title: Irish Americans

text: Two pairs of Irish empresarios founded colonies in coastal Texas in 1828. John McMullen and James McGloin honored the Irish saint when they established the San Patricio Colony south of San Antonio; James Power and James Hewetson contracted to create the Refugio Colony on the Gulf Coast. The two colonies were settled mainly by Irish, but also by Mexicans and other nationalities. At least 87 Irish-surnamed individuals settled in the Peters Colony, which included much of present-day north-central Texas, in the 1840s. The Irish participated in all phases of Texas' war of independence against Mexico. Among those who died defending the Alamo in March 1836 were 12 who were Irish-born, while an additional 14 bore Irish surnames. About 100 Irish-born soldiers participated in the Battle of San Jacinto – about one-seventh of the total force of Texians in that conflict.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish Catholics concentrated in a few medium-sized cities, where they were highly visible, especially in Charleston, Savannah and New Orleans. They often became precinct leaders in the Democratic Party Organizations, opposed abolition of slavery, and generally favored preserving the Union in 1860, when they voted for Stephen Douglas.


title: Irish Americans

text: After secession in 1861, the Irish Catholic community supported the Confederate States of America and 20,000 Irish Catholics served in the Confederate States Army. Gleason says:


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish nationalist John Mitchel lived in Tennessee and Virginia during his exile from Ireland and was one of the Southern United States' most outspoken supporters during the American Civil War through his newspapers the "Southern Citizen" and the "Richmond Enquirer".


title: Irish Americans

text: Although most began as unskilled laborers, Irish Catholics in the South achieved average or above average economic status by 1900. David T. Gleeson emphasizes how well they were accepted by society:


title: Irish Americans

text: Before the 1800s, Irish immigrants to North America often moved to the countryside. Some worked in the fur trade, trapping and exploring, but most settled in rural farms and villages. They cleared the land of trees, built homes, and planted fields. Many others worked in coastal areas as fishers, on ships, and as dockworkers. In the 1800s, Irish immigrants in the United States tended to stay in the large cities where they landed.


title: Irish Americans

text: From 1820 to 1860, 1,956,557 Irish arrived, 75% of these after the Great Irish Famine (or "The Great Hunger", ) of 1845–1852, struck. According to a 2019 study, "the sons of farmers and illiterate men were more likely to emigrate than their literate and skilled counterparts. Emigration rates were highest in poorer farming communities with stronger migrant networks."


title: Irish Americans

text: Of the total Irish immigrants to the U.S. from 1820 to 1860, many died crossing the ocean due to disease and dismal conditions of what became known as coffin ships. Irish immigration had greatly increased beginning in the 1830s due to the need for unskilled labor in canal building, lumbering, and construction works in the Northeast. The large Erie Canal project was one such example where Irishmen were many of the laborers. Small but tight communities developed in growing cities such as Philadelphia, Boston, and New York.


title: Irish Americans

text: Most Irish immigrants to the United States during this period favored large cities because they could create their own communities for support and protection in a new environment. Cities with large numbers of Irish immigrants included Boston, Philadelphia, and New York, as well as Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, St. Louis, St. Paul, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.


title: Irish Americans

text: While many Irish did stay near large cities, countless others were part of westward expansion. They were enticed by tales of gold, and by the increasing opportunities for work and land. In 1854, the government opened Kansas Territory to settlers. While many people in general moved to take advantage of the unsettled land, Irish were an important part. Many Irish men were physical laborers. In order to colonize the west, many strong men were needed to build the towns and cities. Kansas City was one city that was built by Irish immigrants. Much of its population today is of Irish descent. Another reason for Irish migration west was the expansion of railroads. Railway work was a common occupation among immigrant men because workers were in such high demand. Many Irish men followed the expansion of railroads, and ended up settling in places that they built in. Since the Irish were a large part of those Americans moving west, much of their culture can still be found today.


title: Irish Americans

text: Between 1851 and 1920, 3.3 to 3.7 million Irish immigrated to the United States, including more than 90 percent of the more than 1 million Ulster Protestant emigrants out of Ireland from 1851 to 1900. Following the Great Famine (1845–1852), emigration from Ireland came primarily from Munster and Connacht, while 28 percent of all immigrants from Ireland from 1851 to 1900 continued to come from Ulster. Ulster immigration continued to account for as much as 20 percent of all immigration from Ireland to the United States in the 1880s and 1890s, and still accounted for 19 percent of all immigration from Ireland to the United States from 1900 to 1909 and 25 percent from 1910 to 1914. The Catholic population in the United States grew to 3.1 million by 1860 (or approximately 10 percent of the total U.S. population of 31.4 million), to 6.3 million by 1880 (or approximately 13 percent of the total U.S. population of 50.2 million), and further to 19.8 million by 1920 (or approximately 19 percent of the total U.S. population of 106 million).


title: Irish Americans

text: The 309 Connemara emigrants, selected by their local clergy as suitable for a new life in America, arrived at Boston June 14, 1880, 11 days after departure from Galway Bay on the SS "Austrian", an Allen Line ship. The settling of 'The Connemaras', as they became known, was a new venture prompted by a Liverpool priest, Fr Patrick Nugent renowned for his 'philanthropic and truly patriotic exertions to alleviate the social conditions of his fellow countrymen in England'; and Archbishop John Ireland, of St Paul, Minnesota, who was already settling thousands of Irish Catholics who were trapped in the ghettoes of New York and elsewhere, on rich prairie lands.


