Born in Boston’s South End to Irish-immigrant parents, John Lawrence Sullivan (1858-1918) was the last of the bare-knuckle heavyweight boxing champions. He was the first American athlete to earn over

Frederick Douglass is well known for his 1845 autobiography which described his life as a slave in Maryland and his escape to freedom in the North. The book, which bluntly

Urged by their mothers to pursue an education, the “one thing they can’t take away,” the American daughters of Irish-born mothers are the unsung heroines of Irish achievement in the

While the rest of the states of the Union in the 1820s and 30s were moving toward universal manhood suffrage, conservative-dominated Rhode Island chose to preserve the state’s once liberal

The Draft Riots of July 1863 in New York City constitute the largest civil uprising in American history. At least 118 people were killed, including a dozen free blacks who

Singer/songwriter, recording artist, storyteller and comedian, Cahal Dunne, has published a semiautobiographical book. Set in economically depressed 1970s Ireland, it is the coming-of-age tale of Dunne's alter ego, Billy Golden.

Oscar Handlin, the eminent Harvard historian, argued that immigration was and is the key to understanding American history. For Newport, the arrival of large numbers of Irish immigrants in the

Irish immigrants faced a punishing arrival in our state, and their forward progress over the years was not much kinder. By the end of the 1800s, Rhode Island Irish had

The 1830s and 1840s were arguably the lowest moment for Irish Catholics in American history. Michael Feldberg will recall those difficult years by recounting the attacks by xenophobic Protestants (including

If you have at least one grandparent who was born in Ireland, you are eligible for Irish Republic (dual) citizenship and then can obtain an Irish passport. Our speaker will

The Great Hunger led to massive emigration to the U.S., Canada, Australia and Europe. Shiploads of emaciated Irish adults, children and families arrived daily on coffin ships in New York

Newfoundland was an early destination for Irish immigrants during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The beginnings of this migration were deeply embedded in the growth of the Atlantic cod