The Irish Americans: A History

Mr. Dolan does a wonderful job of retelling the Irish American experience in such a way that it repeats the key and critical aspects yet at the same time is fresh and interesting. By focusing on such areas as faith, labor and nationalism he does a great job of focusing on what the Irish excelled at in assimilating to the American experience. The book works because it treads on the familiar names and turfs (Kennedy's, Boston, New York) while also venturing to San Francisco and the South and other areas that don't get much attention. I also think Mr. Dolan deserves special praise for treating Al Smith as more than just a trivia answer or as the failed Catholic candidate before Kennedy. Like a lot of people in this book Smith is treated with an honest view warts and all of what he did yet no axes to grind seem evident here. All in all this is a great work and I recommend it to anyone interested in Irish American history.

Jay P. Dolan (Professor Emeritus of History, University of Notre Dame) presents The Irish Americans: A History, a narrative examination of Irish-Americans. "The Irish Americans" covers the saga of Irish-American immigrants and their descendants from the American colonial era to the historical potato famine that spurred an exodus of millions of poor immigrants, to rise of Irish political power and the election of John F. Kennedy as President of the United States, to the end of the twentieth century in the year 2000. "For those Irish who rode the economic escalator up to middle-class respectability, a move to the suburbs generally followed. But more was involved than just an increase in income. A decisive influence was the migration of blacks and Hispanics into the old Irish neighborhoods... The Irish were too numerous and too complex a group to be identified with only one side of the controversy. Many were conservative bigots, hurling epithets at King and his supporters; many were numbered among the liberal activists marching shoulder to shoulder with King. The same type of division present in Chicago was true in Philadelphia and other cities where the migration of blacks into old immigrant neighborhoods led to racial confrontation... a study done in the 1980s by the sociologist Andrew M. Greeley concluded that a majority of the Irish 'have been more sympathetic to integration' than other Catholic ethnics as well as all Protestants during the 1970s." A fascinating, account that academicians and lay readers alike can enjoy, The Irish Americans: A History is an especially welcome addition to public and college library shelves.

This entertaining book, for anyone who considers themselves Irish-American -- or simply identifies with many of the Irish-American characteristics -- is a well researched and well written book about the history of one ethnic group in American history. This has been a delight to read. I highly recommend this book.

Excellent read if you have any Irish family history. More detailed information included that one expects in a non-textbook. Recommend for everyone with any interest in or any family history from Ireland.

Despite my Welsh surname the roots of my family tree run mostly to Ireland and for that reason I obviously found this book to be a fascinating read. As I read through this book though it became clear to me that any student of American history would find this to be a very interesting book because it is almost impossible to study American history without having to deal with the Irish. From the canals, railroads and tunnels built by Irish workers to Irish-Americans like John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan who reached the very pinnacle of American life, the Irish have been a key element if the success of America from its very beginning and this book covers its subject extraordinarily well. One of the things that appealed most to me about this book was the author's coverage of the Irish who arrived in America before the potato famine. Many of my Irish Catholic ancestors arrived in America before the Revolution and almost all of them were here before the famine but those early immigrants are often ignored or it is assumed that they were all Protestant and for the most part Scotch-Irish. The further back into history that one looks the harder it is to come up with sources but this author has not let that deter him from including people like my ancestors in this book. Given the vast nature of this subject I'm sure that it must have been tempting for Mr. Dolan to try to squeeze as many facts as possible into this book by hitting the reader with a rapid fire kind of approach that would have accomplished little except cause confusion but he has resisted that temptation and has written a thoroughly enjoyable and informative book. Many academics write in a somewhat dry style that makes extracting information from their books into almost a chore but this author writes in a very pleasing and readable manner. He takes the time to include little Shelby Foote type anecdotes that help to keep the text flowing and also serve as key insights into the lives of some very colorful characters. As one blurb for this book points out this is a sweeping and vast story but this author manages to tell that story while at the same time focusing on the individuals who helped to drive that story. As the author points out at the end of this book it is now rather fashionable to be Irish. Quite a feat for a people who in the not so distant past were often met with signs saying, "No Irish" or "No Irish Need Apply." This is indeed a vast subject but Mr. Dolan has condensed this epic tale into a very enjoyable, factual and thorough survey that would make the perfect starting point for anyone interested in this subject. I ran across a couple of references to surnames in my family tree and learned a little about my personal heritage and a lot about my Irish heritage. There is no attempt to whitewash the darker episodes in the history of Irish-Americans and there are some disturbing episodes in that history. The author does however take the time to explain what might have caused those pr