LITMIR.BIZ

       Foreword

      Recently, I interviewed an Irish economist who was explaining the phenomenal impact of the Irish in Britain. From Lennon/McCartney to Wayne Rooney and even Tony Blair, the Irish strain has always produced second and third generation performers. In London, some of the major landmark buildings are being snapped up by men who started life making tea on building sites off Regent Street. So, is this reverse-colonisation or just the natural upshot of an emigration-prone nation?

      In America, President John Fitzgerald Kennedy helped not only to put the emigrant Irish on the map but also to take them out of the ‘no dogs, no blacks, no Irish’ generation. Ever since, nearly every American president has found some class of connection to this small but beautiful island. As I write, Senator Hillary Clinton continues to parade her Irish roots and Barack Obama has claimed a bloodline to Co. Offaly.

      How times have changed in Ireland. There have always been Irish sons and daughters on the move in search of better times, but the great ‘brain drain’ that characterised generation after generation of migrants from the Famine to the dark economic days of the 1980s has now halted, thanks to the welcome appearance of peace in the 1990s. A new prosperity has stopped Irishmen and women leaving and brought many of them home to an emotional reunion with families who had expected empty places at the dinner table forever.

      With over 70 million people across the globe claiming Irish ancestry, the arrival of Anthony Adolph’s book couldn’t be timelier. A hotel in Dublin recently hired an archivist to help tourists trace their roots as part of the service provided. Such is the demand for and interest in the past that people feel the desire to investigate further. For those who can’t make it to Ireland or wish to research before they travel, this genealogical manual will do the trick. It’s accessible and helpful as it guides you through the potentially fraught route to your past. The importance of history and the respect that the author has for the past is evident on every page.

      Each of us has a story, first generation Irish and beyond, and here is an opportunity to shine a torch into the past and discover what lies beneath. Whatever you find, be it skeletons or gold dust, it

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