aren’t the intention. Really it’s that last couple of drops you’re distilling that makes all the difference.

It isn’t that hard to get a ton of corn into a gallon of sour mash, but to get that gallon of sour mash down to that one shot of pure whiskey takes patience[as well as] discipline and focus.”

Stephen Colbert compares the production of satire to distilling a story down to ‘one shot of pure whiskey.” – The New York Times

“A few volunteers from the old Postville, descendants of the Irish and Norwegian immigrants who settled here more than a century ago, set out food. Others took turns standing watch at the church door, as if the sight of an Anglo might somehow dissuade the feared Migra, as the immigrants call Immigration and Customs Enforcement, from invading their sanctuary.”

– Samuel G. Freedman in The New York Times

“We don’t happen to believe that it’s good public policy in public housing sites where guns and violence is the highest in our city and, for that matter, in cities across America, to say ‘Hey, come on in; let’s everybody get guns.’”

San Francisco mayor Gavin Newson reacting to the Supreme Court’s affirmation of the right to bear arms. The National Rifle Association sued San Francisco and its housing authority to invalidate a ban on handguns in public housing.

– The New York Times OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008 IRISH AMERICA 39

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{history}

By Tom Deignan

The Battle Over Ulysses The court case that changed the way Americans read.

D

A Time for Censorship Censorship debates, of course, are still with us.

Debates over free or “inappropriate” speech seem to arise every other week, whether it’s controversial magazine covers or shock jocks who, in the minds of some, “go too far.” Then too, lyrics in music performed by gangster rappers or heavy metal rockers always seem to offend somebody.

So it is easy to believe we did not have these rancorous debates in the good old days, when it seemed that all entertainment was wholesome, everything was 40 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

ROSENBACH MUSEUM & LIBRARY, PHILADELPHIA

uring a first-season episode of the excellent AMC TV series Mad Men, set in the New York advertising world of the 1960s, several secretaries are seen gathered around the office water cooler, whispering. Finally, one secretly passes along a well-thumbed copy of the erotic literary classic Lady Chatterley’s Lover, which was only approved for legal publication in the early 1960s.

The fact that a mere novel could hold such cultural power seems almost quaint at this point in time.

However, such curious secretaries may never have had the chance to whisper about D.H. Lawrence’s famous novel if not for a landmark legal battle that took place 75 years ago. The case involved one passionate Irishman, challenged the censorship of perhaps the greatest novel ever written, and changed the way Americans read.

ABOVE: James Joyce reads The Freeman’s Journal in this reproduction of a poster.

LEFT: A page from the Ulysses manuscript, now in the Rosenbach Museum, features the “Calypso” episode.

black and white, the good guys always won, and jazz – which is now studied in universities and played only on publicly-supported radio stations – was the most provocative form of music.

But censorship was on everyone’s mind in 1933.

The most immediate and pressing issue, in the minds of Irish-Americans and many other Catholics across the U.S., were gangster movies, among them The Public Enemy in which James Cagney played Irish Chicago killer Tom Powers.

But even as cinematic gangsters were killing cops, corrupting women, and shipping illegal booze, a different kind of censorship battle was unfolding in a Manhattan courtroom.

At its center was, of all things, an 800page novel with the strange title Ulysses, by a brooding Irishman named James Joyce.

All in all, it took nearly 15 years of arrests, court fights, and even book burnings before the battle over Ulysses was finally settled in the fall of 1933.

The Exiled Artist Joyce had already left his homeland by the time he began writing Ulysses around 1914. His brilliant story collection Dubliners had already been published, followed by his autobiographical novel Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Joyce then turned solely to his monu-

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mentally ambitious retelling of the ancient Greek epic The Odyssey. Joyce, however, would have that epic unfold on a single day, June 16, 1904, in the lives of a tortured young artist Stephen and a kindly, passionate Dublin Jew named Leopold Bloom.

Given Joyce’s ancient inspirations and complex wordplay, Ulysses seemed unlikely to ruffle many feathers. In fact, as the novel grew longer and longer, it seemed that few people would even bother to read it.

However, although Joyce’s previous books had not sold very well, he did have an avant-garde following. It was also clear that while he had an interest in mythology, linguistics, and politics, he did not shy away from sexual and scatological matters, the kind of naughty stuff for which obscenity laws were written.

In 1920, after editor Margaret Anderson published a section of Ulysses in The Little Review, U.S. Postal officials seized copies of the literary magazine.

Among the episodes which alarmed the likes of The Society for the Suppression of Vice was one featuring Leopold Bloom sitting on a Dublin beach, fantasizing about a fair maiden.

In 1921, Margaret Anderson was hauled into court. Copies of The Little Review featuring Ulysses excerpts were either confiscated or, in some cases, actually burned. On the grounds that the material might corrupt children or women (even though it was the woman Margaret Anderson who saw the brilliance in Ulysses), Joyce’s material was deemed obscene. His masterpiece, more than likely, would never be published in the U.S. or Britain, which similarly deemed the book offensive.

A Second Court Battle One bit of good news for Joyce was that the battle over Ulysses garnered the book plenty of attention. Sylvia Beach, who owned the Shakespeare and Company bookstore in Paris, told Joyce it would be an “honor” to publish Ulysses, which she did in 1922.

Soon afterwards, smuggled copies were making their way into the U.S. The book, however, was still deemed legally “obscene” as the 1920s drew to a close, much to the chagrin of Bennett Cerf, who had started a little publishing business called Random House.

Joyce’s Irish-American Ally D

uring the first American obscenity trial against Ulysses in 1920, Joyce’s novel was defended in court by the famed Irish-American lawyer and patron of the arts John Quinn. In fact, the link between Joyce and Quinn – born in Ohio, the grandson of Irish immigrants – has endured for decades. Just a few years back, a Quinn descendant discovered a handwritten Ulysses manuscript and sold it through an auction at Christie’s. Joyce had given Quinn extensive sections of the manuscript, to express thanks for his support.

Quinn, who earned a fortune as a Tammany Hall lawyer, even helped finance The Little Review, the literary magazine which published excerpts of Ulysses and which Quinn ultimately defended in court during the 1920 obscenity trial.

That all being said, Quinn’s relationship to Joyce – and the Dublin author’s circle of avant-garde admirers – was far from perfect. In fact, though Quinn had a long history of supporting innovative arts movements, he also maintained a strain of his conservative Catholic upbringing, which led him to view some radical art with a skeptical eye, even as he understood its aesthetic importance.

Quinn died at the age of 54 in 1924, and was not around for the 1933 trial, which saw Joyce win the right to have his work legally published in the U.S.

B

orn to poor parents in 1870, Quinn became a prominent New York lawyer after attending Harvard. His life story was chronicled in the Pulitzer Prize-winning 1969 biography The Man from New York: John Quinn and His Friends by Benjamin Lawrence Reid.

Quinn was a driving force behind the famous 1913 art exhibition known as the Armory Show, which introduced American audiences to European art such as Impressionism, postImpressionism and Cubism. But books and authors had a special place in his heart. He collected early works by Heart of Darkness author Joseph Conrad, supported W.B. Yeats and Cuala Irish-American lawyer and patron Press which was set up in 1904 by the poet of the arts, John Quinn. and his sister Elizabeth, and the experimental poet Ezra Pound, who introduced Quinn to Margaret Anderson and Jane Heap, owners of The Little Review. When that magazine was dragged into court for publishing supposedly obscene sections of Ulysses, Quinn was a natural to defend the magazine.

Though all involved believed Ulysses to be a true work of art, Quinn, Anderson, and others disagreed on how to go about defending the work.

Quinn even expressed doubts about the literary merits of Ulysses.

“I myself do not understand Ulysses; I think Joyce has carried his method too far,” Quinn once said (as quoted in Edward de Grazia’s highly useful 1992 book Girls Lean Back Everywhere: The Law of Obscenity and the Assault on Genius).

Margaret Anderson lamented: “Quinn’s strategy in defending us was to argue that Ulysses was not indecent, merely disgusting.”

When the trial was over, and Anderson and Heap were dragged off to be fingerprinted and fined, Quinn said to Anderson: “Now for God’s sake, don’t publish any more obscene literature.”

De Grazia and others have speculated that Quinn chose not to appeal the 1920 ruling against Ulysses because he did not believe the censorship of literary material was as pressing an issue as limiting political speech.

Either way, it’s clear that John Quinn played a profound role in bringing James Joyce and his works to the U.S. Without Quinn’s legal and financial support, it is possible that American readers might never have gotten a chance to be dazzled, and baffled, by Joyce’s magical prose. – Tom Deignan

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{history} Cerf told Joyce that Random House would publish the book in the U.S. – but only if the courts allowed him.

That’s when the plotting began. Cerf hired acclaimed obscenity lawyer Morris L. Ernst to provoke a legal challenge to the initial obscenity ruling. In 1932, a copy of Ulysses was shipped to the U.S. and Joyce’s American allies made sure that customs agents seized it, setting the stage for an epic battle over an epic novel.

The case – The U.S. vs. One Book Called Ulysses – began in July of 1933.

Is It Pornographic?

“His Locale Was Celtic” “I hold that Ulysses is a sincere and honest book,” Woolsey wrote. “The words which are criticized as dirty are old Saxon words known to almost all men, and, I venture, to many women, and are such words as would be naturally and habitually used, I believe, by the types of

The Big Winners In the end, there were many winners in the epic battle to publish Ulysses in America. First, of course, was Joyce himself. Literary scholars – and now a federal judge – had deemed his work a masterpiece. His reputation as a genius – and one with a comic-smutty streak – spread far and wide. Not that Joyce needed the reassurance. He once boasted: “If Ulysses isn’t fit to read, then life isn’t fit to live.”

Bennett Cerf, along with partner Donald S. Klopfer, also came out of the case well. Their publishing firm Random House printed Joyce’s book and went on to become one of the world’s dominant publishing houses. Another big winner was the American reader, who could now alone decide what was bad and what was brilliant.

Perhaps the biggest winner in all of this, however, may well have been the lawyer who represented Ulysses, Morris Ernst. Yes, he had the satisfaction of helping to change America’s cultural landscape, and brought a great work of literature to the masses.

But he also agreed to take payment for the case only if he won. What was his payment? Five percent of the royalties on the first 10,000 published copies of Ulysses, followed by two percent of all later printings.

Needless to say, Ulysses is still in print, 75 years after Ernst won the IA Ulysses obscenity case.

Ulysses in Philadelphia

I

n 1924, Dr. A.S.W. Rosenbach purchased the Ulysses manuscript.

The expert bookman half of Philadelphia’s Rosenbach brothers, “the Doctor” had a keen eye for important books. Ulysses had been an immediate success when published in 1922, but it was still less than two years old when Dr. Rosenbach made his purchase. The manuscript had been put out for auction by John Quinn, a New York attorney and collector of modern literature. According to Rosenbach, a 1960 biography of Dr. Rosenbach written by Edwin Wolf, the Doctor paid the then princely sum of $1,950 for the manuscript. It proved to be an incredible bargain.

Ulysses has gone on to be recognized by many as the greatest English-language novel of the 20th century. Wolf tells us that Rosenbach briefly offered the manuscript for sale at $3,000, but quickly pulled it back. He resisted any further offers, including one from Joyce himself, evidently distraught that Quinn had sold the manuscript.

Joyce hoped to buy it back so he could give it to the French Library.

Rosenbach held onto it for the rest of his life, and when he died 30 years later, the manuscript was donated to the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia.

ROSENBACH MUSEUM & LIBRARY, PHILADELPHIA

Ernst was happy to see the case go to Judge John M. Woolsey, known as a sophisticated writer and thinker who loved books. That was important because now it was not just racy excerpts on trial but the entire Ulysses novel – which features scenes in a brothel as well as Molly Bloom’s famous, uh, climactic scene.

As The New York Times reported during the trial: “The principal question [Judge Woolsey] had to solve … was whether or not Joyce’s purpose in writing the book had been pornographic.”

Woolsey took the time to read Ulysses start to finish before the trial, which began with arguments about some of the four-letter words Joyce chose to use.

Ernst argued that these words were offensive only because society chose to make them taboo – and that, furthermore, they were more honest than evasive phrases such as “sleep together.”

Similarly, the coarse thoughts of Joyce’s characters are rendered in realistic stream-of-consciousness, and thus marked a legitimate contribution to the literary art form, Ernst argued.

Nevertheless, the prosecution had one seemingly airtight argument: certain sections of Ulysses, when read on their own, were sexually explicit and inarguably obscene, and thus illegal. What would happen if a child were to get his hands on such material?

Ernst’s response: “Adult literature (should not) be reduced to mush for infants.” On December 6, Judge Woolsey delivered his opinion.

folk whose life, physical and mental, Joyce is seeking to describe.”

Woolsey even suggested that readers should keep in mind Joyce’s Irish setting.

“In respect of the recurrent emergence of the theme of sex in the minds of his characters, it must always be remembered that his locale was Celtic and his season Spring.”

Woolsey agreed with Ernst that adult readers should be distinguished from children. “I am quite aware that owing to some of its scenes Ulysses is a rather strong draught to ask some sensitive, though normal, persons to take. But my considered opinion, after long reflection, is that whilst in many places the effect of Ulysses on the reader undoubtedly is somewhat emetic, nowhere does it tend to be an aphrodisiac. Ulysses may, therefore, be admitted into the United States.”

Woolsey concluded: “If one does not wish to associate with such folks as Joyce describes, that is one’s own choice.”

The Ulysses manuscript in an exhibition at the Rosenbach Museum and Library.

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Bill Maher gets real with Kelly Carlin-McCall about life, work and religion.

THe ReAL PHOTO: COURTESY HBO

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University. He climbed his way through the standmart, funny, bold, proverbial up world cutting his teeth at Catch a Rising Star line-crosser – all of these words in New York City, then began appearing on The could be used to describe Bill Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in 1982. For the Maher. They also could have been next fifteen years he was a frequent guest with used to describe my father, the Carson and Letterman, and had a successful late George Carlin. career as a stand-up comic. But, like most comics Earlier this year, I got the chance to meet Bill back in the 1980s, the goal was television sitcoms Maher. Unfortunately it was under circumstances and movies. And although Maher did both, neither I could have done without – the death of my materialized in a satisfying way. father. At my dad’s memorial service, Bill spoke Then in 1994 a fledgling network, Comedy about his personal feelings about my father’s work Central, was looking for something to put them and the impact it had on him. Bill said that my on the map, and they turned to Maher. Politically father had always been his rabbit – out front Incorrect, Maher’s show for the network, highlightkeeping him sharp and striving for the next line to ed his unique ability to bring together a disparate cross that might wake up the audience. That group (from B-list actors to heads of state) to observation hit me hard. I thought, what are we talk about the big issues of the day. And although going to do without our rabbit now? Who will the show moved to ABC and then was cancelled push the edge of our thinking, slap us into higher in 2002 after Maher made what the network conconsciousness, all the while doing it in such a way sidered controversial remarks about 9/11, it that you can’t help but smile? seemed that Maher had found his calling. He conBill Maher. That’s who. tinues to follow this path on HBO with Real Time Maher was born January 20,1956, in New York with Bill Maher.

City to an Irish Catholic father,William Maher Sr., I was thrilled to reconnect with Bill recently to and a Jewish mother, Julie Berman. Raised in talk to him about his life and work, and Religulous, River Vale, New Jersey, Maher was exposed early his new documentary about religion directed by on to talk of current events and political views by Borat director Larry Charles, that looks at religion his father, who was a news editor for NBC. from many angles. Bill too was happy to reconUnlike most families sitting around the dinner nect and just be talking to someone who was not table in the early sixties, Maher’s parents (his a professional entertainment journalist. The father died in 1992 of cancer) immersed their following is an edited version of that conversation. kids (Bill has an older sister Kathy who is a teacher) in conversations on the big issues of the day, such as civil rights and politics. Couple this open and questioning environWhat does it say about our country that it’s the comedians – Jon ment with Maher’s father’s gregarStewart of The Daily Show and Stephen Colbert of The Colbert ious and comedic nature, and you Report – who are in charge of the truth right now? have a perfect recipe for a politiWell, I think it says that there’s a lot of bullshit [out there]. And I think it says that cal comic to be born. media, in general, is part of the problem.

Maher knew early on that he I’m not even sure that they [Stewart and Colbert] are getting at the truth. I mean, wanted to go into comedy, just because you’re on the side of the liberals doesn’t make it true. People are lazy.

And I’m talking about media people too. So they’re very insecure about what’s the although he did not share his right answer, and if someone with confidence gives an answer, and it seems right and dream with his family until after people are applauding, they all flock to it. It’s a sad state of affairs when the people his 1978 graduation from Cornell who are supposed to be separating truth from fiction themselves don’t know what it is. It’s like having a bad teacher in school. If the teacher doesn’t know, then the kids can’t know. And if the media isn’t up to their job in delivering the news then the people are not going to be well informed.

S

PHOTO: COURTESY HBO

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“We are a nation that was founded by people who were trying to get away from religious dogmatism and the authority of kings and priests.”

And then where does that leave us, as a nation?

We’re all groping. It leaves us panicking.

We’re a panicky nation. We torture people. Attack the wrong country. That was panic, you know? Why do people panic?

They panic when they’re in the dark.

When you’re ignorant, you’re in the dark. And when you’re in the dark, everything scares you.

We had no clue [about the attacks on 9/11]. “Why did they do this to us? Why us Americans? We’re perfect. Doesn’t everybody know that?” I’m not saying it [9/11] was justified. I don’t think it was.

But there’s a big difference between not being justified and people being so ignorant that they have no clue as to where it came from. [The attack] didn’t come out of thin air.

Tell me about your Irish background and how you connect with it.

I’m half Irish. My mother certainly was not Irish. But my father was very Irish. I went to Ireland to find my roots, in 1999.

There were a lot of Mahers. There are variations on the spelling. I think originally it had even more weird letters in it that aren’t pronounced. I’ve seen it M-EA-G-H-E-R, as many as seven letters. In Ireland there were a couple of towns where I took pictures of Maher’s Pharmacy and Maher’s Delicatessen and Maher’s this and Maher’s that. So yeah, being Irish is part of my heritage. But in your father’s last special, he said something that I had never said publicly but I’d always thought, which is, “I don’t see any reason to be proud of what you’re born. You’re proud of what you achieve.” It’s silly to be especially proud 46 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

that you’re Irish, or Jewish, or Hungarian, but let’s say I’m not ashamed to be Irish. I’m kind of glad, because I like a lot of the traits that I think I get from having Irish blood flowing in me.

So I’m kind of glad that my father was Irish.

And what are some of those traits?

The Irish are a poetic people. I think they have communication skills above the ordinary. When you look at all the Irish authors and poets and playwrights, the list is pretty impressive.

And so I probably get some of my comedic skills from [being Irish]. I imagine it played a part. And being a comedian has given me a great life. I can’t imagine being anything else. So I kind of attribute that to my Irish side. Of course, the other half is Jewish. And they [the Irish and the Jews] have a lot more in common than you might think on the surface. The Jews were denied a homeland, just like the Irish, and they too made something of the soul and the artistic, as opposed to, say, the Romans building roads. So the fact that I’m half Irish and half Jewish, they both contributed to a sense of humor. But there’s no doubt that my father, the Irishman, was a gregarious, funny, living room comedian.

opposed to most kids I knew who had an upbringing where it was almost considered impolite to talk politics at home with your family. My mother and father talked and they certainly weren’t shy about sharing it with the kids. And my father certainly wasn’t shy about telling me how to think about matters that usually kids of a young age are not asked to think about, like civil rights. I grew up in an all-white town and yet my father did impress upon me at a young age that this country had a lot of work to do for the civil rights of black people. I think they were called “negroes” then. So it was in my head even though I really [laughs] had never even met a “negro.”

You were raised a Catholic. Did you ever buy into it?

Oh, yes, of course. Well, you’re a child; they stuff it into your head. What are you going to do? Who could argue at that age? I used to have a joke in my act that I, you know, at one time believed everything. I believed that there was a virgin birth. And I believed a man [Jonah] lived inside a whale. And I believed I was, you know, drink-eating the body of a space god when I had the wafer. But then something very important happened to me: I graduated from the sixth grade.

And that was the end of it?

As my dad used to say, “You don’t lick it off the rocks.”

[Laughs] Tell me a little bit about the atmosphere you grew up in.

I think it was atypical of an American upbringing, in the sense that we did talk politics. I think it was more like a European family in that sense, as

Of course it certainly wasn’t over that quickly. One thing we try to show in Religulous is that my evolution to where I am today was gradual, as I think it is for a lot of people. And especially when you’re raised Catholic, you know, you’re starting from a point of indoctrinated religious belief. There isn’t a lot of wiggle room. I kept a list of questions that I

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was given when I couldn’t have been more then seven years old. I think it was to study for my first communion. And it’s a series of questions like, you know, “Who is God?” “Who am I?” blah, blah, blah, that we had to memorize. There was a question, there was an answer for it, and that was it. And there was no deviation from that answer. And that’s what religion is. That’s why your father [George Carlin] and I, and people like us are against it; it’s the absolute antithesis of what we would consider free thinking.

But, yes, I went to church [as a kid].

We went to church every Sunday. I didn’t go to Catholic school, but we would be dropped off at catechism class. It wasn’t like school, because I didn’t know any of the kids. The classrooms were very crowded. The nuns were mean. I was young and scared. It just frightened me and I hated it. And then we went to church, which I didn’t hate as much. I was with my father and my sister so I felt safe. It wasn’t scary. It was just boring, and I thought, “What are they rambling on about?” Half of it was in Latin.

During that time, the late 60s/early 70s, there was an evolution of thought going on in this country. People were walking away from institutions. They were questioning authority on a huge level.

PHOTO BY TIM PALEN

My father stopped going to church when I was about 12 or 13, right before I was supposed to be confirmed, which is why I don’t have a middle name, because that’s where you get your middle name, at your confirmation. That was about 1968/’69 and my father just pulled the plug. I don’t think he ever said why, we just stopped going. And I wasn’t about to argue. It would have been like the kid asking for more homework. I just shut up. I was like, great. I hope this lasts forever. And, you know, I don’t think I ever went back. And I don’t think he did either. He was much more conflicted about it than I was. I was thrilled. He, because he grew up in a very Catholic household, and had been a devout Catholic for all those years, I think it troubled him and gave him some guilt right to the end.

It was around that time when you found out why your mom wasn’t going to church with you, which was because she was Jewish?

Right. I wouldn’t say it was traumatic to find out [that she was Jewish], but what was more traumatic for me was that here I was, 13 years old, and I was just finding out this important thing about my family that I hadn’t ever been told. It didn’t bother me that she was Jewish; it bothered me that we didn’t talk about it.

This was one thing I really wanted to have on film, and luckily [my mother] lived long enough to be interviewed in the movie, because I had never really asked her the question, “Why didn’t we ever have a family discussion about this?” And she didn’t really have a good answer [laughs].

Why do you think that was?

I guess they just figured, well, he’s too young, he can’t really understand, or perhaps they thought it would be very conPhoto: Maher in a promotional shot for Religulous.

fusing. You’re trying to tell a kid, Hey, there’s only one way to think about the afterlife, and that’s in these questions and these answers. I just think the years rolled by and they forgot about it. It just became part of the routine. Every Sunday my father, my sister and I would go to church; Mom would stay home. I never thought anything of it.

What did you learn about religion, or yourself, or the world by doing Religulous?

I learned I didn’t want to make any more

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PHOTO: AL EXANDRA IS LAMBRINID

Above: Maher interviewing “Jesus” at the Holy Land theme park in Orlando.

Above: Larry Charles and Bill Maher during production on Religulous.

Left: Just another face in the clouds; the movie poster for Religulous.

movies [laughs]. It’s a lot of getting up really early and having makeup on your face all day. And I didn’t learn much about religion, or rather what I learned is that it’s as nutty as I thought it was, even nuttier. We spent a week in Jerusalem, which I call “the funny-hat capital of the world” because everybody in that town is wearing some weird hat and getup. There are so many different sects, so many different offshoots and branches of the three major religions, and they all got their own uniform. That place is a feast for the eyes. I would say that in general, my belief about religion wasn’t shaken. I certainly didn’t see a cross on the road to Damascus.

No Virgin Mary in your soup or anything.

No [laughs]. I think the Jews, although certainly less warlike than the Christians and the Muslims, are no less crazy. You know, there’s just some crazy stuff they believe and do, and a lot of OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder). A lot of really cuckoo stuff there in Jerusalem. I think Judaism in America, except for the very Orthodox, is much more just cultural.

If people shouldn’t believe in religion, what would you have them believe in?

Ethics. Religious people don’t need to be ethical, because [religion] is mostly about salvation. It’s about closing your eyes, very tightly, and believing in someone so much, without question, that when you die he will save your ass. [Religion is] about 48 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

COURTESY OF LIONSGATE

ATE F LIONSG URTESY O PHOTO CO

saving your ass. And that ain’t ethical.

There’s a million reasons I could give you as to why a religious [person] is less moral than an ethicist, but here’s just one. Religious people think that animals don’t have a soul – we’re so sure people do – so it’s okay to torture and kill and do anything you want to animals because there’s some bullshit in the Bible about how we have dominion over them and they don’t have a soul. For that reason alone I dislike religion.

