Irish Boston History & Heritage

A three-year effort by a local Girl Scout troop to restore a neglected Civil War statue was celebrated on April 28, 2001 at a rededication ceremony  in front of the  Edgell Memorial Library  in Framingham Center. More than 100 people attended the event.  The restoration effort was spearheaded by the Framingham Girl Scout Troop 2112, which began the project in 1998 as part of a national Save our Statues initiative. Courtesy of  Framingham.com “The 13 girls and three troop leaders learned about the need to repair the statue from local conservator Rika Smith McNally,” reported  The Boston Globe . “Troop 2112 then spent the next two years raising money for the restoration.”  They collected “nearly $1,000 in pennies collected from Framingham elementary school students, and almost $5,000 in private donations from businesses and individuals,” wrote the Globe, in addition to a $1,000 grant from the Framingham Cultural Council and $9,000 from Save Our Statues....

James M.Curley with wife Gertrude  On April 13, 1950, former Boston Mayor James Michael Curley took his family on a seven week vacation to Europe for "relaxation, recreation and study." The previous fall, he had lost his mayoral bid for re-election to fellow Democrat John B. Hynes in November 1949, effectively ending Curley's political career of 50 years.  Then in February, 1950, the Curley family suffered a terrible loss when two of their children, Mary Curley Donnelly, 41, and Leo, 34, died  a few hours apart of cerebral hemorrhages.  The European vacation included stops in France, Switzerland, Italy, Portugal, England and Ireland, visiting Paris, Lisbon, Rome, Naples, London and Dublin.  Before he left Boston, Curley told reporters he was taking with him a replica of the Boston Common plaque in honor of Commodore John Barry, Revolutionary War naval hero, which he planned to present to the French Ministry of Defense. He was also carrying a letter to the F...

Educator Anne Sullivan, known in her lifetime as the Miracle Worker for her work with the blind,  was born on April 14, 1866 in Feeding Hills, Agawam, Massachusetts.  The daughter of impoverished Irish immigrants, Anne contracted trachoma, an eye disease caused by bacteria when she was five years old,  which caused her to become partially blind.  After her mother died in 1874, eight year old Anne and her brother Jimmie were sent to the Tewksbury Almshouse, known as the Poor House for indigent people. Conditions were horrible, and her brother Jimmie died shortly after arriving.   When state officials arrived to conduct an investigation of the almshouse, Annie convinced the commissioners to send her to the Perkins Institute for the Blind  in South Boston, which taught blind children to read, write and spell. Annie entered the school in October 1880. After graduation, Anne was sent to Tuscumbia Alabama to teach a six year old blind child named Helen Keller....

The post-Famine generation of Irish women in Boston and New England were typically relegated to jobs as domestic servants, nursemaids and mill workers, before eventually being accepted as shop clerks, nurses and teachers.  This work was often in addition to their primary role running households as wives and mothers.  The young Irish girls of the Famine generation who benefited the most were the ones who took advantage of education and learning in both public and parochial schools, giving them an unparalleled opportunity to distinguish themselves as individuals, artists and professionals.   By the 1870s, a new generation of Irish and Irish-American women were establishing themselves as poets, children's book authors, novelists, essayists and travel writers.  These women took up writing as a way of earning a living but also as a creative response to their own lives and the lives of their families. Here is a sketch of nine Irish women writers who bec...

This week, Shawn Moran explored Boston's Irish history, taking a walk on Boston's Irish Heritage Trail and dropping in at the Green Dragon Tavern. Learn more about the Irish Heritage Trail . To enjoy Irish cultural activities in greater Boston throughout the year visit IrishBoston.org .

St. Stephen's Church, image courtesy of Digital Commonwealth The next time you are exploring landmarks along the Boston Irish Heritage Trail , take a walk over to the North End and visit Saint Stephen's Church, 401 Hanover Street, in the heart of the city's Italian neighborhood. Originally designed in 1802 as a Congregational Church by famed architect Charles Bulfinch, St. Stephen’s became a Catholic Church in 1862, after Bishop John Fitzpatrick purchased the church to accommodate growing numbers of Irish immigrants settling Boston and this neighborhood in particular. Like nearby St. John the Baptist Church, which St Stephen's replaced, this "would not simply be another parish church, it would be a free church without pew rents," according to Boston Archdiocese archivist Thomas Lester . On the walls outside of St. Stephen's Church are two plaques that speak to a range of experience of Irish women in Boston over two centuries.  The first plaque honors ...