title: Irish Americans

text: However, due to continued immigration from Germany, and beginning in the 1880s, waves of immigration from Italy, Poland, and Canada (by French Canadians) as well as from Mexico from 1900 to 1920, Irish Catholics never accounted for a majority of the Catholic population in the United States through 1920. In the 1920s, an additional 220,000 immigrants from Ireland came to the United States, with emigration from Ulster falling off to 10,000 of 126,000 immigrants from Ireland (or less than 10 percent) between 1925 and 1930. Following the Immigration Act of 1924 and the Great Depression, from 1930 to 1975, only 141,000 more immigrants came from Ireland to the United States. Improving economic conditions during the Post–World War II economic expansion and the passage of the restrictive Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 contributed to the decline in mass immigration from Ireland. Due to the early 1980s recession, 360,000 Irish emigrated out of the country, with the majority going to England and many to the United States (including approximately 40,000 to 150,000 on overstayed travel visas as undocumented aliens).


title: Irish Americans

text: Beginning in the 1970s, surveys of self-identified Irish Americans found that consistent majorities of Irish Americans also self-identified as being Protestant. While there was a greater total number of immigrants after immigration from Ireland transitioned to being primarily Catholic in the mid-to-late 1830s, fertility rates in the United States were lower from 1840 to 1970 after immigration from Ireland became primarily Catholic than they were from 1700 to 1840 when immigration was primarily Protestant. Also, while Irish immigrants to the United States in the early 20th century had higher fertility rates than the U.S. population as a whole, they had lower fertility rates than German immigrants to the United States during the same time period and lower fertility rates than the contemporaneous population of Ireland, and subsequent generations had lower fertility rates than the emigrant generation. This is due to the fact that despite coming from the rural regions of an agrarian society, Irish immigrants in the post-Famine migration generally immigrated to the urban areas of the United States because by 1850 the costs of moving to a rural area and establishing a farm was beyond the financial means of most Irish immigrants. In the 1990s, the Irish economy began to boom again, and by the turn of the 21st century, immigration to Ireland from the United States began to consistently exceed immigration from Ireland to the United States.


title: Irish Americans

text: During the American Civil War, Irish Americans volunteered for the Union Army and at least 38 Union regiments had the word "Irish" in their titles. 144,221 Union soldiers were born in Ireland; additionally, perhaps an equal number of Union soldiers were of Irish descent. Many immigrant soldiers formed their own regiments, such as the Irish Brigade. However, in proportion to the general population, the Irish were the most underrepresented immigrant group fighting for the Union.


title: Irish Americans

text: However, conscription was resisted by many Irish as an imposition. Two years into the war, the conscription law was passed in 1863, and major draft riots erupted in New York. It coincided with the efforts of the city's dominant political machine, Tammany Hall, to enroll Irish immigrants as citizens so they could vote in local elections. Many such immigrants suddenly discovered they were now expected to fight for their new country. The Irish, employed primarily as laborers, were usually unable to afford the $300 "commutation fee" to procure a replacement for service. Many of the Irish viewed blacks as competition for scarce jobs, and as the reason why the Civil War was being fought. African Americans who fell into the mob's hands were often beaten or killed. The Colored Orphan Asylum on Fifth Avenue, which provided shelter for hundreds of children, was attacked by a mob. It was seen as a "symbol of white charity to blacks and of black upward mobility," reasons enough for its destruction at the hands of a predominantly Irish mob which looked upon African Americans as direct social and economic competitors. Fortunately, the largely Irish-American police force was able to secure the orphanage for enough time to allow orphans to escape.


title: Irish Americans

text: 30,000 Irish or Irish-descended men joined the Confederate Army. Interestingly, Gleeson wrote that they had higher desertion rates than non-Irish, and sometimes switched sides, suggesting that their support for the Confederacy was tepid. During the Reconstruction era, however, some Irish took a strong position in favor of white supremacy, and some played major roles in attacking blacks in riots in Memphis.


title: Irish Americans

text: In 1871, New York's Orange Riots broke out when Irish Protestants celebrated the Williamite victory at the Battle of the Boyne by parading through Irish Catholic neighborhoods, taunting the residents who then responded with violence. Police Superintendent James J. Kelso, a Protestant, ordered the parade cancelled as a threat to public safety. Kelso was overruled by the governor, who ordered 5000 militia to protect the marchers. The Catholics attacked but were stopped by the militia and police, who opened fire killing about 63 Catholics.


title: Irish Americans

text: Relations between the U.S. and Britain were chilly during the 1860s as Americans resented instances of British and Canadian support for the Confederacy during the Civil War. After the war American authorities looked the other way as Irish Catholic "Fenians" plotted and even attempted an invasion of Canada. The Fenians proved a failure, but Irish Catholic politicians (Who were a growing power in the Democratic Party) demanded more independence for Ireland and made anti-British rhetoric—called "twisting the lion's tail"—a staple of election campaign appeals to the Irish Catholic vote.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish were having a huge impact on America as a whole. In 1910, there were more people in New York City of Irish ancestry than Dublin's whole population, and even today, many of these cities still retain a substantial Irish-American community. The best urban economic opportunities for unskilled Irish women and men included "factory and millwork, domestic service, and the physical labor of public work projects."


title: Irish Americans

text: During the mid-1900s, immigrants from Ireland were coming to the U.S. for the same reasons as those before them; they came looking for jobs.


