Irish Seisiún Newsletter
This Week’s Session 1
Hey Tom!
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North American 2026 Comhaltas
Music & Dance Immersion Weekend
This year’s Convention was held in Chicago
Pat and Nancy Lyons, Bob, Art, Noreen, Marie, Maureen and me (Tommy Mac) attended this in Chicago this past weekend and played our hearts out.
Francie Campbell and Martin Cloonan center stage, right where they belong, with Bob Murphy helping out
Here is a clip of just one of the many tunes we played.
I’m sorry my Bodhran is so loud, but I recorded it on my phone, which was right in front of me.
Click the link below.
We were honored by the attendance of the President of Comhaltas (Worldwide) Attracta Brady.
And the President of Comhaltas in England, Vincent Jorden
I guess that our own Pat Lyons is kind of a celebrity also,
seeing that all the dignitaries wanted a photo with him!!!!
There may be more on this next week as more photos and stories come in. But, It was GRAND!
Maureen Fallon was once again the worker bee. It seemed that no matter which hall I stuck my nose into, she was there making sure that everything went smoothly. Thanks for everything you do and for taking such great care of us.
Even she wanted a photo with Pat
And here Maureen was taking care of one of the street people in Chicago.
I also want to send a big thank you to Ena Doocey, our wonderful Tir nBlath photographer. She, as always, seemed to be everywhere all at once. With her infectious smile and bouncing to the music as she takes her photos, she is a wonderful part of our experience. Thank you, Ena, for all you do for us.
And, if you send me some of your photos from this weekend, I’ll include them in next week’s newsletter along with some follow-up notes from Bob Murphy. Unfortunately, I don’t have any photos of Ena because she always has a camera in front of her beautiful face.
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Finnegan's Calender
Find out what’s happening at Tim Finnegan’s this month.
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“That’s How I Spell Ireland”
Saturdays at 7 to 8 PM EST.
You can listen on 88.7FM or WRHU.org.
For a request please text me on 917 699-4768.Kevin and Joan Westley
Note: Show will be preempted whenever the NY Islanders have a Saturday game
Recent Mail
Travel in Ireland
Tommy Mac here….Hi Eileen, any fond memories of home in this article???
Experiencing Titanic’s last port of call in Cobh, Ireland
The Titanic Experience at Cork harbor commemorates the Irish passengers who boarded the ship at Titanic’s last port of call.
On April 11, 1912, the Titanic departed Cobh, formerly known as Queenstown, in Co Cork, and set sail for New York. Today The Titanic Experience at Cork harbor commemorates the Irish passengers who boarded the ship at Titanic’s last port of call.
In the dark, on the first night of September, the bells of St. Colman’s ring out over the peaked rooftops of Cobh. The notes, pure and deliberate, linger over the quiet waters of Cork Harbor below.
Liam and I are on the roof deck of the Commodore Hotel. He is my son, and he is seven. The deck is a short bit of hallway and two steps up from our room, which has such a perfect view of the harbor that its two tall windows might as well be paintings hanging on the wall, the work of an artist with an eye for cloud-bearing light.
A brief rain has left the picnic tables on the deck damp so I remain standing while Liam lopes back and forth, back and forth. As the chimes ring, I call to him and point to the cathedral, miles away, atop a steep hill.
While walking up Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, St. Patrick’s startles, as though the cathedral has suddenly stepped forward from the gray gathering of office buildings that surround it. Not so St. Colman’s. From the moment we got off the train from Dublin a day earlier, it drew our gaze. Wherever we go in Cobh, St. Colman’s is there. Imagine what it must have been like to watch it appear on the hillside, stone by stone over forty-seven years, a slowly manifesting angel.
Liam and I have come outside so Travis, my husband, his father, can get some work done by dawn, New York time. And Liam needs to stretch his legs. We live in a four-room apartment in Brooklyn. He takes his space where he can get it. Liam, tall for his age, quickly shifting from puppy to colt. His eyes are the exact blue of my own, and my father’s and those of my grandfather, who was born in Tuam, Co. Galway in 1906. My grandfather left Ireland at the age of nineteen. My grandmother, from Ballinasloe, emigrated a few years later. Both, like thousands of Irish before them, and thousands after, traveled to Cork to sail from Cobh Harbor.
Had either left only a few years earlier, their tickets would have said Queenstown. In 1849, Queen Victoria paid a visit, her first-ever trip to Ireland, and Cobh was renamed to commemorate the occasion. Those with even a glancing knowledge of Irish history will recognize 1849 as a hunger year. Mass starvation and death, eviction, and emigration. It’s difficult to reconcile this with a royal visit. Indeed, after the Irish Free State was established in 1922, Queenstown was replaced with a Gaelicized version of its former (English) name, Cove. And so Cobh was the last my grandparents saw of their homeland, Edward, for decades, Una forever. They would meet and marry in Brooklyn.
Yet it is not our own ghosts that we have come here to find.
I walk to the railing of the roof deck of the Commodore and look left up the street. There, just in sight, is a building, unassuming but for the red flags, embossed with a white star. I call Liam over and point. He looks left.
“That’s the museum,” I tell him. “That’s where we were today.”
The building once housed the local offices of the White Star Line, the renowned British shipping company. On April 14, 1912, Titanic, the gem of its fleet, struck an iceberg on its maiden voyage. The collision happened at 11:40 pm. Within two hours, the ship at once sank to the sea and rose to legend. Approximately 1,500 people died; 706 survived.
I can’t recall why I first mentioned Titanic to Liam but I do know he was instantly fascinated, exactly as I had been when I was eleven and, while browsing in the library, stumbled across A Night to Remember, Walter Lord’s seminal book about the tragedy.
I showed Liam the sinking sequence from James Cameron’s 1997 movie, Titanic. He now has it memorized. He’s also read several children’s books about Titanic. He can name each officer and say who survived and who did not. He can tell you that most of those lost were in Third Class and that a great many of them were Irish.
Titanic was built in Belfast and sailed to Southampton, England, for the official start of her maiden voyage. From Southampton, she went to Cherbourg, France where 281 passengers boarded. On April 11, Titanic arrived in Cobh Harbor, its final port of call. Eight passengers disembarked and 123 boarded.
On the roof deck of the Commodore, Liam bounds off and as I continue to contemplate the museum. Cork was not part of our original itinerary for this trip. We added it at the last minute, for Liam. Given his interest, it seemed unfair to come all the way to Ireland and not touch Titanic. Belfast, where the ship was built and where there is a very big museum and memorial, was not remotely an option. Cork we could manage, though only just. It meant one day in Galway instead of three. Travis said we should because who knew when we’d be back in Ireland?
I agreed, yet my own decision was made both as a parent and as a novelist. I’ve written about real-life tragedies and I know what means to visit a location where lives were lost and how, if you try, you can double-see. The place as it is now and as it was that day, that night, that hour. I understand what it means to say, I know what happened here and I see you. Though Liam is too young to grasp this, he will have the memory to keep.
***
Each ticket to Titanic Experience, Cobh was a replica of a Third Class boarding pass with a passenger’s name on it. At the very end of the tour, we were told, we could check the list of Irish who boarded the Titanic at Queenstown and see if ‘we’d’ lived or died.
My name was Kate Mullen. My husband was Patrick Canavan and Liam, Eugene Daly. The boarding passes were dated April 11, 1912. In small print, there was a menu of the three meals a day provided to the Third Class passengers, who were not allowed in the Titanic’s lavish restaurants.
The tour guide was respectful, but not overly grave. She led us to exhibits of passengers’ quarters: a sepia-lit, First Class stateroom, and then a replica of Third Class, or steerage, quarters. The contrast was striking, like looking at a luxury hotel suite and then a dorm room. Behind a velvet rope, there was a set of bunk beds and a basin for washing. A pair of shoes sat on the floor.
We climbed a flight of stairs and filed outside onto a narrow balcony that overlooked the harbor. Here, the guide informed us that Titanic did not actually sail into Cork Harbor. The ship was too large. It dropped anchor behind Spike Island, which has, over the course of its history, been the site of a monastery, a fort, and a prison.
Passengers were brought to and from Titanic on two small boats called tenders. The guide pointed out the pier from which the passengers boarded the PS Ireland and the PS America. It is the very pier that was in place over a century ago.
Once the guided part of the tour was done, including a short film watched while sitting in a replica of a lifeboat, we were free to stay in the museum for as long as we liked.
There is an exhibit dedicated to Margaret Rice and her five sons, which startled me because I recalled reading their names in the Passenger List index that concludes Walter Lord’s A Night to Remember. Their names were not italicized, which meant they’d died. After each of the boys’ names: (CHILD). They are not otherwise mentioned in the book. I had not known they were Irish.