      Patrick Carr was the last man shot at the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770, the last to die on March 14, and the last to be buried at the Old Granary Burying Ground on St. Patrick's Day, March 17.  The other four victims were Crispus Attucks, Samuel Maverick, James Caldwell and Samuel Gray. Carr was also the only Irish Catholic immigrant among the five victims. His very presence in Boston had to have been circumspect, because of the longstanding prejudice that Bostonians had against Catholics that dated back to the first Puritans who arrived here in 1630.  Religious liberty was not a strong suit of 18th century Massachusetts, and Catholics were despised more than any other religious group.   There are several anti-Catholic themes in the Boston Massacre and subsequent trial. Attorney John Adams , who defended the accused soldiers of firing into the crowd at the famous trial, characterized the Bostonians that night as a mob, stating in court,...

I rish poet, lyricist and musician Thomas Moore, who wrote compelling lyrics to many of Ireland's ancient melodies, died on this day of February 25, 1852.  His ten-volume collection of  Moore's Melodies , published between 1808 and 1834, helped revitalize interest in Irish music that was in danger of being marginalized and forgotten.    For a full story on Moore's achievements, read  Ireland's Minstrel Boy Gets His Encore  in the Irish Echo. In Boston, Moore's Melodies quickly found their way into the city's musical community; with several of his songs published as early as 1811.  His songs, particularly  Last Rose of Summer , were performed as part of Boston's musical repertoire by famous visiting performers like singer  Jenny Lind  and violinist  Ole Bull .   Upon learning of his death in 1852,  Boston Pilot  publisher Patrick Donahoe and other leaders formed a Thomas Moore Club to perpetuate his music.  In 186...

  Eunice Kennedy, a leader in the field of intellectual disability, was born at the Kennedy family home on Abbotsford Road in Brookline, MA on July 20, 1921. She was the fifth child of Rose and Joseph Kennedy’s nine children and their third daughter. Read full biography of Eunice Kennedy Shriver and watch the video, Eunice Kennedy Shriver 100: A Legacy of Inclusion , produced on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of her birth by the National Park Service and Brookline Interactive Group. Eunice began her career as a social worker for women prisoners and juvenile offenders. In 1957 she headed up the Joseph P. Kennedy Foundation, dedicated to improving the way society deals with mental retardation. Her camp for children and adults with intellectual disabilities inspired her to create the Special Olympics, which spread to 150+ countries. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan presented Eunice with the Medal of Honor for her life's work. Read about the Special Olympics . John, Jean and Eu...

  During the American Revolution, Irish and Scots-Irish immigrants from New England played a pivotal role in helping to win the Revolutionary War. The Boston Irish Heritage Trail gives a glimpse of these Revolutionary Irish heroes through landmarks on Boston Common, the Massachusetts State House, Granary Burying Ground, Copley Square Park, Bunker Hill Monument and Dorchester Heights. Many of these landmarks intersect with Boston's Freedom Trail, a unique collection of museums, churches, meeting houses, burying grounds, parks, a ship, and historic markers that tell the story of the American Revolution and beyond. These are the Revolutionary Irish sites along the Irish Heritage Trail. Boston Common A memorial plaque to Commodore John Barry was unveiled along Tremont Street in December, 1949 by Mayor James Michael Curley. Barry was a naval hero in the Revolutionary War. He was commander of the USS Lexington and later chosen by George Washington to create the first U.S. Navy. Barr...

