An ancient Irish ring fort has been discovered just outside of Newbridge, Co. Kildare

Details of the ancient medieval settlement were discussed last week, on May 17, at the Kildare Newbridge Municipal District meeting, the Leinster Leader reports.

“This is a very exciting archaeological find,” said Cllr Mark Lynch (SF).

He asked council heritage officer Brigid Loughlin if further study on the Great Connell site could be conducted by experts at UCD.

Loughlin said the site was set in farmland that was privately owned, so the council would be unable to carry out further studies on the find. He added that it was a massive fort that could only be seen clearly from the air.

“Because of the sheer size of it and cost, it would cost millions to excavate the site. A geophysical survey is available and has been published by the Department,” she said.

She did say that there may be an opportunity for local history groups or specialist journals to write articles about the site. The fort has been added to the record of monuments and places.

Medieval Priory of Great Connell Newbridge Kildare Ireland http://t.co/ot19vQtD0Ypic.twitter.com/XrH7fakc0T

— Catholic Heritage (@catholicheritag) March 3, 2015

This area in Kildare is steeped in history. Close by is the site of the Great Connell Priory, the former house of Augustinian cannons dedicated to Saint Mary and Saint David, now in ruins. It was founded in 1202 as a dependency of Llanthony Priory in Wales by the illegitimate grandson of the Angevin King Henry II, Meiler Fitz Henry. In 1203 the last King of the Ui Faeláin, Faeláin Mac Faeláin, died as a monk there.

If John F. Kennedy’s life had not been tragically cut short on November 22, 1963, there is a chance that the 35th US President may have been celebrating his 100th birthday on May 29, 2017, on which day the US will also be celebrating Memorial Day.

President John F. Kennedy was born in Brookline, Massachusetts on May 29, 1917. With rumors abounding that JFK’s daughter Caroline Kennedy may have visions of carrying on the family dynasty and even speculation that her son Jack Schlossberg, JFK’s grandson, may be priming himself to step into the political limelight, the Kennedys are still far from removed from US life and JFK’s legacy will be more than celebrated in the coming week as his birthday approaches.

While many commemorations are being held throughout JFK’s 100th year across the country, the main events will kick off today, Monday, May 22, and run through to the day itself, May 29.

Read more: Caroline Kennedy does not rule out White House bid

Here are some of the top JFK centennial events organized for the coming week:

Monday, May 22

Washington D.C -  American Youth Philharmonic Orchestra Chamber Ensembles

6 p.m. -  Millennium Stage, The Kennedy Center

Boston - The Road to Camelot: JFK's Five-Year Campaign

6 pm - John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and Washington columnist for the Boston Globe, Tom Oliphant, and former Boston Globe reporter and professor of journalism at the University of Mississippi, Curtis Wilkie, discuss their new book The Road to Camelot: Inside JFK's Five-Year Campaign.

Tuesday, May 23

Washington D.C. - Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra

6 pm - Millennium Stage, The Kennedy Center

Wednesday, May 24

Washington D.C. - National Symphony Orchestra Concert honoring John F. Kennedy

8 pm, Concert Hall - Kennedy Center

A world premiere work from Mason Bates unites the iconic American voices of President John F. Kennedy and poet Walt Whitman in this concert celebration of JFK's monumental legacy that also features world-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

Features a talkback session following the concert

Washington D.C. - “JFK and Hope: Nurturing ‘This Collaboration between Government and the Arts’”

Noon, Library of Congress - Bob Hope Gallery of American Entertainment, ground floor, Jefferson Building

Alan Gevinson, curator of the “Hope for America: Performers, Politics and Pop Culture” exhibition, will discuss Kennedy’s attempt to foster an atmosphere of “collaboration between government and the arts.”  Gevinson will also address Kennedy’s assessment of the revolutionary impact of television on politics and his appreciation of Bob Hope’s dedication to entertaining U.S. military personnel around the world.

Thursday, May 25

Boston - The American Spirit: Who We Are and What We Stand For

6 pm - John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

David McCullough, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, discusses his new collection of speeches, “The American Spirit: Who We Are and What We Stand For”, with longtime former ABC reporter and anchor Charlie Gibson.

Watch this forum live at jfklibrary.org/webcast.

Washington D.C. - Hubble Cantata

7:30 pm, Concert Hall - The Kennedy Center

The hour-long, space-inspired cantata pushes the boundaries of art and science as it takes audiences on a journey of wonder and exploration. It features opera star Nathan Gunn, a 20-piece instrumental ensemble, a 100-person choir from The Washington Chorus, and a cutting-edge virtual reality film (Fistful of Stars).

Washington D.C. - The Washington Ballet: Frontier

7.30 pm, Opera House - the Kennedy Center

Frontier takes Kennedy’s goal of traveling to the moon within a decade as its jumping-off point and moves off to follow an astronaut into the final frontier: Space.

Washington D.C - “JFK Centennial Celebration”

Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History

To commemorate the 100th anniversary of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s birth May 29, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History will display nine photographs of the 35th president and his family within the museum’s “The American Presidency” exhibition. The “JFK Centennial Celebration” display will be on view May 25 through August 27.

Friday, May 26

Washington D.C. - (In)Security: or, Jack and Nikki do the Cold War Tango

6 pm, Millennium Stage. Kennedy Center - Free event

(In)Security is a work of dance, music, film, narrative, and history which simultaneously presents both the American and the Russian viewpoints of the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962. 

Boston - Opening of New Special Exhibit, JFK 100: Milestones & Mementos

11.00am – 5.00 pm, JFK Library

The Kennedy Library’s new special exhibit, “JFK 100: Milestones & Mementos”, features a compelling selection of 100 original artifacts, documents, and photographs, revealing the arc of President Kennedy’s life and political career.

Boston - Red Sox Pre-Game Ceremony

6:45 pm, Fenway Park

Leading into the matchup between the Boston Red Sox and Seattle Mariners, the Red Sox, in partnership with the JFK Library Foundation, will hold a pre-game ceremony celebrating President Kennedy’s life and the ideals he championed.

Saturday, May 27

Boston - JFK 100 Centennial Commemoration for the Peace Corps Community

2.00 pm – 5.00 pm,  Smith Hall, JFK Library.

The JFK Presidential Library and Museum are proud to partner with the National Peace Corps Association and Boston Area Returned Peace Corps Volunteers to host the Peace Corps community at a centennial commemoration of President Kennedy.

Washington D.C. - Kennedy Center Open House: Celebrating JFK at 100

12pm to 10pm, campus-wide

In celebration of John F. Kennedy's 100th birthday, the Kennedy Center opens its doors wider than ever with a free, transcultural festival showcasing street art culture, Hip Hop, and skateboard culture, as well as classical and contemporary arts.

Sunday, May 28

Boston - “JFK 100 – Space Exploration Discovery Day: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow”

12.00 pm – 4.00 pm.  Smith Center, Learning Center, Museum Galleries, JFK Library

To commemorate JFK’s challenge to land a man on the Moon, the Kennedy Library is hosting an afternoon of activities and guest speakers for kids, families, and adults focused on Space.

Featured presentations by NASA astronaut Christopher Cassidy and Spacesuit Engineer Su Curley will highlight space exploration and equipment, including what it’s like to live and work on the International Space Station.  

Washington D.C. - National Symphony Orchestra Memorial Day Concert and Live Broadcast

8 pm, US Capitol

As part of the JFK Centennial Week celebration, the National Symphony Orchestra delivers its traditional Memorial Day Concert, an uplifting performance honoring the military service of all men and women in uniform as well as their families at home.

John F. Kennedy’s birthday - Monday, May 29

Washington D.C. - JFK Centennial Celebration

4 pm, Opera House, The Kennedy Center

Be part of a special evening of readings and musical performances featuring some of America's finest artists, as well as glimpses of rare video footage.

The Kennedy Center celebration of Memorial Day will serve a complimentary hot dog, chips, and soft drink served on the River Terrace (weather permitting) before the performance. All intermission bars will be at half price for the day.

Special readings of JFK speeches will include:

• Journalist and chief political correspondent for CNN Dana Bash,
• Stage-and-screen actor Finn Wittrock
• Celebrated actor and Golden Globe® winner Martin Sheen

Performance will also include:

• New York City Ballet Principal Dancers Joaquín De Luz and Tiler Peck
• Grammy®-nominated jazz pianist, composer, and Kennedy Center Artistic Director for Jazz Jason Moran performing Duke Ellington’s Far East Suite

Boston - JFK Centennial Celebration

9.00 am – 5.00 pm, JFK Library

A fun-filled day of celebration on President Kennedy’s 100th birthday, featuring performances by the U.S. Navy Band, the Boston City Singers, a ceremonial cake cutting, and a flyover performed by the U.S. Navy.  Admission to the JFK Library and Museum will be free and open to the public all day.

