Catherine Connolly, Independent, was expected to win the presidential election in Ireland. But not by a landslide. The Making of a President 2025.

The unlikely choice for Ireland’s first President was Douglas Hyde. The Leading advocate of the Irish language, he was an organizer of the Gaeic League, from which the 1916 Rising flowed. Hundreds of Oregonians heard him speak in 1906.

The epicenter of Trump Ireland is Doonbeg, Co. Clare, the town nearest the Trump golf course and hotel along the Atlantic Ocean.

How did Robert Emmett, leader of a failed rebellion in 1803, become such an icon of Irishness? His name. image, likeness and last words were ubiquitous in Irish America.

Ireland’s decision NOT to name its new national hospital after Dr. Kathleen Lynn is controversial. She had a remarkable career as pediatrician, freedom fighter, politician and children’s hospital founder.

Tualatin Valley Fire and Rescue Pipes and Drums has been performing for a quarter of a century and will celebrate that milestone at Clancy’s in Sherwood on September 17.

Elon Musk is at it again. He’s aiding Conor McGregor’s last ditch effort to get on the ballot in Ireland’s election of a new President next month.

The complicated legacy of Eamon de Valera will be the stuff of arguments for years to come among the Irish. It was fifty years ago that he died after a reign that lasted most of the 20th century.

Martin McDonagh’s Banshees of Inisherin isn’t likely to inspire the kind of reverence and commercialism inspired by John Ford’s 1952 film The Quiet Man starring Maureen O’Hara and John Wayne. Banshees tourism is not likely to become a thing. One is a Rom Com with great passion. The other is a Black Comedy with grim passion.

Seamus Heaney, the greatest Irish poet since W.B. Yeats, died on August 30, 2013.

This might be his greatest poem, the first poem in his first book The Death of a Naturalist  (1966).

The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem made their debut on the Ed Sullivan Show on March 9, 1961.

Twenty three years. Eleven hundred episodes. Ten thousand acts. All cleared by Ed Sullivan himself.

Former President of Ireland Mary Robinson, now 81, is still on the front lines.

Braveheart still beats with bad history 30 years later.

“A 21-year-old Irish girl held the House of Commons spellbound today with a maiden speech of quiet eloquence and powerful emotion.” 22 April 1969 - New York Times

One bonfire. One boat filled with effigies of refugees. One Irish Tri Color. Just another July night near Dungannon.

The Centenarian Bounty paid to 100 year olds led to one of the largest and longest running cases of welfare fraud in the history of Ireland.

“My dad is Irish. My family is Irish. I have an Irish passport. The culture I was brought up around is Irish. The first music I learnt was Irish.”

Barack and Michelle Obama will return to Ireland in September.

Father Jim Galluzzo - educator, administrator, counsellor, student, priest, principal, pastor, painter, author, adviser, advocate and activist.