title: Irish Americans

text: Religion has been important to the Irish American identity in America, and continues to play a major role in their communities. Surveys conducted since the 1970s have shown consistent majorities or pluralities of those who self-identify as being of Irish ancestry in the United States as also self-identifying as Protestants. The Protestants' ancestors arrived primarily in the colonial era, while Catholics are primarily descended from immigrants of the 19th century. Irish leaders have been prominent in the Catholic Church in the United States for over 150 years. The Irish have been leaders in the Presbyterian and Methodist traditions, as well.


title: Irish Americans

text: Surveys in the 1990s show that of Americans who identify themselves as "Irish", 51% said they were Protestant and 36% identified as Catholic. In the Southern United States, Protestants account for 73% of those claiming Irish origins, while Catholics account for 19%. In the Northern United States, 45% of those claiming Irish origin are Catholic, while 39% are Protestant.


title: Irish Americans

text: Between 1607 and 1820, the majority of emigrants from Ireland to America were Protestants who were described simply as "Irish". The religious distinction became important after 1820, when large numbers of Irish Catholics began to emigrate to the United States. Some of the descendants of the colonial Irish Protestant settlers from Ulster began thereafter to redefine themselves as "Scotch Irish", to stress their historic origins, and distanced themselves from Irish Catholics; others continued to call themselves Irish, especially in areas of the South which saw little Irish Catholic immigration. By 1830, Irish diaspora demographics had changed rapidly, with over 60% of all Irish settlers in the US being Catholics from rural areas of Ireland.


title: Irish Americans

text: Some Protestant Irish immigrants became active in explicitly anti-Catholic organizations such as the Orange Institution and the American Protective Association. However, participation in the Orange Institution was never as large in the United States as it was in Canada. In the early nineteenth century, the post-Revolutionary republican spirit of the new United States attracted exiled United Irishmen such as Theobald Wolf Tone and others, with the presidency of Andrew Jackson exemplifying this attitude. Most Protestant Irish immigrants in the first several decades of the nineteenth century were those who held to the republicanism of the 1790s, and who were unable to accept Orangeism. Loyalists and Orangemen made up a minority of Irish Protestant immigrants to the United States during this period. Most of the Irish loyalist emigration was bound for Upper Canada and the Canadian Maritime provinces, where Orange lodges were able to flourish under the British flag.


title: Irish Americans

text: By 1870, when there were about 930 Orange lodges in the Canadian province of Ontario, there were only 43 in the entire eastern United States. These few American lodges were founded by newly arriving Protestant Irish immigrants in coastal cities such as Philadelphia and New York. These ventures were short-lived and of limited political and social impact, although there were specific instances of violence involving Orangemen between Catholic and Protestant Irish immigrants, such as the Orange Riots in New York City in 1824, 1870 and 1871.


title: Irish Americans

text: The first "Orange riot" on record was in 1824, in Abingdon Square, New York, resulting from a 12 July march. Several Orangemen were arrested and found guilty of inciting the riot. According to the State prosecutor in the court record, "the Orange celebration was until then unknown in the country." The immigrants involved were admonished: "In the United States the oppressed of all nations find an asylum, and all that is asked in return is that they become law-abiding citizens. Orangemen, Ribbonmen, and United Irishmen are alike unknown. They are all entitled to protection by the laws of the country."


title: Irish Americans

text: The later Orange Riots of 1870 and 1871 killed nearly 70 people, and were fought out between Irish Protestant and Catholic immigrants. After this the activities of the Orange Order were banned for a time, the Order dissolved, and most members joined Masonic orders. After 1871, there were no more riots between Irish Catholics and Protestants.


title: Irish Americans

text: America offered a new beginning, and "...most descendents of the Ulster Presbyterians of the eighteenth century and even many new Protestant Irish immigrants turned their backs on all associations with Ireland and melted into the American Protestant mainstream."


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish priests (especially Dominicans, Franciscans, Augustinians and Capuchins) came to the large cities of the East in the 1790s, and when new dioceses were erected in 1808 the first bishop of New York was an Irishman in recognition of the contribution of the early Irish clergy.


title: Irish Americans

text: Saint Patrick's Battalion ("San Patricios") was a group of several hundred immigrant soldiers, the majority Irish, who deserted the U.S. Army during the Mexican–American War because of ill treatment or sympathetic leanings to fellow Mexican Catholics. They joined the Mexican army.


title: Irish Americans

text: In Boston between 1810 and 1840 there had been serious tensions between the bishop and the laity who wanted to control the local parishes. By 1845, the Catholic population in Boston had increased to 30,000 from around 5,000 in 1825, due to the influx of Irish immigrants. With the appointment of John B. Fitzpatrick as bishop in 1845, tensions subsided as the increasingly Irish Catholic community grew to support Fitzpatrick's assertion of the bishop's control of parish government.


title: Irish Americans

text: In New York, Archbishop John Hughes (1797–1864), an Irish immigrant himself, was deeply involved in "the Irish question"—Irish independence from British rule. Hughes supported Daniel O'Connell's Catholic emancipation movement in Ireland, but rejected such radical and violent societies as the Young Irelanders and the National Brotherhood. Hughes also disapproved of American Irish radical fringe groups, urging immigrants to assimilate themselves into American life while remaining patriotic to Ireland "only individually". In Hughes's view, a large-scale movement to form Irish settlements in the western United States was too isolationist and ultimately detrimental to immigrants' success in the New World.