New York - Honoring JFK in the Rochester, New York, Memorial Day Parade

10.30 am - Parade forms at Alexander and East Avenue, proceeds along East Avenue to Main Street, then west on Main Street to North Plymouth Avenue. 

The Irish Studies Program at St. John Fisher College in Rochester, New York, in cooperation with the Colonel Patrick O’Rorke Memorial Society will be marching in the annual Rochester Memorial Day Parade with a banner honoring JFK for his service to our country.

Tuesday, May 30

Washington D.C.  - "Primary"

Noon - 2 pm, Library of Congress

"Primary," a documentary. The film follows Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey as they contend against each other in Wisconsin during the 1960 primary season. The film captures Kennedy's political charm and appeals in a manner that still is riveting when viewed today.

All week

Washington D.C. - Exhibition — John F. Kennedy

8:30 am - 4:30 pm, Library of Congress

This display includes special biographical materials about JFK and books written by the former president. Also featured are books about Kennedy in foreign languages.

Location: Great Hall South Gallery, First floor, Thomas Jefferson Building

Washington D.C. - American Visionary: John F. Kennedy’s Life and Times

May 3, 2017 – September 17, 2017, 2nd floor South, American Art Museum (8th and F Streets, N.W.). Free.

“American Visionary: John F. Kennedy’s Life and Times” brings together seventy-seven images culled from the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Getty Images, private collections, and the Kennedy family archives.

The dramatic scope of Kennedy’s life is evident in these photographs—from his first congressional bid as a decorated war hero in 1946, his fairytale marriage to Jacqueline Bouvier in 1953, his run for the White House in 1960 and role as commander in chief, to the tragedy of his death in Dallas in 1963. These images remain as indelible evidence of John Kennedy’s personal charisma and political accomplishments.

Washington D.C. - National Portrait Gallery

May 19 -July 9 at the National Portrait Gallery, Eighth and F streets NW. Free.

The National Portrait Gallery owns 72 portraits of Kennedy are dipping into their collection to highlight some of the best including a 1961 pastel of the young president by Shirley Seltzer Cooper and a William F. Draper portrait of Kennedy in a rocking chair as well.

Are you holding a JFK centennial event? Let us know more about what’s happening in your area in the comments section.

A 2013 study revealed that many Irish men may be able to trace their roots back to Turkey. Focusing on the role of the Y chromosome, which is passed from father to son, the research indicates Turkish farmers arrived in Ireland about 6,000 years ago, bringing agriculture with them. And they may have been more attractive than the hunter-gatherers whom they replaced.

The genetic patterns for Irish females differ from those of men. “Most maternal genetic lineages seem to descend from hunter-gatherers,” an author of the study, Patricia Balaresque, told the London Times. “To us, this suggests a reproductive advantage for farming males over indigenous hunter-gatherer males during the switch to farming.

“Maybe, it was just sexier to be a farmer,” she added.

Eighty-five per cent of Irish men are descended from farming people from the Middle East and especially Turkey, according to the research that was conducted by scientists at the University of Leicester.

The switch from hunting and gathering to farming was a crucial one in human development. Increased food production meant that populations were able to grow.

In Britain, 60-65 per cent of the population has the Turkish genetic pattern, while in parts of the Iberian Peninsula it’s almost as the same as in Ireland.  The research contradicts what was previously thought about Irish genealogy – that hunter-gatherers from Spain and Portugal who survived the Ice Age were our main genetic ancestors.

“This particular kind of Y chromosome follows a gradient, gradually increasing in frequency from Turkey and the southeast of Europe to Ireland, where it reaches its highest frequency,” Mark Jobling from the University of Leicester told the Times.

 We are saying that most of that original hunter-gatherer male population in Ireland was probably replaced by incoming agricultural populations,” he added.

* Originally published in June 2014.

Timothy O’Sullivan was one of the best known and most prolific documenters of the American Civil War.

Born in Ireland, he and his parents immigrated to New York when O’Sullivan was two years old (though some differing accounts of his life say he was born in New York). As a teenager, he was an apprentice to the Irish American photographer, Matthew Brady.

For the first year of the Civil War, O’Sullivan worked with Brady, and then in 1862 became assistant to colleague Alexander Gardner when Gardner moved to set up his own studio. Garder and O’Sullivan were among the first photographers to arrive at Gettysburg, and O’Sullivan, often traveling with the Union army, bore witness to many other key points in the war.

After, he journeyed west on a number of geological survey expeditions and even led his own expedition in 1873. In 1882 O'Sullivan died of tuberculosis. He was just 42 years of age. He is buried in St. Peter's Catholic Cemetery on Staten Island.

Some of O’Sullivan’s most famous images turned 150 in May 2014. In May of 1864, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and the Union Army began the Overland Campaign, which aimed to wedge Union forces between the troops of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia.

The Library of Congress has a plethora of O’Sullivan’s images, recently highlighted by archaeologist Damian Shiels, who writes for the Irish in the American Civil War site. Click through to the gallery to see his captures of Grant and his officers as they set out on the campaign, Union High Command base at Massaponax Church, the aftermath of fighting at Spotsylvania, and more.

Photo Gallery - Timothy O'Sullivan's photogtaphs of the Overland Campaign.

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* Originally published in May 2014.

We’ve put together a list of ancient charms and spells based on this Irish magic.

Whether you are seeking a spell for love, luck, or healing, emotional charms, or even potency, these charms and spells will have something for you.

1. Love spell

On the night of a full moon, walk to a spot beneath your beloved's bedroom window. Whisper his/her name three times to the night wind (el alder).

The night breeze is believed to have a guardian who is compassionate toward requests from mortals between midnight and 1 am (the witching hour).

2. To find stolen goods

Place two keys in a sieve, cross ways. Two people hold the sieve while another makes a cross sign on the forehead of the suspected thief, calling out their name loudly three times. If the person is innocent, the keys will remain stationary. If the person is guilty, the keys will start to revolve slowly round the sieve.

3. Attract good fortune

You will be damn lucky with this one. You will need a candle, some string, and a trinket.

Light the candle and loop the string in through the trinket and tie it. Then start swinging the trinket above the flame and chant:

“A candle flickers, this trinket I pass, good energy and fortune come to me, wealth, knowledge, influence, energy.

"By good means come to me, wealth, knowledge, influence, energy.

"This trinket I pass into power, to attract to me wealth, knowledge, influence, energy, come to me!”

Repeat this three times, then wear the "necklace" around your neck. The more you do this, the more powerful.

4. Beauty spell

This spell makes you prettier than you think – just follow the instructions.

During a full moon, take a mirror and go outside (if you can't then open a window, make sure the moon is reflected on the mirror), take a piece of a picture of your hair, lips, eyes, or whatever you are interested in changing, and place it on the mirror. While concentrating on it, say, "Moonshine, Starlight, let the wind carry your light, let your glow cover my body, and let your shine cover every eye."

Say it three times and concentrate on the part you want to change. Then say, “Moonshine, Starlight, shape and mold my body, as a rose is granted beauty, let me blossom in your light, the light that brings me beauty, and grant me beauty three times three."

Say it three times and when you are finished light a pink candle or incense.

5. To get someone to call you

Take a piece of parchment or fine quality writing paper and inscribe the name of the target. Write it in a circle twice, so the ends meet. As you do this, concentrate on the person's face and your desire for them to call you. Then, while still concentrating, put a needle through the center of the circle created by the name. Place the charm by the phone.

The call will come within five minutes, five hours or five days depending on how well the spell was cast and how much will power was used.

Read more: The history behind Ireland’s ancient Druids (PHOTOS)

6. Hair binding / Bond of trust

In ancient Ireland, it was customary for a man to braid a bracelet from his hair and give it to the woman he loved – a gift of trust – knowing what can be done to someone magically if you possess their hair.

The binding is not activated unless she accepts the gift, thus accepting him and agreeing to the spell. This is not a binding that can be imposed on another person without their knowledge.

7. Healing charm for a wound

Close the wound tightly with the two fingers, and repeat these words slowly:

"In the name of Dagda, Bridget and Diancecht.  The wound was red, the cut was deep, and the flesh was sore; but there will be no more blood, and no more pain, 'till the Gods come down to earth again."

8.  A charm for always having money

Take the feather of a black rooster, go to the crossing points of three fairy-paths, and while holding the feather and a gold colored coin, call the name of the Goddess Áine three times, to bring you everlasting prosperity.

9. Elixir of potency

Two ounces of cochineal, one ounce of gentian root, eight grams of saffron, four grams of snakeroot, four grams of salt of wormwood, and the rind of ten oranges. All of this should be steeped in a quart of brandy, and kept for when it is needed.

10. Charm against depression

When a person becomes low, depressed and careless about everything, as if all vital strength and energy has gone, he is said to have got a 'fairy blast,' and blast-water must be poured over him by the hands of a fairy doctor while saying, "In the name of Lugh with his shining sword, who has strength before the gods and stands among them." 