Margaret was a widow. Her oldest son was ten and the youngest, two. As later reported by a fellow Third Class passenger, the Rice family were last seen on deck, Margaret holding the baby as her other boys clung to her skirt.
One-hundred and fifty of Titanic’s lost are buried in Nova Scotia. Margaret Rice is one of them, identified by a pillbox with her name on it, recognized as Catholic by the rosary in her pocket. If found, Albert, George, Eric, Arthur, and Eugene Francis were never identified.
There is an exhibit dedicated to the Addergoole Fourteen, the men and women from the parish of Addergoole in County Mayo who sailed together on Titanic. Eleven of them died. And so Addergoole bears the tragic distinction of having lost the most people on Titanic, proportionally. That is, the number lost in direct correlation to its population. Most of the groups were related to each other. Husband and wife. Brother and sister. Aunt and niece. Several were cousins. Every April 15, in Addergoole, bells are rung in memory of those who were lost over a century ago, a tradition carried on by the Addergoole Titanic Society.
As for the passengers on our boarding passes, Kate Mullen survived. She went on to work as a domestic in New York City and later married and had four children. She is buried in St. Raymond’s Cemetery in the Bronx.
Eugene Daly saved two Irishwomen, one of them his cousin, by convincing them to go up on decks to get in a lifeboat when neither believed they were in danger. Eugene went down with Titanic, washed overboard at the very end. He survived by clinging to the overturned Collapsible B lifeboat through the night. He married and had one child, a daughter, and eleven grandchildren. Eugene Daly is also buried in St. Raymond’s Cemetery. His gravestone says, ‘Titanic Survivor.’
Patrick Canavan was one of the Addergoole Fourteen, on his way to join his sister in Philadelphia. He was lost. One of the Addergoole survivors credited Pat and another man with guiding many of their group to the deck where the lifeboats were launching. If his body was found, it was not identified.
Quietly, we left the museum.
***
The bells of St. Colman’s ring again.
They remind me that it’s getting late and Liam needs to get to bed. Tomorrow, we are leaving Cobh, catching a train to Portlaoise. But I wait a few more minutes until the bells finish. Below, a small boat passes by, rippling the moonlight on the night-black water.
Titanic set sail at 1 o’clock in the afternoon. According to the online Encyclopedia Titanica, many of the Irish passengers attended morning mass at St. Colman’s. (Encyclopedia Titanica cites “The Irish on the Titanic” by Senan Murphy as its source.)
Cove-Queenstown-Cobh has a third name, a nickname of sorts. The saddest place in Ireland. This refers, of course, to the Irish who emigrated and to the families left behind.
Outwardly, there is nothing remotely morose about Cobh, a garden of a town with rows of colorful buildings. Yet if you dip down into it, I think the sadness is there, like a humming you can’t hear unless you listen for it. Not the ringing of bells, but the vibration left behind.
The intimate, respectful museum to Ireland’s losses on April 15, 1912, speaks to this. In reference to the Titanic, Irish is very often synonymous with steerage or even shorthand for it. A typical, off-the-cuff recitation of Titanic passengers, the survivors, and the dead, usually goes like this: Astor, Guggenheim, Strauss, Duff Gordon. It’s never, Rice, Canavan, Daly, Mullin, Donohoe. The power of Titanic Experience, Cobh is a simple acknowledgment. I see you.
The pier that Titanic’s Irish passengers crossed isn’t visible from the roof of the Commodore. But though I can’t see it, I envision how it must appear in the dark. All the structures that can be seen from the water’s edge of Cork Harbor, the older ones and the more recent, are well-tended: the hotels, pubs shops, restaurants, JFK Memorial Park, directly across from the Commodore Hotel. The pier, in contrast, is notably stark. A pier-skeleton. Of the 123 men, women, and children who boarded the Titanic at Queenstown, 79 were lost.
Imagine their ghosts crossing the pier for eternity. Better to haunt Cobh than the lonely Atlantic. Return to the very last place where your life might have been saved. Stay for the chance that time might deliver you back to April 11, 1912, where a voice can call down through the century, turn back.
* Originally published in April 2018, last updated in April 2023.
This article was submitted to the IrishCentral contributors network by a member of the global Irish community. To become an IrishCentral contributor click here.
Irish Language
Tír gan Teanga, Tír gan Anam:
A land without a language is a land without a soul.
Submitted by our own
Anita
(gir-ian bare-ch boh-har)
Free Irish Classes
The classes are over zoom and are held at 12:00 eastern time the 1 st Sunday of every month.
It is basic conversational Irish and open to learners of all ages, especially beginners.
All are invited.
Hope to see you there!
slan go foill. Le dea ghui,
Anita
click here to register
Travel Quiz
Can you identify this site
and its location in Ireland
Send your guess to Tommy Mac at [email protected]
Answer in Next Week’s Newsletter
Last week’s answer
Roscommon Castle
This week’s Irish Recipe
Pork Tenderloin with Prune Stuffing
Discover a delicious Irish-inspired pork tenderloin stuffed with beer-soaked prunes, perfectly balancing sweet and savory flavors, an elegant twist on the classic pork and apple pairing.
There’s something deeply comforting about the timeless pairing of pork with a touch of sweetness. For many of us, it brings back memories of Sunday dinners where roast pork was served with a generous spoonful of apple sauce on the side.
But today, I’m sharing a slightly different take on that beloved combination, one that has roots in traditional Irish cooking, yet feels just a little bit special.
his prune stuffed pork tenderloin is a beautiful example of how Irish cooks have long paired pork with fruit to create a perfect balance of savory and sweet. Instead of apples, we use beer-soaked prunes, which add a rich, deep sweetness and a lovely softness that melts into the meat as it cooks.
And trust me! Once you try this, you’ll see that prunes and pork are just as delightful a match as pork and apple sauce.
Ingredients
- 6 ounces prunes dried and pitted – about 18 prunes
- 1½ cup beer Irish pale ale
- 2 pork tenderloin pork steak in Ireland
- 4 tablespoons olive oil
- 4 tablespoons butter salted
- 4 shallots peeled and finely chopped
- 4 teaspoons sage fresh and finely chopped
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
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Instructions
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Place the prunes in a small bowl and add the beer. Soak the prunes for about 30 minutes.
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Preheat the oven to 325° Fahrenheit. Slit each pork tenderloin in half lengthways but do not cut all the way through. Season the inside of the tenderloins with salt and pepper.
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Drain the prunes and reserve the beer. Place the prunes inside the open pork tenderloin.
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Close and secure with cocktail sticks at the side.
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Heat half the oil and half the butter in a skillet over medium high heat. Add the pork tenderloin and sautée for 3 minutes on each side to seal the meat.
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Transfer the tenderloin to a casserole dish. Baste with about two tablespoons of the reserved beer marinade. Bake in the pre-heated oven for 20 minutes.
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Add the remaining oil and butter to the pan. Add the chopped shallots and sauté for 3 minutes.
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Pour the remaining beer from soaking the prunes to the shallots in the pan. Scrape the bottom of the skillet to deglaze the pan. Simmer for 3 minutes to reduce the liquid.
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Add the sage and simmer over medium heat for 5 more minutes.
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Take the meat out from the oven and remove the cocktail sticks. Transfer the meat to the skillet with the shallots. Add any juices from the casserole dish to the skillet. Cook for 2 more minutes.
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Slice the tenderloin into rounds to serve. The prunes will form a circular stuffing in the center of each piece. Serve with the reduced beer and shallot gravy.
Poem of the week
SHEEP AND LAMBS
By Katharine Tynan
All in the April evening,
April airs were abroad;
The sheep with their little lambs
Passed me by on the road.
The sheep with their little lambs
Passed me by on the road;
All in the April evening
I thought on the Lamb of God.
The lambs were weary and crying
With a weak, human cry.
I thought on the Lamb of God
Going meekly to die.
Up in the blue, blue mountains
Dewy pastures are sweet;
Rest for the little bodies,
Rest for the little feet.
But for the Lamb of God,
Up on the hill-top green,
Only a Cross of shame
Two stark crosses between.
All in the April evening,
April airs were abroad;
I saw the sheep with their lambs,
And thought on the Lamb of God.
Stories and Tales
WATCH: Liam Neeson takes his Easter Bunny audition very seriously
Leave it to Liam Neeson to envision the Easter Bunny as a “freak of nature, a confused, grotesque monster.”
Liam Neeson has already auditioned to be Santa Claus, so it’s only right that he’s now trying out for the Easter Bunny.
Neeson, the Co Antrim native who’s made a name for himself as one of Hollywood’s premier tough guy action stars, masterfully flexed his comedic muscle in a sketch that debuted on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” just ahead of Easter 2024.
