Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC, and we're going to end today with a little St. Patrick's Day call-in on your Irish family's immigration story from Ireland to here or from here to Ireland, maybe even recently. Give us a call or send us a text, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Your family's immigration story to here, or some people are, under the circumstances in this country, as they perceive them, taking advantage of the opportunity to get dual citizenship if they have Irish heritage. A few are even moving back there, from what I have read. As your calls are coming in, let's listen to our caller from our pandemic St. Patrick's Day show. Remember March 17, 2020, as we've been recalling the fifth anniversary several times on the show today in several different segments, we called it the St. Patrick's Day parade of the air from 2020, because the real St. Patrick's Day parade, the in-person one, was canceled because of the new pandemic. Let's listen to this caller who's actually going to play us a little tune while your calls are coming in.

Speaker 2: I'm actually Irish traditional musician. I'm from Alaska originally, but I've lived here for about 10 years and we've had all our gigs get canceled this year.

Brian Lehrer: Did you call in with something to play for us?

Speaker 2: Yes, I'd love to play a tune if that's all right.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, I'd love that. Oh, please, we're honored.

Speaker 2: Great. I'll play a tune called the Silver Spire, and it's actually in reference to the Chrysler Building. This is just this is for New York City.

[Silver Spire fiddle tune]

Brian Lehrer: As we listen to the fiddle playing from St. Patrick's Day 2020 on the show, our phones are open for you to call in with your family's Irish immigration story, whether from Ireland to here or from here to Ireland. 212-433-WNYC call or text. 212-433-9692. As many of you know, the story of Ireland is one of immigration because of the island's past as an oppressed colony and the economic struggles that come with that. Waves of people are always leaving. The diaspora is large and spread out. According to the Census Bureau's tally, just a couple of years ago, 2022, 32.7 million people of Irish heritage have lived in the United States, or live, I guess, currently in the United States.

How did your family come to leave there and how did it affect them? Of course, there was a time when the Irish were the despised new immigrant group here in the United States and elsewhere in the world.

Do you have a story from your own family's history about that discrimination based on their accent, their Catholicism or anything else that marked them as Irish back in the day? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, and maybe if you've emigrated back to Ireland recently, you're not listening because you're not here, sometimes people listen in Ireland, we know, but if you've recently done the reverse immigration moved back to Ireland, whether you're actually Irish or Irish American, give us a call and share that story.

We know Ireland has been in the news because President Trump has been criticizing the tax advantages that companies like Meta, LinkedIn and others, which are big employers there, get by being there instead of here. That's a whole other story, but how about your immigration story one way or the other? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, and yes, I have heard from Irish American friends or family members of theirs who have been getting that dual citizenship, that they're eligible for, just in case, under the current circumstances as they see them. 212-433-WNYC. Who has a story, coming or going? Irish Americans will take your calls on St. Patrick's Day right after this. Peter in Patterson, you're on WNYC. Hi, Peter.

Peter: Hello, Brian. Huge fan. Anyway, Bergen county resident. I'm now a teacher in Patterson. Proud of it. My grandmother, Molly Dwyer, came here all by herself at the age of about 12 on a ship, of course, came to Ellis island, and she had the chickenpox or the measles or something that had she had to stay for a prolonged period of time. They were feeding her spaghetti. She had never seen spaghetti. She wrote a letter home saying that the Americans were feeding her worms here. I didn't know if she liked it or not, but that was her initial impression of the United States.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you, Peter. Happy St. Patrick's Day. Kay in Irvington, New York. You're on WNYC. Hi.

Kay: Hi, Brian. I love listening to you every morning. Love getting my news from you. Both of my parents were born in Ireland. My father County Kerry, my mother, County Clare. My mother was brought over here by two sisters when she was 16 years old in 1927. And they brought over another sister and two brothers out of 13, and the rest stayed in Ireland. This is the story of train migration that makes America what it is today. Those first two sisters sent my mother to nursing school, where she became a nurse. I have just recently filed for my Irish passport because I understand that I am an Irish citizen since my parents were born in Ireland. By the way, we grew up in. the Bronx.