Where do you think America is right now? And what direction do you want to see the country take?

I want it to go towards the light! God,

there’s so many areas where it needs to be patched up and fixed. In general, I want to see America get out of the [Iraq] war, so that we have the money and the energy to do something else. I want us, obviously, to address the environmental problems that are becoming so frightening. The frogs are dying, the bees are dying, the glaciers are melting. I don’t know what has to happen before the world takes notice. And, you know, America always bragging that it is Number One. Well, if it’s Number One, it’s got to take the lead. And it hasn’t taken the lead, so why should other countries fall in line behind us?

And I would just like us to become a nation that thinks more.

This stuff that’s going on now about oil drilling offshore – you know, even the oil companies [laughs] are saying, “You know what? It really wouldn’t help anything, long range or short range.” You’d think that would be enough for people. And yet, two-thirds of America are like, “No, let’s start drilling. That’ll lower gas prices.” We need the type of leader who will say, “Hey, folks, wrong answer. Not going to help anything. Not going to fix your short-term problems. Definitely is bad for the long range.” We really need to get off the oil. You know, when you’ve got 80-year-old oil men like T. Boone Pickens who are against drilling offshore and want to convert to wind and solar power, that says something about where this nation is.

Continued on page 51

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“I mostly preach the doctrine of ‘I don’t know.’ It doesn’t trouble me that much that there are big questions that I can’t answer. I’ve never been able to answer them; I never will.”

Continued from page 48.

We are a nation that was founded by people who were trying to get away from religious dogmatism and the authority of kings and priests. The founding documents are very vague. They talk about “the Creator” but nothing very specific – nothing at all about Jesus Christ. You’d think, if it was [to be] a Christian nation they would mention Jesus in the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence. That alone should tell you something. They [the religious right] try to take quotes out of context.

Jefferson wrote that bible where he took out all “woo-woo” from Jesus; just left the philosopher. And he [Jesus] is a great philosopher. We can all admire the philosophy.

So, how would you categorize the Founding Fathers?

The Founding Fathers were more deists.

If you had to categorize them as anything. There was some sort of moving prime force. But it’s an impersonal force.

Some people call it Nature. Certainly not this personal god who you have a personal relationship with, who listens to your prayers and answers them, or doesn’t.

You know, not the silly stuff that most Americans believe because we’re such a dumb nation.

PHOTO BY TIM PALEN

One of the things that you dive into in Religulous is the Founding Fathers’ take on religion, and how the Christian religious right has said that this is a Christian nation and how you found out that that just wasn’t true.

Clearly you’ve walked away from the dogmatic stuff. But do you have your own private spiritual path?

One thing people don’t often ask me is “What do you actually believe? We know what you don’t believe.” I mostly preach the doctrine of “I don’t know.” It doesn’t trouble me that much that there are big questions that I can’t answer.

I’ve never been able to answer them; I never will. I just kind of let it go.

“Where did we all come from?” “What’s

the meaning of it all?” “What happens when you die?” Who the f—- knows?

What I do know is that it [laughs] gets my Irish up, to beg the point of our interview, when people make up stories and sell an invisible product. It’s such a scam. I just think people should man-up, suck it up, and just say “I don’t know,” instead of closing their eyes very tightly and insisting on believing something that part of them must know is not true. So when people say, “Yeah, but could it be Jesus Christ?” Yes, it could be. And it could be the lint in my navel. It could be a lot of things. I tend to doubt very strongly [the story of] Jesus Christ or any other story that just smacks of the kind of thing that primitive men would come up with.

One part of the movie that blows people away is when we present the different gods that preceded Jesus Christ who were also crucified. Who they said died for people’s sins, died for three days, came back to life, born of a virgin, baptized in a river. Horace in Egypt and Mithra in Persia and Krishna in India – almost the exact same story as Jesus Christ.

So my main doctrine is, just suck it up and say “I don’t know.” But I also understand that it’s a bit of a luxury to not need to have this sort of spiritual reassurance.

And I’m not trying to point fingers, but I do sincerely believe that, unless we shed this skin of myth turned into religion, mankind can’t progress very far, to the point where we need to solve some problems, especially now, that are becoming life-threatening. And [religion] diverts us from so much that needs to be accomplished. And there are so many people who – and this is very frightening to me IA – are okay with the world ending.

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A Celebration of the Irish in the Southern United States

In this special feature we pay tribute to the Irish in the Southern United States.

The honorees profiled in the following pages will be feted at our third annual Stars of the South dinner in Atlanta on October 18, 2008.

{Kevin Conboy} K

evin Conboy is a dual citizen of the United States and the Republic of Ireland, and president of the Atlanta chapter of the Ireland Chamber of Commerce. In that capacity, he led a trade mission to Ireland and Northern Ireland in June 2007 with Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue. He works with a number of Irish clients, as well as U.S. clients doing business in Ireland.

A senior partner in the international law firm Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walter LLP, Kevin began his career as a law clerk for Marvin H. Shoob, U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Georgia. He was born in Amityville, New York, the oldest of seven, and attended Catholic schools in the New York area including Regis High School in New York City. He received his B.A. in religious studies with a minor in philosophy from LeMoyne College in 1974 and received his J.D. degree, cum laude, from the University of Georgia School of Law in 1979. In law school, he was active in the International Law Society (spending a summer in Brussels at a European Economic Community seminar and at the Hague Academy of International Law), and with the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law,

where he served as lead Notes Editor and published two Notes of his own.

He also served as a research assistant to Gabriel Wilner, Kirbo Professor of International Law, and to the Rusk Center for International and Comparative Law. He is a member of the Atlanta and International Bar Associations and was admitted to the bar in the State of Georgia.

Kevin also served for two years as deputy headmaster and teacher at a secondary school in rural Kenya, East Africa. He is actively involved in various community service organizations, and serves as a trustee for Southern Catholic College. He is on the advisory board for the Dean Rusk Center for International Law at the University of Georgia’s Lumpkin School of Law, and is active with the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.

Kevin lives in Georgia with his wife of 32 years, Maureen, who he met during orientation week at LeMoyne College.

They have three daughters, Meghan, Allison, and Colleen. He is the interim president as well as serving on the board and as general counsel for the Atlanta St. Patrick’s Foundation, a nonprofit group that works with the Atlanta St. Patrick’s Day Parade and raises funds for children’s charities.

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{James Kelly} In 2006, James Kelly received Irish music’s highest honor, the Gradam Ceoil TG4 2006 Irish Musician of the Year Award (TG4 is Ireland’s Irish-language TV station). One of the best Irish traditional fiddlers alive today, he learned his music from his father, John Kelly, the renowned fiddle and concertina player from County Clare.

James won first place in the prestigious Fiddler of the Year competition in Ireland at just age sixteen and soon afterwards recorded his first album, a duet with his brother John. He went on to join the group Ceoltoiri Leigheann (Leinster Musicians), which included his father, and such stellar musicians as Paddy O’Brien, Mary Bergin and Paddy Glackin, and recorded two albums with the group before emigrating to America in 1978.

As a solo artist and a member of such influential groups as Kinvara, Bowhand, Patrick Street and the legendary folk group Plansty, James soon became widely known in the U.S. even as he continued to tour in Europe, Canada and South America. He was was a presenter of the Pure Drop series for Irish television, appeared with The Chieftains, recorded with The Bee Gees and was a regular guest on Garrison Keillor’s national radio show A Prairie Home Companion.

With 18 albums to his credit, including his recently released third solo CD, Melodic Journeys, James, who currently resides in Miami, also teaches the fiddle to students all over the world via the internet and holds regular workshops in U.S., Canada and Europe.

He continues to play concerts and festivals with some of Irish music’s leading accompanists, and is a regular at all the major American music festivals, including the Philadelphia Folk Festival and the Milwaukee Irish Festival. In recent years he received the Florida Folk Heritage Award as well as the Florida Individual Artist Fellowship in Folk Arts Award.

{Haley Kilpatrick} When Haley Kilpatrick was 15 years old and dealing with the pressures of being a teenager, she founded Girl Talk at her school in Albany, Georgia. “It’s an organization that develops leadership skills in high school girls by allowing them to mentor middle school girls,” Kilpatrick told Nicole Lapin when she was on CNN’s Young People Who Rock last year. From humble beginnings in her school, the nonprofit organization now reaches young women in 24 states, with international chapters in Canada, the Virgin Islands and Africa, helping over 30,000 girls deal with the stress and strain of growing up.

The 21-year-old, a Kennesaw State University graduate with a degree in communication, travels extensively around the country spreading the word about Girl Talk and motivating youth, teachers and administrators on the importance of mentoring. The organization’s mission is to help young teenage girls build self-esteem, develop leadership skills, and recognize the value of community service through weekly mentoring meetings.

Apart from CNN, Kilpatrick has appeared on NBC’s Today Show, NBC Nightly News, Montel, and TBS. She has received 54 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

numerous awards and recognitions, including the 2007 Southeastern United States of the NSDAR Community Service Award, an annual award given to a native-born American citizen for outstanding contributions to their part of the country.

She was also honored with the President’s Volunteer Service Award and the Community Service Award from Atlanta’s NBC affiliate 11Alive. She is a spokesperson for American Eagle and appeared on billboards nationally for their Live Your Life Spring 2006 campaign.

CosmoGIRL! magazine named her as their 2004 CosmoGIRL! of the Year and she has appeared on Jezebel magazine’s list of Atlanta’s 50 Most Beautiful People, as well as receiving a $10,000 Maybelline New York scholarship.

As busy as she is with Girl Talk, Kilpatrick has also found time to be Albany’s Volunteer of the Year, United Way’s Southwest Chapter’s Volunteer of the Year, and Miss Teen Albany.

Kilpatrick, of Scots-Irish descent, tells us of her family’s heritage, “Between 1717 and the American Revolution, about 250,000 Scots-Irish came to the New World, but Kilpatricks have been in this country for a longer time than that – at least 330 years, in fact.”

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{Donald Keough}

T

he son of a farmer and cattleman, Donald Keough was born in a small town in Iowa. When the Depression hit, Keough’s father lost most of his money in the cattle market, and when the house on the farm property accidentally burned down the family moved to Sioux City, where Keough’s father struggled to start over again. Of this time, Keough says, “It must have been devastating for him, but he never showed it. He was a great role model for me.”

The young Keough enlisted in the Navy and after serving two years went to Creighton University on the G.I. Bill.

He began his career in television and radio, and moved on to marketing for a food company, which was acquired by Coca-Cola in

1964. And thus began a career that culminated in Keough’s being named president of Coca-Cola in 1974.

Keough, who resides in Atlanta, stepped down from his position at Coca-Cola in 1993, having served as president, chief operating officer, and director of the worldwide Coca-Cola Company, but continues to serve as an adviser to the board. He is currently the chairman of Allen & Company, an investment banking firm in New York.

Throughout his steady rise up the corporate ladder, Keough’s pride in his Irish heritage remained constant. And after a career in corporate America he turned to a venture of a different kind – investing in Irish Studies.

In 1993, with an endowment of $2.5 million he

e s t a b l i s h e d the Keough Institute of Irish Studies at Notre Dame, and the Keough Notre Dame Centre in Dublin, Ireland. “Notre Dame didn’t have any type of academic Irish studies program. It just seemed like a natural fit to me,” Keough said at the time. Today, over 400 students are part of Notre Dame’s Irish Studies Program.

Keough is the recipient of numerous honors, including the Horatio Alger Award and the Notre Dame Laetare Medal. In June, 2007, he was granted Irish citizenship, something he celebrated by taking his wife Mickie, his children and grandchildren on a trip to Ireland.

In July of this year, Keough wrote his first book, The Ten Commandments for Business Failure, where he uses his sixty years of business experience to highlight the challenges and obstacles faced in business. As Jack Welch said of the book, “A must for every leader.”

The Waldorf Astoria, New York, November 7, 1991: Donald Keough reaches for his wife Mickie’s hand as Hugh Carey, New York’s former governor, looks on. Keough received the Gold Medal from the American Irish Historical Society on that night.

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{Dr. Thomas Lawley} Dr. Thomas Lawley was appointed dean of Emory’s School of Medicine in 1996. He is president of the Emory Medical Care Foundation and the Children’s Research Center, and he is on the board of the Emory Children’s Center. He also serves on the boards of The Emory Clinic and Emory Healthcare, and has written more than 200 book chapters, research articles, and abstracts, and is on the editorial boards of several journals.

The son of a policeman, Dr. Lawley was born in Buffalo, New York, graduated magna cum laude from Canisius College and received his M.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo. He trained in dermatology at Yale University, and at the National Institutes of Health, where he began as a clinical associate and became a senior investigator. Board certified in dermatology and in dermatological immunology, he came to Emory’s School of Medicine as chair of the Department of Dermatology in 1988 and increased the then-unranked department’s national rating to third place.

Dr. Lawley has received numerous academic prizes and is a member of several honorary medical societies, including the American Society of Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Professors.

{Michael McGovern} Mike McGovern has devoted a considerable part of his career to finding ways to improve children’s health. One project he is involved with is I4Learning, a company which trains teachers to teach interactive programs dealing with the science of nutrition, exercise and tobacco as part of schools’ science curriculum. This enables children to learn and experience the science and habits of a healthy lifestyle, which is the greatest prevention against Type 2 diabetes, tobacco addiction and the adverse medical consequences associated with each.

To further this cause Mike co-founded The Institute for America’s Health in 2003. This is a public foundation whose mission “is to inspire, motivate, and educate youth to make healthy lifestyle choices.” Another important goal in Mike’s life is the search for a better way to deliver insulin to people who have acquired diabetes.

He is a founding investor in and director of the pharmaceutical company CPEX, with the primary goal of obtaining regulatory approval for the nasal delivery of insulin. CPEX is currently undertaking Phase II clinical trials. Before turning his attention to children’s health issues, Mike had a successful career in tax consultancy and investment.

Mike was born in Dublin to parents who both hailed from

56 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

County Cavan. A strong work ethic was incubated at an early age when Mike started doing chores during extended visits to his grandparents’ farm.

Praised for being industrious in these tasks, he decided to try working for himself when his family moved to New Jersey during the summer before he started the sixth grade. Mike bought a used bicycle and worked his own paper route for the Jersey Journal until he finished grammar school.

He enjoyed all the traditional American sports during his school years, but also found time to work as a stock boy in a local grocery store and as a caddy at Englewood Country Club.

On graduating Don Bosco High School, Mike enlisted in the Army. After his tour of duty was over, he enrolled at the University of Illinois, where he received his B.S. and M.A.S. in accounting as well as his law degree. Today, he and his wife, Elizabeth reside in Sandy Springs with their two children, Isabella and Michael, Jr. Isabella is a graduate student at the University of Chicago and Michael attends The Paideia School. For the last four years, Mike has been serving on the Ireland-America Economic Advisory Board to the Prime Minister (Taoiseach) of Ireland.

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{Brian Moran} As a prosecutor in Arlington County, member of the General Assembly, and leader in the Virginia Democratic Party, Brian J. Moran has focused on education, opportunity, protecting children and creating a better life for the next generation. He is the chairman of the Virginia House Democratic Caucus and a delegate representing Fairfax County and the City of Alexandria, and is currently campaigning as a 2009 Democratic candidate for Governor of Virginia.

The youngest of seven in an Irish middle-class family, Brian worked to put himself through college and law school at Catholic University. His grandparents came to America from County Mayo with nothing more than a single suitcase only to face signs of “Irish Need Not Apply.” The Moran homestead in Carrowkeel, Mayo still exists and is home to the members of the family still in Ireland.

In 1995, Brian ran for the House of Delegates and was elected to represent Fairfax County and the City of Alexandria where he has worked to curb drunk driving, improve Virginia’s small business climate, crack down on Internet child sex predators, and improve preventative health care. House Democrats elected him

as the House Democratic Caucus Chair in 2001. In that role, he has led efforts to expand the Democratic Caucus, resulting in the largest Democratic gains in the Virginia House in over a generation.

After September 11, Governor Mark Warner appointed him to the Secure Virginia Panel, dealing with issues of homeland security in the Commonwealth.

Brian was also a member of Governor Tim Kaine’s 2007 Health Care Reform Task Force and has been a long-time member of the Advisory Board of Stop Child Abuse Now, and has been a member of his local Alexandria Chamber of Commerce, Kiwanis club, and Alexandria Bar Association. He has received numerous accolades, including legislative awards from the Victims and Witnesses of Crime, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the Virginia Sheriffs’Association and Our Military Kids.

He also received the prestigious Tech Ten Award from the Northern Virginia Technology Council and was named the Virginia Jaycees Man of the Year.

Brian and wife Karyn have two children.

{Mary O’Connor} Mary O’Connor is the Director of Outreach for the Center for the Study of the Presidency in Washington, D.C., an organization designed to study the successes and failures of the past presidents and apply these studies to current presidential endeavors. Mary became involved in politics while attending Trinity College in Washington, D.C. While earning her bachelor’s degree in political science, she served as president of the Young Democrats. This early leadership in the political arena helped build the foundation for her future career, which has included time as Georgia Finance Chair for the Elizabeth Dole for President campaign and the Dole for Senate 2002 leadership team.

An advocate for America’s youth, Mary served a two-year term as national president of the Achievement Rewards for College Scientists Foundation, Inc., a nonprofit foundation that, since 1958, has awarded scholarships to U.S citizen-scholars in the fields of science, engineering and medicine. She currently serves on the ARCS Foundation advisory board.

While living in Atlanta she founded 58 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Mary B. O’Connor and Associates, a community relations firm that provides clients with a structured contributions strategy and targeted leadership roles in communities in the Southeast. She also served as executive vice president of SciTrek, the Science and Technology Museum of Atlanta.

Mary, who has received numerous honors, served on the board of the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau, St. Joseph’s Hospital of Atlanta Foundation.

She was the vice president of the Junior League of Atlanta, and has been inducted into the YWCA of Greater Atlanta’s Academy of Women Achievers. She was named Woman of the Year by the Atlanta Women’s Commerce Club, and has also been recognized with the American Institute for Public Service’s Jefferson Award for Outstanding Public Service and the WXIA-TV Atlanta Community Service Award.

Both sets of Mary’s family emigrated from Ireland. Her paternal grandfather, Thomas P. Bagley, was born in the Parish of Ballinacourty, County Kerry, and arrived in America in 1882. Her maternal grandfather,

Thomas Hannigan, left Drimoleague, County Cork, in the late 1800s at the age of 18. When asked why he left Ireland for America, he responded: “Because America needed us.” Of this spirit Mary, who lives in Alexandria, Virginia, says, “That confidence continues to trickle down through generations, culminating in my terrific opportunity to serve as Attaché from the Republic of Ireland for the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. That experience brought my Irish heritage to full circle!”

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DEPARTMENT

{Mary King

}

Rose Taylor

Mary King Rose Taylor is the founder of the Margaret Mitchell House & Museum in Atlanta, Georgia. The turn-of-the-century Tudor revival home was built in 1899 by an Irish Catholic, Cornelius Sheehan. It was converted into a 10-unit apartment building in the late teens and in 1926 became the home of Margaret Mitchell (whose parents were Scots-Irish and Irish Catholic) and her husband John Marsh. It was there that the famed author wrote her Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, Gone With the Wind.

Mary, herself has a background in writing, which she brings to her role with the Mitchell House. She has over 20 years experience in broadcast journalism. Having begun her career with 60 Minutes, she went on to research, direct and produce documentaries for CBS, BBC, and PBS. After working as assignment editor for Metromedia in NYC and Post-Newsweek in Washington, D. C., she moved to Atlanta in 1980 to become a news anchor for the NBC affiliate, WXIA-TV. Mary soon settled in to Atlanta and in addition to being a former Chairman of the board for the Margaret Mitchell House & Museum, she is a founding member of the Atlanta Auxiliary of the Alzheimer’s Association and serves on the Board of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and the Board of Visitors for the University of Georgia Libraries.

Taylor was married to the late C. McKenzie (Mack) Taylor, the former Chairman of Taylor & Mathis, commercial real estate developers. She has two stepchildren and four step grandchildren. She was previously married to PBS’ Charlie Rose.

A graduate of the University of North Carolina, Mary, the oldest of five children, born to the late Dr. Walter Gorringe King of Binghampton, New York, and Marylynn Eusterman of Rochester, Minnesota. She recently learned that her late grandfather, Christopher Evan King, an immigrant from the British West Indies, actually descended from Scots-Irish ancestory.

{D. Reece Williams} D. Reece Williams, whose ancestors were part of the Irish migration from Ulster to America in the first half of the 1700s, is a partner at Callison Tighe & Robinson, LLC, in Columbia, South Carolina, and a member of the American and South Carolina Bar Associations and former president of the Richland County Bar Association.

His forefathers moved from Pennsylvania to South Carolina where they settled in the up-country, lands occupied by the Catawba Indians and birthplace of Andrew Jackson, also of Irish descent. “Like most of these Irish, they mistrusted government – particularly English government – were independent, accustomed to hardship and prone to violence. These qualities contributed to the American Revolution; some say these Irish fomented the Revolution. My ancestors served the patriot cause and remained in the up-country of South Carolina, proud of their Irish heritage, and helped to establish the character of the region and of the new America,” says Williams of his Irish roots.

Williams earned his B.A. from the University of North Carolina in 1960 and his J.D. from the University of South Carolina School of Law in 1964. In 1989, he was elected to the American Board of Trial Advocates, an organization whose membership is restricted to lawyers who have completed at least 50 jury trials. He has been a national director since 1989, national secretary 1991-1993, recipient of its Masters in Trial award in 1995, founder and trustee of its allied foundation, and has formerly served as its national secretary, national vice-president, national president-elect, and national president at various times.

He is a member of the South Carolina Trial Lawyers Association, Defense Trial Lawyers Association, American Judicature Society, and the International Society of Barristers.

He received the University of South Carolina James Petigru Compleat Lawyer award for professional excellence in 2001, and has been a legal education speaker in over 50 trial demonstrations in more than 30 states, and has authored articles for several legal publications.

A past board member of The Workshop Theatre, Columbia Ballet, Kitani Foundation, The Nature Conservancy, The Red Cross, and The S. C. Aquarium Commission, Williams is the present chairman of the U.S.C. School of Public Health Partnership Board, past chairman and present life member of the Salvation Army Board, past chairman of the Columbia Housing Board, present life member of Columbia Art Association and member of The Columbia Museum Board of Visitors, and a former vestryman and canvass chairman of Trinity Episcopal Cathedral. He is an organizational board member of the S.C. Chamber Orchestra and is a board member of the South Carolina IA Philharmonic Orchestra.

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Irish Colleen We all know the wonderful score of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s South Pacific.

The romantic ballads such as “Some Enchanted Evening” and “Younger Than Springtime,” the joyous numbers “CockEyed Optimist” and “In Love with a Wonderful Guy,” the humorous songs “Nothing Like a Dame” and “Honey Bun,” and the insightful lyrics of “You Have to Be Carefully Taught” – these all play in our heads.

Many of us saw the movie, but none of that familiarity prepares you for the pure jolt of emotion that the performers in Lincoln Center Theater’s production of the musical South Pacific, as directed by Bartlett Sher, sends out to the audience.

While being utterly true to the original intent of the show, Kelli O’Hara as Ensign Nellie Forbush, Paulo Szot as Story by Mary Pat Kelly French planter Emile de Becque, Matthew Morrison as Marine Lt. Joseph Cable and a cast the New York Times calls “flawless” reveal levels and nuance that take your breath away.

“Even when crying, the audience is happy,” Julia Judge, Artistic Administrator of Lincoln Center Theater, said of the feedback she’s gotten from theatergoers. Ben Brantley in his New York Times review wrote, “I could feel the people around me leaning in toward the stage as if it were a source of warmth . . . it’s the fire of daily life with all its crosscurrents and ambiguities underscored and clarified by music.”

I saw South Pacific on Memorial Day weekend when Fleet Week filled New York with sailors and marines who are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. When Lt. Joe Cable jumps out of the airplane that brought him from combat on one of the islands on which the marines fought so fiercely and lost so many, we’re with the characters at every turn. South Pacific seems to speak directly to us today. It’s our story as Americans that’s up there on the stage.

And here is Nellie Forbush (O’Hara) singing, “I heard the human race is

62 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

SOUTH PACIFIC PHOTOS: JOAN MARCUS; JIMMY RYAN

THE BEAUTIFUL AND TALENTED TONY AWARD NOMINATED STAR OF THE BROADWAY REVIVAL OF SOUTH PACIFIC, KELLI O’HARA, TALKS ABOUT HER IRISH ROOTS AND GROWING UP IN OKLAHOMA.

PHOTO: JIMMY RYAN

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Left: Kelli O’Hara in scenes from the Lincoln Center production of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s South Pacific.

Above: In a live performance at Lincoln Center.

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WHAT THEY SAID

falling on its face, and hasn’t very far to go. But every whippoorwill is selling me a bill, and telling me it just ain’t so.”

That’s the spirit that animates South Pacific. And O’Hara, who was nominated for Tony awards for her roles in The Light in the Piazza and The Pajama Game, and this year for South Pacific, is an actress who can thrill us with her voice, astonish us with her dancing, amuse us with her clowning and still reveal a woman who comes to question all her unconscious beliefs.