Donning a nonthreatening Easter Bunny get-up, Neeson launches into a decidedly gritty recitation of “Here Comes Peter Cottontail” in the hilarious bit.
“This time, why don’t we keep it light?” the director of the audition suggests as Neeson adjusts his Easter Bunny costume. “Remember, it’s for children and he’s a bunny.”
However, veteran actor Neeson knows there is more than meets the eye when it comes to the Easter Bunny.
“Do you understand what’s happening here?” Neesons retorts. “He’s hopping down the bunny trail, hippity, hoppity. He’s coming. He’s an unstoppable force, measured, inevitable.”
Undeterred, Neeson continues his Easter Bunny audition: “Eggs aren’t the only that will be dying tonight.”
Growingly confused, the director asks if that’s the Easter Bunny saying that.
“If you have to ask, you don’t understand the Bunny’s mindset,” Neeson argues.
“I think I do,” the perplexed director says. “He’s a bunny bringing candy to children …”
“Yes, he’s a Bunny,” Neeson explains. “But a Bunny who’s laying eggs. He’s a freak of nature. A confused, grotesque monster. There’s no telling what he’s capable of.
“Why do you think he’s holding up a carrot, pal?”
The director says, “Because it’s what he likes to eat?”
Neeson retorts: “No. By employing the Bunny’s certain set of skills, he can gnaw it down, into a shiv. Slip it between people’s ribs who have ruined him.”
Obviously convinced the audition is a no-go, the director thanks Neeson for coming in and claims “we’ll give you a call.”
Softening a bit, Neeson requests: “Call soon. I need the job. I’m running out of relatives to be taken.”
*Originally published in March 2024. Updated April 2026.
Irish traditional music remains
Ireland’s most enduring and defining product
“The vast transcultural history of Irish traditional music remains obscured by narrow research agendas and binary debates about tradition and innovation.”
Irish traditional music is among the most popular World Music genres of our time. Performed by Irish and non-Irish musicians throughout the world and patronized by audiences in diverse social and cultural settings, this ancient yet modern art is one of Ireland’s most enduring and defining cultural products.
Although Irish music’s eponymous home on the island of Ireland is still its creative center of gravity, this genre has expanded far beyond its ethnic, regional, and national origins.
In 1855, the music collector George Petrie wrote that “the music of Ireland has hitherto been the exclusive property of the peasantry. The upper classes are a different race – a race who possess no national music; or, if any, one essentially different from that of Ireland. They are insensitive to its beauty, for it breathed not their feelings; and they resigned it to those from whom they took everything else. He who would add to the stock of Irish melody must seek it, not in the halls of the great, but in the cabins of the poor.”
The Great Irish Famine (1845–1852), which provided the context for Petrie’s observation, had a devastating impact on the topography of Irish traditional music, as well as the music makers who maintained it. In its wake, the diaspora carried Irish music and song well beyond the rural cabins where Petrie transcribed during the middle decades of the nineteenth century. Since then, it has put down roots in the towns and cities of Ireland, and in Irish and non-Irish communities in North America, South America, Europe, and Australasia. Its intriguing dispersal from the kitchens and crossroads of the West of Ireland to the concert halls and recording studios of the New World has been propelled further by revolutions in mass media, popular culture, and international travel. While their music may be traced to a rural dialect, a traveling piper, a faded manuscript, or an old gramophone record, Irish traditional musicians today command the avid attention of vast transnational audiences.
There is no ironclad definition of Irish traditional music. It is best understood as a broad-based genre, which accommodates a complex process of musical convergence, coalescence, and innovation over time. It involves different types of singing, dancing, and instrumental music developed by Irish people at home and abroad over the course of several centuries. Irish traditional music is essentially oral in character and is transmitted from one generation to the next through a process of performance. Experienced musicians are capable of memorizing up to five hundred pieces of music, some of which they play regularly, while others may lie dormant for years. While traditional music has developed largely beyond the literate process, much of it has been written down. Some performers learn formally from written sources, as well as informally from experienced players. Others learn from radio, television, sound recordings, and the Internet. Although its repertoire may seem conservative in form, the oral base of Irish traditional music allows it to be more fluid than written music.
Although some musicians and singers are folk composers in their own right, not all new compositions are accepted as part of the living tradition. When they are, the original composer is often forgotten and his or her ‘compositions’ absorb the influence of different dialects, instruments, and musicians. Hence the multiplicity of versions of well-known dance tunes and songs that is commonplace in Irish music. Within the bounds of the established tradition, experienced performers use improvisation in their interpretation of tunes, songs, and dances. This involves ornamenting and varying the basic melodic structures in dance music, as well as in traditional songs. Most musicians refer to their music as ‘traditional music’ or ‘Irish music’. The term ‘folk music’ is only used on occasion, while vague generic labels like Celtic Music, World Music, and market-driven typologies like Celtic Fusion, Afro-Celt, and Ethno Pop enjoy little currency among traditional performers.
Three interlocking traditions
In older rural communities in the West of Ireland, music usually followed the work cycle of the agricultural year. Festivities began with the Wrenboy celebrations on St Stephen’s Day (shortly after midwinter), continued through the matchmaking and weddings of Shrove (which often involved four or five house dances), and on into the sowing and harvest seasons, until the work cycle began again. Traditional music today has moved beyond this older cyclical milieu and may be heard at diverse social gatherings, pub sessions, dances, concerts, and festivals in various urban settings.
Irish instrumental music is sometimes referred to in terms of regional styles. A fiddler may be described as having a Sligo, Clare, or Donegal style. While these simplistic county divisions are partially valid, research among rural communities, especially in the West of Ireland, has revealed a more precise topography of musical dialects. Many of these are based on older clachan-type communities (rural clusters of extended kin and neighbors) that have remained intact since the post-famine era and are distinguished by specific dance rhythms, tune repertoires, and other stylistic features preserved by prominent performers and musical families.
The most common dance tunes in the Irish tradition are reels, jigs, hornpipes, polkas, slides, mazourkas, and highlands. Slow airs (usually based on sean nós songs in Irish) are also played by many instrumentalists. These sound most authentic when played on uilleann pipes, fiddle, flute or tin whistle. Dance tunes usually consist of two eight-bar segments, which older musicians refer to as ‘the first part’ and ‘the turn’. Each part is played twice through and the sequence is repeated twice (or three times) before changing into a new tune.
Most dance tunes in the Irish tradition date from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. They are played on various wind, string, and free-reed instruments, including flute, tin whistle, uilleann pipes, fiddle, concertina, and accordion. With the exception of the goat-skin bodhrán (a traditional drum played with a stick) and drums used in céilí bands, percussion instruments are of minor importance. Some of the most important developments in Irish fiddle music during the 20th century took place in the United States, which, by 1920, had become a creative center of Irish traditional music. The key patriarchs of this movement were Sligo fiddlers Michael Coleman, James Morrison, and Paddy Killoran. In Ireland, fiddlers Tommy Potts, Johnny Doherty, Paddy Canny, and Denis Murphy were responsible for some unique regional and stylistic contributions to their genre. Piping in contemporary Ireland has been shaped ostensibly by the playing of Séamus Ennis and Willie Clancy. Their styles are endemic today. Flute and whistle playing has been influenced by the recordings of John McKenna, John Joe Gardiner, and Tom McHale, who in turn inspired other performers.
Accordions and concertinas have been the most prominent melody instruments in Irish traditional music since the 1950s. The banjo (originally an African instrument, brought to America during the slave trade) has also made its presence felt in Irish traditional music, especially in the hands of Barney McKenna. Harpers have spurred a renaissance in Irish harp music. Other instruments have also been brought into the Irish musical fold, among them the piano, mouth organ, and piano accordion. Despite the obvious antiquity of the dance music, celebrated folk composers like Paddy Fahey and Martin Mulhaire continue to write new tunes. Lilting (portaireacht) or mouth music – once used for dancers in the absence of instruments at country house dances – has also regained its status in recent years.
The song tradition in Ireland is determined largely by the two linguistic cultures on the island. The most archaic form is sean nós (old style) singing in the Irish language. Each regional dialect of Irish has its own unique sean nós style. A complex and magnificent art, sean nós is an unaccompanied form of singing which demands tremendous skill and artistic understanding. It derives in part from the bardic tradition of professional poetry, which declined in the seventeenth century. There is no display of emotion or dramatics in sean nós. The singer is expected to vary each verse using improvisation, an implicit musical skill that requires subtle changes in rhythm, ornamentation, and timbre.