Be careful to ensure that no portion of the water is sullied. Whatever is left over after the procedure must be poured onto the fire.

* Originally published in September 2012.

The underwater hairdryer, the inflatable dartboard, the waterproof teabag; the Irish get a fairly bad rap for being slightly dopey when it comes to the technical side of things.

Yes, we are advanced, in the world’s eyes, when it comes to literature and the arts but what about our scientific discoveries and inventions?

The results might surprise you. IrishCental.com found out that Ireland has been a pretty busy nation inventing some weird and wonderful stuff.

Here are just the top ten most surprising and influential.

1. Guinness

Well maybe this isn't so surprising but its popularity and longevity have made it Ireland's most successful and recognizable export. 

Undoubtedly the most famous Irish export throughout the world, drunk around the globe and loved by millions: It's Guinness.

Arthur Guinness began brewing Guinness in Leixlip, County Kildare, before transferring to St. Jame’s Gate Brewery. In 1759, he signed a 9,000-year lease at £45 per year. That’s how confident he was in his product.

Now, 251 years on, the best-selling alcoholic drink of all time boasts of sales exceeding $2.6 billion. To Arthur, Sláinte!

2. Color photography

Certainly one of Ireland’s most prolific inventors, John Joly was responsible for meldometer for measuring the melting points of minerals, the steam calorimeter for measuring specific heats, and the photometer for measuring light intensity and use of radiation for cancer treatment.

What he is most known for, however, is the invention of color photography. In 1894, this Irish genius from Hollywood, County Offaly, found a successful way of producing color photographs from a single plate. He changed the way we see the world. 

3. Trans-Atlantic calls

It’s a long way from Skype but it was an Irishman who was knighted for his work in establishing the Atlantic Telegraph Cable in 1865. Lord Kelvin Thomson helped to lay the cable which stretched from Newfoundland to Valentia in County Kerry.

He also had a very keen interest in the measurement of temperature and thermodynamics which led to the scale of temperature, “The Kelvin Scale”.

4. A cure for Leprosy

This one I’m especially thankful for. It was an Irish man who accidentally discovered a cure for leprosy while he was looking for answer to Ireland’s tuberculosis problem. What a lucky mistake.

Vincent Barry made this accidental and miraculous discovery, with the catchy title of compound B663. This compound would go on to cure 15 million people of this devastating disease. 

5. The modern tractor

“The Mad Mechanic” Harry Ferguson was responsible for the original Ferguson System of tractor. It was patented by the mad inventor in 1926 and is the same basic design for a modern tractor that is used today.

This County Down loony also invented his own motorcycle, race car and plane and in 1909 he was the first Irishman to fly. Originally a bicycle repairman he even built himself the first ever four-wheeled Formula-One car.

His name lives on in the Massey Ferguson company.

6. The submarine

This man probably took a lot of slack for this invention … an underwater boat? We’ll believe it when we see it!

As it happens, back in 1881, in County Clare, John Philip Holland was the first person to successfully launch a submarine. The first of its kind, it was called the “Fenian Ram”. By 1900 the U.S. Navy was formally commissioning the production. 

7. The tank

From Blackrock, Dublin, in 1911, came the world’s first armored tank.

When the then Home Secretary in Britain, Winston Churchill commissioned the design of a vehicle “capable of resisting bullets and shrapnel, crossing trenches, flattening barbed wire, and negotiating the mud of no-man’s land” this is what our Dublin boy came up with.

The World Wars might have been very different without his invention. Though modern tanks might look entirely different to his original designs the essential “battle buggy” remains exactly the same.

8. Guided missile

It’s strange that such a peace-loving people seem to have had a good head for army equipment. From Castlebar, County Mayo, Louis Brennan invented the guided missile. This stealth torpedo was used as a coastal defensive mechanism.

Brennan is also credited with inventing the first helicopter. However, his prototype crashed and burnt in 1925. 

9. Ejector seat

It is rather worrying that it was Irishmen who came up with the first functioning helicopter (Louis Brennan) and also the first ejector seat.

In 1945, Sir James Martin tested out his device on a dummy - a wise choice. The following year, a man called Bernard Lynch became the first live tester of the County Down man’s invention.

It was soon adopted by the Royal Air force as a standard safety device.

10. Apparatus for whiskey distilling

A Dublin chap with a very exotic name, Aeneas Coffey, came up with the world first heat-exchange device in 1830. This might not sound like that big a deal but this very efficient little piece of equipment led to huge advances in distilling, including whiskey. 

* Originally published in 2013.

About seventy years ago, German war chiefs were busy devising Unternehmen Grün or Operation Green: Nazi Germany’s planned invasion of Ireland. The plan has recently come to light.

Dublin was earmarked by the Nazis as one of six regional administrative centers for Britain and Ireland right after Dunkirk when an Allied collapse seemed imminent.

Had the occupation taken place, the Germans thought it crucial that their advancing units reach Ireland as soon as possible after the initial invasion.

The plan would have seen the fourth and seventh infantry divisions of the Germany Army being deployed to Ireland. The German 4th army corps in particular had a brutal reputation in battle and inflicted many civilian casualties as they secured the Polish corridor to Warsaw during the invasion of Poland in 1939.

Their advance, had the fourth and seventh been deployed to Ireland, would have been rapid - up to 100km a day - and their brutality would have been beyond doubt.

Fifty thousand troops in total were allocated for the Irish invasion with an initial batch of 4,000 crack engineers, motorised infantry, commando and panzer units to reach the Irish shore after having launched from France.

The operatives were initially to land on Ireland’s South-East coast where they expected to be met with only token resistance, and then to aerially bomb targets throughout the Irish Free State as it was then known.

READ MORE: Adolf Hitler, the Irish folk music fan. 

After this initial landing and advancement phase, ground troops of the 4th and 7th army corps would have begun so-called “probing attacks” on the Irish Army based in Cork and Clonmel, followed by a push through Laois-Offaly towards the Army’s Curragh Camp base in Co. Kildare.

Some units would have reached the outskirts of Dublin just 48 hours after having landed in the South-East, such would have been the pace of their progress.

The Nazi politburo in Dublin was to have far reaching executive powers and would have had instructions to dismantle, and if necessary, liquidate, any of Ireland’s remaining indigenous political apparatus, intellectual leadership and any non-Aryan social institutions. The GAA would have been closed and Irish Jews would have been murdered en masse.

Ireland would have been ruthlessly subject to German martial law, with curfews also being imposed on the local population, as well as plans to commandeer resources from locals. To this end an annex was added to the plan listing all petrol stations and garages in Munster and the Midlands. Nothing wasn’t planned for.

Livestock, food, fuel, and forced labor would all have been used by the Germans in their advance northwards, which would have pitted them squarely against the civilian population.

Ireland’s army at the time of 7,600 regulars and 11,000 reserves would have been completely unable to handle the onslaught from the invading force.  The army was also incapable of mounting large-scale maneuvers and was poorly armed. Many companies even travelled by bicycle!

When Winston Churchill got wind of the German plans, he drafted detailed plans for a counter-attack to be launched from Northern Ireland. The plan, codenamed Plan W, envisaged the Irish and British armies fighting side by side to repel the intrusive German forces.

Ireland’s neutrality was respected and they emerged largely unscathed from the war, but had the invasion taken place, there could well have been large-scale casualties.

READ MORE: Dublin woman discovers she was born into Nazi breeding program.

* Originally published August 2013. 

A 5,000-year-old axe washed up on a Galway beach after the severe storms that battered Ireland in early 2014.

It was described as "a precious find" by experts.

Connemara resident Elizabeth Moylan came across the Mesolithic axe on the shoreline near her home after the storms had passed.

The Irish Times also reported on a second axe found in the same vicinity by her niece Lorna.

The late Mesolithic mudstone axe was used for hunting and has been described by Galway archaeologist Michael Gibbons as ‘extremely rare.’

Moylan discovered the axe near her home in Ardmore while a polished stone axe was found in the same area by her niece, Lorna.

Moylan told the paper that she was walking the shoreline after the storms when she discovered the object.

She then contacted Connemara-based Gibbons, who confirmed that the mudstone artifact dated to the late Mesolithic, pre-farming period, about 4,000-5,000 BC.

The Irish Times report says the axe may have been attached to a handle or strap using a deer antler.
The find is believed to be the most westerly example of several hunting implements found in the Galway Bay region.

Moylan told the paper, “We think that it may have been made in one of a number of axe factories in Co Clare and these implements were traded up the coastline.”

Her niece Lorna found a polished stone axe in the same location. Polished stone axes are of later origin and associated with farming.

Gibbons commented that mudstone was not local to the area where it was found, which suggests it was acquired in a ‘hunter-gatherer trade network’ extending from north Clare to the wider western Connacht region.