I met up with O’Hara one evening in early August. She talked about her family history and heritage when I sat down with her in her dressing room prior to another sold-out Friday night performance.

“I’m proud to be Irish,” she said, though she grew up far from the usual Irish-American centers. “I was born and raised in Oklahoma. Both sides of my family came there during the time of the land run in 1889. [The land run started at high noon on April 22, 1889, with 50,000 people dashing for their piece of the two million acres opened for settlement.] My great-grandfather, Peter O’Hara, was born in Ireland, I believe in County Clare. His father, my great-great-grandfather, had actually come to America a generation before when times were very bad in Ireland. He worked in the Pennsylvania area and did well with horses and farming. My great-aunt, who is in her nineties, told me the story. She said that he went back to Ireland, either to get his family or to live there with his newfound wealth, but he was actually forced to leave. Something happened and he had to take his family and nothing else and escape at night. This would be at the end of the 19th century. Three of his sons, my great-grandfather Peter and his brothers James and Michael, split off from the rest of the family to go find

land. They landed in western Oklahoma and participated in the land rush. We still farm the land that they found. My dad’s brother Robert lives on the original farm.

My father and brother are both Patrick O’Haras. Our family has a long wonderful history of Irish lineage that I’ve enjoyed learning about, though I don’t know enough.

“It’s sad how the stories get lost. I want

When I read Frank McCourt’s Angela’s Ashes, I thought, I know these people.

I understand their humor, their endurance, their strength. to write down my great-aunt’s memories.

We do have one precious possession that’s been handed down. It’s an Irish cookbook that we use all the time. On the cover, written in Irish, is O’hEaghra : O’Hara.”

A cookbook. That’s different. More often it’s Irish music.

By my time, we had only a song or two, and every once in a while an aunt would pull out an Irish blessing and read it. But the biggest thing for us is food.

Corned beef and cabbage—that’s our favorite holiday meal when all the O’Haras gather around the table.

So it was a way for everyone to remain connected to Ireland.

Yes. My father named me Kelli because “Kelli O’Hara” just sounded so Irish. Even growing up in the middle of America, I felt grounded because I had such strong roots. We were living in the town where my grandfather had grown up. There were a lot of O’Haras from those three sons, James and Peter and Michael–many, many cousins.

Tell me about your hometown.

Elk City is in western Oklahoma near the Texas panhandle and both my parents grew up there. We’ve had our land since 1889. We just celebrated the centennial of our statehood in 2007, an event that Rodgers & Hammerstein celebrated in Oklahoma. Life is a strange bit of circles, isn’t it? We didn’t have much formal theater. My dad was a farmer. He went back to school and he’s now an attorney. My mom is a teacher. There was singing in church and at weddings.

We were Catholics in the Baptist Bible Belt.

Our church, St. Matthew’s Catholic, was central to our lives. I grew up singing in church and I loved it. I went to Oklahoma City University where my teacher, Florence Birdwell, helped me think outside the box. When I graduated, I could have gone on to grad school or studied more music, but I eventually found myself packing two suitcases with no clue and moving to New York City ten years ago. I think it scared my parents a lot, but they put me on that plane. I just had a feeling that if I didn’t try I would never forgive myself. Somehow I wasn’t even afraid. But then, look at my greatgreat-grandfather and all the Irish who headed out into the unknown. When I read Frank McCourt’s Angela’s Ashes, I thought, I know these people. I under-

BARTLETT SHER, 2008 TONY AWARD FOR BEST DIRECTION OF A MUSICAL FOR SOUTH PACIFIC:

“Kelli is one of our finest artists, and I don't think she even knows how good she is.

I can always tell the great ones because in some strange way they start to understand what I do so well. Often she would say, 'I don't want to cross over there, I think it would be better here' and usually she was right. Kelli sees the whole field, as they say in sports. At the same time, she is a truly good person who deeply understands and cares about people. It's remarkable, that much talent and that much goodheartedness in one person!”

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PHOTO: JIMMY RYAN

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Kelli and Greg Naughton got married in Vermont

stand their humor, their endurance, their strength.

And now after your great successes in The Light in the Piazza and The Pajama Game, you have made Ensign Nellie Forbush come to life. Could you talk about that process?

I find everything through personal connections. I have pictures in my dressing room of my grandmother on my mom’s side, who was English. She was from right outside Little Rock, Arkansas. She was blond. She was feisty. She grew up in the time before civil rights, when children were “carefully taught,” as the song says. She was the person in my head when I started thinking about Nellie.

When you go to acting school, everyone wants you to say what your big problems are so you can weep. But I’m not going to lie about the fact that I had a good childhood. I had two sets of grandparents in my little tiny town and I walked barefoot down the street and everyone

knew whose daughter I was. I’m proud of that and I’m using it. I suppose there are a lot of reasons to be jaded or sarcastic or bitter in life. But I hang on to the reasons why life is beautiful. It helps to have a history to think about, to remember those who came before you, to help you be in this place. I feel very fortunate.

I don’t feel held down, or that I need to create angst in order to be a good artist. I feel like my artistry comes from the things I do believe in. I’m very happy.

The longer I play Nellie Forbush, this cock-eyed optimist person, the better I feel about that.

And Nellie was also a professional woman, a nurse, liberated for her time.

But liberated doesn’t mean that you don’t fall in love and that you don’t lose control of all sense of anything. It’s something I’ve struggled with before, to find that openness. But once you allow it to happen and you really believe in it, then, gosh, nothing feels better. When

WHAT THEY SAID LEONARD JACOBS WRITING IN BACKSTAGE:

“Besides possessing outer and inner beauty . . . [O’Hara] brings an often breathtaking intelligence to her acting. Watch her sit, disturbingly motionless, as her take on “A Wonderful Guy" unfolds. It is just one example of O’Hara's meticulous, unforgettable work in a mesmerizing revival.”

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Matthew Morrison and Kelli O’Hara in a scene from the Lincoln Center Theater production of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s South Pacific.

WHAT THEY SAID

you actually allow yourself to just be grateful. I feel that way especially since I married my husband, Greg Naughton, a year ago. He’s an actor and a singer and has a wonderful theatrical heritage from his father, James Naughton. And he’s Irish. My father-in-law’s mother had passed on before I came into the picture, but Greg said, “She would have loved you just because of your name.” We met through a mutual friend and just kind of immediately hit it off. I felt like I knew him somewhere before. Maybe somewhere back in Ireland, something aligned. He’s a great person. We’re

happy. He’s been very encouraging to me and was instrumental in helping me with my new CD Wonder in the World that I did with Harry Connick, Jr. Our kids will need a lot of sunscreen, though.

Are there other new things you are working on?

I’ve been working on a new musical, just in workshop, called Writing Arthur [composer-lyricist-librettist David Austin’s musical – about an agoraphobic bookshop clerk/novelist] which is set in Dublin but in a dream. It’s about an American man who is writing a story

about this tiny village, kind of like Brigadoon. It’s modern-day, but in his story everything is magical in this little place. I play Alanna, which comes from the Irish, “my dear child.”

Have you ever traveled in Ireland?

It’s my biggest goal to visit there, especially with Greg. I did spend a night in Ireland one time. It was the most surreal experience, because I’ve always wanted to see the countryside of Ireland. I was coming from London and it was winter and there was a storm here in New York City that kept the plane from crossing the Atlantic. We were diverted to Shannon Airport. It was kind of a scary moment – they took us to this hotel in the middle of nowhere. It was dark, late at night. It was about two years ago. I sat with several Irish couples and they told me about Ireland and how they grew up. They were about my own age. I had a pint and went to bed. And when I woke up, I looked out the window and I was in the middle of the Irish countryside. There were rock walls and sheep and rolling green hills. It seemed unreal because it was so what I’ve imagined. You know, when you go to a country and imagine what it will be but it’s not, it’s just like New York City? Well, this was as I’d imagined. Then they took us back on a bus and I flew away. It was almost like I’d been magically transported to an essential version of Ireland. Later I found out that I’d been looking out at the hills of County Clare where the O’Haras are from. I couldn’t wait to tell my parents, my brother Patrick, and my sister Anne Marie. I’m very proud of my family.

I’m sure they’re proud of you.

Well, they’ve been up here four times to see the show! I’m just so grateful to be involved with something that says something about this world.

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BEN BRANTLEY WRITING IN THE NEW YORK TIMES:

“. . . I’m talking partly about the chemistry between the production’s revelatory stars, Kelli O’Hara and Paulo Szot, in the opening scene of this tale from 1949 of men and women unmoored by war. But I’m also talking about the chemistry between a show and its audience. I could feel the people around me leaning in toward the stage, as if it were a source of warmth on a raw, damp day. And that warmth isn’t the synthetic fire of can-do cheer and wholesomeness associated (not always correctly) with Rodgers and Hammerstein. It’s the fire of daily life, with all its crosscurrents and ambiguities, underscored and clarified by music.”

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The Legacy of the

San Patricios

Lives On

To the Mexicans they were heroes.

To the Americans they were traitors.

They were recent Irish immigrants fleeing poverty and famine in Ireland who, motivated by discrimination in their own ranks, a shared religion, and sympathy for the cause, fought on the side of Mexico in the U.S.-Mexican war of 1846-1848.

By Robert Salas

68 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

T

he war between the United States and Mexico had two causes: “Manifest Destiny,” the desire of the U.S. to expand its territories under the belief that Americans had a Godgiven right and duty to “civilize the whole continent,” and the Texas War of Independence.

In 1844, with the election of President James K. Polk, an avowed expansionist, the United States embarked on a course to acquire the lands west to the Pacific Ocean. Polk had authorized his envoy John Slidell to offer $5 million for Texas, $5 million for New Mexico and up to $25 million for California, but the offers were refused by Mexico. Slidell’s formal instructions were to negotiate, adjust boundaries and other causes of differences under fair and equitable principles. To the Mexicans this meant, “Accept our terms or face the consequences.”

Many Mexicans still refused to accept the annexation of Texas to the U.S. in 1836 under the Treaty of Velasco which was signed by General Santa Anna.

Captured in the battle of San Jacinto, Santa Anna was a prisoner of the Texans at the time of the signing.

After many savage border fights, Texas decided to join the United States on July 4, 1845. Mexico was not happy with its breakaway province, which now claimed the border at the Rio Grande River. A major international issue and a tense standoff ensued.

On April 2, 1846, a clash occurred between Mexican and American troops on soil that was claimed by both.

President Polk, in his declaration of war, stated that, “American blood had been shed on American soil.” In truth, the war had been planned even before the news of the Mexican attack on the American patrol had been received.

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COURTESY CLIFDEN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

Despite early popularity, the war had its opponents.

There was great opposition to the war by the Whig Party and some members of the U.S. Army. Ulysses S. Grant, later General Grant, wrote in his memoirs, “I was bitterly opposed to the Annexation of Texas measure, and to this day regard the war that resulted, as one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation. It was an instance of a republic following the bad example of European monarchies, in not considering justice in their desire to acquire additional territory.”

Former President John Quincy Adams described the war as a Southern expedition to find “bigger pens to cram with slaves,” and Whig congressman from Illinois Above: Sculpture in Clifden, Co. Galway commemorating the San Patricios. Opposite Page: Illustration showing the battle Abraham Lincoln disputed the at Churubusco. Below: The hanging of the Irish soldiers (top location of the skirmish as left corner of illustration). being American soil and submitted “Spot Resolutions” to The San Patricios Congress.

Mexico was not to be outdone in terms In order to fight the war, Congress of recruitment. General Santa Anna authorized 50,000 troops and $10 milencouraged American soldiers to fight on lion. The offer for volunteers was ten the Mexican side with offers of cash in dollars a month with three months dollars and 200-acre grants of land. They advance pay and 160 acres of farmland. could retain their rank and pay grade and Volunteers, including thousands of Irish fight under the leadership of fellow immigrants newly arrived from famineAmerican officers. stricken Ireland, swarmed the recruiting Estimates as high as 9,000 soldiers centers and quotas were filled within deserted from the American army during weeks.

Ties That Last to This Day

T

he goodwill that sprouted as a result of the Irish soldiers fighting in the Mexican forces has been embraced and nurtured by Ireland and Mexico. Both countries have maintained efforts to commemorate the Irish soldiers and the impact they made while fighting under the Mexican flag.

Every year in Mexico there are two days where the San Patricios are celebrated, September 12, the anniversary of the execution of the soldiers who were captured, and March 17, Saint Patrick’s Day. In Monterrey, an Irish school is located on a street called Batallón de San Patricio ("Battalion of Saint Patrick"), and in Mexico City a street is also named in honor of the Irish fighters – Mártires Irlandeses ("the Irish martyrs").

Clifden, the Galway hometown of San Patricios leader John Riley, flies the Mexican flag in the town center to honor the Irish brigade.

Also, in 2004, the Mexican government donated a statue to the Irish government that stands in Clifden.

On September 12, 1997, the 150th anniversary of The San Patricios, the post offices in Mexico and Ireland issued a commemorative stamp designed by Lorenzo Rafael.

The San Patricios legend also inspired several films, most notably One Man’s Hero, the 1999 movie starring Tom Berenger. IrishAmerican band Black 47 also wrote a song “San Patricio Brigade,” which includes the following verse: The Mexican people They treated us great We danced at their weddings And sang at their wakes We fought in their battles And where'er we'd go Hiya le mad Irish San Patricio

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the Mexican war and many later vanished into the Mexican countryside.

The Irish deserters joined together and, under the leadership of Irish-born John Riley, formed the San Patricio Battalion.

The San Patricios created their own military banner with Saint Patrick on one side and a shamrock and the harp of Erin on the other. The reasons given for desertion were bad treatment and poor subsistence they received from non-Catholic members of the American Army. Being Catholics, they also resented the bad treatment given to Mexican civilians, priests and nuns after the war started.

The San Patricios fought in the five major battles against the Americans, which included Matamoros, May 3, 1846, Monterrey, Sept. 21, 1846, Buena Vista, Feb. 22, 1847, Cerro Gordo, April 17, 1847 and Churubusco, August 20, 1847. After the battle of Buena Vista, the San Patricios gained recognition as a Mexican fighting unit to be reckoned with. They gained the grudging respect of the American Army.

Churubusco was the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Mexican War. The superior tactics and strategy of the American Army, which included Military Academy-trained officers, accurate and fast-loading artillery and the U.S. Army’s 1841 percussion rifle, helped make the assault on the fortress-convent of San Mateo at Churubusco a success.

Equipment alone does not win battles; it was the blood and guts of the American soldiers and marines under the command of Major General Winfield Scott that contributed to this victory.

The Castle of Chapultepec, located southwest of Mexico City, was heavily fortified and was a military obstacle that had to be taken prior to entering the city.

The castle had been the resort of Aztec princes and since 1833 had served as Mexico’s military academy. The phrase “From the Halls of Montezuma” in the U.S. Marine Corps hymn is based on the battle of Chapultepec. The castle was stormed by a mixed force of American soldiers and marines. About 50 young Mexican cadets refused to leave and — some of them younger than 13 — confronted a bayonet charge. An American correspondent described the youths as “fighting like demons” as some of them fell to their death over the castle wall to the rocks below. They were later immor70 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Top: Map showing Churubusco where one of the decisive battles took place. Left: President James K. Polk who declared war on Mexico.

Left: San Patricio memorial plaque in Mexico City.

talized by their countrymen as “Los Ninos Heroicos” — the heroic children.

The story of the San Patricios has been shrouded in legend so the numbers mentioned in this article may have some variation. It was reported that the victory by the Americans led to the capture of the San Patricios, which included Mexican Brevet Major John Riley. It is estimated that as many as 260 San Patricios fought alongside the Mexicans in the battle of Churubusco; 72 were taken prisoners; the rest escaped or were killed in action.

General Santa Anna commented, “a few hundred more men like them and we would have won the battle” and praised them for their proficiency and bravery.

Their capture by the Americans led to a verdict of “guilty of desertion” and pun-

ishments ranged from two hundred lashes, branding of “D” for desertion, or death by hanging. The penalty of death was not unusual punishment, since most armies imposed a death penalty for desertion during a time of war. Of the fifty sentenced to death, “sixteen were hung by the neck until dead” and two days later, the remaining San Patricios faced the firing squad. The sentences of Mexican Brevet Major John Riley and eleven others were commuted by General Scott because they had deserted before the war with Mexico had been officially declared.

Mexico honored the San Patricios with medals, memorial plaques and annual ceremonies. The U.S. Army regarded them as deserters and traitors, who deserved the punishment they received.

The Irishmen, who had never formed much devotion to America due to the treatment they had received, were unfortunate in choosing the losing side. This did not diminish their bravery, since heroism can surface in the heat of battle on either side of a conflict. The bond of friendship between the Irish and Mexicans still exists, and if you visit Mexico and run across some Mexicans with Irish surnames, they may be descendants of San Patricio Battalion soldiers that escaped from the battle of Churubusco.

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The Legal

100

Irish America is proud to present its inaugural Legal 100 feature.

The following list is comprised of lawyers from all around the country who share a passion for the law and pride in their heritage.

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THE LEGAL Wylie Aitken

Maureen Bateman

Trial lawyer Wylie A. Aitken, founding partner and CEO of the California law firm Aitken, Aitken and Cohn, was the youngest ever president in the history of the State Trial Bar and served on the Federal Judicial Advisory Committee which recommends the appointment of federal district judges.

Aitken graduated from law school at Marquette University in 1965 and was recently appointed to the university’s Law School Advisory Board. He was the recipient of Marquette’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004. His recent court victories include a wrongful-death action against Disneyland, after a dislodged metal cleat on a Disney sailing ship killed a man and disfigured his wife. The case led California to strengthen theme park safety regulations. Aitken has also worked as a consumer advocate, developing bilingual consumer protection brochures.

A second-generation Irish-American whose mother’s family hails from County Cork, Aitken is married and has three children. He is a founding member and the current president of the Celtic Bar Association.

Robert Bennett

Aidan Browne

Robert S. Bennett, a partner at the Washington D.C. law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom, specializes in civil and criminal enforcement matters and complex civil litigation. He has represented numerous high-profile corporations and individuals including President Clinton in the Paula Jones case and journalist Judith Miller in the CIA leak investigation. He also served on the National Review Board of the Catholic Church, which investigated sexual abuse claims.

A member of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, Bennett traces his Irish heritage to his maternal grandfather who hailed from Limerick. A graduate of a Catholic high school in Brooklyn, he attended Georgetown University, the University of Virginia Law School, and received his Master of Laws from Harvard.

Bennett, who is the author of the recently published book, In the Ring: Trials of a Washington Lawyer, lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife, Ellen Gilbert Bennett, who is also IrishAmerican. They have three grown daughters.

Aidan F. Browne focuses on foreign investment matters in the U.S., Europe and, most recently, China. He brings over two decades of experience as a corporate and commercial real estate attorney in Europe, and a foreign legal consultant in the U.S., to his position as Director of Business Development for the Massachusetts law firm of Sullivan & Worcestor.

In addition to his work with Sullivan & Worcestor, Browne is the U.S. representative partner for Ireland’s largest law firm, A&L Goodbody, and has assisted Irish companies now located in the United States with corporate partnerships and market development.

Born in Dublin, with degrees from Boston’s Suffolk University Law School, the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland, Dublin, and University College, Dublin, Browne now resides in Boston, where he is a member of numerous Irish organizations including the Friends of Irish Progressive Democrats and the Friends of Irish Labour in North America.

76 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Maureen Scannell Bateman is counsel for the Butzel Long firm in New York City, executive vice president and general counsel of State Street Corporation and partner of Holland & Knight. She sits on several boards, including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and serves as a director of the Catholic Schools’ Foundation of Boston and the Boston Bar Foundation.

All four of Bateman’s grandparents were born in Ireland. On her mother’s side they hailed from Dublin and Longford, and on her father’s side from Cork and Kerry. Her grandfather served on the New York police force, retiring as a lieutenant, and her father, David T. Scannell, graduated from Fordham University, served as a detective, attended Fordham Law School at night and ultimately became vice chairman of the Metropolitan Transit Authority. Bateman also graduated from Fordham Law School, served on its board of trustees for twelve years, was vice chairman and is presently trustee fellow.

Her son, Dan, is a sophomore at Fordham.

Scannell Bateman serves as vice president in the American Irish Historical Society, and is a member of its board of directors.

Susan Bryant Susan Bryant is the Director of Clinical Programs and a professor of law at the City University of New York School of Law. She designed the experiential learning component of the school’s curriculum in the 1980s and, prior to that, directed clinical programs at Hofstra University’s Law School.

Bryant, whose ancestors on both sides emigrated from County Clare in the mid-1850s, received her undergraduate degree from St. Xavier in Chicago and her law degrees from Georgetown University, where she was a Prettyman Fellow. Married with two children, she has served on New York’s Board of Legal Services since 2004 and on the New York State Diversity Coalition of Legal Services since 2002, and received the Bill Pincus Award from the Association of American Law Schools for her “significant contributions to clinical legal education.”

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THE LEGAL Larry Byrne Larry Byrne is U.S. CoManaging Partner and Head of the U.S. Litigation Practice of Linklaters LLP, a 2,600-lawyer global firm and the world’s second largest law firm by gross revenues.

Named a New York Super Lawyer in 2006 and 2007, Byrne handles white-collar criminal defense cases as well as government regulatory and civil cases. He has successfully represented Deutsche Bank in a number of notable cases, including the Enron securities litigation.

Byrne graduated magna cum laude from Hofstra University in 1981 and received his law degree at the New York University School of Law in 1984. Before entering private practice, he was the Deputy Chief of the RICO Section in the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice in Washington D.C. from 1992-94, and prior to that served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York.

He is married with three children and lives in Pelham, New York.

A member of the New York City Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, Byrne is a second-generation Irish-American whose parents’ families both hail from Wicklow town.

Anthony Callaghan

Anthony P. Callaghan is an attorney for Gibbons P.C. With a background in federal court litigation, he primarily focuses on class-action securities litigation, telecommunication matters and contract disputes. In addition, Callaghan deals in general practice litigation in the areas of banking and drug-product liability defense.

A cum laude graduate of Seton Hall University Law School, Anthony received his B. Ed., with honors from the National University of Ireland, Carysfort College. In his law career he has served as lead counsel on cases involving everything from corporate dissolution proceedings to auditor malpractice and contract disputes.

A native of Donegal, Ireland, Callaghan is fluent in Gaelic. He is a member of The American Ireland Fund and the Irish American Partnership, and has served on the AIF New York dinner committee for several years and as chairman of the AIF New Jersey Golf Classic.

Callaghan is married with two children.

John Connorton John Connorton specializes in the law of public finance and municipal bonds. He has participated in capital infrastructure project financings throughout the United States, and his bond counsel clients include major power, energy, transportation, industrial development, environmental and housing public authorities and agencies, as well as various states and municipalities.

Connorton was born in Washington, D.C. and attended Fordham Law School. He has served as an Assistant Counsel to the Governor of the State of New York, has clients in major investment banking firms and served as a special counsel to universities and corporations, including those doing businesses to Northern Ireland. In 2003, the University of Ulster awarded Connorton an honorary Doctor of Laws, and in 2004, for his services to peace and reconciliation in Northern Ireland, Queen Elizabeth II made him a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.

All four of Connorton’s grandparents were Irish-born. They came from counties Roscommon, Mayo, Kerry and Cork.

James Clerkin James C. Clerkin is a founding partner of Kral, Clerkin, Redmond, Ryan, Perry & Girvan, one of New York’s leading civil-defense litigation firms.

Under his leadership, the firm has grown to 32 attorneys in three fully staffed offices in Manhattan, Nassau County and Suffolk County, New York.

A native of Palmerton, Pennsylvania, Clerkin earned both his B.A. and J.D. degrees from Fordham University. His admissions include the New York Bar, Federal Bar (SDNY and EDNY) and the United States Supreme Court. Clerkin has received Martindale-Hubbell’s highest (“AV”) “Peer Review Rating” for his legal ability and ethical standards.

Clerkin, whose father is from Monaghan and whose mother is from Donegal, resides in Mahwah, New Jersey. He has been married 26 years to his wife, Virginia, and they have three children.

Philip Corboy Philip H. Corboy, co-founder of Corboy & Demetrio, one of the nation’s top law firms based in Chicago, has been practicing personal injury law for more than 50 years. The recipient of many honors and awards during his remarkable career, Corboy has been named one of the Top 100 Most Influential Lawyers in the United States, is a former president of the Chicago Bar Association and the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association and is a former chairman of the American Bar Association’s Section on litigation. He served as general counsel for the Illinois Democratic Party and is a member of such national and international associations as the Inner Circle of Advocates, the International Academy of Trial Lawyers and the American Board of Trial Advocates, and has been described as “the premier personal injury lawyer in Chicago and a mentor to many of the other top personal injury lawyers in the city.”

Born in Chicago, Corboy attended St. Ambrose College and Notre Dame University and graduated from Loyola University College of Law. His parents’ families hail from County Limerick. A member of the Irish Fellowship Club of Chicago, Corboy enjoys dual Irish and American citizenship. He is married to Mary Dempsey, the Commissioner of the Chicago Public Library.

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THE LEGAL Carol Corrigan

Ellen Cosgrove

Denis Cronin

Justice Carol A. Corrigan was appointed to the California Supreme Court in 2006. Prior to that she served on the California Court of Appeal, Superior and Municipal Courts, and was a trial lawyer in the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office.