The transition from Irish to English language was marked by the growth of bilingual macaronic songs, many of which still survive. There are two categories of songs in English: English and Scottish songs, and Anglo-Irish songs. The first was introduced to Ireland by English and Scottish settlers in the seventeenth century, and by Irish migrant workers. This genre, which includes classic ballads like Lord Baker and Barbara Allen, is still popular in Ulster. Anglo-Irish songs were composed by Irish people whose mother tongue was English. These songs address the themes of love, courtship, emigration, politics, elopements, and other topics of human interest. Apart from these secular songs, a unique body of carols survives in the village of Kilmore Quay, Co Wexford. It dates from the seventeenth century and derives from a corpus of songs published by Luke Wadding in Ghent in 1684, as well as a manuscript collection compiled by William Devereux in Wexford in 1734.
There are few written accounts of dancing in Ireland before the 18th century. Foreign travelers have left references to the Irish hey, as well as the sword dance, round dance, and long dance. The English geographer Arthur Young left a colorful account of the Irish dancing master in the 1770s. Since then, Irish dancing has morphed into three distinct traditions, namely set dancing, céilí dancing, and step dancing, each of which has cross-cultural cognates in North America. Michael Flatley’s theatrical extravaganza Lord of the Dance, for example, derives much of its material from the formulaic step dancing initiated by Gaelic League revivalists in the late 19th century.
Since the spectacular emergence of Riverdance in 1994, Irish traditional music, song, and dance have received considerable media attention worldwide.
Other touring performers, new trends in Irish music education (formal and informal), and Internet sociology have also expanded the patronage and topographies of these genres. Despite this acclaim, however, the vast transcultural history of Irish traditional music remains obscured by narrow research agendas and binary debates about tradition and innovation – that frequently fail to explore the full gamut of Irish music memory and historiography. The purpose of this book, therefore, is to shed further light on this immense reserve of Irish cultural history, to acknowledge the music makers who sustain it, and to delight in the enduring success of their traditions at home and abroad.
*The above is an extract from “A Short History of Irish Traditional Music“, by Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin.
* Originally published in 2017 in Ireland of the Welcomes, updated in April 2026.
Click below to watch, and remember to click on the speaker for sound.
Warning: there is foul language.
On This Day: An Irishman was the first paid television preformer
On April 7, 1927, Mr A. Dolan was the first person in history who was paid to perform on American TV.
Television is an everyday part of life, but in the 1920s, it was an experimental and revolutionary technology. Long before the golden age of television, Irish performers played a pivotal role in its earliest broadcasts. Two key figures—Mr. A. Dolan and Peg O’Neil—helped shape television history, marking Ireland’s contributions to the birth of this transformative medium.
In 1927, the world witnessed the dawn of paid television broadcasting, a groundbreaking moment that featured an Irishman at its center. Mr. A. Dolan, employed by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), became one of the first professional performers to be broadcast on television. He delivered a “short act of monologue and song” in what was a pioneering experiment in visual entertainment. This historic moment demonstrated the potential of television as a commercial and artistic platform.
Just a year later, in 1928, another Irish artist made television history—this time in Britain. Peg O’Neil, an Irish singer, became the first professional performer to be seen on British television. As British television was still in its experimental phase, O’Neil’s appearance was a significant milestone, demonstrating the ability to broadcast musical performances to audiences beyond a live setting.
The 1928 British broadcast was conducted by John Logie Baird, a Scottish engineer widely credited with developing the first mechanical television system. His experiments led to the first public television demonstration in 1926, and by 1928, he was able to feature performers like Peg O’Neil, showing the potential of television as a new medium for entertainment. O’Neil’s performance marked the beginning of a tradition that would later see music, drama, and storytelling flourish on television screens across the world.
How the 1916 Easter Rising gave way to Ireland’s War of Independence
For many, the differences between the three-year Irish War of Independence and the 1916 Easter Rising become blurred.
Ireland’s War of Independence is sometimes confused with the 1916 Easter Rising – the two are different but related.
The conflict between British forces and Irish volunteers escalated in earnest in 1920, and the centenaries of several key moments in Ireland’s bid for freedom were marked in 2020.
However, the Irish War of Independence and Ireland’s 1916 Easter Rising often get conflated over time. It’s important to make the distinction between two different but related Irish revolutions because, to those who didn’t grow up with an education in Irish history, the difference between the ill-fated Easter Rising and the successful War of Independence can be a little confusing.
The close proximity of the two revolutions, coupled with the fact that many of the leaders of Ireland’s bid for freedom also fought during Easter week in 1916, means that the two conflicts are synonymous.
But there were almost three years between the last shots of the Rising in Dublin and the first shots of the War of Independence in Soloheadbeg, Tipperary.
It is important, therefore, to look at the two conflicts as two separate events where the Rising had a significant bearing on what came next, rather than viewing them as two entirely separate conflicts or one continuous war.
On the face of it, they are almost polar opposites of one another.
The 1916 Rising was borne out of Britain’s ongoing war with Germany and the opportunities that it presented, among other things.
The rebels were overwhelmingly vilified by the Irish public, who looked on and viewed them as responsible for the destruction of Dublin City and the deaths of hundreds of innocent civilians.
During the War of Independence, on the other hand, Irish rebels had almost complete support from the Irish people. Many rebels were sheltered by civilians in safe houses across the country in their fight against the Black and Tans, the Royal Irish Constabulary [RIC] and other occupying forces.
That seismic shift in public sentiment can be largely, but not exclusively, attributed to the events directly after the Easter Rising, when British authorities made the fatal decision to execute the leaders of the uprising without trial.
The executions of James Connolly, who was so badly wounded he was shot in a chair, and Joseph Mary Plunkett, who was married on the eve of his execution, were particularly harsh and whipped the Irish public into a frenzy.
To paraphrase W.B. Yeats, one of Ireland’s greatest poets, the political landscape in Ireland was “changed, changed utterly.”
A terrible beauty was born.
Other events, like the plan to introduce conscription in Ireland in 1918, helped to deepen the divide between the Irish people and the British Government, but the execution and martyrdom of 1916’s leaders turned public opinion irreversibly and gave Ireland an unstoppable momentum towards achieving its independence.
It was this dual blunder of the 1916 executions and the introduction of conscription in 1918 that gave rise to Sinn Féin’s popularity.
In the 1918 British general election, Sinn Féin would win 73 seats out of 105 available on the island of Ireland – a staggering feat considering they were only founded a year previously.
Sinn Féin vowed to fight for an independent Ireland, showing that the Irish people overwhelmingly rejected British rule.
In a tradition that continues to this day, Sinn Féin did not take its seats in the British parliament in Westminster but instead set up Dáil Éireann in January 1919.
This would give the Irish rebels something that their counterparts in 1916 did not have: a political wing that could be sent to negotiate when the time came.
Coincidentally, the first shots of the War of Independence were fired on the same day that the Dáil sat for its first session.
So, with the will of the people and an elected government behind them, Ireland’s latest band of rebels had more hope than ever before of winning independence from the United Kingdom.
That is another key difference between the Easter Rising and the War of Independence. The leaders of the 1916 Rising knew they would be defeated and likely meet their ends, but they carried on in the hope that their efforts would inspire others.
And that is exactly what transpired.
Soldiers during the 1916 Rising, like Michael Collins, rose to prominence during the War of Independence. They had been interned in Prisoner of War camps as retribution for their part in the Rising, but were released to appease the growing discord among the Irish public.
This partially accounts for the lengthy gap between the end of the Rising and the beginning of the War of Independence.
Collins himself was interned at Frongoch Prison Camp in Wales, and it was there that he began to consider different forms of warfare to harm the superior British forces.
While the 1916 Rising was a grandiose act of war designed to attract the world’s attention, the War of Independence was a series of gritty skirmishes with few, if any, instances of traditional battles.
Collins organized his troops into ‘flying columns’ comprising between 20 and 100 men. The idea was to employ hit-and-run tactics on small targets like RIC barracks or British intelligence officers and then disappear into large crowds.
It was this guerrilla warfare that leveled the playing field between the inferior Irish forces and the vast expanses of the British Empire, and 1920 saw an escalation in that warfare.
From Black and Tans to British spies and from the original Bloody Sunday to IRA ambushes, 1920 saw some of the most significant moments in recent Irish history.
*Originally published in February 2020, updated in April 2026.
Glenn McCarthy: The Irish American Texas wildcatter
Glenn McCarthy rose from a Beaumont waterboy to a multimillion-dollar wildcatter whose Shamrock Hotel opening in downtown Houston attracted Hollywood glitter but ended in theft, injury, and infamy.
On March 17, 1949, the new hotel’s glitter drew Hollywood names such as Kirk Douglas and Lana Turner, who admired shamrocked lights and what was then the world’s largest outdoor pool, before the gala descended into mayhem. The night marked the high-water point of a flamboyant wildcatter who rose from a waterboy in Beaumont amid the Spindletop boom to amass vast wealth from wells around Anahuac and beyond, only to see fields run dry, debts mount, and the hotel later sold as his empire unraveled.