title: Irish Americans

text: In the 1840s, Hughes campaigned for publicly funded schools for Catholic immigrants from Ireland modelled after the successful Irish public school system in Lowell, Massachusetts. Hughes made speeches denouncing the Public School Society of New York, which mandated that all educational institutions use the King James Bible, an unacceptable proposition to Catholics. The dispute between Catholics and Protestants over the funding of schools led the New York Legislature to pass the Maclay Act in 1842, giving New York City an elective Board of Education empowered to build and supervise schools and distribute the education fund—but with the proviso that none of the money should go to schools which taught religion. Hughes responded by building an elaborate parochial school system that stretched to the college level, setting a policy followed in other large cities. Efforts to get city or state funding failed because of vehement Protestant opposition to a system that rivaled the public schools.


title: Irish Americans

text: In the west, Catholic Irish were having a large effect as well. The open west attracted many Irish immigrants. Many of these immigrants were Catholic. When they migrated west, they would form "little pockets" with other Irish immigrants. Irish Catholic communities were made in "supportive, village style neighborhoods centered around a Catholic church and called 'parishes'". These neighborhoods affected the overall lifestyle and atmosphere of the communities. Other ways religion played a part in these towns was the fact that many were started by Irish Catholic priests. Father Bernard Donnelly started "Town of Kansas" which would later become Kansas City. His influence over early stages Kansas City was great, and so the Catholic religion was spread to other settlers who arrived. While not all settlers became Catholics, a great number of the early settlers were Catholic. In other western communities, Irish priests wanted to convert the Native Americans to Catholicism. These Catholic Irish would contribute not only to the growth of Catholic population in America, but to the values and traditions in America.


title: Irish Americans

text: Jesuits established a network of colleges in major cities, including Boston College, Fordham University in New York, and Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Fordham was founded in 1841 and attracted students from other regions of the United States, and even South America and the Caribbean. At first exclusively a liberal arts institution, it built a science building in 1886, lending more legitimacy to science in the curriculum there. In addition, a three-year Bachelor of Science degree was created. Boston College, by contrast, was established over twenty years later in 1863 to appeal to urban Irish Catholics. It offered a rather limited intellectual curriculum, however, with the priests at Boston College prioritizing spiritual and sacramental activities over intellectual pursuits. One consequence was that Harvard Law School would not admit Boston College graduates to its law school. Modern Jesuit leadership in American academia was not to become their hallmark across all institutions until the 20th century.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish became prominent in the leadership of the Catholic Church in the U.S. by the 1850s—by 1890 there were 7.3 million Catholics in the U.S. and growing, and most bishops were Irish. As late as the 1970s, when Irish were 17% of American Catholics, they were 35% of the priests and 50% of the bishops, together with a similar proportion of presidents of Catholic colleges and hospitals.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Scots-Irish who settled in the back country of colonial America were largely Presbyterians. The establishment of many settlements in the remote back-country put a strain on the ability of the Presbyterian Church to meet the new demand for qualified, college-educated clergy. Religious groups such as the Baptists and Methodists did not require higher education of their ministers, so they could more readily supply ministers to meet the demand of the growing Scots-Irish settlements. By about 1810, Baptist and Methodist churches were in the majority, and the descendants of the Scotch-Irish today remain predominantly Baptist or Methodist. They were avid participants in the revivals taking place during the Great Awakening from the 1740s to the 1840s. They take pride in their Irish heritage because they identify with the values ascribed to the Scotch-Irish who played a major role in the American Revolution and in the development of American culture.


title: Irish Americans

text: The first Presbyterian community in America was established in 1640 in Southampton, Long Island New York. Francis Makemie, an Irish Presbyterian immigrant later established churches in Maryland and Virginia. Makemie was born and raised near Ramelton, County Donegal, to Ulster Scots parents. He was educated in the University of Glasgow and set out to organize and initiate the construction of several Presbyterian Churches throughout Maryland and Virginia. By 1706, Makemie and his followers constructed a Presbyterian Church in Rehobeth, Maryland. In 1707, after traveling to New York to establish a presbytery, Francis Makemie was charged with preaching without a license by the English immigrant and Governor of New York, Edward Hyde. Makemie won a vital victory for the fight of religious freedom for Scots-Irish immigrants when he was acquitted and gained recognition for having "stood up to Anglican authorities". Makemie became one of the wealthiest immigrants to colonial America, owning more than 5,000 acres and 33 slaves.


title: Irish Americans

text: New Light Presbyterians founded the College of New Jersey, later renamed Princeton University, in 1746 in order to train ministers dedicated to their views. The college was the educational and religious capital of Scots-Irish America. By 1808, loss of confidence in the college within the Presbyterian Church led to the establishment of the separate Princeton Theological Seminary, but deep Presbyterian influence at the college continued through the 1910s, as typified by university president Woodrow Wilson.


title: Irish Americans

text: Out on the frontier, the Scots-Irish Presbyterians of the Muskingum Valley in Ohio established Muskingum College at New Concord in 1837. It was led by two clergymen, Samuel Wilson and Benjamin Waddle, who served as trustees, president, and professors during the first few years. During the 1840s and 1850s the college survived the rapid turnover of very young presidents who used the post as a stepping stone in their clerical careers, and in the late 1850s it weathered a storm of student protest. Under the leadership of L. B. W. Shryock during the Civil War, Muskingum gradually evolved from a local and locally controlled institution to one serving the entire Muskingum Valley. It is still affiliated with the Presbyterian church.