The report added that a Fanore axe-making site was washed away in the recent storms.

Gibbons said, “Several late Mesolithic finds have come to light in Connemara and the surrounding regions over the last few years, but this one pushes settlement in the Connemara Gaeltacht back further than we previously had evidence for.”

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In his novel “The 13th Apostle," author Dermot McEvoy writes about his own family's part in the fight for Irish freedom and their relationship with Michael Collins.

Here is how he introduces the fateful clip of Michael Collins the day he signed the Anglo-Irish treaty and proclaimed with sad prescience that he had signed his own death warrant.

McEvoy writes: "Check out this video to find out why the ladies so loved Michael Collins! This silent British Pathé newsreel film was taken after the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed on December 6, 1921.

“Sit through 1:14 before Collins shows up—yeah, that’s King George V and British Prime Minister David Lloyd George performing the overture—and it'll be worth the wait. With Collins are three of his fellow signatories: Robert Barton, Gavan Duffy and Arthur Griffith.

“Right at the end of the clip you can see Collins first smiling, then giving a great guffaw. He's wearing his famous—or infamous—facial hair, which his fiancée Kitty Kiernan referred to as his “Charlie Chaplin mustache.””

* Originally published in January 2014.

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The ancient Celts, the people who lived in Britain and Ireland from 500 B.C. to 400 A.D., considered their Celtic symbols and signs to hold incredible, meaningful power in their lives. The stories behind their Celtic symbols have been carried on from generation to generation with the help of bards and storytellers, allowing their heritage to live on.

Even though the lack of written history means that Celtic symbolism is open to interpretation, the meanings are fairly evident.

The relevance and significance of the Celtic symbols are timeless; themes of love, loyalty, energy, wisdom and war which are very much alive today.

So tap into the nature and energy of the Celts, and learn about the language of Celtic symbols.

Irish Harp:

The traditional symbol of Ireland, the harp is said to reflect the immortality of the soul. The musicians of ancient chieftains played the harp, and it remains one of the most popular Celtic instruments today. You’ll find the harp everywhere in Ireland, from coins, uniforms and the state seal to the Guinness pint glass.

Shamrock:

The Celtic symbol for luck and the unofficial, yet the most recognizable symbol of Ireland. The shamrock is a single-stemmed plant with three leaves and grows on the hills of Ireland. The shamrock is everywhere: postcards, t-shirts, cereal boxes, you name it – if it’s “Irish,” there’s typically a shamrock involved. The shamrock was made famous by St. Patrick, the Patron Saint of Ireland. Legend tells that he used the shamrock’s three leaves to help explain the Holy Trinity to the pagans during his mission to bring Christianity Ireland.

Claddagh:

The heart represents timeless love, the crown represents loyalty and fidelity, and the hands represent friendship.

Tri-Color Flag:

The Irish Flag has three vertical stripes, from left to right: green, white and orange. The flag was first used in 1848 and symbolizes hope and political peace. The green represents the Catholic population of Ireland, while the orange represents Irish Protestants. The middle stripe of white symbolizes a wish for harmony and unity between the two.

Celtic Cross:

The Celtic symbol for Christianity that combines the traditional Christian cross with a ring through the cross’s intersection. Also referred to as the High Cross, the Irish Cross and the Cross of Iona. The ring is considered a solar symbol of energy, a life source.

Celtic Tree of Life:

Oneness with nature. The Celts had many tree symbols. Birch signifies youth, beginnings, and renewal. Ash signifies connection, wisdom, and surrender. Heather stands for dreams, romance, and feelings.

Celtic Horse:

The horse is the Celtic symbol for victory at war. The Celtic horse-goddess Epona was known as the “Great Mare.”

Celtic Dragon:

A mythical creature thought to be a Celtic symbol of fertility and power. It was believed that the dragon was created when the first living cell was born from the earth, and the sky fertilized it with the wind and water. Because of this, the dragon is associated with seasonal fertility and the energies of the earth. Christians later associated the dragon with Satan, and pagan evil.

Celtic Serpent:

Celtic symbol for rebirth, healing, and wisdom, due to its cyclical shedding of its skin. The serpent was considered an immortal creature that came to life each year with a new skin. The Celts believed serpents slithered up from the inside of the earth, and they held all of the world’s secrets and divine wisdom. The serpent was the Celtic people’s “Earth Healer,” but later turned into the Christian symbol for the devil and paganism.

Celtic Hounds:

Guardian figures and sources of healing power. Hounds are associated with various Celtic gods and goddesses, including the famous Irish mythological hero Cúchulainn. In ancient Celtic Ireland, hounds were given as gifts to honorable men, and many warriors and chiefs took the name as a title (as in “Hound of Culann”) to demonstrate their loyalty and courage.

Celtic Birds:

This Celtic symbol stands for freedom and transcendence. Birds have the power to soar up into the heavens, and so they represented the liberation of the human soul. Birds were thought to bring messages of guidance and prophecy from the gods down to the earth, making them mediators between humans and the heavens.

Irish Ogham Alphabet:

A gift from the Celtic god Ogmios, or the god of eloquence. The true origin of the alphabet remains a complete mystery.

Knots and Spirals:

The knots and spirals with never-ending lines symbolize the Celts’ beliefs in eternal life and in humans’ complex relationship with the natural and the divine.

Triquetra/Trinity Knot

The most common knot. Unity and trinity of soul, heart, and mind. Three distinct yet interlocked levels: physical, mental and spiritual. 

Love this living art from Co. Sligo, a woodland Trinity Knot. More info http://t.co/aVCvzTzYQJpic.twitter.com/e5ZCuxysG3

— Irish Archaeology (@irarchaeology) September 23, 2015

Triskelion

Like the trinity, the spiraled triskelion, or triskel, stands for unity of the three. In the case of Celts, this is the physical, mental and spiritual. It also symbolizes the eternal life, the flow of nature, and spiritual growth.

Triskelion https://t.co/ZZsMnOEZ2f#Symbolismpic.twitter.com/5Lj3rMZADk

— Phoenix Trilogy (@GoldHardShell) August 30, 2015

Triple Spiral

The triple spiral of life shows the continuity of life, and how it travels in cycles. As with the triskel, the existence of “the three” stands for mind, body, spirit; birth, death, rebirth.

http://t.co/dkaX1LcnTF Love this triple-spiral��❤️������ pic.twitter.com/35SxpsLoPN

— CharlieⓂ️ (@charm972) April 4, 2015

Tuim Knot

An interweaving, diamond-shaped knot that represents the four seasonal lunar holidays and the four elements: earth, air, fire, and water.

We love this Celtic Tuim Knot Necklace | The perfect gift for her http://t.co/E0a3KXF9aCpic.twitter.com/b0AoXuNiBP

— MyGiftClues.com (@MyGiftClues) August 7, 2015

Wheel of Being

The five-fold pattern, also known as the Wheel of Balance, is made up of four circles united by a fifth circle in the center. The structure stands for four powers or elements balanced by a fifth. The Druidic universe consisted of four Powers united by a fifth Balance.

*Originally published in 2013. 

Our guide has told the same story perhaps a thousand times yet still it brought a lump to her throat.

“People around here recall that in 1849 folks living in my home town of Louisborough in Co Mayo - around 600 in total and including women and children - were starving as a result of the potato famine and a rumor went around that, if they walked to Delphi Lodge where the landlord and council of guardians were, then they’d be given food,” she said.

“It’s about 15 miles and a very beautiful walk today by the shores of the Killary and Doolough lakes. But it was bleak and freezing when those people set out on that night on their journey to meet their landlord.

“So they set out and walked anyway in atrocious conditions and literally died on the way back of weakness and starvation. Later, people found corpses by the side of the road where you’re standing with grass in their mouths that they had been eating for want of food.

“When the people had eventually got to Delphi Lodge , they were told that the guardians could not be disturbed while they were taking their lunch. When they finally did see them, the people were sent away empty-handed and most of them died on the journey back.”

We all went quiet for a moment.

Then our guide continued: “It makes me very sad and very angry.”

The Great Hunger - An Gorta Mor - is the biggest tragedy to have hit Ireland. Between 1845 and 1850 an estimated one million people died there when the staple potato crop failed. If you add forced emigration to the USA, Canada and elsewhere to that figure which followed as a result, Ireland’s total population was cut by around a quarter as a direct cause of the Famine.

There are a number of versions of the Doolough Famine Walk of 1849, as it has become known, in which the numbers of people and the circumstances of their deaths vary tremendously. We rely on a letter published in the Mayo Constitution of April 10 1849, signed by ‘A Ratepayer’, which first blew the whistle on the case.

It describes how in late March of that year, a Colonel Hogrove,  a member of the Board of Guardians (who administered the Poor Relief), and a Captain Primrose, the local Poor Law inspector, arrived in Louisborough to inspect those claiming relief.