It is Saint Patrick’s Day, 1949. We are in the newly built Shamrock Hotel, the stage for what promises to be a spectacular occasion. Hollywood stars like Kirk Douglas and Lana Turner are here, admiring the Irish-themed lighting overhead. Most of the guests are calm and collected, but some are not – the mayor’s chair is stolen, a radio broadcast is cut off after someone swears too effusively, and someone even breaks their arm. Indeed, the mayor, incensed by the loss of his chair, later called the party “the worst mob scene I ever witnessed”.
Born in Beaumont, Texas, in 1907, Glenn McCarthy was destined for a life in the oilfields, even as a boy. At the age of eight, he began work as a waterboy for his father, a labourer in a nearby oil field, earning 50 cents a day. An accomplished football player but mediocre student, he entered the oil business after dropping out of college, buying two Houston fuel stations before his 23rd birthday. He married the daughter of a prominent oil tycoon, setting in motion a distinguished career in the industry.
McCarthy came of age at the opportune time for an aspiring oilman. In 1901, an oil well was found at Spindletop, near Beaumont, sparking a flood of investment into the town. The following year, Spindletop alone accounted for 94% of the state’s total production, while Beaumont’s population increased fivefold that same year. Companies like the Texas Fuel Company (Texaco) were set up in the town, making Texas the most oil-rich state in the country. By 1940, its oilfields were producing twice as much annually as California, its closest competitor.
A charming man, McCarthy was looked down on by his new father-in-law, who dismissed him as a social climber. Determined to prove him wrong, McCarthy went hunting for oil fields to drill. He struck liquid gold for the first time in Anahuac, a small town midway between Beaumont and Houston, shortly before his 26th birthday, from which he could extract almost 600 barrels of oil a day. His landholdings expanded rapidly – by 1949, he owned about 400 oil and gas wells, sufficient to put his net worth at $200 million (about $2.5 billion in today’s money).
McCarthy spent his wealth liberally. He built a mansion in downtown Houston and financed unsuccessful efforts to bring an NFL football team to the city. In 1949, he built the Shamrock Hotel near his mansion, flying in 2,500 shamrocks from Ireland for its opening ceremonies.
Eighteen stories tall, it was adorned with green décor and featured what was then the largest outdoor swimming pool in the world. In a further nod to his ancestry, he called the inhouse night club the Cork Club and employed a team of synchronised swimmers called the “Corkettes”, who delighted his famous guests. In all, about 5,000 people attended the hotel’s opening ceremony, costing McCarthy about $1 million in total.
Now well-established in elite American circles, McCarthy grew his business empire further. He co-produced the film “The Green Promise”, starring Natalie Wood, then just a child actor, and Walter Brennan, an Irish-American friend.
McCarthy’s enchanting personality made him many friends – a 1952 Time magazine write-up reported how, after finding out that he needed $20,000 to finish his mansion, an oilman that McCarthy barely knew sent him a cheque of $50,000 with the note “Pay me when you can”.
Later that year, novelist Edna Ferber published Giant, a book about a Texan family, with one of its protagonists, Jett Rink, being based on McCarthy. In 1956, the book was adapted into a film, with Rink’s character being played by James Dean.
Flush with cash, McCarthy bought a 15,000-acre ranch in West Texas and invested in cattle, a radio station, banks, tabloid newspapers, steel mills, and even his own brand of bourbon. He also served as the chair of Eastern Airlines and was appointed President of the U.S. Petroleum Association. Unfortunately for McCarthy, however, the good times would not last forever.
In the early 1950s, his wells began to run dry, and low oil prices further reduced his revenues. By 1952, he owed $52 million to insurance companies, forcing him to sell the Shamrock to the Hiltons, an affluent family of hoteliers. He even sold off his mansion, moving to the small Texas town of La Porte.
With the assistance of his moneyed friends and a government loan, he eventually recovered financially, but his entrepreneurial streak was gone. He embarked on failed drilling ventures in South America before retiring from public life. He died in 1988, just long enough to see the Shamrock Hotel demolished. McCarthy’s high life had come to a crushing end.
In this essay, I have told the story of Glenn McCarthy, the Irish-American wildcatter of elite Texan society. He was one of many oilmen to shape its economic and political fortunes during the 20th century. H.L Hunt became the wealthiest man in the United States and used his money to fund the far-right John Birch Society, Clint Murchison operated oil and gas reserves across the state, financing his son’s founding of the Dallas Cowboys NFL team, and William G. Heltzel oversaw the construction of the Inch Line, which supplied American ships and aircraft with Texan oil during the Second World War.
Today, Texas is home to a new cadre of ultrarich business prospectors, including Elon Musk, Mark Cuban, and Stan Kroenke. These wildcatters lie at the vanguard of technological progress, media ownership, and sporting success, influencing all of our lives for good and for ill. As in McCarthy’s day, Texas continues to power the United States, but this time using renewables – it is the number one provider of both wind and solar energy in the country. Even without its Irish-American wildcatter, the party goes on.
This article was submitted to the IrishCentral contributors network by a member of the global Irish community. To become an IrishCentral contributor click here.
Red wine in Georgian Dublin:
It’s healing and detrimental effects
If you’re of Irish heritage and fond of a glass of claret – there may be a very good reason why!
An extract from” Enjoying Claret in Georgian Ireland: A history of amiable excess” by Patricia McCarthy on the believed healing properties and subsequent health issues caused by the popular Bordeaux red wine.
From ancient times and throughout the eighteenth century, wine played a major part in medicine and in religious practices. The Greek Hippocrates (c. 450 BC) was the first recognized practitioner who, having experimented with different wines for various ailments, recommended wine as a disinfectant, a medicine and part of a healthy diet. The Good Samaritan, after all, poured wine (and oil) into the wounds of the traveler that he encountered. The Roman physician Galen (second-century ad) found through his experience of treating wounded gladiators that wine was the most effective disinfectant for wounds; the Talmud states that ‘wine is the foremost of all medicines: wherever wine is lacking, medicines become necessary’; and wine was a feature in the worship of Bacchus, the god of wine.
In the 13th century, Roger Bacon, the philosopher and writer on alchemy and medicine, suggests that wine could “preserve the Stomach, strengthen the Natural Heat, help Digestion, defend the Body from Corruption, carry the Food to all the Parts, and concoct the Food till it be turned into very Blood: It also cheers the Heart, tinges the Countenance with Red, makes the Tongue voluble, begets Assurance, and promises much Good and Profit.”
“But”, he warns, “if it be over-much guzzled, it will on the contrary do a great deal of Harm: For it will darken the Understanding, ill-affect the Brain … beget shaking of the Limbs and Bleareyedness.”
John Dymmok, an Englishman who came to Ireland possibly in the service of Lord Essex, in his “Treatise of Ireland” (1600), tended to blame the climate in Ireland for the amounts of wine and other liquors that were drunk:
“The cuntry lyeth very low, and therefore watrish and full of marishes, boggs and standing pooles, even in the highest mountaynes, which causeth the inhabitants, but especially the sojourners there, to be very subject to rheumes, catarrs, and flixes [sic] for remedy whereof they drinke great quantity of hott wynes, especially sackes and a kind of aqua vitae, more dryinge and less inflamynge, than that which is made in England.”
In the 18th and 19th centuries, people were not shy about discussing their health with each other, probably doing so in the hope that a cure or panacea would be recommended. From correspondence it can be seen that they kept themselves informed regularly regarding complaints, sometimes checking up to see how an illness might be progressing or otherwise, constantly giving advice and sending recipes (or ‘receipts’) of ‘cures’ that they had experienced or of which they had been informed.
In fact, it was expected that everyone had their store of medical ‘cures’, especially women, and those who did not were frowned upon, seen as being similar to a woman who was unable to bake, sew or manage the servants.
A collection of recipes and cures written into or collected in a notebook was an important item in every household. Until the late 18th century, most doctors in Ireland were quacks with some exceptions, one being Lord Trimleston from Co. Meath.
As one doctor put it in a letter to a colleague in 1818, “The superiority of bloodletting over wine, wine over bloodletting, will be successfully established two or three times in the course of every century.”
Daniel O’Connell remarked that “almost all the diseases of persons in the upper classes do at middle life arise from repletion or over-much food in the stomach,” which was probably true.
Among the upper classes, however, gout was the major health problem, particularly for men.
“Irish hospitality” had another meaning for Lord Orrery, who commented in a letter to a friend: “Lord Thomond is laid up with the Gout: the Irish Hospitality has broke out in his Feet, and pins him down to a great Chair and a slender Meal.”