title: Irish Americans

text: Brought up in a Scots-Irish Presbyterian home, Cyrus McCormick of Chicago developed a strong sense of devotion to the Presbyterian Church. Throughout his later life, he used the wealth gained through invention of the mechanical reaper to further the work of the church. His benefactions were responsible for the establishment in Chicago of the Presbyterian Theological Seminary of the Northwest (after his death renamed the McCormick Theological Seminary of the Presbyterian Church). He assisted the Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond, Virginia. He also supported a series of religious publications, beginning with the "Presbyterian Expositor" in 1857 and ending with the "Interior" (later called "The Continent"), which his widow continued until her death.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish immigrants were the first immigrant group to America to build and organize Methodist churches. Many of the early Irish immigrants who did so came from a German-Irish background. Barbara Heck, an Irish woman of German descent from County Limerick, Ireland, immigrated to America in 1760, with her husband, Paul. She is often considered to be the "Mother of American Methodism." Heck guided and mentored her cousin, Philip Embury, who was also an "Irish Palatine" immigrant. Heck and Embury constructed the John Street Methodist Church, which today is usually recognized as the oldest Methodist Church in the United States. However, another church constructed by prominent Irish Methodist immigrant, Robert Strawbridge, may have preceded the John Street Methodist Church.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish people were the first of many to immigrate to the U.S. in mass waves, including large groups of single young women between the ages of 16 and 24. Up until this point, free women who settled in the colonies mostly came after their husbands had already made the journey and could afford their trip, or were brought over to be married to an eligible colonist who paid for their journey. Many Irish fled their home country to escape unemployment and starvation during the Great Irish Famine. The richest of the Irish resettled in England, where their skilled work was greatly accepted, but lower class Irish and women could find little work in Western Europe, leading them to cross the Atlantic in search of greater financial opportunities.


title: Irish Americans

text: Some Irish women resorted to prostitution in large cities such as Boston and New York City. They were often arrested for intoxication, public lewdness, and petty larceny. Most of the single Irish women preferred service labor as a form of income. These women made a higher wage than most by serving the middle and high-class in their own homes as nannies, cooks and cleaners. The wages for domestic service were higher than that of factory workers and they lived in the attics of upscale mansions. By 1870, forty percent of Irish women worked as domestic servants in New York City, making them over fifty percent of the service industry at the time.


title: Irish Americans

text: Prejudices ran deep in the north and could be seen in newspaper cartoons depicting Irish men as hot-headed, violent drunkards. The initial backlash the Irish received in America lead to their self-imposed seclusion, making assimilation into society a long and painful process.


title: Irish Americans

text: Down to the end of the 19th century a large number of Irish immigrants arrived speaking Irish as their first language. This continued to be the case with immigrants from certain counties even in the 20th century. The Irish language was first mentioned as being spoken in North America in the 17th century. Large numbers of Irish emigrated to America throughout the 18th century, bringing the language with them, and it was particularly strong in Pennsylvania. It was also widely spoken in such places as New York City, where it proved a useful recruiting tool for Loyalists during the American Revolution.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish speakers continued to arrive in large numbers throughout the 19th century, particularly after the Famine. There was a certain amount of literacy in Irish, as shown by the many Irish-language manuscripts which immigrants brought with them. In 1881 "An Gaodhal" was founded, being the first newspaper in the world to be largely in Irish. It continued to be published into the 20th century, and now has an online successor in "An Gael", an international literary magazine. A number of Irish immigrant newspapers in the 19th and 20th centuries had Irish language columns.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish immigrants fell into three linguistic categories: monolingual Irish speakers, bilingual speakers of both Irish and English, and monolingual English speakers. Estimates indicate that there were around 400,000 Irish speakers in the United States in the 1890s, located primarily in New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago and Yonkers. The Irish-speaking population of New York reached its height in this period, when speakers of Irish numbered between 70,000 and 80,000. This number declined during the early 20th century, dropping to 40,000 in 1939, 10,000 in 1979, and 5,000 in 1995.


title: Irish Americans

text: According to the 2000 census, the Irish language ranks 66th out of the 322 languages spoken today in the U.S., with over 25,000 speakers. New York state has the most Irish speakers of the 50 states, and Massachusetts the highest percentage.


title: Irish Americans

text: Daltaí na Gaeilge, a nonprofit Irish language advocacy group based in Elberon, New Jersey, estimated that about 30,000 people spoke the language in America as of 2006. This, the organization claimed, was a remarkable increase from only a few thousand at the time of the group's founding in 1981.


title: Irish Americans

text: Before 1800, significant numbers of Irish Protestant immigrants became farmers; many headed to the frontier where land was cheap or free and it was easier to start a farm or herding operation. Many Irish Protestants and Catholics alike were indentured servants, unable to pay their own passage or sentenced to servitude.


title: Irish Americans

text: After 1840, most Irish Catholic immigrants went directly to the cities, mill towns, and railroad or canal construction sites on the East Coast. In upstate New York, the Great Lakes area, the Midwest and the Far West, many became farmers or ranchers. In the East, male Irish laborers were hired by Irish contractors to work on canals, railroads, streets, sewers and other construction projects, particularly in New York state and New England. The Irish men also worked in these labor positions in the mid-west. They worked to construct towns where there had been none previously. Kansas City was one such town, and eventually became an important cattle town and railroad center.