People came to the town from all around only to find that the two men had headed south to Delphi, where at that time stood on the shores of Doolough lake the hunting lodge of the Marquess of Sligo. It’s thought the two men had gone to Delphi to go hunting. They gave instructions for people to gather there for the inspection instead, or face being struck off the poor relief register.

The letter writer went on to call for an inquiry into the ‘melancholy affair’.

Louisborough today is a small friendly town. Four miles away is Croagh Patrick, Ireland’s holiest pilgrimage site, at the foot of which is Ireland’s National Famine Memorial. It’s a sad metal structure of a three-masted ship, the sort that took people to the New World back then. They became known as coffin ships. Around the structure skeletal figures of the starving stand pleading.

And then we continued our journey onwards to Delphi in the footsteps of our ancestors as we walked our way through history.

The inky waters of Doolough came into view and then three hills in the distance upon one of which you could still make out the scant edges of the old potato fields. Two memorials marked the spot where disaster happened. One a plain stone cross engraved with the words ‘Doolough Tragedy 1849’. The other carried another inscription: “To commemorate the hungry poor who walked here in 1849 and who walk the Third World today.

Every year since 1988 there has been a walk along this route in memory of the Doolough dead and to highlight the starvation of the world’s poor still today. Archbishop Desmond Tutu has done it, the children of Chernobyl have done it. So has the Cellist of Sarajevo, Vedran Smailovic who played daily in his city despite sniper fire in the 1990s while it was under siege. And Kim Phuc - the woman who was made famous in photographs of her as a girl running naked and burned by napalm in Vietnam - she has done it too.

As have Native American Indians. When they learnt of the tragedy in 1849, members of the Choctaw tribe raised $710 which they donated to Irish famine relief. They did so because the story reminded them of their own plight when, 18 years earlier, they were forcibly removed from their land by the white man to make way for modern day Oklahoma. Their march was some 500 miles and they lost lives along the way. The Indians’ march became known as the Trail of Tears.

In 1992 a group of Irish people returned the Choctaw Indians’ kindness by walking the Trail of Tears, raising a huge $710,000 which they donated to famine relief in Africa.

The annual commemoration of those events of March 1849 leading to the Doolough Tragedy ensure the people’s sacrifice in these parts will never be forgotten.

* Originally pubished in 2016.

Since it opened its doors to the public in October 2012, Quinnipiac University's Great Hunger Museum in Hamden, CT has displayed the world's largest collection of visual art, artifacts and printed material related to the starvation and forced emigration of the Irish people in the 19th century.

Part of the museum’s mission is to explore how the crisis of Great Hunger was reported to the wider world, and in recent months it has invited celebrated Irish authors, artists and academics to address the disaster as part of their Famine Folios series. The resultant essays are remarkable.

In "The Tombs of a Departed Race – Illustrations of Ireland's Great Hunger," Professor Niamh O'Sullivan writes one of the most lucid accounts of the background, scale and impact of the Great Hunger that I have ever encountered.

In her 61-page essay O'Sullivan - an award winning scholar who writes on 19th century Irish and Irish American art and popular culture - examines how the periodicals and pictorial newspapers of that century first shaped our understanding of the unfolding calamity.

But the depictions that O'Sullivan has collected do much more than simply present a pictorial account, they also comment on the prevailing social and political attitudes – and often the prejudices – of the English artists and periodicals that were reporting the conditions on the ground.

O'Sullivan reminds us that the Famine was not simply a year or a crop failure in the making. Instead, she writes, “It is better understood as a hundred-year event rather than a seven year one – an outcome of systematic neglect by government...”

For decades poverty, work for low wages and biting rents kept the Irish peasants in a perpetual state of dependency and always on the verge of famine. Dispossessed by settlers who had “expropriated" their lands during the Conquest, O'Sullivan writes, “Irish Catholic landowners and peasants had been driven to the bogs and mountainsides, most especially in the west,” where they were left to cultivate the subsistence crop that kept them alive – the potato – because even on stony soil it grew abundantly.

Driven away to the worst land and cheated of their ability to prosper, the Irish were then blamed for their own grinding poverty, which many colonial settlers claimed was God's judgment on their race. Bogus scientific theories abounded to rationalize their suffering as a symptom and sign of their religious and biological inferiority.

By 1845, 85 percent of the 8.7 million population lived on tiny plots of land in extreme poverty. So there was an inevitability about what happened that was all the more shocking because every portent had been ignored.

O'Sullivan's selection of supporting materials conveys the sheer scale of the horror and supplies unforgettable on-the-ground accounts like this one from an 1847 edition of the Southern Reporter: “We are overwhelmed with distress; we are crushed with taxation; we are scourged by famine and visited by pestilence. Our jails are full; our poor houses choked; our public edifices turned into lazar houses (places rife with infectious diseases like leper colonies); our cities mendacities: our streets morgues; our churchyards fields of carnage.

“Our ordinary trade is gone; our people are partially demoralized. Society itself is breaking up; selfishness seizes upon all; class repudiates class; the very ties of closest kindred are snapped asunder. Sire and son, landlord and occupier, town and country repudiate each other, ceasing to cooperate. Terror and hunger, disease and death afflict us....horrible suffering, utter penury.”

O'Sullivan’s carefully chosen pictorial selections illustrate the near total collapse of every social and familial bond as the crisis – the largest demographic catastrophe of the 19th century in Europe – took hold.

But she also reminds us that visual representation is not an objective pursuit. Every historical image of the Famine, she writes, “contains components that implicitly or explicitly disclose the often contesting ideologies of the protagonists.”

In her essay O'Sullivan contextualizes the perilous condition of the Irish poor in the lead up to the Great Hunger and she examines the prevailing attitudes of the landowners and the government, showing us how each pictorial account of the Famine contained not just a portrait but a point of view, often a distancing one, or one that attempts to apportion blame for the lamentable conditions on the shoulders of those who had their lives and futures upended by it.

Quinnipiac University Press, $15.

* Originally published April 2015.

Ever wonder if your family had any important family names?

Our ancestors in Ireland had a very strong tradition for naming the eldest children in each family. It’s really interesting to see this naming pattern in your own family tree, but it’s especially valuable to know for family history research.

This naming pattern was most prevalent from around the late 18th century to the middle of the 20th.

Here’s the gist of it:

• The eldest son would be named after his paternal grandfather

• The second son would be named after his maternal grandfather

• The third son would be named after his father

• The fourth son would be named after his father’s oldest brother

The amazing thing about this naming pattern is how closely it was followed across levels of Irish society and in different religious denominations. It’s very likely your family followed this tradition pretty closely. Knowing this can explain recurring names throughout your family tree and can help you when trying to decide if an ancestor you found fits in.

There was also a similar naming pattern for girls, although it wasn’t followed as closely as it was for boys. As time went on, naming fashions came to be the reason for girls names, first among wealthy families and then more increasingly among everyone.

This could be motivated by the simple fact of maiden names – once a girl would marry, her original family name would be lost. Perhaps this caused families to place less emphasis on female naming traditions.

How to use this for family history research

While you might be tempted, knowing this pattern doesn’t mean you should rush to fill in missing branches of your family tree just because you have a clue to someone’s first name.

One of the main challenges of Irish genealogy is not having anything at all to begin your search. That’s where understanding this naming pattern can help. It’s not enough to give you definitive evidence of an ancestor’s name, but it’s a great place to start looking.

If you’ve hit a brick wall or are feeling totally lost, try to estimate some names based on this pattern. It will narrow your search results tremendously, and while it isn’t guaranteed to turn up evidence of your ancestors, it could be the beginning of a trail that leads to an amazing discovery.

For instance, if you’re researching a family with the last name of Murphy (the most common name found in our Irish Catholic parish registers from County Cork, you’re going to have a lot of names to search through. But if you know that your Irish immigrant ancestor’s first name was Patrick, you now have a place to start – his grandfather may have been Patrick Murphy. Still a common name, but it’s a starting place.

While this won’t give you the answer in and of itself, it could help you find their household. You may discover that someone with that name occupied a household with other family names you are certain are correct. Even knowing that, you’ll still need more direct evidence linking your ancestry to that person, but the path will be easier if you’ve got a good hunch a certain member fits.

This naming pattern can also explain when you find seemingly duplicate baptism records from the same family. Some families thought names to be so important that if a child with one died, it would be re-used on the next born child.

When you see something like this in our Catholic Parish Records, it usually indicates the death of the older child, and tells us that this name was particularly important to the family. This was both a way to honor and remember the deceased child, while still keeping the ever important family naming tradition alive.

This naming tradition might still exist in your family to this day. Do they keep the tradition alive? If not, go check out your family tree – you may notice which names were the most important.

H/T Findmypast 

The untold story of 50,000 Famine Irish who were deported back to Ireland by New England authorities has been revealed.