Orrery would have agreed with William Buchan who was of the opinion in “Domestic Medicine” (1784) that excessive alcohol and idleness can be the causes of gout.
In his book, “A Treatise on the Gout” (1760), Charles Louis Liger wrote that “in Great Britain there are perhaps as many if not more victims to this excruciating distemper than in any other part of the world.”
It would seem fairly obvious that, given the amounts of wine consumed in Ireland during the 18th and 19th centuries, there would be numerous health problems, among them gout, about which the barrister Jonah Barrington had this to say:
“I have heard it often said that, at the time I speak of, every estated gentleman in the Queen’s County [Laois] was honoured by the gout … its extraordinary prevalence was not difficult to be accounted for, by the disproportionate quantity of acid contained in their seductive beverage, called rum-shrub, which was then universally drunk in quantities nearly incredible, generally from supper-time till morning, by all country gentlemen, as they said, to keep down their claret.”
In her “Cooking Recipes and Medical Cures”, Mary Ponsonby has a couple of remedies for gout: one was for “three grains of musk in a glass of Madeira or Tent sweetening it with sugar”, while the recipe for the other sounds quite dramatic and required some muscle to prepare:
“Take one pound of stone Brimstone pound in fine and pour one Gallon of Boiling water upon it in a stone jar, shake it several times a day for 2 or 3 days then draw it off for use, take half a pint every morning an hour before breakfast. The jar to be kept close stop’d.”
While the drinking of “the sober gallon of claret” consumed by many was considered to be utterly excessive, doctors too believed in the positive health aspects of wine.
Daniel O’Connell, suffering from “a slow nervous fever”, was advised by his doctor in 1794 to drink a bottle of port per day to cure it.
Thomas Jefferson said, “I have lived temperately … I double the doctor’s recommendation of a glass and half of wine each day and even treble it with a friend”.
For his daughter in her final illness in 1804, he recommended sherry: writing to his son-in-law who was with his wife at Monticello, “The sherry at Monticello is old and genuine, and the Pedro Ximenes much older still and stomachic. Her palate and stomach will be the best arbiters between them.”
In France, a major commercial spat occurred between the French regions when Louis XIV’s physician recommended that the king should drink burgundy rather than champagne for his health.
Lord Byron recommended hock and soda water as a hangover remedy, and Richard Brinsley Sheridan, regarding claret, insists in School for Scandal that “women give headaches, this don’t”.
The earl of Chesterfield’s treatment, recommended by his doctor for an unspecified illness, involved “the consumption of substantial amounts of mercury and burgundy’ which he called ‘my two most constant friends”.
Richard Lovell Edgeworth had his head shaved by his local barber in Edgeworthstown so that his wig would fit snugly, and whether it was the result of this, or perhaps to cure a condition like ringworm, he had his head treated with brandy. Even though drinkers and medical practitioners in the 18th century were fully aware that gout was a direct result of too much wine, it seemed to make little or no difference to their habit nor to the frequency with which they imbibed.
Further, he believes that men “of a good Constitution, whose Parts are sound and Vitals untainted”, suffer no ill-effects from “a continual debauch or excess in this exhilarating fluid, for a long series of Years; but always appear florid and gay, vigorous and lusty”.
Well-run households had a book of recipes and remedies (sometimes referred to as “receipts”), used by the family and very often handed down from one generation to the next. A number of these can be found in family archives in the National Library of Ireland, and other places, and they make for interesting reading. From these, it is obvious that women exchanged recipes with friends whose names were noted in the recipe titles, or they would have read about recipes and/or cures and copied them into their books.
Included in these were remedies for a multitude of illnesses, such as for ‘the Plague’, ‘Hystericks’ or ‘To relieve the common Irish complaint of a pain about ye Heart’ – for the latter ‘strong tea made of peppermint or penny royal, add to this a little wine of any sort with some sugar, and take 3 spoonfuls a dose’. For a sore throat – gargle with ‘3 table spoonfuls of Claret, one of Vinegar, half a spoonful of Honey, a teaspoon of salt, a pinch of Alum, boil and scum it’; for a stomach pain – ‘Half an ounce of rhubarb, a quarter of a nutmeg grated in a quart of Madeira – take a small wine glass going to bed’.
It should be noted that there was no threshold age for children to be introduced to taking alcohol, as it was routinely used in both cooking and medicine.
To twenty-first-century eyes some of these remedies are quite bizarre, but perhaps anything was worth trying and, at the time, they were possible lifelines. Women took pride in their collections of remedies, frequently to be found written in notebooks together with their recipes.
Food, its quantity and its effect on a person’s health, did not seem to be of any real importance compared with the drinking of wine, which could and did cause ill-health but, according to the medical profession at the time, was also the remedy.
* An extract from “Enjoying Claret in Georgian Ireland: A History of Amiable Excess” by Patricia McCarthy (to be published by Four Courts Press in March 2022. Large Format. Full Colour Ills. €40.00).
* This article was originally published in our former sister publication Ireland of the Welcomes in 2022 and updated in April 2026.
On This Day: Titanic sets sail from Southampton, docks in Cherbourg, France
On this day in 1912, Titanic officially began its maiden, yet tragic, journey.
The Titanic picked up more than 200 passengers at its French stop
On April 10, 1912, the Titanic departed from Southampton in the UK just after noon, officially launching her maiden yet tragic voyage.
Upon her departure from Southampton, an estimated 1,846 people were on board making up the majority of the ship’s maximum capacity of 3,547 people.
Departing Southampton, the Titanic endured a small delay when the massive amount of water the ship displaced nearly caused a collision with the SS New York.
Titanic Belfast reports that the SS New York broke free of her moorings and swung towards Titanic, but that the quick actions of a nearby tug who pulled her out of the way saved the day and allowed the Titanic’s maiden journey to continue with just a small delay.
Today, the refurbished SS Nomadic is a feature of the Titanic Belfast exhibit in Northern Ireland:
Two hundred and eighty-one passengers boarded in France: 151 were First Class, 28 were Second Class, and 102 were Third Class.
Twenty-four passengers disembarked Titanic in Cherbourg as their journey had completed.
Many of Titanic’s most wealthy and famous passengers boarded at Cherbourg. Amongst them was John Jacob Astor and his pregnant wife, as well as Sir Cosmo Edmund Duff Gordon and his wife Lady Lucy Christiana Duff Gordon.
Titanic Belfast reports: “Only 21 of those who embarked at Cherbourg were French, with the rest from America, England, Belgium, Canada, Croatia, Greece, Italy, Lebanon, Poland, Russia, Syria, and Uruguay.
However, luxury French products, such as champagne, wine, and cheeses, were also transferred to the Titanic at the port – specifically 75,000 pounds of meat, 15,000 bottles of beer, 10,000 bottles of wine, and 12,000 bottles of mineral water!
Titanic was docked in Cherbourg for only a few hours before departing at about 8:10 pm and heading for Queenstown – now Cobh – in Co Cork in Ireland for its last stop before it fully headed to sea.
* Originally published in April 2019. Updated in April 2026.
News From Ireland
Donald Trump blasts Pope Leo claiming “he likes crime”
President Donald Trump has taken the extraordinary step of publicly criticising Pope Leo XIV, saying he is ‘not a fan’.
He also claimed the American pontiff was “a very liberal person” who needed to “stop catering to the Radical Left”.
Trump launched his full-frontal attack on the leader of the Catholic Church in a scathing and lengthy social media post while flying back to Washington from Florida on Sunday night.
He then backed up his comments to waiting reporters when he landed.
“I’m not a fan of Pope Leo,” he said.
Trump fired back with a typically abrasive post on his Truth Social platform
“Pope Leo is WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy,” the president wrote in his post, adding: “I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s OK for Iran to have a Nuclear Weapon.”
He repeated that sentiment in comments to reporters, saying: “We don’t like a pope who says it’s OK to have a nuclear weapon.”
Leo presided over an evening prayer service in St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican on Saturday, the same day the US and Iran began face-to-face negotiations in Pakistan during a fragile ceasefire.
The pope didn’t mention the US or Trump by name, but his tone and message appeared to be directed at Trump and US officials, who have boasted of US military superiority and justified the war in religious terms.
The pope, who is scheduled to leave on Monday for an 11-day trip to Africa, has previously said that God “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them”.
He has also cited an Old Testament passage from Isaiah, saying that “even though you make many prayers, I will not listen – your hands are full of blood.”
Before the ceasefire, when Trump warned of mass strikes against Iranian power plants and other infrastructure and that “an entire civilization will die tonight”, Leo described such sentiments as “truly unacceptable”.
In his social media post on Sunday night, however, Trump went far beyond the war in Iran in criticizing Leo.