Born in Stockton, California Justice Corrigan attended local Catholic schools and Holy Names University. All eight of her great-grand parents immigrated from Ireland, and she is fiercely proud of her Irish heritage.

Justice Corrigan has served on the President’s Commission on Organized Crime, California Judicial Council, Center for Judicial Education and Research, and Commission on the Future of California Courts. She has lectured widely and served as an adjunct professor at serveral universities including University of California at Berkeley. Her honors include the Thomas More Award, California Jurist of the Year, Teaching awards from The National Institute of Trial Advocacy and California Judge’s Association; and The Golden Pen Award. She serves on the boards of St. Vincent’s Day Home, Holy Names University, Goodwill Industries of East Bay and advisory boards of St. Mary’s Community Center and Providence Hospital.

As the Associate Dean and Dean of Students at Harvard Law School, Ellen Cosgrove supervises a broad range of extracurricular activities, from moot court competitions to the student-edited law journals. She oversees student organizations and residence life as well as a variety of all-school activities including orientation, graduation, conferences, and co-curricular programming which serve to entertain, educate and cultivate community. She is also involved in developing and enforcing academic policies and practices. Prior to joining Harvard, Cosgrove served as Associate Dean and Dean of Students at the University of Chicago Law School.

Cosgrove, whose grandparents were all Irish immigrants, graduated from Mount Holyoke College, where she now serves as a trustee. She then spent four years in corporate and investment banking in New York before attending University of Chicago Law School.

Cosgrove worked for four years in private practice at LeBoeuf, Lamb, Green & MacRae before returning to Chicago to serve as Associate Dean at the law school.

Denis F. Cronin is a senior partner in New York at the law firm of Vinson & Elkins, LLP, where he is co-chair of the firm’s Restructuring and Reorganization practice group and a member of the Management Committee.

Prior to joining Vinson & Elkins, Cronin was a founding partner of the New York-based bankruptcy firm Cronin & Vris, and before that he was a partner at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz for 16 years, where he served as Managing Partner for six years.

Cronin focuses his practice on Chapter 11 reorganizations, mergers and acquisitions, corporate/commercial law and mediation.

For over 20 years Cronin has been listed as one of the Best Lawyers in America and New York Magazine has named him among the Best Lawyers in New York since the inception of its survey. The New York Times Magazine named him as one of New York’s Super Lawyers and he is listed as a “Senior Statesman” in Chambers USA. All four of Cronin’s grandparents were born in Ireland; his father’s parents were from County Cork, while his mother’s hailed from County Kerry.

Kathleen Cronin Kathleen M. Cronin has served as Managing Director, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary of CME Group since July 2007, when CME and CBOT merged to become the world’s largest and most diverse exchange. She is responsible for overseeing the company’s Corporate Secretary, Shareholder Relations, Membership Services, Legal and Market Regulation functions. Previously, she served as Managing Director, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary of CME Holdings and CME since 2004.

Cronin has advised CME on all legal matters since joining the company in November 2002 as Acting General Counsel & Corporate Secretary. She was an integral part of CME’s efforts to complete its IPO in December 2002 and its secondary offering in June 2003.

Additionally, she has played a key role in further developing the company’s corporate governance principles and corporate compliance program.

A second-generation Irish-American, Cronin’s maternal grandparents emigrated from Killarney, County Kerry as teenagers. She is in touch with her Irish cousins and is a frequent visitor to Killarney.

Michael Critchley Michael Critchley, Sr., a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, the American Board of Criminal Lawyers, and the American Bar Foundation, founded Critchley and Kinum in 1975.

He is the former president and founding member of the New Jersey Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys, past president and founder of Seton Hall University School of Law Inn of Court, and member of the New Jersey State Bar Association Judicial & Prosecutorial Appointments Committee. He serves on the Board of Visitors of Seton Hall University School of Law, where he received his B.A. and J.D. Critchley, who received an AV rating in Martindale Hubbell and was awarded the Trial Bar Award by the Trial Attorneys of New Jersey, has successfully tried over 100 cases in federal and state courts and practices in securities fraud, anti-trust violations, official misconduct, and tax fraud.

He’s also been awarded the Lawrence A. Whipple Award by the Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers of New Jersey, and is listed in the Best Lawyers in America and Best Lawyers in New Jersey.

Critchley traces his Irish roots to counties Carlow and Westmeath.

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THE LEGAL Sean Crowley

James Cullen

Sean E. Crowley is a partner at the New York City law firm of Davidoff, Malito and Hutcher LLP where he focuses on government relations.

After graduating from Fordham University, Crowley spent three years as an investigator for New York City. He went on to get his law degree from CUNY Law School. Along with Marty Glennon, he co-founded the Joseph Doherty Civil Rights Fellowship, which provides scholarships for City University of New York Law School.

As president of the Brehon (Irish) Law Society of New York, Crowley traveled to Ireland with New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn to meet with Northern Irish leaders last March, and says the Brehons are working to “ensure that Northern Ireland will be part of the Celtic Tiger and not be left out in the cold.”

Crowley is a first-generation Irish-American; his mother was born in County Down, and his father's parents hailed from County Cavan.

Crowley and his wife, who is also first-generation Irish-American, have three sons.

John Dearie

Mary Dempsey

Prior to establishing his private practice, which now includes five offices in New York and “mobile law offices” that travel to meet clients unable to travel, John Dearie served as an Assemblyman from the Bronx from 1973 to 2002.

During that time he helped secure passage of the MacBride Principles, through the New York State Legislature and organized IrishAmerican Presidential Forums, including a 1992 forum where candidate Bill Clinton first committed to finding a solution to the troubles in Northern Ireland.

Dearie, who practices in a variety of areas, including medical malpractice, personal injury, wills and estate, also worked at the United Nations for three years.

Born and raised in the Bronx, he attended Notre Dame on a full basketball scholarship, and went on to receive his Masters of Business from the Kellogg Graduate Business School at Northwestern University. He received his law degree from the New York University School of Law. A Bronx native, Dearie lives with his wife, Kitty, and sons, John and Michael, in Harrison, New York.

As Commissioner of the Chicago Public Library, Mary Dempsey is responsible for managing the library’s operations, more than 1,300 employees in 79 locations, and an annual operating budget of $98 million.

A third-generation IrishAmerican with roots in counties Wicklow and Clare, Dempsey was born in Chicago. She earned her B.A. and M.L.S. degrees from St. Mary’s University, and her J.D. from DePaul University College of Law, and worked in libraries in her hometown and at a law firm before being appointed commissioner by Mayor Richard M. Daley in January 1994. Upon her appointment Dempsey quickly developed the library’s first-ever strategic plan which focused on rebuilding the human and physical infrastructure and installing a professional development and training program for all 1,300 employees.

The recipient of four honorary degrees and numerous professional awards, Dempsey is married to Legal 100 honoree Philip H. Corboy.

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James Cullen of the New York law firm Anderson, Kill and Olick, has practiced real estate and construction law for the past 38 years. He has negotiated many construction projects including hospitals, schools and water treatment plants, and also advises non-profit institutions and government entities. A retired brigadier general from the Army Reserves, Cullen is part of a group of over 40 retired generals and admirals who has spoken out publicly against the Bush administration’s policies on torture and interrogation.

A first-generation Irish-American, Cullen received his bachelor’s degree from Iona College and his J.D. in Law from St. John’s University. His father hailed from County Sligo and his mother from County Offaly, where he built a home for her in 1978. He expanded the house so that his four children, Tara, Kerry, Erin and Sean, can visit with their families. A proud IrishAmerican, Cullen is active in the Irish Parades Emergency Committee, which monitors Orange parades in Northern Ireland. He was also the first president of the Brehon (Irish) Law Society.

Mary Daly The Dean of St. John’s University School of Law, Mary Daly began her legal career in private law and went on to serve as Assistant United States Attorney and Deputy Chief for the Southern District of New York. She joined the Fordham Law School Faculty in 1983 and subsequently worked as the Reporter to the New York Bar Association Task Force. Before assuming her present position at St. John’s, she served as co-director of the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics and Professor of Legal Ethics at Fordham.

Daly graduated from Thomas More College and went on to earn a J.D. from Fordham and an L.L.M. with a comparative law focus from New York University. A third-generation Irish-American who traces her Irish roots to Cork, Dean Daly says being Irish means “being passionate about life and steadfast in commitment.” She lives in New York City with her husband and three children.

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THE LEGAL Bob Donnelly

Larry Downes

Bob Donnelly is an entertainment lawyer at the New York office of the law firm of Lommen, Abdo, Cole, King and Stageberg. Donnelly, who has focused his practice on the music industry for 30 years, has represented an eclectic group of artists, including Hasidic rapper Matisyahu and Bill Whelan, the composer for Riverdance. A recent lawsuit Donnelly pursued in New York netted $55 million in past due royalties for thousands of music artists. He also settled the largest case in world music on behalf of four Irish clients and represents a large number of Celtic musical artists.

All four of Donnelly’s grandparents were born in Ireland. On his mother’s side they hailed from Monaghan and Cavan, and on his father’s from Fermanagh.

Donnelly received his undergraduate degree from Providence College, his law degree from St. John’s University, and a master's degree from Columbia University. A member of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, he is married to Marie Donnelly and they have three children, Chris, Cindy and Alexis.

Larry Downes is a partner in the law firm of Gilroy, Downes, Horowitz and Goldstein where he focuses on civil rights, commercial litigation and tort cases.

He is also the president and a founding member of the Friends of Sinn Féin, and says the organization strives to play a significant role in the Irish peace process. “We continue to work toward a united Ireland which, of course, is our ultimate goal,” he says.

Downes, who grew up in Bayside, Queens, earned his undergraduate degree from Queens College and his law degree from Hofstra. He began his career at the law firm of O’Dwyer and Bernstien and says that civil rights lawyer Paul O'Dwyer, who, along with Frank Durkan, founded the Brehon Law Society, was an inspiration to him.

A secondgeneration IrishAmerican on both sides, Downes’ grandparents hailed from Cork, Mayo and Carlow. He has visited Ireland a number of times and connected with distant relatives who still live there.

Sean Downes New York personal injury attorney Sean Downes represents a broad range of clients. One standout case occurred in 1996 when Downes won $3.25 million for a pregnant woman whose construction worker husband was killed when he fell from a building.

A Bayside, Queens native, Downes earned his bachelor’s degree from Queens College (he spent his junior year in Dublin, where he became passionate about the political issues in Ireland), and his law degree from Hofstra University. His brothers, Larry (who is also on this list), Kevin and Chris are also lawyers. He is involved in the Brehon (Irish) Law Society and credits his first big break to working to help Sean Mackin become the first Irish person to obtain political asylum in the U.S. He is one of the founders, along with his brother Larry, of the Friends of Sinn Féin.

Downes is married to Marianne, his wife of 20 years, and they have two daughters, Mollie and Katie.

John Driscoll

Jenny Durkan

John Driscoll served in the New York City Police Department for 34 years, taking a year’s leave of absence in 1981 to serve as Assistant District Attorney in Queens County. Recently retired, he is now a director for BlueCrest Capital Management, a hedge fund. For the past 11 years, Driscoll has served as the president of the NYPD Captain's Endowment Association, the union that represents captains through deputy chiefs.

Driscoll, who graduated from St. John’s University, School of Law in 1978, was honored by the New York State Bar Association in 1992 for Outstanding Police Contribution to the Criminal Justice System.

A first-generation Irish-American whose father, a native of Skibereen in County Cork, spent 35 years in the police force, Driscoll has visited Ireland over 20 times. His mother is from Glenmaddy in County Galway. His wife, Phylis Byrne-Driscoll, a captain in the NYPD, has served as the honorary Grand Marshal of the Queens St. Patrick’s Day Parade. The couple lives with their three children in Rockville Centre, New York.

Jenny A. Durkan is a Washington State Attorney known for both her successful trial practice and for her continued civic leadership.

She has worked on a number of notable cases, including as trial counsel defending the election of Washington State Governor Christine Gregoire.

Durkan served on civic panels relating to police integrity and chaired the former Attorney General’s Task force on Consumer Privacy. She also taught Trial Advocacy at the University of Washington Law School.

A founding board member of the Center for Women and Democracy, Durkan also completed political training in Morocco. She received her law degree from the University of Washington, and spent her Junior year of college in Dublin. Her grandfather, who immigrated to the U.S. in 1898, served in the Montana state legislature, as did her father, who became an Irish citizen.

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John Feerick John D. Feerick heads up Fordham Law School’s Center for Social Justice and Dispute Resolution, which provides students with hands-on clinical programs devoted to issues of poverty. He is also the Chairman of the NYS Commission on Public Integrity.

Responding to a State Department invitation, Feerick was awarded a government grant to gather 22 Northern Irish community leaders, 11 Catholic and 11 Protestant, and teach them mediation skills, working on creating peace from the street level up. In 1999, he was awarded the Gold Medal of the American Irish Historical Society for his work.

A graduate of the St. Angela Merici elementary school in the South Bronx, Feerick received his undergraduate degree from Fordham University and graduated from Fordham Law School in 1961. He practiced at the New York law firm of Skadden Arps for 21 years, and went on to serve as Dean of Fordham Law for 20 years.

Feerick, whose parents were both natives of County Mayo but met in New York, is married with six children and eleven grandchildren. He is a member of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick in New York.

Patrick Fitzgerald Patrick Fitzgerald is the U.S. Attorney in Northern Illinois who headed the 2005 investigation into the leak of the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame. It was his research that led to the indictment of Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, Scooter Libby. Fitzgerald’s controversial decision to question New York Times journalist Judith Miller, which ultimately led to her jailing, garnered a great deal of criticism, but Fitzgerald maintains that her testimony played a pivotal role in leveling charges against Libby. This was not the first time Fitzgerald’s work made headlines. He was a major figure in the prosecution of the perpetrator of the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993.

Fitzgerald attended the Jesuit-run Regis High School in New York and went on to attend Amherst College and Harvard Law School, where he pursued a passion for rugby as well as for law. On his summers off, Fitzgerald’s strong work ethic kept him busy and he worked as a doorman, following in his father’s footsteps.

Both of Fitzgerald’s parents immigrated to the United States from County Clare. He was raised in Brooklyn, New York.

86 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Joseph Fegan

William Fenrich

Joseph Fegan is a partner and head of litigation at the Brooklyn law firm of Cullen and Dykman.

He has more than 24 years of experience as a litigator with a primary focus on trial practice and tort and insurance litigation, and has tried over 100 jury trials to verdict as well as numerous bench trials and arbitrations. In addition to his experience as a trial lawyer, Fegan has also briefed and argued numerous appeals in the Appellate Courts of New York State. A Bronx native, Fegan served as counsel to the New York Claims Association, a group of insurance carriers and self-insureds in the New York area. He is a member of the Brooklyn Bar Association and has authored several articles and given lectures on trial practice.

Fegan is a graduate of St. John's University, where he received both his undergraduate and law degrees, and is also a member and past president of the Long Island Emerald Association.

A third-generation IrishAmerican whose father’s family hails from Dublin, and whose mother’s family is from County Galway, Fegan is married and has three children, two sons and a daughter.

William Fenrich is a member of Davis Polk & Wardwell’s Litigation Department.

He joined Davis Polk in 1999 and became a partner in 2005.

Over the years he has represented numerous broker-dealers and their employees in a number of matters relating to equity research practices, including Credit Suisse First Boston, NASD and NYSE. Fenrich graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1991 and in 1997 received his J.D., magna cum laude, Order of the Coif, from Fordham University School of Law, where he was research editor of the law review.

He clerked for the Honorable Thomas J. Meskill, U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, from 1998 to 1999, and for the Honorable Loretta A. Preska, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, from 1997 to 1998. A firstgeneration IrishAmerican whose parents were both from Mayo, Fenrich is an active member of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick. He has been honored by the American Irish Historical Society and the New York State Bar Association and holds honorary degrees from Fordham University and the College of New Rochelle.

Timothy Flanagan Timothy Flanagan is a partner at the law firm of Cullen and Dykman in Brooklyn, New York. He handles commercial, construction and insurance liability claims and has extensive trial and appellate experience in these areas. He has also handled numerous medical malpractice claims and served for three years on the Malpractice Prevention Committee of the Church Charities Foundation, which owned and operated hospitals and nursing homes throughout the New York area. Flanagan is an active member of the Brooklyn and New York Bar Associations, as well as the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, where he has served on various committees throughout the years.

Flanagan is a fourth-generation Irish-American. His father’s family hailed from Roscommon and his mother’s from Kilkenny. He received his bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and attended law school at Syracuse, where he graduated cum laude and served on the Moot Court Board.

He and his wife Nancy, a second-generation Irish-American whose maiden name was also Flanagan, have three children, Caroline, Claire and Fiona.

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THE LEGAL Michael Gallagher

Peter Gleason

Michael Gallagher, who practices in Houston at the Gallagher Law Firm, has been honored annually as one of the Best Lawyers in America since 1983 and has been a Texas Super Lawyer since 2003.

He has been recognized as a leader in environmental, pharmaceutical and product liability litigation, is board certified in personal injury trial law, and obtained the largest verdict in the U.S. in the case against Fen-Phen and the second largest in the Rezulin case.

A past president of the Texas Trial Lawyers’ Association and a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, the International Society of Barristers, the American Board of Trial Advocates, and the International Academy of Trial Lawyers, Gallagher did his preparatory education at the University of Houston and earned his LL.B. in 1965 from the University of Texas.

Gallagher, who traces his Irish roots to County Donegal, is a hit both in court and out – he has the highest amateur batting average in the history of baseball in Houston.

Kristen Glen Prior to her election to Manhattan’s Surrogate Court, Judge Kristen Booth Glen spent ten years as the Dean of the City University of New York Law School.

Glen, whose grandparents hailed from County Leitrim, received her B.A. from Stanford University and her J.D. from Columbia University Law School. The family claims relationship to Irish politician and nationalist Countess Markiewicz (nee Gore-Booth), the first woman in Europe to hold a cabinet position.

The divorced mother of a son and daughter, Glen was a friend of the late activist and civil rights lawyer Paul O’Dwyer, who was her son’s godfather.

She has received numerous honors, including the Brehon (Irish) Law Society's 1999 Distinguished Service Award and was honored by the National Lawyers’ Guild in 2000. Glen remains supportive of the Joseph Doherty Civil Rights Fellowship for CUNY Law, a scholarship given to students in honor of the Irish activist's struggle.

Peter J. Gleason is a private practice lawyer who serves as counsel to Levine & Gilbert, a New York law firm specializing in personal injury, accident and health, insurance, wrongful death, civil law, and service law.

A former New York City police officer and firefighter, Gleason earned his J.D. from City University of New York Law School. He was also a member of the U.S. Coast Guard Reserve for over 20 years before retiring as a lieutenant.

Aside from his work as a private practice lawyer, Gleason is involved in public service as are his two brothers and his parents. He says that the family’s dedication to the greater community is by way of giving thanks for the opportunities that America afforded his four grandparents who emigrated from Ireland.

A single parent, Gleason lives with his seven-year-old son, Kole, in New York City.

James Gill As a senior partner at Bryan Cave, LLP, James Gill practices in labor and regulatory affairs. Joining Robinson, Silverman and Pearce in 1964 before it merged with Bryan Cave, Gill has remained loyal to the firm for more than 43 years.

A graduate of Holy Cross College and Fordham Law School, Gill served as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps Schools in Quantico, Virginia where he prosecuted and defended general courts marshal. He was then appointed assistant district attorney of New York County by District Attorney Frank S. Hogan and has worked in many areas of public life. Gill serves as chairman of the board of trustees of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and Group Health Inc. As chairman of the Battery Park City Authority, Gill was a participant in the effort to rebuild Lower Manhattan after the September 11th attacks.

A well-known public speaker and author of two books, Gill remains connected to his Irish roots and gave a speech at the opening of the Irish Hunger Memorial at Battery Park City in 2002. He has traveled to Ireland and traces his roots on his father’s side to Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare.

88 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Marty Glennon Marty Glennon is a partner in the Long Island, New York law firm of Archer, Byington, Glennon and Levine where he practices labor, employee benefits and employment law. He began his career as a thirdgeneration member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and remains a card-carrying union member. He attended the City University of New York School of Law through a scholarship and assistance from the union’s Education and Cultural Fund.

While in law school, Glennon helped establish the Joe Doherty Civil Rights Fellowship with Sean Crowley, providing scholarships for CUNY law students interested in civil rights issues. (Doherty, a former member of the IRA, was a political prisoner in both Ireland and the U.S.) Glennon is also a founding member and immediate past president of the Brehon Law Society for Nassau County and a member of the Brehon Council. He has visited Ireland a number of times and has played the bagpipes in the Dublin Millennium Parade.

Glennon’s family maintains a farm in Shangarry, Gurtymadden, County Galway. He is married to Jennifer with two daughters, Caroline and Isabelle.

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THE LEGAL John Goodrich John P. Goodrich is a partner and vice president at the law firm of Goodrich and Goodrich, P.C. in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Goodrich went into private practice following his graduation from law school and merged practices with his brother, Bill, in 1993. Goodrich was one of the first criminal defense lawyers in Allegheny County to try a case involving DNA evidence.

In recent years, he has concentrated his practice in personal injury and product liability cases.

Goodrich received his undergraduate degree from St. Francis University and his law degree from Duquesne University School of Law. He was named Irishman of the Year in 2006 by Pittsburgh Iron City and was on the national Super Lawyer list in 2006 and 2007.

Married with one child, Goodrich is a second-generation Irish-American whose father’s family hails from Galway. His mother's family is from Mayo and Galway. He is a member of a number of Irish organizations, including the A.O.H. Irish Society for Education and Charity and the Irish American Unity Conference.

Terence Hallinan

Terence Hallinan is an attorney at law in his private practice in San Francisco. For eight years he served as the District Attorney of the City and County of San Francisco. During his time as D.A., Hallinan was know for his hands-on involvement in the courtroom, his opposition to capital punishment and for the significant progress the District Attorney’s office made in the fight against violent crime under his leadership. Prior to his time as D.A., Hallinan worked as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. During his sevenyear tenure he was chair of the Government Efficiency and Labor Committee, vice chair of the Health, Public Safety and Environmental Committee and a member of the Finance Committee.

Hallinan graduated with a B.A. in History from UC Berkeley, where he narrowly missed becoming a member of the 1960 Olympic boxing team. He went on to attend law school at Hastings College of Law. A second-generation Irishman, Hallinan traces his ancestry to County Cork on his mother’s side and County Limerick on his father’s. He is a member of the Irish American Democratic Club and is married with five children.

John Hanify John D. Hanify is the co-founder of Hanify & King, Professional Corporation. For 25 years, he has tried cases and represented business clients in state and federal courts, before federal and state agencies, and in arbitration.

Hanify received his A.B. from Harvard Law and his J.D. from Boston College Law School, and served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts.

A third-generation Irish-American whose family is from County Galway, Hanify is a trustee of the Boston Bar Foundation, and an Overseer of Boston College Law School.

He has been named, for consecutive years, to the Best Lawyers in America list, while his litigation experience has earned him a Massachusetts Super Lawyer distinction. He is a recipient of the Justice Department’s Outstanding Performance Award, and in 2006 was named Outstanding Alumnus of the Year, Boston College Law School.

Phillip Hanrahan

Kevin Hanratty

Phillip J. Hanrahan joined the Milwaukee law firm of Foley & Lardner upon his graduation from Harvard Law School in 1966. The firm has grown from 62 lawyers and one office when Hanrahan joined to almost 1,000 lawyers and 21 offices worldwide. He served as a partner at Foley & Lardner from 1973 until his retirement in 2007. He had a particularly active practice in corporate law, with an emphasis on securities and mergers and acquisitions, serving as legal counsel to large publicly held companies as well as closely held and family businesses. He is a member of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin and American Bar Associations.

Boston born, Hanrahan is involved in various charitable activities, including acting as an officer, director and legal counsel to two Milwaukee-based Irish charitable organizations. Every August for the past 25 years, he and wife Mary June (one of ten O’Neil sisters from Boston) have hosted numerous Irish musicians and other performers at their home during Milwaukee's Irish Fest, resulting in many strong friendships. They have four sons, and have owned a home in Ballyvaughan, County Clare since 1998.

Kevin Hanratty was appointed by Governor George Pataki to serve as a counsel in the New York State Office of Homeland Security, where his responsibilities included drafting and reviewing legislation and regulations and helping to shape New York’s homeland security policy.

Previously he worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP and the City of New York. He has served as a state committeeman and district leader for Queens’ Republican Party and ran for state senate in 1996. Since April 2008 he has been working at Mayor Bloomberg’s Office of Contract Services as a counsel.

Hanratty, a graduate of Fordham Law School, received undergraduate degrees from both Queens College and Baruch College, part of the City University of New York. He served as president of the Irish-American Republicans group and is a member of the W.B. Yeats Society of New York.

A first-generation Irish-American, Hanratty lived in Ireland with his family for several years when he was a child. His father hails from County Louth and his mother from County Clare. Hanratty grew up in Jackson Heights, Queens, and currently resides in Woodside, Queens.

