Notable Irish Americans

Throughout the years the Irish immigrant has made his mark on almost every facet of American life, from politics to Hollywood to engineering and to science. These are just some of those Irish men and women who have helped shape the course of American history.

In 1828, Andrew Jackson became the first president of the United States of Irish heritage. His style of politics known as "Jacksonian Democracy," disbursing favors to loyal supporters gained the support of the commoners and disenfranchised, and would forever change the face of American Politics.

While the majority of Irish immigrants settled in large cities, many preferred the wide-open spaces of the "West." Two such notable frontiersmen were Davy Crockett and Colonel William Barret Travis. They were among the small garrison of 186 Texas volunteers that held off Mexican General Santa Anna long enough for fellow Irishman General Sam Houston to regroup his forces and win the decisive victory securing Texas' independence in the battle of San Jacinto.

The massive Brooklyn Bridge that took fourteen years to construct was presided over by the Irish-born contractor William Kingsly and Irish laborers, skilled and unskilled alike, did much of the excavation work for the foundation.

The son of Irish immigrants, Henry Ford would go down in the history books as the man responsible for introducing the concept of mass-production and for making the first car affordable to the middle class, the Model T. Single handedly, Ford created a social and economic revolution in a class of its own

Ronald Wilson Reagan was the descendant of Michael Reagan who came to the U.S. from Tipperary in 1853. His career spanned the film industry, California's governorship, and the White House. His presidency (1980-1988) was marked by national prosperity, increased military preparedness, and vigorous anti-Communist efforts abroad. The latter, in combination with his diplomatic overtures to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, are seen by many as having played a key role in winning the Cold War.

Father Edward Flanagan (1886-1948) was born in County Roscommon, Ireland, and first traveled to the United States to earn an undergraduate degree. He was ordained in Austria in 1912 and returned to America to pastor an Omaha, Nebraska, parish. Moved by the plight of homeless and orphaned boys, he opened Father Flanagan's Boys Home in 1917. Filling a need, it expanded rapidly, and was renamed Boys Town in 1922. Within 15 years Boys Town had been incorporated and added additional facilities across the state. Flanagan died in 1948 while on an overseas fundraising trip for Boys Town. His story was made famous in the 1938 movie Boys Town, starring Spencer Tracy.

Born the son of a bartender, James Cagney grew up on the tough streets of New York’s Lower East Side. Drawn to the theater, he began touring with a vaudeville troupe as a song-and-dance man with his wife Frances. In the late 1920s he moved to Broadway and enjoyed critical success opposite Joan Blondell in the musical Penny Arcade (1929). His performance in the film version brought him to Hollywood where he subsequently won the lead role in the movie Public Enemy (1931). It launched his career as the classic Irish gangster and led to several more films such as Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), Each Dawn I Die (1939), and The Roaring Twenties (1939).

Henry Stack Sullivan is considered by many to be one of the great contributors to the field of psychiatry in the 20th century. Born in upstate New York, he graduated from medical school in 1917 and immediately took a job with the Medical Corps providing mental evaluations of potential soldiers. Sullivan spent most of the 1920s doing clinical research and in 1931 opened a private practice in New York City. He also began to publish studies based on his research. In so doing he proposed several novel theories of psychiatry most notable of which was his work into schizophrenia which resulted in the disorder no longer being classified as “incurable.”

Among America's greatest actors, John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara both hailed from Ireland.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edgar Allan Poe, Thomas Flanagan and Frank McCourt are among an extensive list of Irish American novelists.

The Irish American contribution to space exploration has continued in recent years with astronauts Kathryn Sullivan and Eileen Collins. Selected by NASA in January 1978, Dr. Kathryn Sullivan became an astronaut in August 1979. She served as Capsule Communicator in Mission Control for numerous Shuttle missions. During her first mission she and Commander Leestma successfully conducted a 3½-hour Extravehicular Activity to demonstrate the feasibility of satellite refueling. She is the first American woman to perform an EVA.

The founder of the world’s leading producer of water treatment products was born in a small brick house in Yankton, South Dakota. Emmett J. Culligan left college after two years and tried his hand at farming. After service in World War I, he landed a job with a water softening company, eventually rising to become district manager for the state of Iowa. In 1924 he started his own company, but saw it fail with the onset of the Great Depression. It was in the 1930s that he hit upon the idea of selling softened water (as opposed to water softening equipment) to customers on a franchise basis. He started his new company, the Culligan Zeolite Company, in 1938 and soon had 150 dealers. By the 1990s the company, now Culligan International, had more than 1,000 franchised dealers in the U.S. with expanding operations throughout the world and annual revenues of 150 million dollars.

With so many Irish Americans playing professional baseball in its early decades, it’s not surprising to that many of the game’s earliest stars were of Irish ancestry. Mike “King” Kelly, for example, helped the Chicago Nationals win five championships in the 1880s. He led the league in batting in 1884 and 1886 and was a legendary base stealer, giving rise to the expression, “slide, Kelly, slide.” "Big" Ed Delahanty (one of five brothers who made the big leagues) posted a whopping career batting average of .346 and even hit four home runs in a single game. 

One of the creators of the NFL, Art Rooney  purchased the Pittsburgh Pirates (the future Steelers) for $2500 in racetrack winnings in 1933. His passion for horse racing was legendary. One weekend in 1936, he took $500 to the races and left with $300,000! Not one to waste money, he applied his earnings to his shrewd business dealings.

For decades, Rooney watched the Steelers lose until the 1970s, when they became a football powerhouse, winning the Super Bowl in 1975, 1976, 1979, and 1980. True to his team, Rooney stayed on as chairman until his death at age 87.

Richard (b. 1926) and Albert McGuire (1928-2001) are the only brothers elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame. Dick McGuire played twelve NBA seasons with the New York Knicks and Detroit Pistons during which he was named an NBA All-Star seven times. He led the league in assists in 1950 and piloted the Knicks to three consecutive NBA championships (1951-1953). As a player, he was known as “Tricky Dick” for his lightning fast moves, slick passing, and uncanny ability to find an opening. He later coached both the Pistons and Knicks.

Dick McGuire’s younger brother Al made his mark in coaching college basketball. First with Belmont Abbey and then with Marquette University, McGuire established himself as one of the game’s great motivators and teachers. He led Marquette to eleven consecutive post-season tournament appearances, including the NIT (1970) and NCAA (1977) tournament championships. The latter victory was the last game he coached. He later became a highly respected analyst for televised basketball.

One of only two American-born players in the Hockey Hall of Fame, Joe Mullen (b.1957) was born in New York City. He starred at Boston College before joining the St. Louis Blues. Over the course of eighteen NHL seasons, Mullen became the first American-born player to tally more than 1,000 career points. In stints with St. Louis, Calgary, Pittsburgh, and Boston, Mullen scored 40 or more goals and had 40 or more assists in six seasons. He also won the Lady Bing Trophy for sportsmanship in 1987 and 1989.