The president wrote: “I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s terrible that America attacked Venezuela, a Country that was sending massive amounts of Drugs into the United States.”
That was a reference to the Trump administration’s ousting of the Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro in January.
“I don’t want a Pope who criticizes the President of the United States because I’m doing exactly what I was elected, IN A LANDSLIDE, to do,” Trump added, referencing his 2024 election victory.
Trump also suggested in the post that Leo only got his position “because he was an American, and they thought that would be the best way to deal with President Donald J Trump!”
“If I weren’t in the White House, Leo wouldn’t be in the Vatican,” Trump wrote, adding: “Leo should get his act together as Pope, use Common Sense, stop catering to the Radical Left, and focus on being a Great Pope, not a Politician. It’s hurting him very badly and, more importantly, it’s hurting the Catholic Church!”
In his subsequent comments to reporters, Trump remained highly critical, saying: “I don’t think he’s doing a very good job. He likes crime I guess,” adding: “He’s a very liberal person.”
In the 2024 election, Trump won 55% of Catholic voters, according to AP VoteCast, an extensive survey of the electorate.
But Trump’s administration also has close ties to conservative evangelical Protestant leaders and has claimed heavenly endorsement for the war on Iran.
* This article was originally published on Extra.ie.
Release date set for magnificent movie filmed entirely in West Cork
Titled ‘Jimmy’, the film will follow a pivotal period in the life of Hollywood icon Jimmy Stewart.
The release date for a West Cork-filmed biopic has been revealed, with the rebel county setting the scene for a massive production.
The film will follow a pivotal period in the life of Hollywood icon Jimmy Stewart, with Burns & Co Entertainment partnering with Fathom Entertainment on theatrical distribution.
Titled ‘Jimmy’, the biopic will show the period in the actor’s life that saw him go from winning the Academy Award for ‘The Philadelphia Story’ to serving as a combat pilot and commander in World War II.
According to Variety, the movie will open nationwide with a traditional theatrical release on November 6.
Riverdale star KJ Apa portrays Jimmy in the film, which shows how he rose to the rank of colonel in the war, only to return emotionally exhausted.
When Jimmy came home from the war, he landed his most iconic role as George Bailey in the Christmas movie ‘It’s A Wonderful Life.’
Other big names in the cast include Kara Killmer, Neal McDonough, Max Casella, Jason Alexander, Christopher McDonald, Sarah Drew, and Rob Riggle.
Ray Nutt, CEO of Fathom Entertainment, told Variety that the biopic ‘is a special film filled with genuine heart and terrific performances from a remarkable ensemble cast that brings Hollywood’s golden age and the battlefields of World War II vividly to life.’
Fathom also announced that it will be bringing It’s a Wonderful Life back to cinemas on December 18 for its 80th anniversary.
The Hollywood production took over West Cork last Autumn, with Extra Extra casting agency in the county putting out a call for over 1,000 extras of all ages.
At the time, they said: ‘Extra extra is currently casting for a major feature film, shooting in West Cork. We’re looking for talented background actors to bring scenes to life. This is a costume period film, all extras will be paid and provided with a fitted costume.’
The agency asked for ‘speaking roles, swing dancers wanted, ballet dancers, Hollywood Oscar party goers, brass bands, Glen Miller Orchestra players, townspeople, airbase crew, bomber pilots, army officers, and medics’.
*This article was originally published on Extra.ie.
Chief economist warns: All roads lead to inflation
The Tánaiste [Irish deputy leader] has played down recession fears, saying: “This is not 2008,” writes Brian Mahon.
However, the chief economist in the Department of Finance, John McCarthy, said it was “impossible” to “assign any probability to a recession,” adding that whatever happens regarding the Iran war, “all roads lead to higher inflation”.
Simon Harris and the chief economist made the remarks while setting out the first-quarter figures for the economy.
Speaking about the war in Iran and the potential for a prolonged economic crisis, Harris said: “If this escalation continues, particularly involving critical energy infrastructure or key maritime routes, the global economic consequences will be significant, and we will face an economic challenge of varying scale, substance and severity, depending on the course of action [of] others in the hours ahead. No government can fully shield its people from a shock of that magnitude.
“But what… this government is doing is acting decisively, in an informed manner, and in a way that seeks to protect the most vulnerable and sustain our economic stability.”
He continued: “Ireland is in a strong position to navigate this period. This is not 2008 – we have full employment, we have a growing economy, which is crucial.
“We have public finances that are managed in a way that gives us options. It’s because of that disciplined approach that we now have fiscal capacity for external shocks… It’s more important than ever that we maintain a balanced and sustainable budgetary strategy.”
McCarthy added: “In terms of the scale of the shock to the economy, it really will depend on the disruption to energy supplies, and, quite clearly, that’s unknown and unknowable.
“Even in the best-case scenario, all roads lead to higher inflation. I think the idea of a kind of short, sharp shock has receded.’ He continued:
“The Tánaiste mentioned some of the differences between now and 2008, and mentioned, quite correctly, the… government’s balance sheet, which is in a much better position. Lots of financial assets and liabilities are quite low. I’d go a little further and say household balance sheets and corporate balance sheets… are in a much better position than they were.”
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Asked by the Irish Daily Mail to rate on a scale of 1-10 the likelihood of a recession occurring as a result of the war, McCarthy said: “At this point, it is impossible to assign any probability to a recession or otherwise.”
He said the department was working on three scenarios, the first of which was benign and a relatively short, sharp shock. McCarthy said it’s “less and less likely” this is about to unfold.
He said they were also preparing a scenario where oil remained at around $100 a barrel, which would have a “large” impact. A third scenario will sketch out what the Irish economy would look like at $150 a barrel. It comes as there was a 3.4% increase in the amount of tax collected by the government in the first quarter of the year, compared to 2025.
Exchequer figures released yesterday show receipts of €22.6bn were collected in the first three months of 2026. There was a 6.1% rise in income tax to €8.7bn, and a 5.3% rise in VAT receipts to €8bn.
While an Exchequer deficit of €200m was recorded, McCarthy explained that it was largely a “timing issue” as a result of money being transferred to Ireland’s long-term investment funds, the Future Ireland Fund (FIF) and Infrastructure, Climate and Nature Fund (ICNF).
McCarthy also described the increase in tax revenue as “solid” without being “spectacular”. Also, government spending was up €1.6bn compared to last year.
* This article was originally published on BusinessPost.ie.
Second day of mayhem on the roads expected
as fuel protestors say they are going nowhere
A second day of fuel protests is set to bring more chaos to roads in the capital and across the country.
A number of slow-moving convoys traveled into the capital on Tuesday morning, causing significant travel delays for commuters going to work and trying to get home in the evening.
Several other protests took place in other counties across the country, including in Galway and Cork, where more slow-moving convoys traveled into the city centers to protest the increased fuel prices as a result of the US and Israel’s war in Iran.
After reaching O’Connell Street on Tuesday afternoon, many protestors said that they planned on remaining in Dublin City Center overnight, with them making good on that promise, as the protests have continued.
Gardaí have warned that possible road blocks may be in place on roads leading to Dublin Airport and Dublin Port, with the protests beginning at 6.30am.
The protests have also disrupted public transport routes — with the LUAS green line being disrupted between St Stephen’s Green and Dominic [Street] due to the protestors blocking the tracks on the O’Connell Bridge.
Gardaí have confirmed in a statement on Wednesday morning (April 8) that the protests are continuing, with traffic at O’Connell Street and the O’Connell Bridge at a standstill.
Traffic is also affected on the North and South Quays in Dublin City Center.
“There is ongoing protest activity currently disrupting traffic in Dublin City Center. O’Connell Street and O’Connell Bridge are at a standstill, and both the North and South Quays are now also affected,” Gardaí wrote on Twitter (X).
“Please plan your journeys accordingly.”
Several slow-moving convoys traveled along a number of motorways into Dublin City on Tuesday morning (April 7), converging at O’Connell Street for a rally that included Sinn Féin TD Matt Carthy, Aontú leader Peadar Tóibín, and Independent Ireland’s Michael Collins.
The protests are also taking place in Galway, Cork and Limerick, with Gardaí advising motorists to plan their journeys accordingly.
The disruptions are occurring on the Ballysimon Road and on the N21 from Adare to Limerick City in Limerick, at the Docks in Galway, and in both directions on the Macroom bypass in Cork.
Speaking after the protests began on Tuesday, Tánaiste and Minister for Finance Simon Harris said that while “everyone has a right to protest in a democracy… these aren’t consequence-free actions.
We shouldn’t pit sectors against sectors,” Mr. Harris added. “This is a moment of national challenge, and no one sector is more important than the other, and we have to work through this.”
* This article was published on Extra.ie.
