(This Article appeared in the Irish Echo Newspaper, NYC) By Michael P. Quinlin
Perhaps the rural back roads, green hills and rugged coastline remind people of home. Maybe it’s the proximity to Massachusetts, America’s most Irish state.
Whatever the case, New Hampshire’s Irish-American community is thriving as never before, thanks to a creative infusion of musicians, cultural activities, pubs and restaurants and political activism that has revitalized the granite state’s reputation as one of America’s greenest states.
Irish heritage has long been one of “the many cultural threads that make New Hampshire such a vibrant place,” says state tourism official Victoria Cimino.
Cimino cited the Seacoast Irish Festival in Dover, along with the Highland Games in Hopkinton as two of the state’s most popular annual events, adding that “the small, personal and intimate encounters with (Celtic) culture and heritage” is a perk for visitors coming to the granite state.
Those perks have increased in the past year, as two newly opened Irish pubs - the Shaskeen in Manchester and Peddler’s Daughter in Nashua – offer the winning combination of Irish food, music and ambiance to visitors and residents alike.
“It’s going to be brilliant,” says Tommy McCarthy, of the state’s Irish cultural scene. He and Peter Molloy opened the state’s latest Irish pub, the Shaskeen, on Elm Street in downtown Manchester in 2005.
“I want people from all aspects of life to enjoy the Shaskeen, to partake of Irish hospitality,” says McCarthy, who also runs two Boston-area pubs – the Burren and the Skellig – with his wife Louise Costelloe.
That thirst for hospitality was apparent at the pub’s official opening on Thanksgiving weekend, when 1,800 people showed up to see a free performance by the Chieftains and Michael Flatley, friends of the owners. The concert was transmitted on giant TV screens on the street as 1,500 people patiently waited to get inside the pub, which has a capacity of 300.
History and Politics
New Hampshire’s Irish roots go back to 1718, when Ulster Presbyterians first arrived in Boston Harbor, looking to settle in Boston.
They were rebuffed by Boston Puritans and headed north to New Hampshire, settling towns like Londonderry, Derry, Antrim and Dublin. They guarded the fringes of the Bay Colony against encroachments from the French and Indians coming down from Quebec. They produced prominent heroes during the Revolutionary War, including General John Sullivan and his brothers, whose parents emigrated from Limerick in the 1740s.
In the 19th century, new waves of Irish Catholic immigrants –fleeing famine, economic uncertainty and political discrimination in Ireland - moved to New Hampshire to work in the shoe factories and textile mills in Nashua and Manchester.
By the 20th century the Irish became prominent in politics, exemplified today by John Lynch, the state’s governor, and Kathleen Sullivan, head of New Hampshire’s Democratic Party.
The state’s most prominent Irish clan is the Dunfey Family of Portsmouth, whose political activism dates back to the Kennedy Administration. Today they run Global Citizens Circle, which seeks to resolve conflicts around the world, including Northern Ireland.
New Hampshire held an Irish forum for candidates in each of the last three presidential elections, says David R. Burke, a national officer in the Ancient Order of Hibernians, which has three state divisions. And it was one of the first states to pass the MacBride Principles in 1989.
Van McCloud, a local cultural leader, has just directed a film entitled Romancing the Violence: The Murals of Belfast. The film won the international Aurora Award and was screened at the New Hampshire Film Expo.
Today 240,295 residents – or 19.4% of New Hampshire’s population - claim Irish ancestry, according to the 2000 US Census. After Massachusetts, it has the highest percentile of Irish Americans in the USA.
Irish Music Thriving
Irish culture flourishes in Boston, New York, and Chicago, but it also takes root in places like New Hampshire, where people appreciate the intimate aspects of a folk culture not overrun by homogenous corporate marketing.
Mary Lou Philbin and Charlie Clarke exemplify that grass roots folk culture. Since 1993 they have been distributing Irish music in the USA for Ossian Publications of Cork. They run a small music store in Loudon, and host a concert series featuring world class musicians like fiddler Seamus Connolly and Paddy Keenan, the master uilleann piper from Dublin and seminal member of the Bothy Band. Keenan lives in Loudon when he is not on tour.