Writing in The Irish Times in March, Hidetaka Hirota, a Mellon Research Fellow who is writing a book “Expelling the Poor” (Oxford University 2017) on the subject, revealed a little-known hardship many Famine emigrants faced.

The Know Nothings, the KKK-like Protestant group, was behind the persecution of Catholics who had fled to Boston during the famine.

The State of Massachusetts, heavily influenced by the Know Nothings, “systematically deported destitute Irish men and women as a matter of public policy. As anti-immigrant sentiment grows today in Europe and America, this story of hardship is worth remembering,” Hidetaka Hirota wrote.

Massachusetts law allowed the deportation of beggars and many indigent Irish were targeted.

Read more:Why the real story of the Ireland's Great Hunger is not taught in U.S. schools

Foreign paupers, up to 50,000 in number, were deported between 1840 and 1870, the vast majority of whom were Irish. It was a sweeping policy. Irish Americans born in the USA, that is citizens, were among the swept up. Some immigrants had spent up to 40 years in America but were not spared. American-born children were also shipped off

As Hirota wrote, 'In 1855, the Boston Pilot, an Irish Catholic newspaper, fiercely condemned these manners of removal: “How much more will [the deportation law] be abused under this vile tyranny which decrees that poverty, Irishism, and Catholicity are crimes, and to be punished as such?”'

Deportation was supported by the Know Nothings. Calling Irish paupers “leeches upon our taxpayers” they described “an ignorant and vicious Irish Catholic population.” One leading nativist in Boston said in 1858 that an Irishman “will not work while he can exist by begging.”

Most were shipped to Liverpool and many were shipped on to Ireland because of their condition, in effect being deported twice. Even in Ireland, they were not welcome. Hirota wrote that 'a group of four deportees entered the workhouse in Cork in 1868, one local official asserted that they “ought not to come at all.” Another Cork official complained, “This city is the receptacle for every poor person who comes from America or England.” Some were even re-deported back to America.

Read more:Little known tale of generous Turkish aid to the Irish during the Great Hunger

* Originally published in early 2016. 

Findmypast is working in partnership with IrishCentral to share fascinating insights into your Irish ancestors. Click here to get a special half price subscription, and discover your Irish roots today!

If you know enough about your Irish family history, you probably know what county your ancestors originated from.

This is a really crucial piece of information – if you have a common last name, you’ll really be lost if you try to search the whole country of Ireland. It’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

But even if you know your ancestors’ county of origin, there’s more information you need to know if you want to trace your heritage even further back in time.

Once you find your ancestors in our Irish parish records (free to search forever), you’ll want to look in other databases that make use of Civil Registration Districts.

The good news is, it’s really easy to figure out what district your ancestors lived in if you have this map.

Civil Registration Districts

Some of the most important record sets for Irish genealogy are broken down by geographic areas called Civil Registration Districts. These districts were set up for record-keeping purposes.

Sometimes your family’s Civil Registration District will have the same name as the county, but most of the time it will be called something else – there are multiple civil registration districts in every county of Ireland.

To complicate things even further, some Civil Registration Districts span two counties. For instance, the Kilmallock district is mostly in County Limerick but also spills over the border into County Cork.

The Map

Our original map - pictured above or you can zoom in via this link - shows both county and Civil Registration Districts. The solid lines are counties and the dotted lines are the smaller Civil Registration Districts.

Once you located your ancestors in our parish records, you’ll know more about their specific location by learning their parish. Locate it on a map and note its approximate location within the county.

Then, using this map, you should be able to easily cross-reference and see what Civil Registration District your ancestors were in.

Congratulations! You’re now armed with information that you’ll need to locate your ancestors in our other essential Irish records– the largest online collection of Irish records anywhere.

Starting your research on Irish genealogy can be a daunting task. Where do I start? Where are the best places to look? What kind of information can lead me on the path to my ancestors?

The list of possible places where you could find information on your family is long but luckily, the Library of Congress (the research library that officially serves the United States Congress) has put together this small but useful referencing guide to help you get out of the blocks and begin researching Irish genealogy and local Irish history.

Although the library admit that it is far from a comprehensive list, and as you get further into your research you may need to look to more specific resources, the guide acts as a great starter aid to get you over that intimidating first hurdle: working up the courage to start.

Not only can the aid be used within the Library of Congress but any other large library is likely to hold the same content as listed below.

Here are some of the Library’s suggestions:

1. Handbooks

Although some of them are now quite dated, there have been a number of handbooks published that aim to guide you through the genealogy research process. The LOC recommends “Pocket guide to Irish genealogy” (1991) by Brian Mitchell or “Irish family history” (1990) by Marilyn Yurdan among others.

2. Pedigrees and family histories

These resources focus on certain Irish lines and on certain families which means that unless your family was extremely well-off or a part of the gentry, you are unlikely to find information on your particular family here.

Some recommendations:

• “The Irish and Anglo-Irish landed gentry when Cromwell came to Ireland” (1884) by John O’Hare.
• “The Palatine families of Ireland” by Henry Z. Jones.

3. Bibliographies

If you’re looking to cast out your net very far at the start, these resources will be useful. Many of them list further resources for research purposes.

Some recommendations:

• “Bibliography of Irish family history” (1982) by Edward MacLysaght
• “A guide to Irish bibliographical material: a bibliography of Irish bibliographies and sources of information” (1980) by Alan R. Eager.

4. Local history

The Library of Congress contains many histories of Irish localities that may contain name and family information. One given example is the collection of letters written by John O’Donovan as he completed the first Ordnance Survey of Ireland between 1834 and 1841. The letters contain information on the people O’Donovan met with as he mapped the country and information on the names he came across during this research.

5. Biographical information

Here you'll find not only published works on the more famous and influential Irish families but collections of the names of judges, architects and those who moved to different countries during certain periods.

Some recommendations:

• “Irish families in Australia and New Zealand, 1788-1978” by Hubert William Coffey and Marjorie Jean Morgan
• “A biographical dictionary of architects in Ireland, 1600-1720” by Rolf Loeber

6. Land, Property and other records

Looking through land records is a great way to find out more information on where your family lived and at what time. Listed in many of these records is the amount of land the family owned and in what specific area. It may also use alternate spellings of both place and family names so they can be difficult resources to work your way through accurately but worth the time and effort.

Some recommendations:

• “A census of Ireland, circa 1659; with supplementary material from the poll money ordinances (1660-1661). Irish Manuscripts Commission.
• “The Tithe applotment books”.

7. Maps, atlases and gazetteers

Looking through older maps may be useful if you are having difficulty establishing the home place of your family. Place names have changed over time, have changed spelling, or may have been anglicized but if you can trace the place name through time it will tell you the correct spelling to look for when you are looking for your family in certain older documents.

Some recommendations:

• “A new genealogical atlas of Ireland” from Brian Mitchell
• “Philip's 19th century county atlas of Ireland” with original consulting index and edited with a new introduction by John D. Blackwell & Laurie C.C. Stanley Blackwell.

8. Names: Geographical

As with maps, these resources will help you to weave through the maze that is Irish topography.

Some recommendations:

• “Ainm: bulletin of the Ulster Place-Name Society. -- Vol. 1” (1986).
• “A dictionary of Irish place-names” (1986) by Adrian Room.

9. Names: Personal

By finding out more about your own family name and its origins and various spellings you can hope to open up new doors in your research and other routes for you to take until you find the right path.

Some recommendations:

• “Irish surnames and their possible locations for family history research” (1984) by James McClelland
• “Special report on surnames in Ireland. Together with Varieties and synonymes of surnames and Christian names in Ireland” by Robert E. Matheson.

10. Periodicals

There have been many journals dedicated to investigating links to Ireland and tracing Irish heritage, some of which are still being published.

Some recommendations:

• “Journal of the Irish Family History Society.”
• “Irish Family Links” from the Irish Genealogical Association.

11. Religions

Parish registers are a goldmine for the genealogical researcher. You can look through records of different religions and churches as well as registers for graveyards.

Some recommendations:

• “Guide to Irish Quaker records, 1654-1860” (1967) by Olive C. Goodbody
• “A guide to Irish parish registers” (1988) by Brian Mitchell.

12. Wills

If one member of your family left a will in the past, it may outline other members of the family and their relation to them.

Some recommendations:

• “Registry of Deeds (Ireland). Abstracts of wills,” edited by P. Beryl Eustace
• “Irish genealogical guides : a guide to copies & abstracts of Irish wills” by Wallace Clare.

13. Emigration

Pinpoint the exact time your family left Ireland with these useful resources on Irish emigration.

Some recommendations:

• “Irish passenger lists, 1847-1871 : lists of passengers sailing from Londonderry to America on ships of the J. & J. Cooke Line and the McCorkell Line,” compiled under the direction of Brian Mitchell.
• “The Famine immigrants : lists of Irish immigrants arriving at the port of New York, 1846-1851.” Ira A. Glazier, editor; Michael Tepper, associate editor.