title: Irish Americans

text: Labor positions were not the only occupations for Irish, though. Some moved to New England mill towns, such as Holyoke, Lowell, Taunton, Brockton, Fall River, and Milford, Massachusetts, where owners of textile mills welcomed the new, low-wage workers. They took the jobs previously held by Yankee women known as Lowell girls. A large percentage of Irish Catholic women took jobs as maids in hotels and private households.


title: Irish Americans

text: Large numbers of unemployed or very poor Irish Catholics lived in squalid conditions in the new city slums and tenements.


title: Irish Americans

text: Single, Irish immigrant women quickly assumed jobs in high demand but for very low pay. The majority of them worked in mills, factories, and private households and were considered the bottommost group in the female job hierarchy, alongside African American women. Workers considered mill work in cotton textiles and needle trades the least desirable because of the dangerous and unpleasant conditions. Factory work was primarily a worst-case scenario for widows or daughters of families already involved in the industry.


title: Irish Americans

text: Unlike many other immigrants, Irish women preferred domestic work because it was constantly in great demand among middle- and upper-class American households. Although wages differed across the country, they were consistently higher than those of the other occupations available to Irish women and could often be negotiated because of the lack of competition. Also, the working conditions in well-off households were significantly better than those of factories or mills, and free room and board allowed domestic servants to save money or send it back to their families in Ireland.


title: Irish Americans

text: Despite some of the benefits of domestic work, Irish women's job requirements were difficult and demeaning. Subject to their employers around the clock, Irish women cooked, cleaned, babysat and more. Because most servants lived in the home where they worked, they were separated from their communities. Most of all, the American stigma on domestic work suggested that Irish women were failures who had "about the same intelligence as that of an old grey-headed negro." This quote illustrates how, in a period of extreme racism towards African Americans, society similarly viewed Irish immigrants as inferior beings.


title: Irish Americans

text: Although the Irish Catholics started very low on the social status scale, by 1900 they had jobs and earnings about equal on average to their neighbors. This was largely due to their ability to speak English when they arrived. The Irish were able to rise quickly within the working world, unlike non-English speaking immigrants. Yet there were still many shanty and lower working class communities in Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, New York, and other parts of the country.


title: Irish Americans

text: After 1945, the Catholic Irish consistently ranked at the top of the social hierarchy, thanks especially to their high rate of college attendance, and due to that many Irish American men have risen to higher socio-economic table.


title: Irish Americans

text: In the 19th century, jobs in local government were distributed by politicians to their supporters, and with significant strength in city hall the Irish became candidates for positions in all departments, such as police departments, fire departments, public schools and other public services of major cities. In 1897 New York City was formed by consolidating its five boroughs. That created 20,000 new patronage jobs. New York invested heavily in large-scale public works. This produced thousands of unskilled and semi-skilled jobs in subways, street railways, waterworks, and port facilities. Over half the Irish men employed by the city worked in utilities. Across all ethnic groups In New York City, municipal employment grew from 54,000 workers in 1900 to 148,000 in 1930. In New York City, Albany, and Jersey City, about one third of the Irish of the first and second generation had municipal jobs in 1900.


title: Irish Americans

text: By 1855, according to New York Police Commissioner George W. Matsell (1811–1877), almost 17 percent of the police department's officers were Irish-born (compared to 28.2 percent of the city) in a report to the Board of Aldermen; of the NYPD's 1,149 men, Irish-born officers made up 304 of 431 foreign-born policemen. In the 1860s more than half of those arrested in New York City were Irish born or of Irish descent but nearly half of the city's law enforcement officers were also Irish. By the turn of the 20th century, five out of six NYPD officers were Irish born or of Irish descent. As late as the 1960s, 42% of the NYPD were Irish Americans.


title: Irish Americans

text: Up to the 20th and early 21st century, Irish Catholics continue to be prominent in the law enforcement community, especially in the Northeastern United States. The Emerald Society, an Irish American fraternal organization, was founded in 1953 by the NYPD. When the Boston chapter of the Emerald Society formed in 1973, half of the city's police officers became members.


title: Irish Americans

text: Towards the end of the 19th century, schoolteaching became the most desirable occupation for the second generation of female Irish immigrants. Teaching was similar to domestic work for the first generation of Irish immigrants in that it was a popular job and one that relied on a woman's decision to remain unmarried. The disproportionate number of Irish-American Catholic women who entered the job market as teachers in the late 19th century and early 20th century from Boston to San Francisco was a beneficial result of the Irish National school system. Irish schools prepared young single women to support themselves in a new country, which inspired them to instill the importance of education, college training, and a profession in their American-born daughters even more than in their sons.


title: Irish Americans

text: Evidence from schools in New York City illustrate the upward trend of Irish women as teachers: "as early as 1870, twenty percent of all schoolteachers were Irish women, and...by 1890 Irish females comprised two-thirds of those in the Sixth Ward schools." Irish women attained admirable reputations as schoolteachers, which enabled some to pursue professions of even higher stature.


title: Irish Americans

text: Upon arrival in the United States, many Irish women became Catholic nuns and participated in the many American sisterhoods, especially those in St. Louis in Missouri, St. Paul in Minnesota, and Troy in New York. Additionally, the women who settled in these communities were often sent back to Ireland to recruit. This kind of religious lifestyle appealed to Irish female immigrants because they outnumbered their male counterparts and the Irish cultural tendency to postpone marriage often promoted gender separation and celibacy. Furthermore, "the Catholic church, clergy, and women religious were highly respected in Ireland," making the sisterhoods particularly attractive to Irish immigrants.


