IRISH TO THE CORE

Zen and the Art of Knots

Celtic knotwork has fascinated me for over 30 years now. It has always been drawn, painted, etched and carved etc., so I set myself a completely new challenge to tie the longest Celtic knot I could. And to my…

Last Thursday, Israel’s Labor Party elected a new leader.  Isaac Herzog replaces Shelly Yacimovich as the party’s Chairman.

Herzog immediately called on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to move the peace process with the Palestinians forward.  In his victory speech, Herzog vowed to refocus the party’s agenda on diplomacy.  He said the Labor Party would offer a…

New Ross, County Wexford -- The JFK Trust announced an exciting new campaign with Irish emigrants and their families at its heart. The REUNITED AT THE EMIGRANT FLAME campaign will give participants a chance to win return flights to Ireland in time for Christmas and is sponsored by Connect Ireland and managed by the John F Kennedy Trust. The…

Today (November 22, 2013), the world commemorates the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Irish-American president John F. Kennedy.  You may not know that Belfast-born author and theologian, C.S. Lewis, passed on the very same day.  Fifty years after his death, Lewis is even more influential than he was during his lifetime.  His popular "Chronicles of Narnia"…

The following is a transcript taken from the LIVE Community Chat chat hosted here at TheWildGeese.com on Friday, November 22, 2013 -- the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's assassination.  Some editing has been applied for clarity.

The Wild Geese:  Céad míle fáilte, a chairde! So glad to see…

The image to the left is the first page of a hand-written letter from Jacqueline Kennedy to Eamon De Valera in January of 1964.  In the letter, Mrs. Kennedy expresses how much her late husband's trip to Ireland the previous summer had impacted him, and how much his Irish heritage meant to him.  

You can download the full letter in PDF format by clicking…

In the early morning hours of August 2, 1943, a small American torpedo boat was moving just west of New Georgia in the Solomon Islands. In command was a young Irish-American destined to be the first Catholic president of the United States: Lieutenant…

By John Bruton

In 1963, when President John Fitzgerald Kennedy visited Ireland, I was 15 years of age.

To understand the impact of President Kennedy, one has to understand that the Ireland of 1960 was a very different place, even to the…

France has its Eiffel Tower, the U.S. its Statue of Liberty, but arguably the most iconic attraction in Ireland is that cathedral of conviviality, the Irish pub. The unique thing that this Irish institution has is that, unlike the others, it’s exportable, if you don’t count plaster-of- Paris imitations of Lady Liberty and the Eiffel Tower,that really don’t do it for…

The government of Ireland has pledged aid of more than 3 million euro to the disaster-stricken Philippines, and Irish missionaries are in the forefront of providing assistance to the victims of Typhoon Haiyan, according to Irish news reports. Tipperary-born…

November 22^nd. Strikes a sullen chord. Any year -- and yet this year, it is the 50^th year. Striking a crescendo of deep and bitter sadness.

Maybe it’s because I was raised in a house where John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s picture (clipped from the Sunday Daily News…

Have a read and see what you think, but I think Colm O'Regan has captured the essence of of Irish Mammys. Don't some of these phrases ring bells? 

It’s impossible to…

The following is a transcript taken from the LIVE Community Chat chat hosted here at TheWildGeese.com on Monday, November 15, 2013 with three of the "leading lights" in contemporary Celtic Art and fellow Wild…

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, 35^th President of the United States

It was early Friday afternoon, November 22, 1963. I was a student at the Catholic University of America in northeast…

”They could take our land, starve our poor, destroy our homes and plunder our institutions; they could deny us education, but they could not destroy our music and song” No truer words were ever spoken. These are by Derek Warfield himself.

Derek Warfield is a singer, songwriter, mandolin player and a founding member of…

Ireland's worldwide invitation to the Irish diaspora to come home in the very ambitious and controversial countrywide event "The Gathering" has exceeded all expectations.  A resounding success, especially for Irish tourism, the central statistics…

I made several trips back into the devastation after that initial writing. The work never got easier. In fact it got much harder. Age on a man is often internal and aches and pains are the wrinkles.

Above, Cross Bay Blvd and a ship washed into the median. See more pictures below. Photos by Kevin Gleeson

One friend in particular deserves a mention here – a year later. Living in east Rockaway on…

John Ridge Presents on Lost Irish Colonies of New York

John Ridge, premier researcher of Irish life in the New York metropolitan area, spoke about the discoveries he has made about Irish neighborhoods in New York at the Irish Cultural Society…

One of the joys of my early childhood was going with my family to the beaches of New York City, particularly Rockaway and Jacob Riis. Getting there was at least half the fun. We’d go over the George Washington Bridge, then…