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THE LEGAL Mark Harty

Joseph Hassett

Kenneth Horoho

Mark P. Harty is the Managing Partner of Morrison Mahoney LLP, where his expertise is focused on handling employment cases in public agencies and the state and federal courts, civil litigation, and malpractice claims.

A graduate of Dartmouth College (B.A., magna cum laude) and Georgetown University Law School (J.D.), Harty was admitted to the bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the United States District Court of Massachusetts, the United States Court of Appeals, First Circuit, and the United States Supreme Court. In 1999, he received the Dartmouth Alumni Award for distinguished service.

Harty, who grew up in Buffalo, New York, traces his ancestors on his father William’s side to County Limerick. He is on the board of the Massachusetts Defense Lawyers Association, has served as a trustee of Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital in Boston as well as the board of the Greater Boston Legal Services, and is a member of the American Bar Association, the Association of Defense Trial Attorneys, and the Federation of Insurance and Corporate Counsel. He is also a life member of the Boston and Massachusetts Bar Foundations.

Joe Hassett serves as counsel to the Washington-based law firm of Hogan & Hartson LLP, where he was a partner from 1970 through 2007. He has tried jury and non-jury cases involving a wide variety of public and private issues, and has argued in appellate courts all over the country and in the United States Supreme Court.

A graduate of Canisius College (B.A., summa cum laude), Harvard University (LL.B., cum laude), and University College, Dublin (M.A., Ph. D.), Hassett is engaged in a trial and appellate practice focused on corporate and securities matters.

A proud Irish-American whose great-grandparents emigrated from counties Clare and Cork, Hassett serves as counsel to the Embassy of Ireland. He has published a book on W.B. Yeats, and has lectured on Yeats and other Irish writers at such venues as the Yeats International Summer School in Sligo, the James Joyce Summer School in Dublin, the Princess Grace Irish Library in Monaco, and Oxford University.

Hassett and his wife Carol live in Washington, D.C. Their two children, Matthew and Meredith, are students at Brown and Tufts Universities, respectively.

Kenneth J. Horoho is a partner in the Pittsburgh law firm of Goldberg, Gruener, Gentile, Horoho and Avalli PC. He formerly worked as an associate at Raphael, Gruener & Raphael, where he was made partner in 1987.

He has a long history in the area of child custody law and served as president of the Pennsylvania Bar Association in 2006-2007, where he was chair of the Young Lawyers Division and the vice-chair of the Children’s Rights Committee.

Horoho received his B.A. in accounting from St. Francis University, from which he also received the Outstanding Pittsburgh Alumnus Award, and his law degree the Duquesne University School of Law. He was named an adjunct professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law in 2005, where he now teaches a course on advanced family law trial advocacy. He also assisted in the development of an educational video that explains the custody process for families in the process of divorce.

A second-generation IrishAmerican whose father’s family hails from Galway, Horoho lives in Pittsburgh, with his wife and son, Sean.

Patrick Hobbs Patrick Esmond Hobbs became the Dean of Seton Hall University's School of Law in 1999, after teaching at the school for nine years and following a career in private practice. As dean, Hobbs has helped to establish the law school as one that consistently ranks among the best nationwide. Under his leadership, the school launched the “Seton Hall Law Rising” campaign, which aims to enhance its scholarship programs and improve technology and educational facilities for an urban student population.

Hobbs received a B.S. in accounting from Seton Hall University, a J.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a Master of Laws in taxation from New York University. Among the many honors Hobbs has received are the Seton Hall Faculty Excellence Award and the Student Bar Association Professor of the Year award.

A member of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, Hobbs is a first-generation Irish-American. His father’s family hails from County Louth and his mother's clan is from County Meath. He is married to JoAnne and has three children: Patrick, John and Alexandra.

Colleen Hyland Colleen Ann Hyland is an Associate Judge of the Chicago Circuit Court. She received her B.A. from John Carroll University. A graduate of DePaul Law School, Colleen spent her early career as an assistant for the Illinois State’s Attorney’s Office, and made a name for herself as an assistant prosecutor in the sexual misconduct case against Congressman Mel Reynolds. She went on to serve as a judge in the Chicago criminal courts where she heard several high-profile gang cases. She was recently relocated to the District 5 Municipal Courts.

Hyland grew up in Evergreen Park, a predominantly Irish Catholic neighborhood in the south suburbs of Chicago. Her father, John Hyland, was the president of Evergreen Savings and Loan and the son of Irish immigrants from Castlebar, County Mayo. Her mother Mary’s grandparents came from Tipperary.

Hyland is an Alumni Fellow of Leadership Greater Chicago and teaches trial advocacy at Depaul Law School. She lives in the Chicago suburbs with her husband, John, and their daughter, Maggie.

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Hugh Keefe Hugh Keefe, a Managing Partner at the Connecticut law firm Lynch, Traub, Keefe & Errante PC, was the first U.S. lawyer to be board-certified in both civil and criminal trial advocacy. He has taught trial advocacy at the Yale Law School since 1978, is an Associate Fellow of Saybrook College, and continues to try both civil and criminal cases in federal and state courts.

Keefe, who graduated from Quinnipiac University and the University of Connecticut Law School, has consistently been listed as one of the best lawyers in America in various publications. He has been honored with the Distinguished Alumnus Award from both the University of Connecticut Law School and Quinnipiac University, and he and his three sons carry the Quinnipiac University banner at the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade each year.

Both of Keefe's parents were born in County Kerry, his mother in Kenmare and his father on Castleisland. He is a member of the Gaelic Club in East Haven, Connecticut, and his firm sponsors “Sounds of Ireland,” a weekly radio show that airs in the New Haven area.

Kevin Kearney

Paul Kane

Kevin M. Kearney is a partner in the Brooklyn law firm of Wingate, Kearney & Cullen, which for over 100 years has represented religious and notfor-profit organizations.

A native of Brooklyn, New York, Kearney is a director of Mutual of America Investment Corporation and serves as chairman of its Audit Committee. He is also a director of Concern Worldwide U.S, and has traveled extensively with Concern to the neediest countries.

Kearney, who holds degrees in philosophy from Manhattan College, and a Doctor of Law from St. John’s University School of Law, has lectured at Fordham University Center for Non Public Education. He has served on the New York State Interfaith Commission on Landmarking of Religious Properties and the New York State Council of Catholic Bishops Legal Advisory Commission.

An avid runner who has completed 12 marathons, Kearney resides in Belle Harbor, New York with his wife, Mary Beth, a Clinical Nurse Specialist in Pediatric Cardiology at Schneider’s Children’s Hospital, New Hyde Park, New York, and their children, Christine, Elisa and Sean.

Paul M. Kane, a partner in the Boston law firm of McGrath & Kane, specializes in Family Law. He is a former Assistant Dean of Boston College Law School and has been a Family Law lecturer at Boston College since 1970.

He has lectured on numerous aspects of Family Law practice for Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education, the Massachusetts Bar Association, the Flaschner Institute, the Massachusetts Inns of Court and Suffolk University Law School’s Advanced Legal Studies program.

Kane is a member of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers and has been listed in The Best Lawyers in America since 1989. He is a graduate of Boston College and Boston College Law School, and currently serves as a member of the Board of Overseers at the school.

Kane, who served in the United States Navy from 1964-1967, is also an adjunct professor at Suffolk University Law School. He is firstgeneration Irish-American whose mother is from County Cork and whose father is from the Aran Islands.

Don Keenan At the age of 34, Don Keenan was the youngest lawyer ever inducted into the Inner Circle of Advocates, and has received numerous honors, including the Chief Justice Award for Civility and Professionalism (the highest honor possible for a lawyer in Georgia). He was also named one of the best medical negligence lawyers in the United States by the National Law Journal.

In 1993, Keenan formed the Keenan’s Kids Foundation to help children at risk in the legal system. He is also the driving force behind fundraising efforts to provide a new home for the Murphy family of Atlanta, who have adopted 23 children with special needs.

Raised in Morehead City, North Carolina, Keenan knew from an early age that good things do not come easily to all. He was raised by his grandfather, who told him stories of his Irish ancestors and the “No Irish Need Apply” signs they encountered.

Today, Keenan is the driving force behind Irish America magazine’s annual “Stars of the South” gala in Atlanta, which honors IrishAmericans from the Southern U.S.

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“Being Irish is being part of a very large clan that tends to take care of its members socially, spiritually and in their essence.”

– Justice Donald Molloy

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THE LEGAL Anastasia Kelly

Anastasia D. Kelly is the American International Group’s (AIG) executive vice president, general counsel, and senior regulatory and compliance officer. She supervises 550 and lawyers around the world. Between 2003 and 2006, Kelly served as Executive Vice President and General Counsel of MCI during its bankruptcy proceedings. She also worked for Sears, Roebuck and Co., and Fannie Mae. Kelly received her B.A. from Trinity College, Washington, and her J.D. from George Washington University Law Center. She has been involved with a significant amount of non-profit and committee work throughout her career. She was born and raised in Boston, the daughter of an Irish Catholic policeman who “instilled in her the love of the law and maybe a bit of the Blarney, too,” and was encouraged by both parents to get the highest level of education possible.

Her family on her father’s side is from County Meath, where her cousins still live, and her mother’s side hails from County Cork. She and her husband Tom are the very proud parents of twin boys, who just graduated from high school and are off to college (UVA and Davidson).

Edmund Lynch

James Lynn

Edmund Lynch serves as a senior litigation attorney at the New Jersey law firm of Lynch and Lynch, where he has worked since 1974. His professional activities are various, ranging from serving as a judge in college and high school mock trials to serving needy defendants as a pro bono attorney.

Lynch received his bachelor’s degree from St. Francis College in 1963 and his law degree from Georgetown University in 1968. Lynch returned to Georgetown in 2005 to moderate a forum on the Irish peace process. He also moderated Syracuse Law School’s forum of the same name and has spoken elsewhere on human rights in Northern Ireland.

Lynch is a second-generation Irish-American whose mother's family hailed from Belfast and his father's family from County Cork. He is married and has three children and a granddaughter. Lynch is active in the Irish community and has received recognition from the Voice of the Innocent Human Rights Project in Belfast and the Peace and Justice Award from Irish Organizations United.

Judge James Murray Lynn is a member of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas of Pennsylvania. Previously, he was a prosecutor and trial lawyer.

He graduated from Loyola University Law School in New Orleans, where he earned the highest average in constitutional law and criminal law and procedure, and was a member of the Loyola Law Review. He returned to New Orleans to help in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and also assisted in the 9/11 rescue efforts, saying he was inspired by his mother, a nurse who served police and firefighters in Philadelphia.

Lynn, whose ancestors hail from various areas of Ireland including Louth, Down, Donegal and Sligo, has served as president of Philadelphia’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade and is its long-time announcer. He was president and a founding member of the Brehon Law Society, and was invited by President Clinton to serve as a delegate to the White House Conference for Trade and Investment in Northern Ireland and the Border Counties. Judge Lynn is married to Barbara. His 19-year-old daughter, Grainne, is a student at The Catholic University of America.

Thomas Mahoney

Anthony Kennedy U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy was born in Sacramento, California, on July 23, 1936, the second of his parents’ three children. His father was a well-established attorney and lobbyist and his mother, Gladys McLeod, was involved in civic activities.

An honor student in high school, Kennedy went on to Stanford University. He also spent a year at the London School of Economics.

After Stanford, he enrolled in Harvard Law School and graduated cum laude.Kennedy returned to California after law school and practiced in San Francisco. When his father died in 1963, he returned to Sacramento to take over his practice. During this time he befriended Ed Meese. In 1973, Meese, who was working for California governor Ronald Reagan, recruited Kennedy to help draft a plan to limit the state’s spending. Reagan recommended Kennedy for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and in 1975 Kennedy became the youngest federal judge of the day. He was appointed to the Supreme Court, the third Catholic to serve on the nation’s highest bench, by President Reagan, and assumed that office on February 18, 1988.

Kennedy is married to Mary Davis and the couple has three children.

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Thomas Mahoney, Jr., is a partner in the Savannah law firm Ranitz, Mahoney & Mahoney PC, which focuses on criminal and trial law. Mahoney has been involved with general law practice since 1962. He previously served as a Special Agent for the FBI, earned his B.A. from the University of South Carolina and received his J.D. from the University of South Carolina School of Law. In 1995, Mahoney was elected Grand Marshal of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Savannah, and has served as the past president of both the Irish Heritage and the Sinn Féin Societies of Savannah, the latter of which has no affiliation with Northern Ireland.

A fourth-generation Irish-American who traces his roots to County Cork, Mahoney has traveled to Ireland four times since 2004. He enjoys the sounds of local Savannah musician Harry O’Donoghue, as well as the writings of Frank McCourt, and lives with his wife, Judy, in Savannah. They are proud parents to four children and grandparents to three.

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Seamus McCaffrey Seamus McCaffrey is a Justice on the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. McCaffrey became a municipal judge in 1993 and in 2001 was appointed by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court as the Administrative Judge of the Municipal Court. He was elected to the Supreme Court in 2003.

Unlike most in his field, McCaffrey did not earn his law degree until he was almost forty, when he graduated with a J.D. from Temple University School of Law. Born in Belfast, he joined the Marine Corps after graduating Cardinal Dougherty High School in Philadelphia, and later transferred to the Marine Air Force Reserve, where he rose to the rank of Colonel.

McCaffrey, who served on the Philadelphia Police Department Homicide Unit for 20 years, has a reputation that is synonymous with his innovative National Football League Court (he created the ad hoc Nuisance Night Court program in 1998 to deal with rowdy fans at the Philadelphia Eagles home games). He was named “Philadelphia’s Quality of Life Judge” by the city’s largest newspaper. He is married to Lise Rapaport, and they have three sons.

Joseph McLaughlin Judge Joseph M. McLaughlin was appointed United States Circuit Judge on October 17, 1990 and entered on duty the next day. He received his LL.B. from Fordham Law School, and his LLM from New York University Law School, and served in the United States Army from 1955-57.

Judge McLaughlin served as dean of Fordham Law School from 1971 to 1981, and was chairman of the New York State Law Revision Commission from 1975 to 1982. He was a United States District Judge from the Eastern District of New York from 1981 to 1990, and also an Adjunct Professor at St. John’s Law School from 1982 to 1997.

A first-generation Irish-American whose father’s and mother’s families both hail from County Longford, Judge McLaughlin is married to the former Frances Lynch and has four children, Mary Jo, Joseph, Matthew and Andrew.

Only three people have given the address at the annual Friendly Sons of St. Patrick New York dinner more than once: William Hughes Mulligan, Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen and Judge Joseph M. McLaughlin.

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Denis McInerney

Rob McKenna

Denis J. McInerney is a former federal prosecutor who concentrates in white collar criminal defense work at Davis Polk & Wardwell where he has been a partner since 1997. He was educated by the Irish Christian Brothers at Iona Grammar School and Iona Prep and received his B.A. from Columbia College and his J.D. from Fordham Law School. He currently serves on the Board of Sanctuary for Families and is a member of the New York City Bar Association’s Committee on Professional and Judicial Ethics.

Denis’ maternal grandfather was Francis T. Murphy, a lawyer and former President of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, whose Irish ancestors came to this country in 1847 and fought in the Civil War. Denis’ paternal grandparents were both born in Clare and came to this country as teenagers.

Although they had lived only a few miles apart in Ireland, they first met each other in the Bronx at the Clare Ball. Through several trips to Ireland, Denis’ father instilled in all of his children a love for their heritage which has resulted in their being in regular contact with their aunts, uncles and cousins from O’Callaghan’s Mills, Loch Graney and Dublin.

Rob McKenna is Washington’s 17th Attorney General. As the state’s chief legal officer, he directs 500 attorneys and over 700 professional staff providing legal services to state agencies, boards and commissions.

McKenna, whose great-grandfather immigrated from Buncrana, County Donegal in the late 1860s, received his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1988, where he was a member of the Law Review. He earned a B.A. in economics and a B.A. in international studies, both with honors, from the University of Washington. A committed community leader, he has raised funds for Seattle’s Eastside Domestic Violence Program and the Bellevue Schools Foundation. A former Eagle Scout, he also serves as a board member with the Chief Seattle Council of the Boy Scouts of America, is on the board of the Bellevue Community College Foundation and is a longtime member of the Bellevue Rotary, as well as serving as a fundraising chair of the Eastside Domestic Violence Program.

McKenna and his wife of 20 years, Marilyn, have four children.

Paul McNamara Paul J. McNamara, partner at Masterman, Culbert and Tully LLP, is a member of the bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. He is a 1965 graduate of Boston College Law School and received its 1989 Alumnus of the Year Award.

McNamara specializes in property and estate planning. He also represents individuals in estate planning, probate administration, and tax and succession planning. He serves on the Board of Overseers of Boston College Law School and the Board of Trustees of the Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Boston, and has served on the Board of Directors of the Irish Immigration Center.

McNamara’s paternal grandmother, Mary Swift McNamara, came from Williamstown, Co. Galway in the late 1800s and married Bernard F. McNamara of Boston. His mother’s family, the Cassidys, immigrated in the 1800s from Dublin. McNamara is married to Mary Hallisey who traces her roots to Tubercurry, Co. Sligo. They have two sons, Paul Joseph McNamara, Jr. and Bernard Swift McNamara, and three grandchildren, Nina, Alice, and Callum.

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John McNicholas John P. McNicholas III is a senior partner at the Los Angeles law firm of McNicholas and McNicholas. Recent court victories included a $5.4 million settlement on behalf of the Isley Brothers against Sony Music and singer Michael Bolton. He also won a $1.67 million settlement for a single mother who sustained serious injury from an over-the-counter dietary supplement.

McNicholas received his bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Los Angeles and his law degree from Loyola Law School.

He received Loyola’s Board of Governors Award in 2000 and has served on the advisory board to UCLA’s Catholic Center since 2000.

McNicholas is a third-generation Irish-American whose father’s family hails from County Mayo and whose mother, Rosemary’s, from Cork. He is a member of the Society of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick’s Executive Board and the Irish American Bar Association, which awarded him the Daniel O’Connell Award in 2005.

McNicholas is married and has seven children.

Patrick Meehan

Greg Milmoe

Patrick Meehan, who until recently served as United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, first began his public service work in 1995 when appointed District Attorney of Delaware County, Pennsylvania. As U.S. Attorney, Patrick pioneered the AntiTerrorism Task Force, which has since been touted as a national model for the prevention of future terrorist attacks. His most recent accomplishment, the “Route 222 Corridor Anti-Gang Initiative,” brings together faithbased and community efforts with local, state and federal law enforcement to establish safer neighborhood conditions across five cities and four counties in Pennsylvania.

On July 21, 2008, Meehan joined Conrad O’Brien Gellman & Rohn, P.C. where his focus will be on representing multinational corporations and individuals and a wide range of corporate commercial litigation.

Meehan graduated from Bowdoin College in Maine and earned his J.D. from Temple University. A Philadelphia native, he is a third-generation Irish-American with roots in County Mayo and enjoys the sounds of the contemporary Irish band the Corrs. He is married with three children.

As Partner and Co-head of Corporate Restructuring at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom, LLP, Greg Milmoe plays a leadership role in the Los Angeles firm’s numerous restructurings, acquisitions and financings. His career with Skadden began before he even graduated law school, as a mailroom assistant in 1971.

A graduate of Fordham University Law School, Milmoe received his A.B. from Cornell University. As a corporate lawyer, Milmoe has received accolades for his ability to fashion pragmatic solutions to complex problems from differing legal disciplines. In 2007, The American Lawyer awarded Milmoe its Dealmaker of the Year award, and he has also been named to Turnarounds and Workouts’s list of the top dozen restructuring lawyers in America.

Milmoe’s achievements aren’t limited to law: in 2006 he was honored by the Partnership for Afterschool Education as its Afterschool Champion, and in 2008 he helped win the Lawyer’s Cup for Skadden’s ice hockey team.

Milmoe’s father’s family hail from Sligo, while his mother’s come from Galway. He is married with two children.

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John J. Meehan is a retired District Attorney in California’s Alameda County.

He began working in the state District Attorney’s office in 1960, having graduated from the University of San Francisco, School of Law. He had been inspired by his father who was a police captain, active in the predominantly Irish community of Eureka Valley near San Francisco, to pursue a career in prosecution.

Meehan, who was named the St. Thomas More Lawyer of the Year in 2003, also has a talent for the written word, starting a publication called Point Of View, which reviewed cases from the United States Supreme Court and the California courts. He continues to write a column for a statewide legal publication called Did You Know.

Meehan’s paternal grandparents hailed from County Leitrim and his mother’s family was from County Cork. He and his wife, who is part IrishAmerican, had four children, three living, and spent their thirtieth wedding anniversary in Ireland.

George Mitchell Former senator George J. Mitchell has a name that is synonymous with the Northern Irish peace process, having chaired the talks which led to the Good Friday Agreement. A partner in the New York City law firm DLA Piper, Mitchell served as a U.S. senator from Maine for fifteen years and was voted the “most respected member” for six consecutive years. He served as Senate Majority Leader and was instrumental in the reauthorization of the Clean Air Act and Americans with Disabilities Act. He served as Chairman of the International Commission on Disarmament in Northern Ireland, for which he received the Nobel Peace Prize and Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Mitchell also served as Chairman of the International Crisis Group, and has been appointed Chancellor of the Queen’s University in Northern Ireland. He recently headed an investigation into past steroid use in major league baseball.

A Maine native, Mitchell received his bachelor’s degree from Bowdoin College and his law degree from the Georgetown University Law Center. He is a second-generation Irish-American.

Donald Molloy Justice Donald Molloy worked in private practice, where he focused on civil litigation, before he was appointed U.S. District Judge for the District of Montana, Missoula Division in 1996. With jurisdiction over a vast amount of federal land, including ten national forests, Molloy has been colored as “one of the greenest judges in the West”

by High Country News, a magazine dedicated to reporting environmental news in the West.

Judge Molloy graduated with a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Montana, and received his J.D. from the university’s Law School after serving five years active duty in the U.S. Navy. His Irish ancestors emigrated from Counties Offaly and Cork to Montana. Of his sense of Irish connection in America, Donald says, “Being Irish is being part of a very large clan that tends to take care of its members socially, spiritually and in their essence.” Judge Molloy instituted an internship program under which law students at University College Cork have the opportunity to attend the University of Montana.

He has been married to Judith for 37 years and they have five children.

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THE LEGAL Joseph Mulherin

Kenneth Nolan

A lawyer at Lewis, Owens and Mulherin, a firm concentrating on personal injury cases, Joseph Mulherin previously practiced law at Bouhan, Williams and Levy for sixteen years, where he focused on civil litigation. A member of the Savannah and American Bar Associations and the American Association for Justice, Mulherin focuses on automobile collision, medical misconduct and workplace injury cases.

Mulherin graduated from the University of Georgia and went on to earn his J.D. from the university’s Law School. A fourth-generation Irish-American with roots in County Mayo, he believes that being Irish means “sharing a sense of pride with others in the many accomplishments of the Irish and enjoying a camaraderie with other Irish people resulting from the many hardships our people have overcome.”

An active participant in the Ancient Order of Hibernians’s annual Irish road bowling competition, Mulherin enjoys the tunes of both the Clancy Brothers and The Chieftains. He lives in Georgia and is married with a son and a daughter.

Thomas Nolan

Donal O’Brien

Thomas J. Nolan is a partner in the Los Angeles law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom LLP and the co-chair of Skadden’s West Coast litigation practice. He has extensive experience representing corporations and individuals in civil and criminal litigation. A former federal prosecutor, he served as chief of fraud and prosecutions in the Los Angeles U.S. Attorney’s office.

Nolan is consistently recognized for his work by California’s Daily Journal and Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers for Business, and was selected by The Best Lawyers in America for its 2008 edition. In addition to his extensive white-collar defense practice, Nolan has represented clients in complex civil litigation matters and has obtained verdicts of over one billion dollars for his clients over the past six years. Nolan is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and a fellow of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers Nolan received both his undergraduate and law degrees from Loyola University. His mother's family hails from County Mayo.

He is married and lives in California.

Donal O’Brien is a partner at the Chicago law firm of Bryan Cave LLP, where he focuses his practice on corporate law including mergers and acquisitions, commercial finance and general securities. He represented American Tower in its $800 million acquisition of ALLTELL cell phone towers, and other recent clients include Barrilla Foods, Irish Dairy Board and United Shockwave. In the area of finance, O’Brien has advised financial institutions in numerous secured and unsecured lending transactions. He also represents foreign investments to and from Ireland.

O’Brien graduated from University College Dublin with honors in history and received his law degree from Chicago's Loyola University, where he has taught a course in Documenting and Negotiating Finance Transactions. He is a member of the Chicago Bar Association’s Judicial Evaluation Committee, a director of the Illinois Chapter of the American Liver Foundation and the founder, director and president of the Ireland Network, North America’s largest Irish professional network in North America. He emigrated from Dublin in the 1990s.

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Kenneth P. Nolan, managing partner of the New York office of Speiser, Krause, Nolan & Granito, specializes in aviation personal injury and wrongful death litigation and trials. He has successfully obtained million-dollar verdicts and settlements in the Avianca crash on September 20, 1989 and the TWA Flight 800 explosion of July 17, 1996, as well as many others.