Down the road in Epsom lives fiddler Roger Burridge, one of New England’s premier Irish fiddlers. Raised in England, Burridge was a pivotal figure in the vibrant music scene around Doolin, County Clare in the late 1970s. He’s equally influential in New Hampshire, where he has lived for over twenty years with his wife Kate and their two children.
Tommy Makem, the bard from Keady, County Armagh, lives in Dover and has helped build a solid Irish music scene along the seacoast. As one of the leading Irish musicians of his generation, Makem’s presence has put New Hampshire on the Irish music map.
Makem’s three sons, Shane, Conor and Rory perform as the Makem Brothers along with Mickey and Liam Spaine, and perform frequently in the area. | Gerry Corr, a mandolin player from Belfast, has lived in state almost 20 years. He formed An Bannac Ceoil six years ago to meet the constant demand for Irish music in the region. “We are a party band,” he says.
These musicians formed the Seacoast Irish Cultural Association to promote Irish culture. Their annual summer festival features top local musicians like Eugene Byrne, the house musician for Boston’s famous Black Rose Pub, as well as super groups like Eileen Ivers and Immigrant Soul. Dublin banjo player Neil Kenny lived in Boston for a decade before moving north. A carpenter by trade, he bought some land in Concord in 1988 and built his own house, where he lives with his wife and two children. He plays at the Tuesday night session at the Barley House in Concord.
“Most of the players are American, and there are some good ones,” he says. “They have a fantastic interest in the music.”
Other pubs have started regular music sessions to attract patrons.
Mike Conneely of Connemara opened The Peddler’s Daughter this summer in Nashua, advertising “Great Craic and Pure Irish.” The pub is located next to the city’s new Riverwalk, and Conneely envisions regular music sessions, concerts and a variety of social activities for the local community.
Irish chef Ray Gardiner, a Waterford native, opened his restaurant, Cu Na Mara in Bristol, near Newfound Lake on St. Patrick’s Day in 2002, and since then it has become a local dining landmark as well as a session spot.
Other Irish pubs in the state featuring Irish music include Jack Molly Malone’s in Portsmouth, the Barley House in Concord, the Wild Rover in Manchester, and Biddy Mulligan’s in Dover. Irish Language
Conradh na Gaeilge Shasana Nua (The Gaelic League of New England) offers several levels of Irish language courses in Manchester. Kenneth Peterson of Worcester first started teaching in 1994, and there has been Irish instruction ever since.
Teachers include Domi O'Brien, who taught beginner and intermediate Irish in southern New Hampshire in the late 1990s, and Kathleen Joyce-Page, a native speaker of Irish who is originally from Inis Bearacháin in County Galway.
They offer level two courses in Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced, with a course for new beginners slated for September.
“Our course enrollments in Manchester have always been tremendous;” Peterson says. “2003 was a record-setting year for us, with 74 registered students. (It’s) an impressive figure for a city which is more French-Canadian than Irish.”
More information
Tourism
New Hampshire Division of Tourism & Culture
172 Pembroke Road
Concord, NH 03302
1 800 Fun-In-NH
Pubs
Barley House
132 N. Main Street, Concord
Biddy Mulligan’s Pub
1 Washington Street, Dover
Cu Na Mara
11 Hobart Road, Bristol
Molly Malone’s Pub
177 State Street, Portsmouth
Shaskeen Irish Pub
900 Elm Street, Manchester
Peddler’s Daughter
48 Main Street, Nashua
Music
Ossian USA
118 Beck Road
Loudon, NH 03307
Language
Conradh na Gaeilge Shasana Nua
(The Gaelic League of New England)
http://www.gaeilge.org/manchester.html
New Hampshire Landmarks with an Irish Connection
Saint Gaudens National Historical Site in Cornish
Former estate of Irish-born sculptor Augustus Saint Gaudens
General John Sullivan Memorial in Durham
Tribute to the Revolutionary War hero from New Hampshire
Colonel John Stark Memorial at State House in Concord
Tribute to Scots-Irish hero at Battle of Bunker Hill
Civil War Monument in Keene
Created by Martin Milmore, Sligo-born sculptor.
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