For Immediate Release: February 13, 2002
Further information: Tom McNaught (617) 514-1662
It need not be St. Patrick’s Day to take pride in one’s Irish ancestry. A stop at the John Fitzgerald Kennedy Library and Museum in Boston will remind any visitor of the important role Irish Americans have played in the history of the country.
One of Boston’s most popular destinations for visitors from all nations, the national memorial to President John F. Kennedy -- America’s first Irish Catholic president -- sits on a 10-acre waterfront site on Columbia Point offering panoramic views of Boston's skyline and Harbor Islands.
Housed in a striking building designed by I.M. Pei, the Museum at the Kennedy Library enables visitors to step back into the recreated world of the early 1960s and experience first hand the life and legacy of President John F. Kennedy. Period settings from the White House and 25 multimedia exhibits create a stirring account of President Kennedy’s thousand days in office. Visitors can witness the first televised presidential debate, glimpse life during the Cold War, feel the tension of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and experience the warmth and affection showered upon President Kennedy during his June 1963 visit to Ireland.
It was during that historic visit that President Kennedy remarked to the people of New Ross, Ireland:
"When my great grandfather left here to become a cooper in East Boston, he carried nothing with him except two things: a strong religious faith and a strong desire for liberty. I am glad to say that all of his great grandchildren have valued that inheritance."
Included in the Library’s vast collection is the Fitzgerald family Bible brought from Ireland by President Kennedy’s forebears on which he took his oath of office as President of the United States on January 20, 1961. The Bible is an 1850 Edition of the Douay English translation containing a handwritten chronicle of the Fitzgerald family from 1857, including a record of the birth of John Fitzgerald Kennedy on May 29, 1917.
On display in the Museum’s Oval Office exhibit is a sterling silver goblet made in Dublin in 1805, given to President Kennedy by the people of New Ross, Ireland, home of his great-grandfather. President Kennedy kept it in his Oval Office and Mrs. Kennedy instructed the White House gardener to place a fresh flower in it every day.
Also exhibited in the Museum’s Oval Office is a fragment of a pennant flown on the Raleigh, a ship commanded by John Barry, a founder of the U.S. Navy and former commander of the USS Constitution. Barry, who served during the Revolutionary War as one of the first captains of the Constitutional Navy, was born in County Wexford, Ireland, the ancestral home of President Kennedy. President Kennedy displayed the pennant in the White House Oval Office.
Film footage of President Kennedy’s visit to Ireland is featured prominently in the Museum tour, including the president’s remarks at Eyre Square in Galway on June 29, 1963 after receiving the freedom of the city.
"If the day was clear enough, and if you went down to the bay, and you looked west, and your sight was good enough, you would see Boston, Massachusetts," President Kennedy said at the time. "And if you did, you would see down working on the docks there some Doughertys and Flahertys and Ryans and cousins of yours who have gone to Boston and made good."
Photographs of President Kennedy and his sisters, Jean Kennedy Smith and Eunice Shriver, document their visit to the Kennedy family’s Irish homestead in Dunganstown, County Wexford for a family reunion. On display is the Irish blackthorn walking stick presented to President Kennedy by his cousin Jimmy Kennedy during that visit.
Among the other Kennedy family treasures exhibited throughout the museum is a Waterford Crystal Pedestal Vase depicting an Irish homestead, an immigrant ship, and the White House, that outlines the history of John F. Kennedy and his family heritage. The vase was presented to President Kennedy by the New Ross Harbor Commissioners during his visit to New Ross on June 27, 1963. The president’s great-grandfather Patrick Kennedy had departed from New Ross for Boston in 1848.
Other Irish treasures on display include a Carrickmacross lace napkin, one of a set of 36, presented by Irish Prime Minister Sean LeMass.
Of special interest is the original Treaty of Ormonde, a treaty between the Earle of Ormonde and John O'Kennedy and those of his nation, dated March 5, 1336. This document, the first known mention of the Kennedy name in recorded Irish history, was a gift to President Kennedy from Prime Minister Sean LeMass and the people of Ireland.