14. Irish in America

So you know what date your family left Ireland and you know where in the US they are all currently living, but what happened in the interim? Trace the journey of your Irish family in America to the present day with this list of resources on Irish Americans.

Some recommendations:

• “The Irish in America : immigration, land, probate, administration, birth, marriage, and burial records of the Irish in America in and about the eighteenth century,” edited by Michael J. O'Brien
• “Irish settlers on the American frontier” by Michael C. O’Laughlin.

If you wish delve further into the Library of Congress’ resources, you can view the full list here.

Do you have any other recommendations from your own experience? Let us know in the comment section.

John F. Kennedy would have celebrated his 100th birthday on Memorial Day, Monday, May 29, 2017. In tribute to JFK, the 35th President of the United States, and his centennial year, IrishCentral is looking back on the life and times of the charismatic and intriguing Irish-American leader; from his early years to his rise to the presidency, to his untimely assassination in November 1963 at just 46 years old. 

Here we look at Kennedy famous trip to his ancestral home in Ireland and the thousands who came out to see him. For more on JFK and the Kennedy family, you can visit our special topic page.

The Irish Film Institute has released documentary film footage of President John F Kennedy’s historic trip to Ireland in June 1963.

The 27-minute film, produced by the Columban Fathers, is now available to be viewed online.

Producer Fr Gerry Smith was a missionary priest from Co. Cavan who had studied filmmaking in the U.S. He had made several films about “the old country” before making the documentary chronicling the president’s visit. The film, titled 'President Kennedy in Ireland,' was meant to be shown at fundraising events for Irish-American audiences.

Kennedy, a Catholic and an Irish American, was the first U.S. president to visit an independent Ireland. The visit occurred just five months before the president’s tragic assassination in Dallas.

While several films were made of Kennedy’s trip to Ireland, the Columban Fathers documentary was the only professionally-made film shot in color.

Footage shows Kennedy visiting his ancestral home in Dunganstown, Co Wexford; excerpts from several public speeches; and sequences from his visits in Dublin, Cork, Galway, and Limerick, all of which were attended by large crowds.

The entire documentary can be viewed online at http://ifiplayer.ie/president-kennedy-in-ireland/.

John F. Kennedy would have celebrated his 100th birthday on Memorial Day, Monday, May 29, 2017. In tribute to JFK, the 35th President of the United States, and his centennial year, IrishCentral is looking back on the life and times of the charismatic and intriguing Irish-American leader; from his early years to his rise to the presidency, to his untimely assassination in November 1963 at just 46 years old.

Here we look at Kennedy famous trip to his ancestral home in Ireland and the thousands who came out to see him. For more on JFK and the Kennedy family, you can visit our special topic page.

Dr. Peter Green, a Professor of Clinical Medicine, Director of the Celiac Disease Center at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, suspects that JFK was the victim of celiac disease an undiagnosed disease common to the Irish.

Green recently wrote in History News Network that Kennedy’s Irish heritage may have played a part in the disease, noting that it is more highly associated with Irish than many other races. The article was later picked up by our sister publication Irish America Magazine.

Green wrote, “John F. Kennedy’s long-standing medical problems started in childhood. In Kennedy’s adolescence, gastrointestinal symptoms, weight and growth problems, as well as fatigue, were described. Later in life, he suffered from abdominal pain, diarrhea, weight loss, osteoporosis, migraine and Addison’s disease. Chronic back problems, due to osteoporosis, resulted in several operations and required medications for chronic pain.

Green says that by the standards of the time Kennedy was extensively assessed. ”He was extensively evaluated in major medical centers including the Mayo Clinic and hospitals in Boston, New Haven and New York. Among the multiple diagnoses were ulcers, colitis, spastic colitis, irritable bowel syndrome, and food allergies. His medications included corticosteroids, antispasmodics, Metamucil and Lomotil.

However, while it is not clear that his physicians obtained a definitive diagnosis, a review of his medical history raises the possibility that JFK had celiac disease.

Green explains how celiac disease happens. “Celiac disease is caused by ingestion of gluten, which is the main protein component of wheat and related cereals, rye and barley. The small intestine develops villous atrophy that results in difficulties in the absorption of nutrients. Diarrhea and abdominal pain are common symptoms. Elimination of gluten from the diet results in resolution of the inflammatory condition in the intestine and the associated symptoms and prevention of the complications of the disease. A life-long gluten free diet is then required. People with celiac disease, providing they adhere to the diet have normal longevity.

Green notes it often occurs early in life. ”Celiac disease can present at any age. In infancy and childhood, it may cause chronic diarrhea and abdominal pain, in addition to growth, behavioral and developmental problems. In older individuals, the presentation of celiac disease is frequently due to the development of complications of the disease. These include anemia, osteoporosis, skin rashes or neurologic problems. The neurologic problems include neuropathy, epilepsy, ataxia (balance disorders) and migraine.

While the disease is more common in females, men are affected as well. Osteoporosis is common in patients with celiac disease; men often are more severely affected than women. Gastrointestinal symptoms in celiac disease persist for many years prior to diagnosis and are often attributed to an irritable bowel syndrome or spastic colitis.

Autoimmune disorders occur more frequently in patients with celiac disease than the general population by a factor of ten. Frequently, the autoimmune disorder assumes greater clinical significance than the celiac disease and, as a result, is diagnosed first. The associated autoimmune disorders include thyroid dysfunction, psoriasis, dermatitis herpetiformis (an intensely itchy skin rash), Sjogren’s syndrome, and Addison’s disease. Relatives of patients with celiac disease have a greater risk, not only of celiac disease, but also of other autoimmune diseases.

As to the Irish connection, Green says Kennedy may well have been more susceptible because of his heritage.

“Celiac disease was formerly considered a rare disease of childhood. It is now recognized as being very common in those of European descent, one of the most common genetically determined conditions physicians will encounter. Recent studies have demonstrated the country with the greatest prevalence to be Ireland.

In Belfast, one in every 122 have the illness. The prominent familial association of the disease indicated by the occurrence in one of ten first degree relatives and in 80 percent of identical twins points to a genetic component of the disease. However, the actual genes responsible for the disease have not been discovered, though many groups are working on the problem. It is known that there is a strong association with specific HLA genes that are required for the disease to occur but are themselves not sufficient for the disease to be manifested.

Kennedy’s Irish heritage, long duration of gastrointestinal complaints (since childhood), diagnosis of irritable bowel syndrome and migraine, presence of severe osteoporosis, and the development of Addison’s disease all lead to a presumptive diagnosis of celiac disease. Kennedy was given steroids for his problems. Steroid use is associated with the development of osteoporosis and Addison’s disease.

However, steroids were initially used in clinical practice in the 1930s and 1940s for many indications not considered appropriate now.

In the case of Kennedy, if he did, in fact, have celiac disease, the steroids would have suppressed the inflammation in the intestine and reduced his symptoms, making the diagnosis of celiac disease less likely to be established. The occurrence of Addison’s disease in his sister, however, argues for a familial [genetic] cause of his Addison’s disease, rather than an iatrogenic one.

Green says that despite the intense medical scrutiny his doctors failed to diagnose it, yet at the time there was sufficient knowledge about the disease to allow for a diagnosis.

“Could celiac disease have been diagnosed in Kennedy during his lifetime? Possibly. The disease was first recognized in 1887, as was its treatment with an elimination diet. It was recognized to occur at all ages. However, it was not until the 1950s that the shortage of bread during the Second World War and its subsequent reintroduction in Holland led to the recognition of wheat's role as a cause of this malabsorption syndrome. It was in the 1970s that physicians became aware of the more subtle presentations of the disease. The diagnosis of celiac disease initially requires consideration that it may be present in an individual patient; even now many physicians do not consider the diagnosis.

It would, however, be possible to diagnose celiac disease in JFK now, if biopsies taken during his life, or autopsy material of the small intestine had been archived and was now made available. Frozen blood samples could also provide diagnostic material, for there are serologic tests now available that are specific for the condition.

A diagnosis of celiac disease, if it had been made, could have been treated by diet alone. This would have prevented all the manifestations of the disease and its complications.

Due to the strong genetic component of celiac disease, Kennedy’s family may well be interested in obtaining the diagnosis as well.

(This article was previously published on HNN/History News Network)

* Dr. Peter H.R. Green, director of the Celiac Disease Center at Columbia University, is a professor of clinical medicine at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University and attending physician at the Columbia University Medical Center. Celiac disease has been his focus for almost 20 years, with equal concentration on patient care and research. He is one of the few physicians in the United States with an intense clinical academic interest and expertise in celiac disease. He is the author of Celiac Disease: A Hidden Epidemic, which has been called “the definitive resource for celiacs and those yet to be diagnosed.”

For more information on celiac disease visit: celiacdiseasecenter.columbia.edu

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*Originally published in February 2014. 