Nolan has served as an editor for The New York Times and has written articles for The Times and other publications. He is a past member of the Board of Editors of The New York State Bar Journal and has been president of the Catholic Lawyers Guild.

A past president of the Emerald Association of Long Island and a past member of the Board of Trustees of Bishop Ford Central Catholic High School, Nolan has been honored by the Holy Name Foundation, which raises funds to support Nolan’s former grammar school.

Nolan’s family is from Tipperary and Limerick.

He and his wife Nancy have four children and live in Brooklyn and Shelter Island, New York.

Mary O’Connell Mary Ellen O’Connell is the Robert and Marion Short Chair in Law at the Notre Dame Law School, where she teaches international law courses. She began her teaching career at the Indiana University Law School, following a career in private practice in Washington, D.C. She has also taught at Ohio State University and for the U.S. Department of Defense at the Center for Security Studies in Germany. She was appointed by the International Law Association in 2005 to chair a fouryear study on the meaning of war in international law.

O’Connell received her bachelor’s degree from Northwestern University. She holds a J.D. from Columbia Law School, an MSc in International Relations from the London School of Economics and an LL.B. from Cambridge University.

She is a third-generation Irish-American; her father’s family hails from County Kerry. She has written seven books and about 70 articles, some appearing in major publications such as The Wall Street Journal and USA Today. O’Connell is married.

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THE LEGAL Brian O’Dwyer

Michael O’Leary

Brian O’Dwyer is a senior partner in the New York litigation firm of O’Dwyer and Bernstien and has been cited as winning the highest personal injury award – $61 million – in the United States. He has served as Counsel to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the New York District Council of Carpenters and other unions. He is a regular commentator on legal issues for Fox TV and CNBC. His efforts on behalf of Puerto Rico brought him the honor of serving as Grand Marshal of the Puerto Rican Day Parade in 1993.

A recipient of the New York City Council Spirit of New York award for his work to bring together New York’s many cultures, O’Dwyer received papal honors in 2000 when he was named a Knight of the Holy Sepulchre. O’Dwyer received his undergraduate degree from George Washington University, his masters in Spanish in Madrid and his Juris Doctor law degree from Georgetown University. He returned to George Washington to receive his Masters in Law. He is the son of County Mayo native Paul O'Dwyer, a famed lawyer and politician who cofounded the firm of O’Dwyer and Bernstien.

Michael O’Leary is a partner in the Houston law firm Andrews Kurth LLP. His practice is involved in all aspects of corporate transactions, including representation of public and private companies and investment banking firms. O’Leary also counsels on a wide range of strategic transactional matters, including international joint ventures and alliances, publicly traded limited partnerships, spin-offs, mergers, acquisitions and dispositions (by tender offer, exchange offer and otherwise) of corporations, divisions of corporations and other entities. He has particular experience with energy and oilfield service companies, pipeline transportation, staff leasings, royalty trusts, and forest products companies.

O’Leary graduated with a B.S. in Finance from the University of Alabama and earned an honors J.D. from the University of Houston Law Center. He has been published in Financier Worldwide and is a member of the Houston Bar Association and the State Bar of Texas. In 2006 he was included as one of Chambers USA Leading Business Lawyers and featured in Texas Monthly as a Texas Super Lawyer in Securities and Corporate Finance from 20032007. Married with three children, he has roots in County Cork.

John O’Malley John O’Malley is a shareholder in the law firm of Volpe and Koenig P.C. in Philadelphia where his practice is focused on litigation and trademark matters. He is a member of the bar in Pennsylvania and was admitted to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, and the Supreme Court of the United States.

O’Malley graduated cum laude from George Washington University and received his law degree from Villanova University.

He is first-generation Irish-American whose mother’s family hails from Termon, County Donegal and his father’s from Louisburgh, County Mayo. He has been vice president of the Brehon Law Society since 2006. He is also a board member of the Irish American Business Chamber Network and a member of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick.

He has served as a board member of Family and Community Services of Delaware County since 2001.

O’Malley is married with two children.

James O’Malley James A. O’Malley is a native of Limerick City and a graduate of the National University of Ireland, Galway and New York Law School. He is the senior partner in the law firm of O’Malley & Associates, a boutique law firm in New York City which handles all aspects of U.S. Immigration law. The firm’s areas of specialization include executive and managerial transferee visas, investment visas, permanent residence and United States citizenship. He is also the co-editor of Everything Irish, a comprehensive one volume popular reference book on Ireland published by Ballantine Books in the U.S. in 2003, and by Mercier Press in Ireland in 2005.

O’Malley is pictured above with members of the U.S. Munster Rugby Supporters Club of which he is a co-founder and the current president.

Patricia O’Neill

John Phelan

A strong advocate for legal justice for children, Patricia O’Neill has practiced law for over fifteen years in Pennsylvania and Delaware, and has represented numerous cases involving children with disabilities under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. After graduating from Chestnut Hill College, Patricia taught for ten years before working as a visiting nurse for nine years. She attended Widener School of Law in Wilmington, where she graduated cum laude.

Patricia’s grandmother, who emigrated from Ireland at the age of three, spent the next ninety years of her life in America fostering a strong sense of Irish appreciation in the lives of her children. A secondgeneration Irish-American, Patricia says that “being Irish manifests itself through my efforts to fight for justice. Not only do I firmly believe that Ireland stood and cried for justice, but I learned it from my very Irish dad.” O’Neill lives in Delaware with her husband and four daughters.

John Phelan has been practicing law in New York and Connecticut for the last 15 years.

A trial attorney by trade, he has tried cases in all of the Supreme Courts in New York.

Phelan has been living his dream of having his own practice and giving back to the Irish community since 2001 when he opened his office on McLean Avenue in Yonkers. The practice is primarily devoted to real estate, particularly first time buyers.

“Each time we help an Irish or Irish-American couple close on their first house in the Bronx or in Yonkers or anywhere in New York City, we take pride in helping their dream come true,” says Phelan.

Both of Phelan’s parents emigrated from Waterford in the early 1950s and he grew up surrounded by Irish culture. At age five, he started playing Gaelic football and eventually traveled to Ireland to play in the Minor Championship. Phelan played football for 30 years and now his three children, Sean, Claire and Leah, have embraced the sport.

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THE LEGAL Samantha Power

William Quinlan

Jack Quinn

Pulitzer Prize-winner Samantha Power was the founding executive director of the Care Center for Human Rights Policy at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University where she is now a professor.

Straight out of college, Power spent three years covering the war in Bosnia as a reporter and remains a working journalist, with her work appearing in various publications including The Atlantic Monthly and The New Yorker. She won the Pulitzer in 2003 for general nonfiction for her book A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide, and spent a year working in the office of presidential hopeful Senator Barack Obama. Power is a graduate of Yale University and Harvard Law School.

She was born in Dublin and moved to the United States when she was nine. She married Cass Sunstein on July 4 of this year.

William Quinlan is a managing partner at the Chicago law firm Quinlan and Carroll. His practice is primarily focused on business law. Quinlan previously served as a Justice of the Illinois Appellate Court and is a former Circuit Court Judge in Cook County.

Quinlan, who received the Distinguished Award for Excellence from the Illinois Bar Foundation and was inducted as a laureate by the Illinois State Bar Association Academy of Illinois Lawyers, graduated from Loyola University and received his J.D. from Loyola and his LLM from the University of Virginia. He is married with six children. A second-generation Irish-American, Quinlan’s father’s family hails from Cork and his mother’s from Galway. He is a member of the Irish Fellowship Club of Chicago, the Celtic Legal Society of Chicago and the Irish American Partnership for Excellence.

Jack Quinn is the co-founder and chairman of Quinn Gillespie & Associates, a strategic consulting company he formed in Washington, D.C. in January 2000 with Ed Gillespie.

Quinn served as counsel to President Clinton from November 1995 to February 1997. Prior to that, he was Vice President Gore’s Chief-of-Staff and Counselor. Before his government service, Quinn was an Adjunct Professor of Law at his alma mater, Georgetown University Law Center, where as a student he edited the Georgetown Law Journal. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and has served on a number of boards, including Fannie Mae, the Philadelphia Stock Exchange, the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial and the Center City Consortium.

Quinn’s great-grandfather came from County Clare.

Paul Quinn Paul S. Quinn works for Buchanan Ingersoll and Rooney PC in Washington, D.C., where he specializes in federal government relations.

Prior to joining Buchanan, Quinn provided policy and strategic advice to many senators, including Ted Kennedy, and served as a lieutenant in the United States Army from 19561958. He was the 2005 recipient of the Irish Peace and Culture Award from The American Ireland Fund, where he sits on the Board of Directors. He also founded the AIF’s annual gala fundraiser in Washington.

Quinn chairs the American Advisory Board of the Smurfit Graduate School of Business at University College Dublin. A Rhode Island native, he attended Providence College and received his law degree from Georgetown University.

All four of Quinn’s grandparents hailed from Ireland, and he enjoys dual citizenship. His paternal grandfather was from Coalisland in County Tyrone, and his maternal grandmother was from Belfast. On his mother’s side his grandfather was born in Waterford and his grandmother in Drumlish in County Longford. Quinn has been married to his wife, Denise, for 50 years. They have two children and two grandchildren.

Tom Reynolds Tom Reynolds III is a former Assistant Attorney General for the State of Illinois and a veteran of more than twenty jury trials. Along with another partner at the Chicago law firm Winston & Strawn, Reynolds holds the distinction of having secured the highest jury award ever collected in the Seventh Circuit of the United States.

Reynolds’ clients have included American Appraisal Associates, Baxter International, Carbon County Coal Company, FMC, Jefferson Smurfit Corporation, Gannet Co., Gould Inc., Multimedia Co., Northern Trust Company, Philip Morris, Salomon Brothers, United Airlines, VMS Realty and Wirtz Corporation. Reynolds is a member of the Boards of Directors of Georgetown University and Smurfit Stone Container Corporation, and is a recent past president of the Better Government Association in Chicago.

Reynolds is president of the Brain Research Foundation.

He received a B.S. in business administration from Georgetown University in 1974 and a J.D. from Emory University in 1977.

Reynolds is a third-generation Irish-American.

Robert Reilly Robert J. Reilly is the Assistant Dean for the Feerick Center for Social Justice at Fordham University School of Law. After a career in corporate law at Transamerica Corporation, he returned to Fordham, where he had received both his undergraduate and law degrees. He has been involved in the administration of the school for over 25 years. For three seasons he served as the host of the cable television program Ask the Lawyer.

A former president of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick in New York, Reilly was a contributing author to The Encyclopedia of the Irish in America, Reilly is also a member of the New York Irish History Roundtable and the American Irish Historical Society. He was involved in organizing the Fordham Law School Northern Ireland Mediation program. A fifth-generation IrishAmerican, he is married to the former Mary Jane Conlon and has three sons, John, Benedict and Michael.

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THE LEGAL Sean Riordan

Fred Rooney

Sean Patrick Riordan is an associate at Brecher Fishman Pasternack Heller Walsh & Tinker, a firm committed to personal injury lawsuits. After graduating with a B.A. in political science from Molloy College, Sean received his law degree in 2004 from St. John’s University School of Law. Riordan converges his Irish roots with his legal career with memberships in the Nassau County Brehon Law Society and The American Ireland Fund Young Leaders group. Of how his Irish roots affect his current law practices, Riordan says, “Being Irish provides me with the knowledge of what injustice looks like, and the strength to help fight against it today.” He serves on the Board of Directors for the Feel Good Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to education and relief of health and financial burdens on the first responders to the 9/11 attacks.

He lives in New York with his wife, Elizabeth, and two young children who, Sean hopes, will value their Irish heritage “when they are old enough to appreciate anything other than Mickey Mouse!” A second-generation Irish-American, Sean has roots in counties Armagh, Roscommon, Cork and Mayo.

Kevin Ryan

William Ryan

Kevin Ryan is the Criminal Justice Director for the City of San Francisco. He is also Deputy Chief of Staff to Mayor Gavin Newsom, and a senior advisor on criminal justice issues. Prior to joining the Mayors’ staff, Ryan was a partner in a major Ca. Law firm. Before that he was the 48th U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California.

Ryan’s four and a half years as Northern California’s top federal prosecutor will be remembered for his efforts to rid sports of performance-enhancement drugs.

His handling of the BALCO steroids case permeated all levels of professional sports. Major league baseball has twice changed its testing policy for steroids and controlled substances since the case. Ryan attended Saint Ignatius High School before earning his Bachelor of Arts History from Dartmouth College and JD from the University of San Francisco School of Law. He was named one of the Top 100 California Lawyers of 2006 by the San Francisco Daily Journal, and voted a N. California "Superlawyer" for 2006 and 2007. Ryan’s father was born in Dublin and his mother in Longford. They immigrated first to Canada where Ryan was born, and then to San Francisco. He is married with two sons.

A career prosecutor, Bill Ryan serves as First Deputy Attorney General to Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett.

In this role, Ryan supervises all administrative and legal issues within the Office of the Attorney General, and also serves as the primary advisor to Corbett on all major issues.

Prior to his appointment as First Deputy, Ryan served as Director of the Attorney General’s Criminal Law Division, overseeing investigations of all criminal matters including insurance fraud, environmental crimes, narcotics and Medicaid fraud.

Ryan earned his bachelor’s degree from St. Joseph’s University and J.D. degree from Villanova University School of Law. Upon graduation, he was hired as a legal intern with the Delaware County District Attorney’s Office, progressing to Trial Assistant, First Assistant District Attorney and later District Attorney.

Ryan is proud of his Irish heritage and traces his roots back four generations on his mother’s side and even further on his father’s. He lives with his wife, Debra, and their two sons in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.

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Fred Rooney is the director of the Community Legal Resource Network at City University of New York Law School, which supports a network of solo and small-firm attorneys in community-based practices in their efforts to increase access to civil justice in the New York City area. He is also a partner in the small Bethlehem, Pennsylvania-based law firm of Rooney and Mannicci LLC, and is committed to practicing pro bono law that focuses on international child abductions and lifesaving healthcare for children of needy parents.

A graduate of CUNY’s first law class in 1986, he received his master’s in bicultural and bilingual studies from Marywood College and his bachelor’s in Latin American Studies from Moravian College, both in Pennsylvania. He was awarded Moravian College’s Haupert Humanitarian Award in 2002. He remains a supporter of CUNY’s Joseph Doherty Fellowship, which provides financial assistance to CUNY law students who have demonstrated a commitment to civil rights or activism on behalf of Irish causes.

Rooney has two children and traces his roots to County Cork.

John Roberts John G. Roberts, Jr., Chief Justice of the United States, was born in Buffalo, New York, on January 27, 1955. He received an A.B. from Harvard College in 1976 and a J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1979.

Roberts began his career as a law clerk for Judge Henry J. Friendly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit from 1979-1980, and as a law clerk for Justice William H. Rehnquist of the Supreme Court of the United States during the 1980 term.

Roberts went on to serve as a Special Assistant to the Attorney General of the United States. In 1982, he was appointed as Associate Counsel to President Reagan and served until 1986. From 1989-1993 he was the Principal Deputy Solicitor General, following which he practiced law in Washington, D.C. He served as a Judge on the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 2003-2005 until his nomination as Chief Justice of the United States by President George W. Bush. He assumed office on September 29, 2005.

Roberts is Irish through marriage. His wife, Jane Sullivan has roots in County Limerick where the couple maintain a home. They have two children, Josephine and John.

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THE LEGAL William Shearouse William Ward Shearouse,Jr., of the Savannah-based firm Weiner, Shearouse, Weitz, Greenberg and Shawe, specializes in the area of real estate transactions, general business and land development. He concurrently serves as the Assistant City Attorney for the City of Savannah, and has received the prestigious AV rating, the highest mark awarded by the Martinsdale Hubbell Law Directory. A member of the Hibernian Society of Savannah, Shearouse says, “Irishmen are inclined by nature to good fellowship and charity, and should not forget the duties they owe to themselves, their national character and their distressed countrymen.”

Shearouse earned his political science degree from the University of Georgia and his J.D. from the university’s Law School, where he was a member of the Prosecutorial Clinic. He is a second-generation IrishAmerican whose family hails from County Cork. He lives in Savannah with his wife, Ronda.

Roger Sullivan

Frank Sweeney

Roger Sullivan is a partner in the Los Angeles law firm of Sullivan, Workman and Dee, specializing in eminent domain and land use. He is the past chair of the eminent domain committees of the American, California and Los Angeles Bar Associations, and a fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers. He is also a member of the American College of Real Estate Lawyers.

Sullivan served in the Navy as an aviator and a qualified carrier pilot until 1947. He began his law career in 1952, having obtained his law degree from Loyola Law School, where he helped found the St. Thomas More Law Society to encourage an emphasis on ethics and morality in legal education.

He has served as president of Loyola’s Board of Visitors and received their Distinguished Alumni Award in 1989.

Sullivan, whose father’s family hails from the Beare Peninsula in County Kerry, is married with six children. He is active in the Catholic Church and is a Knight in the Papal Order of Saint Gregory.

Francis “Frank” Sweeney, who started out as General Counsel at TDK Corporation, was named Corporation President and CEO of TDK USA in 2004. He is responsible for strategic plans of subsidiaries throughout the U.S. as well as domestic and international mergers.

After receiving his B.A. in English literature from Villanova University and his J.D. from Fordham University School of Law, Sweeney worked at Transamerica Interway, Inc., where he dealt with legalities in domestic and international leasing before serving as Senior Counsel at the Hertz Corporation.

A second-generation Irish-American who often quotes Oscar Wilde, Sweeney traces his roots to Counties Cavan, Mayo and Cork. He was awarded the Villanova University Distinguished Arts and Science Alumni Award in 2005, and believes that being Irish means “working hard and maximizing our God-given talents to advance each generation. Sometimes it is done with a joke or a laugh but that is just for fear of revealing the depth of the heart that cares so much.”

Sweeney lives in Connecticut with his wife of 32 years and their four children.

David Tierney David C. Tierney is a partner in the Scottsdale, Arizona law firm Sacks Tierney P.A., where he acts as an arbitrator and mediator.

Named in Woodward/White, Inc.’s The Best Lawyers in America from 2003-04 through 2007-08, Tierney was also listed by Southwest Super Lawyers magazine as one of the top attorneys for 2007.

Tierney received his undergraduate degree in psychology from Brandeis University and his law degree from Harvard in 1965. He served in the Peace Corps in Venezuela in the 1960s and continues to be active in public service, for which he received an award in Maricopa County.

A third-generation Irish-American, Tierney founded the Phoenix chapter of the Irish American Cultural Institute and serves as its chairman. His father’s family hails from Limerick.

Married with two children, Sean and Connor, Tierney is a member of the Arizona Coalition for Tomorrow, which operates programs to benefit children in the state.

William Treanor William Treanor is the Dean and Paul Fuller Chair of Law at Fordham Law School in New York City. He joined the faculty in 1991 and has taught a range of subjects including property law and criminal law. Prior to joining the Fordham faculty, Dean Treanor was a speechwriter for the United States Secretary of Education and served as Associate Independent Counsel in the Office of the Iran-Contra Independent Counsel. He successfully defended on appeal before the United States Court, the conviction of the only Iran-Contra figure to serve jail time.

Treanor is also a leading constitutional historian. He is active in Fordham’s summer program in affiliation with University College Dublin and Queen’s College in Belfast. His senior paper in college was on the Dublin Archdiocese and the Home Rule Movement. Dean Treanor attended Yale College for his undergraduate degree, received an A.M. in history from Harvard, where he began law school. He received his law degree from Yale Law School. Irish on both sides, with roots in County Donegal and Belfast. He and his wife, Allison, have two children, Liam and Katherine.

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THE LEGAL John Tully

Neal Tully

John F. Tully is a lawyer in the New York Office of Fulbright & Jaworski LLP, where he defends clients in commercial, environmental and property damage lawsuits. Tully graduated from St. Francis College in 1967 and named the new college board chairman on July 1. He received his J.D. from the University of Notre Dame Law School. He began his legal career working in the homicide bureau of the New York County District Attorney’s office.

He went on to work for ExxonMobil, where he first served as staff counsel, focusing on environmental and employment law issues, and eventually rose to the position of Assistant General Counsel, where he was responsible for worldwide litigation.

Tully is second-generation Irish-American. After emigrating to the United States from County Galway, his grandmother worked as a maid in a house on Remsen Street in Brooklyn, current home to St. Francis College, where he earned his B.A. in history. His grandfather hailed from County Cavan, where Tully, his wife and two children visited this past summer, fulfilling his desire to show the children “exactly where their great-grandfather was born and raised.”

Neal C. Tully, partner at Masterman, Culbert and Tully LLP, is a member of the bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. He has also been admitted to the Federal District Court for Massachusetts, the First Circuit Court of Appeals, and the United States Supreme Court.

A 1973 graduate of Boston College Law School, he has a general civil litigation and appellate practice with a concentration in eminent domain, land valuation and land use and development.

Tully has tried approximately sixty jury trials and an equal number of bench trials and arbitrations. He is the former chairman of the Eminent Domain Committee of the Boston Bar Association, and has lectured and written articles on eminent domain and land valuation. He was selected by Super Lawyers magazine in 2004, 2006 and 2007, and has been chosen

by The American Lawyer as among the Best Lawyers in America for eminent domain and condemnation law for 2008.

Tully’s father’s side is from the Connemara area of County Galway and Cork, and his mother’s side is from Tuam, County Galway and from Donegal.

Mark Tuohey

James Wade

Mark Tuohey is a partner at the Washington, D.C. branch of the law firm of Vinson-Elkins, where he is a litigator and represents companies in civil and white-collar criminal litigation.

He served as president of the District of Columbia Bar Association and is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers.

As chair of the D.C. Sports and Entertainment Commission, Tuohey brought major league baseball to Washington and was named Washingtonian of the Year in 2005. A former advisor to the Independent Commission on Policing for Northern Ireland, Tuohey has also served as a legal advisor to the office of Ireland’s Attorney General. He currently chairs Cooperation Ireland (U.S.), an organization involved in cross-border reconciliation efforts.

Tuohey, who received his bachelor’s degree from St. Bonaventure University and his law degree from Fordham University Law School, is an Irish citizen whose maternal grandparents hail from Tipperary and paternal grandfather from Galway. The grand marshal for this year’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Washington, he is married with three children.

New York native James Wade is a partner at the law firm of Robinson and Cole LLP in Hartford, Connecticut.

He has been consistently named in the directory of Best Lawyers in America in the categories of corporate and negligence litigation and whitecollar criminal defense, and has been a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers since 1980.

Appointed by Connecticut’s governor to serve as an arbitrator on the state’s behalf in a dispute with the state of New York over Metro-North Railroad funding, Wade served as counsel to the Connecticut State Democratic Party for 20 years and as counsel to three of the state’s governors.

Wade received his undergraduate degree from Yale University in 1959 and went on to law school at the University of Virginia. He also served in the U.S. Navy.

Married with two children, Sarah and Michael, Wade is a third-generation Irish-American whose father’s family hails from Waterford. His mother’s family is from Dingle, County Kerry

110 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

Joseph Walsh Joseph A. Walsh is a partner and vice chairman of Winston & Straw’s corporate department. Since joining the firm in 1977, Walsh has practiced exclusively in the corporate area, concentrating in mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures, as well as joint ventures for public and privately held companies. He also practices in the area of securities law and has extensive experience in sports law and media law, handling the acquisitions of the San Francisco 49ers, Denver Nuggets, Chicago White Sox, and Montreal Canadians and numerous television stations and newspapers.

Walsh serves as a panel member of the American Association of Arbitrators and as a director for the Ireland Chamber of Commerce in the United States. He received his B.A., with honors, from Indiana University in 1971 and a J.D., magna cum laude, from Indiana University Law School in 1974.

Walsh is a second-generation Irish-American whose father’s family hails from Kerry and whose mother’s is from Dublin.

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{sláinte}

By Edythe Preet

All Hail The Humble Spud!

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114 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

EDYTHE PREET

ack in first grade my See Spot Run primer told how Dick and Jane grew potatoes in their backyard and roasted them in an autumn leaf bonfire. If those kids can do that, I thought, so can I. Mom supplied a few spuds that had begun to sprout ‘eyes,’ and we buried them in a skimpy strip of dirt edging our row-house driveway.

Impatiently, as summer dragged on, I watched my precious potato vine overflow onto the cement.

When the leaves on our neighborhood trees began turning autumn colors and the lumpy dirt suggested there might actually be some potatoes hiding under the soil, a little digging yielded a modest mound of petite spuds. The joy of harvesting was only minimally diminished when Mom drew the line at roasting my crop under a pile of leaves in the city street, and baked Potatoes - An integral part of Irish culture and history. them in the oven along with a celebratory roast. At dinner that night Dad swore they marched through South America pillaging seas during the reign of Elizabeth I. Local were the best taters he had ever tasted, and ancient civilizations for treasure, the myth tells that Sir Francis Drake brought I went to bed dreaming of the piles of foods they discovered proved far more the South American tubers back from an spuds I would harvest the following year, valuable than the gold they sought. From expedition in 1586 and gave some which of course never happened. the holds of Spanish galleons, potatoes seedlings to his friend Sir Walter Raleigh, In the intervening decades, I have eaten found their way to farms and gardens all who planted them at his estate in potatoes boiled, broiled, baked, roasted, over Europe.