The Museum also displays handwritten notes made by President Kennedy of a verse from the poem "River Shannon" that Mrs. Eamonn de Valera, wife of the President of the Republic of Ireland, recited during a state dinner in Ireland. President Kennedy copied it at the time and recited the same verse to the Shannon crowds as he departed to the United States. The poem in President Kennedy’s handwriting is displayed next to the video of him holding and reciting it.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy was the offspring of two families whose roots stretched back to Ireland. The Fitzgerald family was from western Ireland in the rural County Limerick village of Bruff. Sometime between 1846 and 1855 some of the Fitzgeralds migrated to America because of the devastating Potato Famine. During that same period of time, Patrick Kennedy, a cooper, left his ancestral home in Dunganstown, County Wexford for the United States. In 1849 he married Bridget Murphy in East Boston. Nine years later she was a widow with four small children, the youngest of whom, Patrick, would become John Kennedy’s grandfather.
The Fitzgeralds and Kennedys lived and worked in Boston, seeking to take advantage of the economic opportunity offered in America. To do that, they had to overcome the harsh, widespread discrimination against Irish Catholic immigrants at that time. The early Kennedys and Fitzgeralds worked as peddlers, coopers and common laborers; later they became clerks, tavern owners and retailers. By the end of the century, Patrick "P.J." Kennedy and John "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald, the president’s other grandfather, had become successful Boston politicians.
Among the distinguished Irish foreign visitors who have visited the Kennedy Library and have been hosted by members of the Kennedy family are Prime Minister Bertie Ahern; President Mary McAleese; Prime Minister Garrett Fitzgerald; President Mary Robinson; Prime Minister Charles Haughey; and Prime Minister Albert Reynolds. Mary Robinson, who now serves as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and who has traveled the globe in an effort to advance freedom, promote peace, and protect human rights, delivered a keynote address at the John F. Kennedy Library on January 6 of this year.
In December, 1998, the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation and the members of its Profile in Courage Award Committee presented a special John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award to eight political leaders of Northern Ireland and Senator George Mitchell, the American chairman of the peace talks, in recognition of the extraordinary political courage they demonstrated in negotiating the historic Good Friday Peace Agreement. The award presentation was made by Caroline Kennedy, president of the Kennedy Library Foundation, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, and U.S. Ambassador to Ireland Jean Kennedy Smith at a formal ceremony at the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum in Boston. The presentation of the Profile in Courage Award to a non-American was unprecedented.
Nobel Peace Prize winners John Hume of the Social Democratic and Labour Party and David Trimble of the Ulster Unionist Party; as well as Gerry Adams, Sinn Fein; John Alderdice, Alliance Party of Northern Ireland; David Ervine, Progressive Unionist Party; Monica McWilliams, Northern Ireland Women's Coalition; Gary McMichael, Ulster Democratic Party; Malachi Curran, Northern Ireland Labour Party; and former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, the American chairman of the peace talks, were presented with the prestigious award for political courage.
The John F. Kennedy Library and Museum is open daily 9 am-5 pm. The Museum is closed Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Day. General Admission to the Museum’s permanent exhibition on John F. Kennedy is $8 for adults; $6 for seniors and students; $4 for children ages 13-17; and free admission for children ages 12 and under. The John F. Kennedy Library and Museum is located off Morrissey Blvd., next to UMass Boston’s campus. There is free shuttle service to the Library from the JFK/UMass T Stop on the Red Line. Parking is free. The Museum is fully handicapped accessible. For more information, call 1-(877) 616-4599 or visit the Library’s web page at www.jfklibrary.org.
The John F. Kennedy Library and Museum is a presidential library administered by the National Archives and Records Administration and supported, in part, by the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation, a non-profit organization. The Kennedy Library and the Kennedy Library Foundation seek to promote, through educational and community programs, a greater appreciation and understanding of American politics, history, and culture, the process of governing and the importance of public service.