Irish Boston History & Heritage

James M.Curley with wife leaving for Europe 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.  The 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 th...

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....