title: Irish Americans

text: Nuns provided extensive support for Irish immigrants in large cities, especially in fields such as nursing and teaching but also through orphanages, widows' homes, and housing for young, single women in domestic work. Although many Irish communities built parish schools run by nuns, the majority of Irish parents in large cities in the East enrolled their children in the public school system, where daughters or granddaughters of Irish immigrants had already established themselves as teachers.


title: Irish Americans

text: Anti-Irish sentiment was rampant in the United States during the 19th and early 20th Century. Rising Nativist sentiments among Protestant Americans in the 1850s led to increasing discrimination against Irish Americans. Prejudice against Irish Catholics in the U.S. reached a peak in the mid-1850s with the Know Nothing Movement, which tried to oust Catholics from public office. After a year or two of local success, the Know Nothing Party vanished.


title: Irish Americans

text: Catholics and Protestants kept their distance; intermarriage between Catholics and Protestants was uncommon, and strongly discouraged by both Protestant ministers and Catholic priests. As Dolan notes, "'Mixed marriages', as they were called, were allowed in rare cases, though warned against repeatedly, and were uncommon." Rather, intermarriage was primarily with other ethnic groups who shared their religion. Irish Catholics, for example, would commonly intermarry with German Catholics or Poles in the Midwest and Italians in the Northeast.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish-American journalists "scoured the cultural landscape for evidence of insults directed at the Irish in America." Much of what historians know about hostility to the Irish comes from their reports in Irish and in Democratic newspapers.


title: Irish Americans

text: While the parishes were struggling to build parochial schools, many Catholic children attended public schools. The Protestant King James Version of the Bible was widely used in public schools, but Catholics were forbidden by their church from reading or reciting from it. Many Irish children complained that Catholicism was openly mocked in the classroom. In New York City, the curriculum vividly portrayed Catholics, and specifically the Irish, as villainous.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Catholic archbishop John Hughes, an immigrant to America from County Tyrone, Ireland, campaigned for public funding of Catholic education in response to the bigotry. While never successful in obtaining public money for private education, the debate with the city's Protestant elite spurred by Hughes' passionate campaign paved the way for the secularization of public education nationwide. In addition, Catholic higher education expanded during this period with colleges and universities that evolved into such institutions as Fordham University and Boston College providing alternatives to Irish who were not otherwise permitted to apply to other colleges.


title: Irish Americans

text: Many Irish work gangs were hired by contractors to build canals, railroads, city streets and sewers across the country. In the South, they underbid slave labor. One result was that small cities that served as railroad centers came to have large Irish populations.


title: Irish Americans

text: In 1895, the Knights of Equity was founded, to combat discrimination against Irish Catholics in the U.S., and to assist them financially when needed.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish Catholics were popular targets for stereotyping in the 19th century. According to historian George Potter, the media often stereotyped the Irish in America as being boss-controlled, violent (both among themselves and with those of other ethnic groups), voting illegally, prone to alcoholism and dependent on street gangs that were often violent or criminal. Potter quotes contemporary newspaper images:


title: Irish Americans

text: You will scarcely ever find an Irishman dabbling in counterfeit money, or breaking into houses, or swindling; but if there is any fighting to be done, he is very apt to have a hand in it." Even though Pat might "'meet with a friend and for love knock him down,'" noted a Montreal paper, the fighting usually resulted from a sudden excitement, allowing there was "but little 'malice prepense' in his whole composition." The "Catholic Telegraph" of Cincinnati in 1853, saying that the "name of 'Irish' has become identified in the minds of many, with almost every species of outlawry," distinguished the Irish vices as "not of a deep malignant nature," arising rather from the "transient burst of undisciplined passion," like "drunk, disorderly, fighting, etc., not like robbery, cheating, swindling, counterfeiting, slandering, calumniating, blasphemy, using obscene language, &c.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish had many humorists of their own, but were scathingly attacked in political cartoons, especially those in "Puck" magazine from the 1870s to 1900; it was edited by secular Germans who opposed the Catholic Irish in politics. In addition, the cartoons of Thomas Nast were especially hostile; for example, he depicted the Irish-dominated Tammany Hall machine in New York City as a ferocious tiger.


title: Irish Americans

text: The stereotype of the Irish as violent drunks has lasted well beyond its high point in the mid-19th century. For example, President Richard Nixon once told advisor Charles Colson that "[t]he Irish have certain — for example, the Irish can't drink. What you always have to remember with the Irish is they get mean. Virtually every Irish I've known gets mean when he drinks. Particularly the real Irish."


title: Irish Americans

text: Discrimination against Irish Americans differed depending on gender. For example, Irish women were sometimes stereotyped as "reckless breeders" because some American Protestants feared high Catholic birth rates would eventually result in a Protestant minority. Many native-born Americans claimed that "their incessant childbearing [would] ensure an Irish political takeover of American cities [and that] Catholicism would become the reigning faith of the hitherto Protestant nation." Irish men were also targeted, but in a different way than women were. The difference between the Irish female "Bridget" and the Irish male "Pat" was distinct; while she was impulsive but fairly harmless, he was "always drunk, eternally fighting, lazy, and shiftless". In contrast to the view that Irish women were shiftless, slovenly and stupid (like their male counterparts), girls were said to be "industrious, willing, cheerful, and honest—they work hard, and they are very strictly moral".


