Here and There September 2011

By Bill O'Donnell
August 31, 2011
Bill O'Donnell

By Bill O’Donnell

Lenihan Family Passes On Politics – For the first time in a third of a century no member of the Lenihan family will stand for election in Dublin West. The death three months ago of Fianna Fail TD and former Finance Minister Brian Lenihan has brought to a close the active participation of the family members in Irish national politics. Mary O’Rourke, an aunt of Brian, and a longtime Fianna Fail TD and minister, was defeated for reelection earlier this year.

Here’s hoping the 2010’s Tea Party story ends the same way the 1850’s Know-Nothings era did

By Peter F. Stevens, Reporter Staff
August 31, 2011
Peter F. Stevens, Reporter Staff

Millard FillmoreMillard FillmoreBy Peter F. Stevens
BIR Staff

The Boston Irish community of the 1850s would have recognized the ways and means of the Tea Party of today. Those immigrants from the “old sod” would have known exactly what the “I-want-my-country-back” crowd of 2011 was up to and would likely be part furious, part ashamed to learn that any of their descendants were imbibing the tea of Texas Governor Rick Perry, Congresswoman Michelle Bachman, Dick Armey, FreedomWorks, the Koch brothers, et al. (In a case of art imitating life, check out the old Eddie Murphy-Dan Aykroyd comedy “Trading Places” for a look at the uber-rich, bigoted, social-experimenting, morally bankrupt “Duke” brothers played by Don Ameche and Ralph Bellamy and you will that some “Koch-like” traits abound.)

Concannon, Haiti: a 'visceral' connection

By Staff
August 31, 2011

Brian ConcannonBrian ConcannonBy Greg O'Brien
Special to the Reporter

It may be hard to imagine any parallel between Ireland and destitute, still earthquake-ravaged Haiti, and yet there are any number: analogous gripping histories of famine, long stretches of political and economic repression, and the bad geographical luck of being adjacent to a super power or dominant force that presents undesirable attention. It is always difficult fighting a bully in your own backyard.

Human rights attorney Brian Concannon wrote of these dilemmas three years ago in the Boston Irish Reporter and in the Boston Haitian Reporter. “Like the British response to Ireland’s famine, bank programs (in Haiti) do not rise to the need,” he wrote, predicting the inevitable in a column headlined: Eating Dirt in Haiti and Ireland. “They are too late—they will not provide relief for months, perhaps years. They are too little—they stop where the requirements of helping poor people conflict with the requirements of the bureaucrats’ economic theories. In the meantime, just as Ireland exported food during a famine, Haiti will keep exporting money. So more Haitians will die of the diseases of hunger, and more children will grow older without going to school.”

Patrick Cassidy is Captain von Trapp in ‘Sound of Music’ at Reagle Theatre

By Ed Forry
July 29, 2011

By R. J. Donovan
Special to The BIR

Award-winning Broadway star Patrick Cassidy represents one branch of a far-reaching family tree of musical performers.  His Mom is Shirley Jones (he was actually conceived during the filming of “The Music Man”).  His Dad was Jack Cassidy.  His siblings include David Cassidy and Shaun Cassidy.  And his niece is Katie Cassidy of “Gossip Girl” fame.

Irish offer lots of help in choosing accommodations

By Staff
July 29, 2011

Fishing in Co. Galway. Photo by Judy EnrightFishing in Co. Galway. Photo by Judy EnrightBy Judy Enright
Special to the BIR

Some people say that carefully choosing accommodation in Ireland isn’t all that important because, after all, you just sleep in those places.

For a lot of travelers, that seems to be all too true. They just slog from one place to another without experiencing the history or flavor of the places they have visited.

But, fortunately, there are a number of organizations in Ireland that have set out to change all that. There is Ireland’s Blue Book and Manor House Hotels, The Great Fishing Houses of Ireland, Green Book Hotels, and many more. Some of the recommended properties appear in more than one book, too.

Irate PM Kenny scolds Vatican for abuse stance

By Ed Forry
July 29, 2011

Enda Kenny (AP Photo)Enda Kenny (AP Photo)By Shawn Pogatchnik
Associated Press

DUBLIN – From the pews and pulpits, Ireland’s Catholics are demanding that the Vatican finally come clean on its oversight role in child abuse cover-ups.

It’s a revolution of sorts in Ireland, a nation founded on a pillar of devotion to Roman Catholicism, where many now question the church’s role in a rapidly changing society. For decades Irish leaders let archbishops vet proposed laws, declared they were Catholics first and Irishmen second, and saw crossing the church as a surefire way to lose office.
No longer.

Ireland’s population surges to highest level in 150 years

By Joe Leary, Special to the BIR
July 29, 2011
Joe Leary, Special to the BIR

By Joe Leary
Special to the BIR

The population of Ireland before the famine was a little over 8 million people. Many thought this was an over-population that was at least partly responsible for the tragedy.

Now there are predictions that, despite the impact of the recession, an 8-million population number on the island of Ireland is within the foreseeable future.

My big brother is turning 70

By Tom Mulvoy
July 29, 2011
Tom Mulvoy

Mark (left) and Tom MulvoyMark (left) and Tom MulvoyBy Tom Mulvoy
Reporter Staff

My older brother, first in a line of the five children of Tom and Julia (Harrington) Mulvoy, turns 70 next month, the patriarch of an American Irish clan whose gritty founders lived in smoky huts far from any mansion’s candles, working the stubborn land in villages named Moycullen, Rosscahill, and Oughterard, and fishing the nearby waters of Lough Corrib some 20 miles outside Galway City.

From this milieu and over the Atlantic to Somerville, Massachusetts, emerged my father, then 12, only son of a widowed mother and big brother to three sisters. For all four of the immigrant Mulvoys, a strong commitment to the values of family life brooked no exceptions. “When you are older and need a hand, or maybe get in trouble,” my Dad used to preach to his four sons and his daughter from the head of the dinner table,” the only ones who will care will be your family, especially this one. Don’t ever forget that.”

Given that background, I want to take up the relationship of big brother/little brother that has obtained between the one-time Skippy Mulvoy and his brother Tommy since 1943, the year the latter joined the former in the back bedroom on the first floor of 22 Lonsdale Street, a two-decker in the heart of Dorchester.

‘Luck of the Irish’ abounds tee to green: Northern Ireland is now 'world capital of golf'

By Peter Stevens
July 29, 2011
Peter Stevens

By Peter F. Stevens
BIR Staff

“Darren Clarke – the first Northern Irish golfer to win a major in almost four weeks.” The words were those of Graeme McDowell, the gifted Northern Irish golfer who won the 2010 U.S. Open, on Twitter following Clarke’s stunning triumph at the 2011 British Open.

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