Roxbury Soldier at Forest Hills Cemetery A notice in the Boston Evening Transcript, dated February 18, 1869, reported that Martin Milmore 's Roxbury Soldier bronze statue was on temporary display at Boston City Hall on School Street, across from the statue of Ben Franklin. The piece had just been cast at Ames Works in Chicopee, MA and had been commissioned by the Town of Roxbury for placement in Forest Hills Cemetery. "It deservedly attracts much attention from the throngs of people who are constantly passing through that thoroughfare," BET reported.  Clay Model of Roxbury Soldier in Milmore's Studio on Tremont Street Image Courtesy of Library of Congres s The Town of Roxbury commissioned the statue which it "purchased a lot in the Forest Hills Cemetery upon recovering the bodies of 8 local soldiers from the Antietam Battlefield in 1862," according to a National Portrait Galley exhibit in 2006.  "We have spoken heretofore of this fine work when in the c...

General John Sullivan, a hero in the War for Independence and a key figure in ending the Siege of Boston, was born in Somersworth, NH on February 17, 1740.    Sullivan was the third of five sons born to Owen Sullivan of Limerick and Margery Browne of Cork, both indentured servants from Ireland. He and his brothers were home-schooled by their father, who had been a teacher in Ireland.  His brother  James Sullivan  was governor of Massachusetts and his brothers Daniel and Ebenezer also fought in the American Revolution.  John became a lawyer, served in the New Hampshire legislature, and was chosen as a member of the First Continental Congress in 1774 and the Second Continental Congress in 1775.  As the Revolutionary War escalated, Sullivan was selected as one of General George Washington’s eight Brigadier Generals in the Colonial Army.  When  Henry Knox  delivered the cannons from Fort Ticonderoga in New York to Massachusetts in the w...

  Image Courtesy of Mass Moments Thursday, February 4, 1993 was Larry Bird Night at the old Boston Garden, when the Boston Celtics officially retired Larry Bird '33 jersey and hoisted it to the rafters. It was an event for the ages, with Larry's former teammates and coaches returning en masse to honor one of the most consequential basketball players in NBA history, and certainly one of the Celtics' most legendary players.  During his 13 year career with the Boston Celtics Bird led the team to NBA championships in 1981, 1984, and 1986. He is also the only person in NBA history to win MVP, Coach of the Year, and Executive of the Year.  At the Larry Bird Night, Magic Johnson was there, and so were teammates Cedric Maxwell, Rick Robey and M.L.Carr, along with Kevin McHale and Robert Parish. Bird's wife Dinah and son Connor were on the parquet, along with Bird's mother Georgia, his sister Linda and brothers, Mike, Mark, Jeff and Eddie.  The Garden itself was packed to...

  Louise Bogan photo, courtesy of Library of Congress Acclaimed American poet Louise Bogan (1897-1970) was born in Livermore Falls, Maine on August 11, 1897, the daughter of Irish Catholic parents whose own parents had emigrated from Donegal and Derry in the 19th century.  A story in the Livermore Advertiser in September 2023 reveals more about her ancestry. “Bogan was the granddaughter of a sea captain who emigrated from Ireland to Portland, Maine, before the potato famine of the 1840s. The couple had 12 children and built a home on Captain’s Hill in Portland. The eldest, Daniel Bogan, was Louise Bogan’s father, who married Mary Murphy Shields in 1882. ” Because her father worked in paper mills and bottling plants, the family moved around often, in Maine, New Hampshire and finally to Andover, Massachusetts.  Image courtesy of Beltway Poetry Louise began writing poetry at age 14, attending both the Girls Latin School in Boston and then Boston University for one year. ...

Jeremiah Cohan, circa 1915 Jeremiah Cohan, a traveling minstrel who toured the country with his wife and two children in the late 19th century until they became vaudeville stars on Broadway, was born on Blackstone Street in Boston's North End on January 31, 1848.   He was one of 10 children born to Michael Keohane and Jane Scott, both emigrants from Bantry Bay, County Cork who had moved to Boston in the 1840s. Michael worked as a tailor and died when Jeremiah was 11.  At the time, the North End was a heavily Irish neighborhood due to the number of immigrants who came here to escape the Irish Famine between 1945-49. As a boy, Jeremiah worked as a saddle and harness maker and became a Surgeon orderly during the Civl War, before turning to music, dancing and acting.  "From a boy he was an expert dancer," wrote the New Britain Herald.  "It is said that he had inherited some talent for the stage from an Irish minstrel among his forebears."  He married Nellie Cos...