In 1875, St. Patrick's Day in Pennsylvania's Mahanoy City broke cold and clear. But conflict gripped the hard coal region. Festivities that honored Ireland’s patron saint would highlight a longstanding war between Irish priests under the authority of Archbishop James Frederick Wood and Irish Catholic men who marched under society banners

Long-buried accounts of those…

A Life-Long Fascination with Gaeilge

by Crystailín Narayana, for The Irish Gift

Ever since I was a…

  In  the light of all the abuse scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church in…

For generations, the sacred remains of Saint Patrick, the great Apostle of Ireland; Saint Brigid, the renowned Virgin; and Saint Columcille, the illustrious missionary, lay far distant from each other. When St Patrick died at Saul in 493, a question arose over where to bury him.…

How I am Finding (and Strengthening) My Irish Roots

by Kristin Waggoner, for The Irish Gift

I couldn't tell you when it…

Seachtain na Gaeilge (Irish Language Week) is an international Irish language festival and one of the biggest celebrations of our native language and culture that takes place each year in Ireland and in many other countries. 

This year’s festival is running from 1 –…

I am amazed at how often the descendants of Limerick emigrants come back to Limerick and are shocked that we do not look like the photo above, with barefooted children an women in shawls:

It has been said to me "Oh! I thought you all lived in the…

Welcome to The Irish Gift, an Irish organization that provides online classes in the East Galway music tradition and the music of Eddie Kelly. We also offer classes in the Irish language, sean nós singing and sean nós dancing. Online classes in bodhrán and uilleann pipes are also…

Colaiste Lurgan, the creative and ever-blossoming Irish language school in Connemara, is preparing for the March 3rd launch of their massive initiative to help people who would like to learn the Irish language.

Here's Lurgan's description of the initiative they're calling “Sé Seachtaini” (six…

Seventy million Irish diaspora know they have something intense and unexplainable coursing through their DNA. Perhaps, more than any other country in the world, Ire-land has left an extremely strong emotional connection to it's land through the DNA of it's people.   While we were…

Let's take a look back to the late 1800s and early 1900s at old pictures of the rural countryside and city life throughout various parts of Ireland. (Top image: Donkey cart…

It's funny, but when I mentioned to a close friend that I was going to be reviewing this book, she said "Oh, I found all of that on Ancestory.com". Fair enough. Some people visit one website and are satisfied with the history they come away with. For my friend (being third…

In 1876, the New York Times described the conditions across the East River before the Brooklyn Bridge connected the two cities.

“Desperate outrages by organized gangs of ruffians have been of frequent occurrence in Brooklyn.”

The words…

Learn about the stories and tales behind Ireland’s most recognised and renowned symbols as we begin the 4 week count down until Saint Patrick’s Day. The time of year for parades, green outfits, face-paints, Guinness and all…

As you enter the main gate of the Recoleta Cemetery in Buenos Aires, continue walking straight in and on the right side perhaps within 100 yards, you will find a monument, the burial place of Almirante Guillermo (Admiral William) Brown, the Irishman who is considered to be the…

The Desmond Fitzgerald Photographs, a stunning collection of 179 photos is now available to view on the University College Dublin Digital Library website.  This collection of photographic prints forms part of the papers of Desmond FitzGerald. The majority of these photographs arise out of the…

Hi all, thank you for the welcome and specially for the personal messages I received.

As you know, I am based in Buenos Aires, Argentina. My MacLoughlins ancestors came in 1851 to Argentina, They were form Glascorn, 5 miles from Mullingar, in county Westmeath. I have also previous and latter ancestors from Westmeath (Maguire, Phillips, Murray, Kelly); from Longford (Garrahan, Doolin,…

St Patrick’s Day is nearly upon us. Every year we see more and more different buildings lit up and different rivers dyed green. However it’s going to be tough to beat last year as the whole world quite literally went green in a global greening campaign to promote tourism in Ireland.

Within the space of a week we saw images appearing of well known buildings and monuments across the world lit up in vibrant green shades to celebrate Paddy himself.

Lets hope this St Patrick’s Day…

Today in southern Russia, Irish-Canadian Sean Greenwood will be sliding head-first down an iced-over track at speeds exceeding 80 miles per hour.  Sean is from the Vancouver area of British Columbia, Canada, but he's competing for Ireland in the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi.…