Tommy Mac here….They’ve already made a joke video about this. Click below to watch and click the speaker for sound
Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary’s nightmare prediction
if Strait of Hormuz remains closed
He predicted as many as 10% of his airline’s flights could be canceled if the crisis doesn’t end soon. And he advised travelers to book as soon as possible, as the rocketing price of fuel is almost certainly going to impact ticket prices.
He predicted as many as 10% of his airline’s flights could be canceled if the crisis doesn’t end soon. And he advised travelers to book as soon as possible, as the rocketing price of fuel is almost certainly going to impact ticket prices.
Jet fuel prices have surged more than 100% over the past month as the Middle East conflict disrupted energy supplies.
The Ryanair chief recently told Sky News he would expect jet fuel supplies to start being disrupted in early May if nothing changes.
He said Ryanair was “reasonably well hedged” on 80% of its fuel but added it is paying almost double (at around $150 a barrel) on the other 20%.
Speaking to ITV News, the airline boss revealed that between five and 10% of flights in May, June and July could be canceled if the Strait remains closed.
He explained: ‘We have aircraft that are based at 95 airports across Europe.
“And we’ll have to cancel routes at whichever airport where the fuel company advises us they’re short of jet fuel at, say, Malaga Airport or Athens Airport.
“It’ll be those kinds of decisions. And we’ll get very little notice – we’ll be told, I think, within five or seven days.
“So we will then be looking around, and we will be trying to ground one or two aircraft and minimize inconvenience for customers. But it’s going to be difficult, it’s going to be challenging.”
O’Leary admitted that some holidaymakers may get stuck abroad due to flight cancellations, but noted that airlines have a responsibility to get you home.
He said: “Now, you won’t get compensation because it’s clearly beyond the airline’s control, but we will, and in Ryanair’s case we have lots of flights on a daily basis, we will re-accommodate you and get you back.
“You might be stuck for a day or two, but if you’re staying within Europe, you should be reasonably confident.”
Asked if it would be a “gamble” to book a summer holiday, O’Leary admitted, “life is a gamble”.
He continued: “I think we’re looking at the risk of five or 10% of cancellations in June or July, but 90 to 95% of flights will still operate.
“So, I think you’re really not taking much of a gamble. I would be much more concerned if you delay your booking, that actually you and your family will be paying much higher prices if you get to May, June, or July.”
The blame for any cancellations should be laid at the feet of the US President, not the airlines, the Irish airline boss added.
He added: “There doesn’t seem to be any exit plan at all. But we are where we are, blaming Trump is not going to get us anywhere.”
O’Leary said that this would be an “unknown scenario” for the airline industry and that “the sooner this war is over, the better”.
* This article was originally published on Extra.ie.
WATCH: Shane Lowry’s hurling break
at Augusta piques Irish sport fan Jason Kelce’s interest
It’s high time Irish golfer Shane Lowry shows NFL star Jason Kelce how hurling is done.
Irish golfer Shane Lowry took a break from his golf clubs when he whipped out a hurley and sliotar in Augusta, Georgia, this week, ahead of his 11th Masters start.
The GAA-mad native of Co Offaly shared a brief clip of the unexpected hurling puck on his social media pages on Wednesday, prompting a huge response.
“You can hit a bigger one, Dad!” one of his daughters can be heard saying in the background of the sweet clip.
Lowry shouts to the family dog, Paddy, to chase after the sliotar on the green.
“Paddy, you lazy lump,” a woman, presumably Lowry’s wife Wendy, jokes offscreen.
Lowry’s hurling clip has drawn plenty of heartfelt – and hilarious – reactions.
“Things we love to see,” the GAA commented on Lowry’s Instagram post. “Ádh mór! [Good luck!]”
DP World Tour commented, saying that Offaly GAA should sign Lowry.
Meanwhile, Australian pro-golfer Min Woo Lee joked: “fastest swing speed recorded from you shano.”
Also among the commenters was former Philadelphia Eagles center and Super Bowl winner Jason Kelce – who, as it happens, Lowry dressed up as once for Halloween.
“Hurling, would love to know how that sport actually works,” Kelce wrote on Lowry’s Instagram post.
“Love watching it, looks absolutely crazy.”
Hurling isn’t the first Irish sport that has caught Kelce’s interest. Last year, he was in Boston to learn all about Irish road bowling in a special feature for ESPN.
Kelce said afterward that he was officially an “enormous fan” of the sport and that he couldn’t “wait to get another crack at it!”
Hurling has already gotten a brief mention on ESPN in the past – could a Jason Kelce hurling special be up next? Fingers crossed!
On This Day: The Good Friday Agreement was signed in 1998
The Good Friday Agreement was signed in Belfast on April 10, 1998, a pivotal moment in Northern Ireland’s peace process.
The Good Friday Agreement, which can be read in full here, has been the main source of peace in Northern Ireland since its signing.
The Good Friday Agreement – also known as the Belfast Agreement – was signed on April 10, 1998 following years of negotiations.
After it was signed, the agreement was put to voters in two referendums – one in Ireland and one in Northern Ireland – on May 22, 1998.
The following day, May 23, it emerged that the Good Friday Agreement found a majority of support in both referendums – 71% supported it in Northern Ireland while 94% supported it in Ireland.
It subsequently came into law in December 1999 and is now part of the Irish Constitution.
The two main political parties to the Agreement were the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP), led by David Trimble, and the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), led by John Hume. Sinn Féin, the Alliance Party, and the Progressive Unionist Party also supported the agreement, while the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) did not.
Talks surrounding the agreement were chaired by US Senator George Mitchell, who was sent by US President Bill Clinton.
The Good Friday Agreement created power-sharing in Northern Ireland with the creation of the Northern Ireland Assembly and the Northern Ireland Executive, ending decades of direct rule from London.
The historic agreement recognized that the majority of Northern Irish people wanted to remain in the UK, although it also recognized that a substantial section of the region wished for a United Ireland.
It also recognized the legitimacy of any choice made by the people of Northern Ireland to either continue as part of the UK or become part of a United Ireland. In essence, the Agreement included the provision for a referendum on a United Ireland on both sides of the border if the Northern Ireland Secretary believes that a majority of voters would vote in favor of a United Ireland.
Contentiously, the Agreement allowed for the release of nationalist and loyalist terrorists who were sentenced before April 10, 1998, while it also allowed Northern Irish residents to identify as British or Irish or both.
The Good Friday Agreement also created several north-south and British-Irish institutions to ensure continued peace in Northern Ireland.
Additionally, the Agreement created open borders between Ireland and Northern Ireland void of any checkpoints – a clause that has come under threat since Britain voted to leave the European Union.
While the agreement brought an end to most of the violent conflict in Northern Ireland, it was only a line in the sand and should only ever be viewed as the beginning of the peace process rather than the end. There is plenty of work to do to ensure the continued survival of the agreement and peace in Northern Ireland lest the region falls back into the dark days of the Troubles.
* Originally published April 2021, last updated April 2026.
Additional 36 infant remains recovered
at Tuam Mother and Baby Home site
It is described as a large feature or area, of over three metres in width and was identified in historical documents as a “burial ground”, however, no surface markers indicated the presence of burials at the location.
According to the latest update, evidence indicates that some burials were disturbed in the creation of the feature through the use of a mechanical digger.
It says marks on the sides and base of the feature provide evidence consistent with the use of a mechanical excavator fitted with a toothed bucket and the feature was then backfilled with sand, gravel and building debris.
Aerial photography available indicates that the disturbance took place sometime after 1977, however, further excavation is expected to establish a more accurate timeframe.
The excavation work at the site began last July, 11 years after research by local historian Catherine Corless found there were no burial records for almost 800 infants and children who died at the institution.
An identification programme to establish the identities of those buried at the site is underway. A total of 33 family DNA samples have been delivered to Forensic Science Ireland.
The team will be taking more samples over the coming weeks in Ireland, the UK and the US.
It is encouraging anyone who believes they may have a family member buried at the site of the former Tuam Mother and Baby Institution to contact the Office of the Director of Authorised Intervention in Tuam.
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Jokes
There is no distinctly Native American criminal class
… save Congress.
— Mark Twain
Irish skill of giving directions
I suppose Ireland is the best place in the world for directions.
People will say to you,
“I wouldn’t start from here if I were you.”
–Dave Allen
Funnies From My Wife
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Times when you might be excused for using foul language
Look closely. They have all been set to start ringing!
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First Day At School for a 4-Year Old
Good night to you all….Tommy Mac
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Tír na mBláth is one of hundreds of branches throughout the world of Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann (CCÉ) pronounced “kol-tus kyol-tori air-in“, the largest group involved in the preservation of Irish music, dance and song.
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