Youghall, County Cork. fried, mashed and hashed. Hot and cold, There are Irish folk tales of potatoes The new vegetable quickly became a crisp and fluffy, plain and embellished, washing ashore from wrecks of the staple crop of the island’s agricultural jackets on and jackets off. I make potato Spanish armada that stalked the British economy. Potatoes were a godsend. They salad infrequently because after one were easy to grow, requiring bite I have to employ strict self-disonly an initial planting with Top potato producers, 2006-2007 cipline not to eat the whole bowlful. minimal tending. They were (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) The same is true for potatoes au easy to cook, needing only a pot COUNTRY QUANTITY (TONS), 2007 gratin, potatoes roasted with garlic and a fire. And they were abunand rosemary, or even plain-jane dant. Supplemented with plenty 1. China 72, 000, 000 mashed potatoes and gravy. Mildly of fresh whole milk, greens, and 2. Russian Fed. 35, 718, 000 put, I am a potato addict. a bit of meat, fish or eggs, a 3. India 26, 280, 000 Some of the blame can be good potato harvest meant that 4. Ukraine 19, 102, 300 ascribed to my Irish heritage. Ask the average farm family had 5. USA 17, 653, 920 anyone where potatoes were first ready access to a nutritious diet. grown and odds are you’ll be told For nearly two hundred years 6. Germany 11, 604, 500 ‘Ireland.’ Nothing could be further the ancient South American 7. Poland 11, 221, 100 from the truth. Potatoes were plant nourished Ireland’s poor.

8. Belarus 8, 497, 000 unknown to the Western palate Then disaster struck. In the 9. Netherlands 7, 200, 000 until the discovery of the New warm, wet summer of 1845, a 10. France 6, 271, 000 World. As the Conquistadors fungus attacked the potato crop,

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RECIPES Potato Curry 4 2 2 1 ⁄2 1 2 2 1 1 ⁄2 1 1 1 ⁄3

[Personal Recipe]

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large potatoes, peeled and cubed spring onions, minced cloves garlic inch piece fresh ginger, peeled green chile, seeded and minced tablespoons butter large tomatoes, chopped small cinnamon stick, broken teaspoon mustard seeds tablespoon garam masala cardamom pod, opened cup plain yogurt

2 left-over chilled baked potatoes 1 green bell pepper, seeded and cut in chunks 1 red bell pepper, seeded and cut in chunks 1 onion, sliced medium thick 2 tablespoons butter salt & pepper

Cut baked potatoes into bite-size chunks, do not remove skins. Melt butter in a heavy frying pan and sauté peppers and onion until slightly wilted.

Add potato chunks and continue frying, stirring frequently and scraping any browned bits into the mix, until potatoes are browned and vegetables are fully cooked. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve with fried or scrambled eggs. Makes 4 servings.

[Personal Recipe] 4 large red potatoes, unpeeled and cubed 2 large carrots, peeled and cubed 1 ⁄2 medium red onion, minced 1 cup frozen peas, defrosted 1 ⁄2 pound lobster meat, shredded 1 ⁄4 cup mayonnaise 1 tablespoon lemon juice salt & pepper

Boil the potatoes and carrots in water until just tender, then drain and combine with onion, peas and lobster meat.

Add mayonnaise, lemon juice, salt and pepper to taste. Chill until ready to eat.

Makes 4-6 servings. (Note: any of the

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Hawaiian Potato Salad

Left-Over Baked Potato Pan Fry [Personal Recipe]

Boil the potatoes in water until just tender, then drain. Grind the spring onions, garlic, ginger and chile to a paste and cook in the butter for 2 minutes. Add tomatoes, cinnamon, mustard seeds, garam masala and cardamom and cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring. Add the yogurt and cook to a thick sauce.

Add the potatoes and simmer for 4-5 minutes. Makes 4 servings.

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and as winds carried the invisible spores from county to county, green fields turned black in days and the tubers rotted.

Blights had troubled local areas before, notably Mayo (1831) and Donegal (1836). This time the infestation was national. Again, in 1846 tragedy descended. More than two-thirds of the harvest rotted, and in some western areas the crop was lost completely. Blight struck again in 1849 and 1851.

With the main food source for people and livestock destroyed five times in seven years, Ireland was devastated. One and a half million people died of starvation, cholera, and famine fever. Another million emigrated. In the following decades, the tide of emigration swelled to a flood as millions more fled the specter of starvation. More than one million Irish immigrants came to the United States, bringing with them their love for spuds.

Initially, Americans were suspicious of potatoes as they belong to the botanical nightshade family that includes many poisonous plants. While it’s true that the potato plant’s leaves are toxic, the tubers are perfectly safe for consumption. Even so, most Americans chose to feed spuds to their pigs rather than serve them at the family dinner table. But the Irish knew a good thing when they bit into it, and when they began arriving by the boatload, the tide of American anti-potatoism started to shift. Today, more than 1.3 million acres across 35 states are planted in potatoes with an annual yield of nearly half a billion bushels. Considering that several dozen potatoes are contained in every bushel, the actual yearly U.S. spud count is in the trillions. While Ireland’s size naturally limits the total tonnage of its crop, the Irish are among the world’s heartiest potato-eaters with average annual consumption weighing in at a hefty 319 pounds per person.

Ireland and the United States are not the only countries where spuds have taken firm dietary root. In that potatoes are fat- and cholesterol-free, and one serving of a 5.3 ounce, medium potato provides 45 percent of the Daily Value for vitamin C, 21 percent of the Daily Value for potassium, three grams of fiber, and only 100 calories, spuds pack an impressive nutritional punch. Add to that the success with which they are cultivated and it’s easy to see how the potato has become a vital food staple all over the

Mom’s Potatoes Au Gratin [Personal Recipe] 2 large baking potatoes, peeled flour butter salt & pepper milk (approximately 2 cups)

Slice potatoes very thin. Layer potato slices in a small casserole, dusting each layer with flour, a sprinkle of salt and pepper, and small bits of butter. When casserole is full, pour in milk to cover.

Bake in a 350F oven for approximately 45 minutes or until top is nicely browned and a knife inserted into the potatoes indicates they are cooked tender. Makes 4 servings.

ingredients can be increased to taste.)

world with production growing faster than any food crop except for wheat.

Until the early 1990s, most potatoes were grown and consumed in Europe, North America, and countries of the former Soviet Union. Since then, there has been a dramatic increase in potato production and demand in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, three continents where output rose from less than 30 million tons in the early 1960s to more than 165 million tons in 2007. In 2005, for the first time, the developing world’s potato production exceeded that of the developed world.

China is now the biggest potato producer.

To honor the humble spud’s value as a global dietary mainstay, the United Nations has designated 2008 as the International Year of the Potato.

Everywhere, people have discovered the wisdom of the time-honored Irish proverb: “Be eating one potato, peeling a second, have a third in your fist, and your eye on a fourth.” I’ve even planted a patch of spuds again. And when they’re harvested, in addition to champ and colcannon, I’ll be cooking them up in an internationIA al rainbow of recipes. Sláinte!

OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008 IRISH AMERICA 115

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{crossword}

By Darina Molloy

ACROSS 2 It’s 10 years since this town was bombed (5) 7 Marvin Lee Aday sang at the Bundoran Live festival. He is otherwise known as? (8) 8 (& 5 down) Daniel Rooney owns this team (10) 10 (& 11 across) Limerick climber who died on K2 (6) 11 See 10 across (9) 13 City of Olympians (7) 16 Woodstock is in these mountains (9) 17 Legend has it that St. Columkille founded this city (5) 18 Tipperary rock or Daniel Day-Lewis’ son (6) 20 Shannon heritage castle and folk park (8) 21 (& 29 across) This Dubliners lead singer will be sadly missed in his hometown (6) 22 This Ms. Brennan is sister of 32 across (4) 23 This Earl built 20 across (7) 26 Swimmer Michael swept the boards at Olympics 2008 (6) 28 (& 31 down) Hospital where Grey's Anatomy is set (7) 29 See 21 across (4) 32 Reclusive Donegal singer (4) 33 This makes for a good old-fashioned fire (4) 34 (& 1 down) Sister of actor Aidan has her first feature film in 32A (6) 35 Last name of Blasket storyteller Peig (6) 36 (& 14 down) He stars with Colin Farrell in In Bruges (7) 37 Michael Collins was from this county (4)

DOWN 1 See 34 across (5) 2 Solemn vow (4) 3 Genetic condition resulting in white hair and skin (6)

4 See 6 down (10) 24 This city will host the 50th 5 See 8 across (8) Eucharistic Congress in 2012 (6) 6 (& 4 across) First Irish golfer to win 25 U.S. star Robert recently honored two majors in one year (7)

by Trinity College (7) 9 Spicy Indian dish (5) 27 See 22 across (5) 12 Marian Keyes is now writing about 28 Noted salmon river in this kind of man (8) Co. Wexford (6) 14 See 36 across (7) 30 Mary Louise Parker hit show (5) 15 This Niall builds sustainable 31 See 28 across (5) housing in South Africa (6) 19 (& 20 across) Irish August/September Solution gov’t minister who died in July (6) 20 See 19 across (7) 22 (& 23 down, & 27 down) Hit show for the late Tim Russert (4) 23 See 22 across (3)

Win a subscription to Irish America magazine Please send your completed crossword puzzle to Irish America, 875 Sixth Avenue, Suite 2100, New York, NY 10001, to arrive no later than October 15, 2008. A winner will be drawn from among all correct entries. If there are no correct solutions, the prize will be awarded for the completed puzzle which comes closet in the opinion of our staff. Winner’s name will be published along with the solution in our next issue. Xerox copies are acceptable.

Winner of the August/September Crossword: Frank J. Collins, East Northport, New York 116 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

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{roots}

The Mighty Mahers Tara Dougherty traces the history of this fine Irish clan.

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he Irish surname Maher, appearing also as O’Meagher, Meagher, O’Maher and Mahir, originated in County Tipperary. The name stems from the surname O’Meachair, a derivation of the word “meachar” meaning hospitable.

Over fifty percent of Mahers can trace their family history back to County Tipperary, where the ancient clan held control of the territory near Roscrea at the foot of Devil’s Bit Mountain for centuries. Ui Cairin, modernized as Ikerrin, was a barony in the north of Tipperary and was a division of the ancient kingdom of Ely. The Mahers held control of Ikerrin, even against Norman invaders in the 10th century. It was not until the Cromwellian period that many Mahers would disperse from north Tipperary to southern baronies and further afield to France and Spain with the Irish Brigades.

Among the most famous of this clan was Thomas Francis Meagher (18231867). This Irish nationalist was a prominent leader in the Young Ireland Party.

His speech advocating the use of force to liberate Ireland from British occupation earned him the nickname “Meagher of the Sword.” He was part of the Young Ireland Rebellion of 1848 and was arrested and sentenced to life in prison.

Meagher escaped and eventually made his way to America, where he would later become an American Civil War general as leader of the Irish Brigade in the Federal Army. A gravestone was unveiled In Meagher’s honor at a ceremony held at the Green-Wood cemetery in Brooklyn this April.

Another clan member who is a rebel in his own right is subject of this issue’s cover story, Bill Maher, who has become a household name due to his work in television. The native New Yorker began working as a stand-up comic while attend-

118 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

ing Cornell University. He became a regular on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, which ignited his television career. Maher later developed his own round-table current affairs talk show called Politically Incorrect, for which he received 11 Emmy nominations. He now hosts Real Time with Bill Maher, a similar discussion program on HBO. Australian actor Ray Meagher secured a place in the Guinness Book of Records for being one of the longest-serving actors on an Australian drama. He is best known for his role as Alf Stewart on long-running Australian soap opera Home and Away. In 1987, he was selected by his peers as the recipient of a Penguin Award for Best Lead Actor in a Drama for his performance in the tele-

Thomas Francis Meagher who was known as Meagher of the Sword.

movie Male Order Bride. During his 25 years working in show business, Meagher has been featured in over 60 television productions, 29 films and 20 theatre productions.

Sharing in his kinsmen’s love of the stage, Joseph Maher (1933-1998) was a Broadway character actor best known for his work in Joe Orton’s plays often as

absurd, off-beat characters. Maher was nominated three times for a Tony Award for the Best Actor in a Featured Role. He did not limit himself to stage work, however, crossing over into both film and television, guest starring on Seinfeld and playing memorable film roles in Heaven Can Wait and Sister Act. Born in Westport, County Mayo, Maher became a naturalized American citizen before he succumbed to a brain tumor in 1998.

The Maher family name is recognized in the world of horse breeding thanks to JJ Maher’s contribution around the turn of the 20th century. His family of thoroughbred mares from Ireland would produce two Grand National winners.

Among the most well known athletes in America at the end of the 19th century was Irish-American Peter Maher, who won Heavyweight Championship of the World in 1895 when he beat Steve O’Donnell. The world champion was born in Galway and raised in Dublin where he began boxing. His biography, The Irish Champion Peter Maher, written by Matt Donnellon, chronicles his career and looks into his high-society social circle, which included the likes of Teddy Roosevelt, William McKinley and Wyatt Earp.

Continuing the Maher legacy in sport, Kevin Maher is a London-born Irish soccer player. He began his career with the Tottenham Hotspurs, training with the team for nearly three years. After he was released from Spurs, he was club captain of Southend United for six years before joining Oldham Athletic in the summer of 2008.

In the world of music, Brent Maher is among the most acclaimed country music producers and songwriters in Nashville.

Maher discovered the talents of Naomi and Wynonna Judd and has produced all of the duo’s records, and co-wrote many of their hits including “Why Not Me.” Now that the Judds have retired from music, the Grammy award-winning producer has founded his own independent production company called Moraine Music Group. Moraine Music has worked with Garth Brooks, Dixie Chicks, Tim McGraw and countless IA other country music names.

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{ review of books}

Tom Deignan reviews a selection of recently published books of Irish and Irish-American interest.

($25.95 / 480 pages / Viking)

Fiction Recommended The Likeness by Tana French ana French made a surprise splash with critics and readers when her debut novel In the Woods was released last year. Aside from spending weeks on numerous best-seller lists, In the Woods also won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel.

In the Woods explored the murder of a girl in Dublin, which is where French grew up. (She also spent time in Italy, the U.S. and Malawi.) Now, French’s detective heroine Cassie Maddox is back with another densely plotted psychological thriller, The Likeness.

As The Likeness opens, Maddox is still trying to get her head straight, following the grim events which unfolded during In the Woods.

Peace of mind is not likely to happen since Maddox’s next murder case is lead by a detective she may or may not be falling in love with. Furthermore, the victim is named Lexie Madison, the very name Maddox once used while working undercover.

Oh by the way, the victim also bears a striking resemblance to Cassie.

So, naturally, Cassie (after some convincing) assumes the identity of the victim, in an effort to draw the killer out of hiding.

The Likeness is one of those

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119 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

ust in time for election season, Dermot McEvoy gives us a political novel which is as acidic and insightful as it is humorous.

Our Lady of Greenwich Village explores a heated New York City congressional race in which the Virgin Mary appears to have made herself available to a Republican Congresswoman.

Not surprisingly, the vision is exploited for political purposes, and the game is on – with tabloid columnists from New York Daily News and New York Post stoking the flames.

Meanwhile, in the name of theological bipartisanship, a liberal spin-meister named Wolfe Tone O’Rourke also has a meeting of sorts with Jesus’ mother and decides to challenge the Republican.

Our Lady of Greenwich Village is a raucous read, with cameos by real-life politicians, as well as lots of characters who more than resemble past and president politicos. This book should have a lot of New York and Washington insiders squirming, as they read closely. McEvoy portrays the modern day Village as a bas-

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tion with a rich past yet still filled with rogues. Anyone with an interest in the kind of big city political history they don’t write up in textbooks should read Our Lady of Greenwich Village. ($22.95 / 384 pages / Skyhorse)

oseanne McNulty is about to turn 100 years old in a Roscommon Hospital when she decides to write her life story.

But in The Secret Scripture, a new novel

by Sebastian Barry, Roseanne’s future is just as important as her past. It turns out Roseanne’s hospital is about to close and doctors need to decide which patients can live on their own.

One doctor in particular begins to look into Roseanne’s past and discovers secrets – about her and himself.

Barry, whose past novels include A Long Long Way (a finalist for the 2005 Man Booker Prize) as well as The Whereabouts of Eneas McNulty and Annie Dunne, is in top form again, though he does cast a particularly harsh eye on the role the Church played in 20th-century Ireland.

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( $24.95 / 300 pages / Viking)

Young Adult Fiction oin McNamee brings his cast of characters from The Navigator back for City of Time. Cati, Owen and Dr. Diamond return and they have a daunting task: to stop what appears to be the world’s inevitable end.

As readers may recall, in The Navigator the evil force known as the Harsh attempted to destroy time. That is until Owen and the Resisters saved the day.

This time around, the moon seems to be moving perilously close to the earth, wreaking havoc on nature’s cycles. So, McNamee’s team travels to the book’s titular city (where time is literally for sale) to see what they can do to ease fears.

McNamee, who lives in Sligo, is perhaps best known for his book Resurrection Man, set in Northern Ireland and later made into a movie starring Stuart Townsend. This time around, in City of Time, the adventure is quite a bit more child-friendly, but no less imaginative.

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($16.99 / 336 pages / Random House Children’s)

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books which might strike some readers as highly imaginative – and others as excessively coincidental. Either way, French is doing something right. The Likeness is already being shopped as a great vehicle for a Hollywood actress.

Whereas In the Woods had a subplot involving the construction of a major highway, which allowed French to explore the rapid pace of change in today’s Ireland, The Likeness is a bit more psychological, with Cassie becoming entangled in her dual identities, and police fearing the case will fall apart.

In the end, French absolutely delivers with this substantive thriller.

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{review of books} R ICHAR D TI LLI NGHAST

FINDING

IRELAND

Non Fiction

A P O E T ’ S E X P L O R AT I O N O F

I R I S H L I T E R A T U R E A N D C U LT U R E

I

reland Since 1939: The Persistence of Conflict by Henry Patterson does a solid job of highlighting the events which laid the foundation for the far-reaching changes which took place in the 1990s and 2000s. As Patterson’s title makes clear, change is far from recent in Ireland.

Currently a professor of politics at the University of Ulster, Patterson gives the infamous Troubles their due, but also sets a keen yet sober eye on other forces – both positive and negative – which have shaped the island of Ireland. Patterson’s previous books include The Politics of Illusion: A Political History of the IRA.

about Ireland) are somewhat familiar, and Tillinghast’s forays into architecture and music feel a bit strained.

Finding Ireland is at its best when Tillinghast celebrates the likes of Yeats, as well as contemporary writers such as William Trevor and Brian Friel. ($25 / 272 pages / Notre Dame Press )

($16 / 429 pages / Penguin )

n Finding Ireland: A Poet’s Exploration of Irish Literature and Culture, Richard Tillinghast explores how he came to be an Irish resident and how Irish culture has affected him as well as the nation’s famous literary canon.

The foundation he lays (about Ireland’s changes as well as Irish-American myths

I

lice Taylor’s 1988 memoir To School Through the Fields was an enormous success, celebrating rural Ireland and the cycles of life that come with this seemingly simple, yet complicated existence. The irony, of course, is that Taylor published this book just as Ireland was about to undergo rapid changes.

Fittingly, Taylor’s latest book, The

A

Parish, explores how towns and rural sections of Ireland have survived (or in some cases, perished) in the face of recent changes. Taylor still has a magnificent eye for touching details, and this book is particularly relevant because there is no more stark symbol of the changes which have taken place in Ireland than the fallen stature of the Catholic Church. Yet Taylor manages to show how Catholic parish life survives, even flourishes, on faith and reverence, as well as the less-miraculous yet very necessary business of fund-raising.

Some will accuse Taylor of nostalgia, but readers – especially those who have personally been jarred by 21st-century Ireland – will take comfort in The Parish, and probably argue that Ireland should not rush blindly to leave the past behind. ($33.95 / 221 pages / Brandon - Dufour)

Memoir

C

ontinuing the theme of the Irish in the American South is the latest memoir from Rick Bragg, best known for It’s All Over but the Shoutin’. Bragg – a Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times writer – has now written The Prince of Frogtown, about the life and legacy of his father.

The elder Bragg lived a hard, fatalistic life, yet Bragg makes it clear that he and his cohorts also knew how to have a good time. In part, these seeming contradictions can be explained by their Irish roots.The Braggs, after all, descended from ancestors who, at night, “beat Irish drums, tooted tin whistles and plucked dulcimers as they danced across dirt floors, and sang in lilting, tragic voice of lost homes, lost love and lost wars,” ($24 / 255 pages / Knopf) as Bragg puts it.

W

ith all due respect to great cities such as Boston, Chicago and New York, the Irish have settled and prospered in many other large American cities. So, it’s great to come across Life with Mae by Neal Shine, a memoir about the Detroit Irish.

Mae is Shine’s mother, born in 1909 in Carrick-on-Shannon. Her own father worked as a distributor for Guinness, while Mae became a housekeeper at just 14 years old. Quickly, Mae saw that her future in Ireland was limited, and headed for the Midwest before she was 20, settling in Detroit.

She raised three sons and, as reported by Shine, left an indelible mark on her family and community.

Shine himself is one of Detroit’s more influential Irish Americans. He was editor and publisher of the Detroit Free Press, as well as a professor of journalism, who was a driving force in the Motor City’s civic life for decades. Shine died just last year at the age of 76. ($24.95 / 248 pages / Wayne State University)

120 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

he Irish experience in the Southern U.S. has long been a neglected area of study, though that is changing. Mystery of the Irish Wilderness: Land and Legend of Father John Joseph Hogan’s Lost Irish Colony on the Ozark Wilderness (by Leland and Crystal Payton) explores the matters. It is a fascinating look at a forgotten experiment led by a visionary Catholic priest who attempted to create a colony for refugees of the Irish Famine in the Ozark mountains of Missouri. The priest was John Joseph Hogan, from Limerick, and his plan was to give struggling Irish Catholics a foothold in America, even if they would have to live side-by-side with the Scotch Irish, with whom they often battled. The land became known as the Irish Wilderness, and many of the Catholic Irish were displaced during the U.S. Civil War, never to return. Almost 100 years later, a land dispute brought this story back into the public eye, and the Paytons are right to suggest this is an important chapter in the Irish-American story. “Many themes come together in this story,” the authors explain.

“Immigration, war, and the challenges of being Catholic in a fundamentally IA Protestant culture.”

T

($18.95 / 128 pages / Lens and Pen Press)

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{ review of books}

Tom Deignan reviews a selection of recently published books of Irish and Irish-American interest.

($25.95 / 480 pages / Viking)

Fiction Recommended The Likeness by Tana French ana French made a surprise splash with critics and readers when her debut novel In the Woods was released last year. Aside from spending weeks on numerous best-seller lists, In the Woods also won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel.

In the Woods explored the murder of a girl in Dublin, which is where French grew up. (She also spent time in Italy, the U.S. and Malawi.) Now, French’s detective heroine Cassie Maddox is back with another densely plotted psychological thriller, The Likeness.

As The Likeness opens, Maddox is still trying to get her head straight, following the grim events which unfolded during In the Woods.

Peace of mind is not likely to happen since Maddox’s next murder case is lead by a detective she may or may not be falling in love with. Furthermore, the victim is named Lexie Madison, the very name Maddox once used while working undercover.

Oh by the way, the victim also bears a striking resemblance to Cassie.

So, naturally, Cassie (after some convincing) assumes the identity of the victim, in an effort to draw the killer out of hiding.

The Likeness is one of those

T

119 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

ust in time for election season, Dermot McEvoy gives us a political novel which is as acidic and insightful as it is humorous.

Our Lady of Greenwich Village explores a heated New York City congressional race in which the Virgin Mary appears to have made herself available to a Republican Congresswoman.

Not surprisingly, the vision is exploited for political purposes, and the game is on – with tabloid columnists from New York Daily News and New York Post stoking the flames.

Meanwhile, in the name of theological bipartisanship, a liberal spin-meister named Wolfe Tone O’Rourke also has a meeting of sorts with Jesus’ mother and decides to challenge the Republican.

Our Lady of Greenwich Village is a raucous read, with cameos by real-life politicians, as well as lots of characters who more than resemble past and president politicos. This book should have a lot of New York and Washington insiders squirming, as they read closely. McEvoy portrays the modern day Village as a bas-

J

tion with a rich past yet still filled with rogues. Anyone with an interest in the kind of big city political history they don’t write up in textbooks should read Our Lady of Greenwich Village. ($22.95 / 384 pages / Skyhorse)

oseanne McNulty is about to turn 100 years old in a Roscommon Hospital when she decides to write her life story.

But in The Secret Scripture, a new novel

by Sebastian Barry, Roseanne’s future is just as important as her past. It turns out Roseanne’s hospital is about to close and doctors need to decide which patients can live on their own.

One doctor in particular begins to look into Roseanne’s past and discovers secrets – about her and himself.

Barry, whose past novels include A Long Long Way (a finalist for the 2005 Man Booker Prize) as well as The Whereabouts of Eneas McNulty and Annie Dunne, is in top form again, though he does cast a particularly harsh eye on the role the Church played in 20th-century Ireland.

