America’s Irish helped shape the nation
Americans of every background celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, the feast day for Ireland’s patron saint. They dress in green, attend parties or parades, and eat corned beef and cabbage, whether they claim Irish heritage or not.
Americans’ enthusiasm for the Irish holiday reflects the vast influence of Irish immigrants and their descendants, including President Biden, on the United States, from the time of its founding to the present day.
Many of those who fought in the American Revolution were Irish, and nine signers of the 1776 Declaration of Independence were either Irish immigrants or descended from Irish immigrants. Others, including Biden’s great-great-great-grandfather, came to escape famine in the 19th century.
Today more than 30 million Americans claim Irish heritage, including former presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Here are several of the many Irish Americans who have made significant contributions to the United States.
Eileen Collins
Born in Elmira, New York, to an Irish immigrant family, NASA astronaut Eileen Collins traveled into space four times and is the first woman to pilot the space shuttle and command a shuttle mission. Before going to work for NASA in 1990, Collins was a pilot and flight instructor in the U.S. Air Force.
Mary Harris Jones
After fleeing Ireland’s Great Famine with her family, Mary Harris Jones arrived in the United States at 23. She married an ironworker and worked as a teacher and seamstress before the death of her husband and four children in an 1867 yellow fever epidemic.
She began advocating for the rights of workers during the Great Railroad Strike of 1877 in Pittsburgh and gained a reputation for her public speaking. Jones supported workers in industries including mining, textile and steel and continued her advocacy into her 80s, earning the nickname “Mother Jones.”
John F. Kennedy
Elected in 1960, during the Civil Rights Movement, President John F. Kennedy urged Americans to live up to the nation’s founding ideals.
Born in 1917 to an Irish American family in Brookline, Massachusetts, Kennedy graduated from Harvard and served in World War II. As president, he planned to advance legislation guaranteeing equal rights for everyone and called for a mission to the moon.
The country achieved both milestones before the end of the 1960s, but after Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, in Dallas.
Kathleen McNulty
An early computer programmer, Kathleen McNulty supported the U.S. government’s development of the world’s first computer, called ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer), which debuted in 1946.
Born in Ireland in 1921, McNulty immigrated to the United States with her family at age 4. She excelled at math and was recruited to support the U.S. military in World War II by calculating trajectories for artillery.
She later was one of a handful of women mathematicians whose calculations enabled the development of ENIAC.
Ronald Reagan
The great-grandson of an Irish immigrant, President Ronald Reagan sought to spur economic recovery at home and ensure “peace through strength” in global affairs.
America’s 40th president — and one of 23 U.S. presidents with Irish roots — Reagan worked as a radio sportscaster, a movie and television actor, and a two-time California governor before his presidential election in 1980.
During his tenure Reagan visited his ancestral home of Ballyporeen, Ireland, in 1984. He told a crowd that for much of his life he didn’t know his heritage because his father was orphaned at a young age.
Learning of his Irish roots and getting to visit his ancestral hometown was both unexpected and satisfying.
“I know at last whence I came,” Reagan said. “And this has given my soul a new contentment. And it is a joyous feeling. It is like coming home after a long journey.”