John F. Kennedy would have celebrated his 100th birthday on Memorial Day, Monday, May 29, 2017. In tribute to JFK, the 35th President of the United States, and his centennial year, IrishCentral is looking back on the life and times of the charismatic and intriguing Irish-American leader; from his early years to his rise to the presidency, to his untimely assassination in November 1963 at just 46 years old.

For more on JFK and the Kennedy family, you can visit our special topic page.

Here are some of the places in Washington, D.C., where JFK lived, ate and worshiped:

Dorchester House apartments, 2480 16th St. NW

In October 1941, when John F. Kennedy was 24 years old, he moved to D.C. to take a position in the Office of Naval Intelligence. He moved in with his younger sister Kathleen, who was already living in the capital and working for the Washington Times-Herald. She lived in the brand-new Dorchester House apartment complex across from Meridian Hill Park. Kennedy moved into Apartment 542, but didn’t stay very long. He was transferred to Charleston, S.C., the following January and didn’t move back to D.C. until 1946, when he was elected to the House of Representatives.

2808 P St. NW

After he was elected to Congress, Kennedy favored Georgetown, living in a number of houses and apartments in the neighborhood. However, in 1955, a few years after his election to the Senate and marriage to Jackie, he purchased the Hickory Hill estate in McLean. A year later, the couple decided to return to Georgetown. In early 1957, they moved into a rental house on P Street NW and lived there for one year — a year which saw the the birth of daughter Caroline and the Pulitzer Prize for “Profiles in Courage.”

Read more:What you should know about John F Kennedy

Holy Trinity Church, 3513 N St. NW.

When he lived in Georgetown, Kennedy regularly attended Mass at Holy Trinity Church, the oldest Catholic church in D.C., including on the morning of his inauguration. He is remembered on a plaque outside the church.

Home of Charles Bartlett, 3419 Q St. NW

On May 1951, Kennedy’s friend Charles Bartlett, the bureau chief for the Chattanooga Times, and his wife, Martha, threw a dinner party at their home expressly for the purpose of setting up Kennedy with Jacqueline Bouvier. The initial meeting was not an instant success.

Bartlett later told the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library: “This was an awkward time actually because, as I said, she was going to Europe and he was just getting involved in the [Senate] campaign.” The friends persisted in the matchmaking and a little over two years later, they wed.

3307 N St. NW

This was the Kennedy’s best-known residence and where they stayed until moving into the White House. The family moved into the three-story townhouse in January 1958. After winning the 1960 election, JFK would meet the press corps on the front steps of the house.

“Our next president doesn’t take the old, easy way of making his announcements about new cabinet ministers, the fate of the new frontier, etc., from his office on Capitol Hill — where, if one need edit, the corridors have steam heat,” complained Washington Post staff writer Thomas Wolfe in December 1960. “He just steps right out on the old front porch at 3307 N St. NW and starts talking. And disappears back into the manse.”

The house was sold in 1961. After Kennedy’s assassination, Jackie and the children moved back into the neighborhood, living at 3038 N St. NW and then at 3017 N St. NW. In 1964, tired of the unwanted attention from gawkers, they moved to New York.

Martin’s Tavern, 1264 Wisconsin Ave. NW

In Booth 3 of this Georgetown tavern is a brass plaque marking the spot where supposedly “JFK proposed to Jackie” on June 24, 1953. However, this important moment is much disputed. Some sources claim the proposal took place at the Parker House restaurant in Boston, while others say it was done by telegram, when Jackie was in London covering Elizabeth II’s coronation for the Washington Times-Herald. The June 28, 1953, Boston Sunday Globe, reported that Kennedy had proposed the week before at the Bouviers’ home in Newport, R.I.

Booth 1 also remembers the president. The booth for one was where Kennedy would frequently eat breakfast and read the newspaper after attending Mass on Sundays.

Read more:Did JFK have a love child with an NY socialite?

The Monocle, 107 D St. NE

One of only a handful of restaurants near the U.S. Capitol, it quickly became of favorite of senators, including Kennedy.

Capital Hilton, 1001 16th St. NW

The evening before Kennedy’s inauguration Frank Sinatra and Peter Lawford organized a gala at the D.C. Armory, with performances by Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Gene Kelly and Sidney Poitier. Sinatra arranged for the participants to stay at the Statler-Hilton, now the Capital Hilton, which was the site of one of the official inaugural balls. The next night, JFK made an appearance at the ball before slipping up to a private party organized by Sinatra.

The Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle, 1725 Rhode Island Ave. NW.

Kennedy’s funeral Mass was held here on the morning of Nov. 25, 1963 by the archbishop of Boston, Richard Cardinal Cushing. A marble circle on the floor in front of the sanctuary marks the spot where his coffin was placed.

H/T: Washington Post.

John F. Kennedy would have celebrated his 100th birthday on Memorial Day, Monday, May 29, 2017. In tribute to JFK, the 35th President of the United States, and his centennial year, IrishCentral is looking back on the life and times of the charismatic and intriguing Irish-American leader; from his early years to his rise to the presidency, to his untimely assassination in November 1963 at just 46 years old.

For more on JFK and the Kennedy family, you can visit our special topic page.

As America celebrates the 100th birthday of JFK here’s what you need to know about the 35th President’s life, from his youth to his road to the White House and his tragic assassination.

Early Life

John FitzGerald Kennedy was born in Boston on May 29, 1917, the great-grandson of famine emigrants. Although his family arrived destitute like so many others, each generation did better than the one before and baby Jack was born into an extremely wealthy family.

In total, there were nine Kennedy siblings – four boys and five girls – and in an age when women rarely ran for office the family’s ambitions centered on the four brothers. The oldest, Joe Jr, was hailed as a future President when born and his father Joseph Sr hoped the others would attain high office as well.

In 1938 JFK's father, Joe Sr, was made US Ambassador to Great Britain and Kennedy traveled with him for a time, working as his secretary. His book, “Why England Slept,” was based on his Harvard University thesis and recounted the lead up to the Second World War and Britain’s inadequate preparations for the conflict. It became a bestseller, but the young JFK declined a career in journalism and joined the US Navy.  

There he served with distinction and was awarded a Navy and Marine Corps Medal for his bravery in action off the Solomon Islands.

Early Political Career

After a brief stint as a journalist in Europe, JFK threw himself into electoral politics, with all his father’s money and connections at his beck and call.

He was twice elected Congressman for Massachusetts's 11th district before winning a tight US Senate race in 1952.

Not long after his election he proposed to 23-year-old Jacqueline Bouvier. She took a while to accept, but the pair declared their engagement in June 1953 and married that September in what was considered the wedding of the season.

Road to the White House

In January 1960 Kennedy told the world he was running for President. Few who knew the handsome and ambitious 42-year-old were surprised but the race against the sitting Vice President, Richard Nixon, proved a tough one. Kennedy charmed voters with his authority and calmness in the nation’s first Presidential debate but ultimately triumphed only by a wafer thin 120,000 vote margin in the popular vote. He did, however, win a comfortable 303 vote slam dunk in the electoral college with huge support in the southern states thanks to his running mate, Lyndon Johnson.

Inauguration

JFK set the bar high for oratory at all subsequent inaugurations. He exhorted his fellow citizens to “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country” and declared war on "common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself."

Domestic Policy

Kennedy appointed former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt to head a Presidential Commission into the Status of Women – leading to the Equal Pay Act of 1963. He also cautiously advanced the cause of civil rights, issuing a number of executive orders to curb discrimination.

His ‘New Frontier’ policies saw an expansion in healthcare for the elderly, more federal money for education and he slashed taxes.

Foreign Policy

Frustrated by Congress, JFK’s primary focus during his years in the White House was on the world beyond America’s shores.

In 1961 Kennedy ordered what came to be known as the Bay of Pigs Invasion and the Cuban Revolution swept a young Fidel Castro to power.

The CIA hoped the invasion by young anti-Castro Cubans would topple Castro, depriving the Soviet Union of its greatest ally in the region.

But the invasion failed and Castro, more hostile to the US than ever, and the young dictator agreed to host Soviet intermediate ballistic missiles weapons on the island.

The Cuban Missile Crisis saw the world teeter on the edge of nuclear war until Soviet leader Khrushchev blinked and agreed to remove the missiles from Cuba. Kennedy had faced his biggest test as Commander in Chief and triumphed.

Assassination

Kennedy was shot and killed on November 22, 1963 in Dallas by Soviet sympathizer Leo Harvey Oswald. All Americans, and most other people around the world, remember where they were on that fateful day.

Vice President LBJ was sworn in on Air Force One that day with a stunned Jackie Kennedy at his side.

The funeral was one of the greatest spectacles the world had ever seen, hundreds of dignitaries attended as the first Catholic Irish American President was laid to rest in Arlington, VA and an eternal flame was lit to burn forever in his memory.