R

( $24.95 / 300 pages / Viking)

Young Adult Fiction oin McNamee brings his cast of characters from The Navigator back for City of Time. Cati, Owen and Dr. Diamond return and they have a daunting task: to stop what appears to be the world’s inevitable end.

As readers may recall, in The Navigator the evil force known as the Harsh attempted to destroy time. That is until Owen and the Resisters saved the day.

This time around, the moon seems to be moving perilously close to the earth, wreaking havoc on nature’s cycles. So, McNamee’s team travels to the book’s titular city (where time is literally for sale) to see what they can do to ease fears.

McNamee, who lives in Sligo, is perhaps best known for his book Resurrection Man, set in Northern Ireland and later made into a movie starring Stuart Townsend. This time around, in City of Time, the adventure is quite a bit more child-friendly, but no less imaginative.

E

($16.99 / 336 pages / Random House Children’s)

M

books which might strike some readers as highly imaginative – and others as excessively coincidental. Either way, French is doing something right. The Likeness is already being shopped as a great vehicle for a Hollywood actress.

Whereas In the Woods had a subplot involving the construction of a major highway, which allowed French to explore the rapid pace of change in today’s Ireland, The Likeness is a bit more psychological, with Cassie becoming entangled in her dual identities, and police fearing the case will fall apart.

In the end, French absolutely delivers with this substantive thriller.

OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008 IRISH AMERICA 119

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{review of books} R ICHAR D TI LLI NGHAST

FINDING

IRELAND

Non Fiction

A P O E T ’ S E X P L O R AT I O N O F

I R I S H L I T E R A T U R E A N D C U LT U R E

I

reland Since 1939: The Persistence of Conflict by Henry Patterson does a solid job of highlighting the events which laid the foundation for the far-reaching changes which took place in the 1990s and 2000s. As Patterson’s title makes clear, change is far from recent in Ireland.

Currently a professor of politics at the University of Ulster, Patterson gives the infamous Troubles their due, but also sets a keen yet sober eye on other forces – both positive and negative – which have shaped the island of Ireland. Patterson’s previous books include The Politics of Illusion: A Political History of the IRA.

about Ireland) are somewhat familiar, and Tillinghast’s forays into architecture and music feel a bit strained.

Finding Ireland is at its best when Tillinghast celebrates the likes of Yeats, as well as contemporary writers such as William Trevor and Brian Friel. ($25 / 272 pages / Notre Dame Press )

($16 / 429 pages / Penguin )

n Finding Ireland: A Poet’s Exploration of Irish Literature and Culture, Richard Tillinghast explores how he came to be an Irish resident and how Irish culture has affected him as well as the nation’s famous literary canon.

The foundation he lays (about Ireland’s changes as well as Irish-American myths

I

lice Taylor’s 1988 memoir To School Through the Fields was an enormous success, celebrating rural Ireland and the cycles of life that come with this seemingly simple, yet complicated existence. The irony, of course, is that Taylor published this book just as Ireland was about to undergo rapid changes.

Fittingly, Taylor’s latest book, The

A

Parish, explores how towns and rural sections of Ireland have survived (or in some cases, perished) in the face of recent changes. Taylor still has a magnificent eye for touching details, and this book is particularly relevant because there is no more stark symbol of the changes which have taken place in Ireland than the fallen stature of the Catholic Church. Yet Taylor manages to show how Catholic parish life survives, even flourishes, on faith and reverence, as well as the less-miraculous yet very necessary business of fund-raising.

Some will accuse Taylor of nostalgia, but readers – especially those who have personally been jarred by 21st-century Ireland – will take comfort in The Parish, and probably argue that Ireland should not rush blindly to leave the past behind. ($33.95 / 221 pages / Brandon - Dufour)

Memoir

C

ontinuing the theme of the Irish in the American South is the latest memoir from Rick Bragg, best known for It’s All Over but the Shoutin’. Bragg – a Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times writer – has now written The Prince of Frogtown, about the life and legacy of his father.

The elder Bragg lived a hard, fatalistic life, yet Bragg makes it clear that he and his cohorts also knew how to have a good time. In part, these seeming contradictions can be explained by their Irish roots.The Braggs, after all, descended from ancestors who, at night, “beat Irish drums, tooted tin whistles and plucked dulcimers as they danced across dirt floors, and sang in lilting, tragic voice of lost homes, lost love and lost wars,” ($24 / 255 pages / Knopf) as Bragg puts it.

W

ith all due respect to great cities such as Boston, Chicago and New York, the Irish have settled and prospered in many other large American cities. So, it’s great to come across Life with Mae by Neal Shine, a memoir about the Detroit Irish.

Mae is Shine’s mother, born in 1909 in Carrick-on-Shannon. Her own father worked as a distributor for Guinness, while Mae became a housekeeper at just 14 years old. Quickly, Mae saw that her future in Ireland was limited, and headed for the Midwest before she was 20, settling in Detroit.

She raised three sons and, as reported by Shine, left an indelible mark on her family and community.

Shine himself is one of Detroit’s more influential Irish Americans. He was editor and publisher of the Detroit Free Press, as well as a professor of journalism, who was a driving force in the Motor City’s civic life for decades. Shine died just last year at the age of 76. ($24.95 / 248 pages / Wayne State University)

120 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

he Irish experience in the Southern U.S. has long been a neglected area of study, though that is changing. Mystery of the Irish Wilderness: Land and Legend of Father John Joseph Hogan’s Lost Irish Colony on the Ozark Wilderness (by Leland and Crystal Payton) explores the matters. It is a fascinating look at a forgotten experiment led by a visionary Catholic priest who attempted to create a colony for refugees of the Irish Famine in the Ozark mountains of Missouri. The priest was John Joseph Hogan, from Limerick, and his plan was to give struggling Irish Catholics a foothold in America, even if they would have to live side-by-side with the Scotch Irish, with whom they often battled. The land became known as the Irish Wilderness, and many of the Catholic Irish were displaced during the U.S. Civil War, never to return. Almost 100 years later, a land dispute brought this story back into the public eye, and the Paytons are right to suggest this is an important chapter in the Irish-American story. “Many themes come together in this story,” the authors explain.

“Immigration, war, and the challenges of being Catholic in a fundamentally IA Protestant culture.”

T

($18.95 / 128 pages / Lens and Pen Press)

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Among Other Things...

Kara Rota talks to writer Aoibheann Sweeney about her first novel, life in NewYork and unearthing her links to Ireland.

122 IRISH AMERICA OCTOBER / NOVEMBER 2008

COURTESY PENGUIN

A

oibheann Sweeney’s debut novel, Among Other Things, I’ve Taken Up Smoking, is quite simply the story of a girl’s journey from one island to another. Miranda Donnal is a young woman caught between her father’s world as he doggedly translates Ovid in the mythic fog of Crab Island, Maine, where she has grown up motherless, well-educated and utterly lonely, and the draw of New York City, where she is sent by her father after forgoing her college admissions test to work at the Institute for Classical Studies that he founded there decades ago.

The story that unfolds in Miranda’s voice is marked by the geographic and generational ambivalence of an emigration narrative, despite the fact that both Sweeney and her heroine were born in New England. “I grew up with an unspellable Gaelic name in Boston,” says Sweeney, “and I got a lot of credit for just being Irish because we were supposed to be the underdogs. I always thought my grandfather came straight from the old sod to here, but actually my great-grandfather came over in the 1880s and married into a very lace curtain Irish family in Queens. His wife, my great-grandmother, died when their children were young, so he sent them home to Ireland to be raised. But by then he was a pretty

wealthy merchant, and they were hardly working the land. He was able to send for them to come back and be educated as teenagers in the United States, and eventually they all attended university.

“Around the time the book was being published, I discovered that the last house my great-grandfather lived in was only a neighborhood away from my own

apartment, and that it was quite well-todo and so on. I think some of the confusion, or secrecy, around the Irish side of my family history crept into the book.

The main character is really trying to find her roots and identity.”

Sweeney’s novel is a loose retelling of The Tempest, which Sweeney describes as a “springboard” for her own story of a girl, like Shakespeare’s Miranda, stuck on an island from age three with her distant father after her mother’s disappearance and death in the surrounding waters. “I think I felt a real sympathy with her,” explains Sweeney, “because in a way she is the classic girl who grows up with a really strong education, but no skills in the real world.” Miranda Donnal’s childhood is deeply impacted by the presence of Mr. Blackwell, an unmarried, part-Native American fisherman who steps in as a surrogate second father to softly fill in the places where her own father falls short, teaching her to cook and fish and drive their dory, helping her make molasses cookies on her first day of kindergarten.

As the unspoken but also unhidden intimate relationship between Miranda’s father and Mr. Blackwell unravels, Miranda is left even more alone. “I get lots of different reactions about the father having a relationship with what I see as the Caliban figure of Mr. Blackwell. But that’s Shakespeare’s idea, that Prospero is necessarily having a complicated relationship with Caliban, his slave, and Ariel, his attendant fairy.” For Sweeney, this retelling was also about breathing new life into Miranda, a character somewhat overlooked in Shakespeare’s version.

“The relationships that stand out in the play are those between Prospero, Ariel and Caliban. Those relationships are really what Shakespeare is more interested in—Miranda has very few lines. But if you’re a girl trying to find a way into Shakespeare, that’s what stands out for you.

“I think Miranda’s situation is also a classic one to write about as a first novel.

What would happen if you could have somebody who has just hatched out of the egg, just fresh—what do they see in the world? I think a lot of first novels are about just trying to see what’s there to a new mind.”

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COURTESY AOIBHEANN SWEENEY

IA.122-123.qxd

Sweeney with her daughter, Willa.

What’s there is a revolutionary take on the coming-of-age novel that draws on mythology as well as a rich history of American literature to create what a Washington Post review refers to as “postgay fiction,” although Sweeney rejects the term. “No movement is ever as simple as the debunking of it sounds,” she says. She takes her inspiration from early- to mid20th century closeted lesbian and bisexual writers who “never wrote explicitly about their sexuality, but all wrote about the complications of love and desire. Their work was not only admired by the literary community but by the broader American public. I feel like I come out of that tradition and I’m honored to be able to be continuing one in which I can be out as a gay person. But I don’t think that means we’re past it in any way.”

Like her predecessors (“writers like Sarah Orne Jewett, Willa Cather, and Elizabeth Bishop”), Sweeney has succeeded in writing a novel that refuses to marginalize itself. “The gay rights movement seems to have not only brought lesbian writers out of the closet but out of engagement with a literary tradition they have every reason to take pride in.

Understandably, lesbian authors today feel compelled to write about explicitly gay characters, but…contemporary lesbian literature tends toward the countercultural and has a narrow readership.”

She says, “It was a relief to me that my book did not have to be pigeonholed.”

Once in New York, Sweeney’s central character begins to put together the pieces of her father’s life there, developing an understanding of who he was before her just as she is developing the person she will be, grown up, without him. She begins a sweet and nerve-wracking affair with Nate, a beautiful and well-bred graduate student fellow at the Institute, but finds herself seeking out momentary interactions with Ana, a Latina selling terrible coffee out of a street cart. Both relationships escalate to crescendo when Miranda joins Nate on a trip to his family home in Long Island for his sister’s wedding.

Overwhelmed by their WASPishness and feeling out of place in a red dress Ana’s had made for her, Miranda decides to cut and run just before the wedding begins, leaving a sparse note for Nate and instantaneously throwing away her ticket to assimilation in a world where she’s never belonged. “I think, interestingly, that this happens to a lot of people who come to New York,” says Sweeney about her heroine’s ultimate decision in the novel. “So many people feel their life open up for them when they arrive here. That definitely happened to me in New York. I fell in love with the city and all the freedom that it represented. So many people my age—even then, in my early twenties—were locked into lives that they felt like they couldn’t get out of. And I felt so differently that I thought, the only thing I can do is write

about this and let people know that there are other options, even if they are imaginary, just to remind people that they always have a choice, that there’s a million adventures for everybody to have.”

The novel ends on a gentle note, with a cathartic conversation between Miranda and her father, as if the understanding she’s wanted to reach with him has been there all along. “What I hope I got across was how much forgiveness there can be between generations,” says Sweeney. “It seems like kind of a dead end game to declare ‘gay’ or ‘not gay’ or the truth or not truth—because as is hopefully seen in Miranda’s life, it’s all very flexible anyway, and individual.”

She’s right. This is not a moralistic coming-of-age novel, nor is it particularly interested in whether its characters are ‘gay enough’ for gay fiction. “In a way, that forgiveness is really forgiveness of yourself for making choices that you can’t understand, and taking risks. I remember when I came back from New York I met a lot of people who hadn’t traveled at all, out of their own cities or out of their own country—out of their comfort zone. There was just kind of a lack of exploration, which to me was what adulthood was about—you didn’t have to be from any certain class to do things differently. I wanted to write something that reminded people they had more choices than just the one they were born with.”

As for a second novel? “I’d like to write some fiction that has siblings in it because I grew up with siblings, part of a relatively big family, and it was a little lonely writing about a girl who lived alone with her father.”

For Aoibheann Sweeney, starting her own family has brought her closer to her Irish heritage. “My partner is Irish, from Dublin, so I go back there every Christmas now, because it’s where the other part of my family is. My daughter is actually in Dublin right now with that side of the family. Ireland is a big part of my life now, in a very different way than it was growing up.” IA Aoibheann Sweeney is the Executive Director of the Center for the Humanities at the City University of New York’s Graduate Center. She lives in Brooklyn, and has roots in Donegal.

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{music}

By Ian Worpole

Still Fiddlin’ Away

F

rom his days with The Bothy and England, and looking to future releasBand, some thirty years ago es. Across the Black River is still doing now, to the present, Kevin very well, so we are in the fortunate posiBurke, who was born in tion of being able to proceed with the folLondon to Irish parents, has low-up at a fairly leisurely pace. been one of the most widely admired fidAcross the Black River has been receiving dlers on the Irish traditional and contemrave reviews, how did you meet Cal, who porary music scene. As an individual is a native of Oregon? performer and as a member of acclaimed It began with a phone call. He was workbands such as Patrick Street and Celtic ing on the soundtrack of a PBS docuFiddle Festival, Burke, who now makes his home in Master fiddler Portland, Oregon, continues to Kevin Burke delight audiences around the has started his world. I caught up with him at own label.

East Durham, New York, Irish Arts week this past July.

IA: So Kevin, what have you been up to of late?

KB: What have I been up to?

Well, after here I’m in Dublin, Ohio playing with Patrick Street and then I’ll be off to Goderich, Ontario for another week of fiddling, both teaching and performing. A few weeks ago I was in Ireland with Cal Scott.

Cal and I were guest lecturers at Limerick University and we did a few concerts around the country while we were over there. He and I have also been working on a book containing the transcriptions of all the pieces from Across the Black River, the CD we recorded together. When I’m not performing, recording or teaching, I’m making arrangements for upcoming tours and recordings, which can often be logistically difficult – and then there’s Loftus Music.

How is the Loftus label shaping up?

Everything is going very well with Loftus. The first year was pretty hectic as I found myself putting out three CDs – The Celtic Fiddle Festival’s Équinoxe, Patrick Street’s On The Fly, and the first Loftus Music CD, Across the Black River.

This year I’m spending more time consolidating the company, arranging distribution for countries other than U.S., Ireland

mentary, The Road to Bloody Sunday, about the political strife in Northern Ireland. He thought that there was a place for some traditional music in the soundtrack and asked if I’d be willing to act as a consultant. When that project was completed Cal expressed an interest in learning more about Irish music. He liked my music, and I, in turn, soon became enamored of several of Cal’s compositions [some of which showed up on Across the Black River]. These regular meetings usually ended up with us recording whatever had been the topic of the day, mainly so we’d have a reference for our next meeting. Eventually we real-

ized that there were probably enough recordings there to make up an album if we only put our minds to it and so, Loftus Music was born.

You’ve made your home in Portland, Oregon since the late 70s, what led you to settle there?

Micheál Ó Domhnaill and myself went there to play a concert as part of a tour.

There was a gas shortage at the time. You could only buy gas every second day depending on whether you had an even or odd license plate, which made travelling to gigs difficult. In fact, we missed a couple and were more or less stranded in Portland for a few days. But we both liked the place, quickly made friends there and decided to stay for a while – and I’m still there, almost 30 years later.

You are a master fiddler of the “Sligo style.” Could you give us an idea of what that means?

It’s a difficult thing to put into words. It’s a bit like trying to describe a regional accent to someone who’s never heard it before. The best I can do is to say that, roughly speaking, the music from the north of the country tends to be quite fast and quite staccato (short bow strokes) and as you move south down the West Coast into County Clare the music becomes smoother and a bit more languid (longer, sweeping bow strokes). I think the slower pace, in general, encourages the musician to include more ornaments and variations, and Sligo sits in between the two extremes so the players there have the best of both worlds. Also, I should let the readers know that I don’t really regard myself as an exponent of a typical Sligo style. It’s true that my parents are both Sligo people, I spent a lot of time there, and learned a lot of music there, especially in my formative years, but, over time I have absorbed many things from many other styles of music.

After the loss of Scottish player Johnny Cunningham,The Celtic Fiddle Festival took on French-Canadian fiddler André Brunet.The new CDs are great so it appears that he’s fitting in well.

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{music} André was an inspired choice. Losing Johnny was a terrible blow. We weren’t sure we could continue without him but there was a tour to do and canceling didn’t seem quite appropriate either. We got offers of help from several of Scotland’s best players but we realized that whoever came with us would be subject to comparisons with Johnny night after night, for the whole tour. And, of course, many of these musicians were good friends of Johnny and were also shaken by the loss, and so we thought that “emotionally” it was too much to ask of them. André came to mind, and he fit in immediately.

He was very sensitive to the fact that we were still mourning the loss of a dear friend and long-time colleague, but his general demeanor was so upbeat and positive that he really lifted our spirits.

He brought a whole new repertoire to the band, and he’s a fantastic fiddle player – that didn’t do us any harm either!

Compass Records is about to re-release your milestone CD If the Cap Fits, from 1974. Does it seem like just yesterday?

Funny you should bring that up – I just got a copy of the remastered version. I had a listen to it from start to finish (the first time I’ve done that, probably, since it first came out 30 years ago) and, of course, the memories started flooding back. I thought it sounded great.

Compass Records have done a great job with the mastering and it’s really heartening to see the care and attention they are giving to this series of re-releases.

People can look forward to the reissue of many great recordings from that late 70s

era – a very exciting time in the history of Irish music.

So, of course, the $64,000 question: any chance The Bothy Band might ever get back together?

Well, you can never say “never” but my hunch is that it’s very unlikely, especially now that we’ve lost Micheál [Ó Domhnaill, who died tragically from a fall in 2006]. For me, and I guess for everyone in the band, it would be odd doing a reunion without him. We did get together last year for a memorial concert in his honor and it really was a very wonderful, special evening of music. I enjoyed it to bits and it felt fantastic to be playing in the band again, but somehow I don’t see it happening. But, you never know.

IA

CD Reviews In Brief

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s Kevin mentioned, his classic solo album If the Cap Fits has been remastered and released on the Compass label. This one is essential listening for anyone interested in a master at his best – tunes flowing from one to the next with that “Sligo” fluidity, with unexpected accompaniments such as slide guitar fading in and out; a gem. Also on Compass, Moving Hearts reunites a collection of legends –Donal Lunny, Christy Moore and Davy Spillane – after a 20-year layoff to perform a series of live gigs in Dublin in 2007. This CD records one of those nights. Back in the early 80s, Moving Hearts were famous for their eclectic Irish/Jazz/Rock ensemble playing – as Donal described it, “Like being dragged along by a speeding bus.” This live album is “some unfinished business...” and rocks the rafters, with the audience roaring along to every monumental crescendo. Totally exhilarating.

Another speeding bus in the form of Damien Dempsey going back to his roots is Rocky Road, his latest CD, a collection of old and new classics.

Damien is a firebrand composer and belter-outer of fierce social commentary songs, with a huge following back in Ireland. This time around he’s performing the likes of “Foggy Dew” and “Rocky Road to Dublin,” along with Shane

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McGowan’s “Rainy Night in Soho.” There’s also some fine session tunes in there performed by various luminaries; this is a rollicking set. So much great stuff!

Absolutely Irish is another live CD, this time of a concert at The Irish Arts Center NYC in April of 2007. Also shown on PBS, this CD features some of the greats in American-Irish music, brought together

by Mick Moloney and including, to name a few, Liz Carroll, John Doyle, Seamus Egan, Joanie Madden, and Karan Casey.

Great songs, tunes and dancing, this is a Hoolie on a grand scale.

Scottish band Capercaillie’s new album, Roses and Tears is a fine collection of songs and tunes. Headed up by ScottishGaelic singer Karen Matheson, the band is experimenting more with rhythms and a jazz-inflected sound than in the past, to great success.

On the smooth side, look out for Fionnuala Gill’s Whispers of Love, a beautiful collection of ethereal, harpaccompanied songs that will lull you to sleep, and on the folk-rock side, check out Declan O’Rourke’s Big Bad Beautiful World. Making quite a name for himself in Ireland, with fans including Paul Weller, Kate Rusby and Snow Patrol, Declan writes powerful ballads and sings them, well, powerfully, something along the lines of Kris Drever.

Oh yes, Kris has a new one too, with his trio Lau, Live. Brilliant.

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Ronnie Drew Laid To Rest

By Frank Shouldice

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egendary singer Ronnie Drew was laid to rest after succumbing to throat cancer. He was aged 72 years. Best known as vocalist with The Dubliners, his passing was mourned by friends and colleagues in a heartfelt, emotional service in Greystones, Co. Wicklow.

Ronnie Drew was born in Dun Laoghaire and after a stint teaching English in Spain he teamed up with Barney McKenna to play traditional sessions in O’Donoghue’s pub in Dublin.

The duo were joined by Luke Kelly, John Sheehan and Ciarán Bourke to make up The Dubliners, a five-piece traditional band that enjoyed huge success at home and abroad.

Drew sang their first chart hit “Seven Drunken Nights” which was banned by RTE, the national broadcaster. The untimely deaths of Bourke and Kelly knocked the band, but The Dubliners persevered and returned to the charts with

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The Pogues after recording a raucous version of “The Irish Rover,” on which Drew shared vocals with Shane McGowan.

A solo career followed – his style described by one critic as “an uncompromising Dublin accent and iron-on-gravel bass delivery” – and he pursued a keen

interest in horses, prompting the NYPD mounted police to make him an honorary member. Fondly known throughout Ireland, he was invited to lead the 2006 St. Patrick’s Day parade in Dublin.

When news of his cancer was revealed, U2 members Bono and The Edge collaborated on a tribute song “The Ballad of Ronnie Drew,” the proceeds of which went to the Irish Cancer Society.

Despite losing his trademark bushy beard and flowing grey hair because of treatment, he bore his illness with little trace of sentimentality. Many of those he had performed with – Shane McGowan, Eleanor Shanley, Mary Coughlan, Phil Coulter, Don Baker, Keith Donald – thronged the small church in Greystones, while surviving members of The Dubliners, Barney McKenna, John Sheehan and Patsy Watchorn played out a few band standard – “McAlpine’s Fusiliers,” “Finnegans Wake” and “Weela Weela Wallia” – for a fitting send-off.

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{photo album} Family Pictures

O’Neil Family, Boston Easter 1953

Boston, 1953: The ten O’Neil sisters march in the Easter Parade with their parents.

aising four sons was a challenge for me after growing up in a family that was dominated by girls, clothes and fashion. My Boston family consists of twelve children, a boy, ten girls and the last, a boy. We became well known in the city in the 40s and 50s when we infiltrated the Boston Brahmins strolling down Commonwealth Avenue on Easter Sunday. In 1941, our parents, with the oldest son and five little girls in matching outfits, all made by my mother, joined the uppity Easter stroll. It made the front page of the Boston Globe. Each year after that, oldest boy, ten sisters, and finally the youngest, a boy, Daniel, Jr. continued that tradition for about twenty years. It was a time in Boston history when the Irish were coming up in the city and our family, in some way, symbolized their pride in an Irish family. When you have a moment, check out the web site we are working on: tenoneilsisters.com.

On Monday after Easter our father went out to buy newspapers first thing in the morning, but not to the shop at the corner of our street. He wanted to make sure that there were plenty of papers available for our neighbors.

The photos went around the United States and the world with international news services. We got fan mail from all over, some with marriage proposals, circling the girl they were interested in.

We also sang and tap-danced to Irish-American music at parish minstrel shows and many other Boston events.

I remember my mother working at the kitchen table with the beautiful fabrics for our gowns, then glancing at the clock. “Girls, it’s time to put this away and start peeling potatoes.”

I’m the seventh daughter in the photograph. My husband Phil Hanrahan [see Legal 100] and I visit Ireland often and have a home in Ballyvaughan, County Clare.

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Submitted by Mary June Hanrahan Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Please send photographs along with your name, address, phone number, and a brief description, to Declan O’Kelly at Irish America, 875 Sixth Avenue, Suite 2100, New York, NY 10001. If photos are irreplaceable, then please send a good quality reproduction or e-mail the picture at 300 dpi resolution to Irishamag@aol.com. No photocopies, please. We will pay $65 for each submission that we select.

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