Brian Lehrer: You grew up in the Bronx. Why do you want the Irish passport?

Kay: Just in case I feel the need to get out of this country for a little bit with Trump in office.

Brian Lehrer: Okay, thank you very much, Kay, in Irvington. By the way, I always say Irvington, New York or Irvington, New Jersey, since we have both in our listening area. It's so confusing. Irvington on Hudson. Little north of the city, in that case. Ridgewood too. Ridgewood, Queens or Ridgewood, New Jersey? Katie in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, Katie.

Katie: Hi, how are you? I'm calling in because I met my husband at the Grand Canyon. It must have been 13 years ago now. He's from a small town in Roscommon. What happened was, the first time when we went over to visit his family, I took my mom. She knew that she had relatives there, that both of her parents came from Ireland, so she did a little ancestry research, but it came to a dead end. We only found out one town and we couldn't find anything more. The town was Ballyhaunis, which happened to be 15 minutes away from my partner's, where he grew up.

We got there, we told the story to his family, and his father brought us to his cousin who lived down the street and he was able to connect us to the one living relative in Ireland, in Ballyhaunis. His family ended up living 15 minutes down the street from where my mom's family had grown up.

Brian Lehrer: Nice story, Katie. Thank you. William in Huntington, you're on WNYC. Hi, William.

William: Hello. Thanks for taking my call. I just wanted to share, all these people that-- like the last lady that told the story, how-- what a strange story that is. Well, that's a very Irish story. My grandmother and her sister left Donegal in 1924 and took a boat that was the sister ship to the Lusitania. They came to Manhattan, got jobs, one sister went back. A hundred years later, my father died, and he's a very tight-lipped Irishman. Found my grandmother's passport, the note she wrote when she left home, and I realized we had relatives in Ireland that I never knew about.

My wife and I, we weren't married at the time. We went over and found them. We invited the matriarch, Bridget, to our wedding, and she came with one of her daughters. Subsequently, we became very close. The reason I wanted to call and to follow up on the last lady was that Ireland is a very mysterious place. My wife went shoe shopping to buy shoes in a town called Killybegs in Northern Ireland. She bought a pair of shoes, and at the counter, after she bought them, she said to the sales lady, "Why does this say Casey on the bottom of the shoe?? The salesperson said, "Well, that's the name of the shoe style, Casey." My wife said, well, that's her last name, Casey.

Subsequently, she's waiting to leave and she buys another pair of shoes, and she comes home and she tells me the story about how she bought this pair of shoes named Casey. I said, "Well, did the other pair of shoes have a name?" She says, "I don't know." She looks. She says, "Yes, they say Ellen." Well, my grandmother who Left Ireland in 1924, her name was Ellen Casey.

Brian Lehrer: Ellen Casey. William, that's a great story. Thank you very much. Glad you got to have that experience. All right, one more, Joan in Riverdale, and I think this is going to be a coming and going story. Joan, you're on WNYC. We've got about 30 seconds for you. Hey, there.

Joan: Oh, hi. I'll talk as fast as I can. Thank you, Brian. My parents came here, one from Mayo and the other from Cavan, and they came in the midst of the Depression and forged a great life here. The point is that each of them came from very, very large families. My mother, what they did with their kids when they were 12 in a family, they would send to the States. My mother's sister was sent here first and she was homesick.

Brian Lehrer: Somebody went back? Oh, she went back because she was homesick? Yes.

Joan: No, my mother had to go and accompany her sister who was homesick. I moved to Ireland because my husband and I went to live there. We lived in Belfast. I left my parents in the-

Brian Lehrer: Joan, thank you very much. I'm sorry. You're right out of time. Everybody, put on your Killybegs and listen to Alison.

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