title: Irish Americans

text: There were also Social Darwinian-inspired excuses for the discrimination of the Irish in America. Many Americans believed that since the Irish were Celts and not Anglo-Saxons, they were racially inferior and deserved second-class citizenship. The Irish being of inferior intelligence was a belief held by many Americans. This notion was held due to the fact that the Irish topped the charts demographically in terms of arrests and imprisonment. They also had more people confined to insane asylums and poorhouses than any other group. The racial supremacy belief that many Americans had at the time contributed significantly to Irish discrimination.


title: Irish Americans

text: From the 1860s onwards, Irish Americans were stereotyped as terrorists and gangsters, although this stereotyping began to diminish by the end of the 19th century.


title: Irish Americans

text: The annual celebration of Saint Patrick's Day is a widely recognized symbol of the Irish presence in America. The largest celebration of the holiday takes place in New York, where the annual St. Patrick's Day Parade draws an average of two million people. The second-largest celebration is held in Boston. The South Boston Parade is one of the USA's oldest, dating back to 1737. Savannah, Georgia, also holds one of the largest parades in the United States.


title: Irish Americans

text: Since the arrival of nearly two million Irish immigrants in the 1840s, the urban Irish police officer and firefighter have become virtual icons of American popular culture. In many large cities, the police and fire departments have been dominated by the Irish for over 100 years, even after the ethnic Irish residential populations in those cities dwindled to small minorities. Many police and fire departments maintain large and active "Emerald Societies", bagpipe marching groups, or other similar units demonstrating their members' pride in their Irish heritage.


title: Irish Americans

text: While these archetypal images are especially well known, Irish Americans have contributed to U.S. culture in a wide variety of fields: the fine and performing arts, film, literature, politics, sports, and religion. The Irish-American contribution to popular entertainment is reflected in the careers of figures such as James Cagney, Bing Crosby, Walt Disney, John Ford, Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, Grace Kelly, Tyrone Power, Chuck Connors, Ada Rehan, Jena Malone, and Spencer Tracy. Irish-born actress Maureen O'Hara, who became an American citizen, defined for U.S. audiences the archetypal, feisty Irish "colleen" in popular films such as "The Quiet Man" and "The Long Gray Line". More recently, the Irish-born Pierce Brosnan gained screen celebrity as James Bond. During the early years of television, popular figures with Irish roots included Gracie Allen, Art Carney, Joe Flynn, Jackie Gleason, Luke Gordon and Ed Sullivan.


title: Irish Americans

text: Since the late days of the film industry, celluloid representations of Irish Americans have been plentiful. Famous films with Irish-American themes include social dramas such as "Little Nellie Kelly" and "The Cardinal", labor epics like "On the Waterfront", and gangster movies such as "Angels with Dirty Faces", "The Friends of Eddie Coyle", and "The Departed". Irish-American characters have been featured in popular television series such as "Ryan's Hope", "Rescue Me" and "Blue Bloods".


title: Irish Americans

text: Prominent Irish-American literary figures include Pulitzer and Nobel Prize–winning playwright Eugene O'Neill, Jazz Age novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald, author and poet Edgar Allan Poe, social realist James T. Farrell, Southern Gothic writers Flannery O'Connor and Cormac McCarthy. The 19th-century novelist Henry James was also of partly Irish descent. While Irish Americans have been underrepresented in the plastic arts, two well-known American painters claim Irish roots. 20th-century painter Georgia O'Keeffe was born to an Irish-American father, and 19th-century trompe-l'œil painter William Harnett emigrated from Ireland to the United States.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish-American contribution to politics spans the entire ideological spectrum. Two prominent American socialists, Mary Harris "Mother" Jones and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, were Irish Americans. In the 1960s, Irish-American writer Michael Harrington became an influential advocate of social welfare programs. Harrington's views profoundly influenced President John F. Kennedy and his brother, Robert F. Kennedy. Meanwhile, Irish-American political writer William F. Buckley emerged as a major intellectual force in American conservative politics in the latter half of the 20th century. Buckley's magazine, "National Review", proved an effective advocate of successful Republican candidates such as Ronald Reagan.


title: Irish Americans

text: Notorious Irish Americans include the legendary New Mexico outlaw Billy the Kid. Many historians believe he was born in New York City to Famine-era immigrants from Ireland. Mary Mallon, also known as "Typhoid Mary", was an Irish immigrant, as was madam Josephine Airey, who also went by the name of "Chicago Joe" Hensley. New Orleans socialite and murderer Delphine LaLaurie, whose maiden name was Macarty, was of partial paternal Irish ancestry. Irish-American mobsters include, amongst others, Dean O'Banion, Jack "Legs" Diamond, Buddy McLean, Howie Winter and Whitey Bulger. Lee Harvey Oswald, the assassin of John F. Kennedy, had an Irish-born great-grandmother by the name of Mary Tonry. Colorful Irish Americans also include Margaret Tobin of "RMS Titanic" fame, scandalous model Evelyn Nesbit, dancer Isadora Duncan, San Francisco madam Tessie Wall, and Nellie Cashman, nurse and gold prospector in the American West.


title: Irish Americans

text: The wide popularity of Celtic music has fostered the rise of Irish-American bands that draw heavily on traditional Irish themes and music. Such groups include New York City's Black 47, founded in the late 1980s, blending punk rock, rock and roll, Irish music, rap/hip-hop, reggae, and soul; and the Dropkick Murphys, a Celtic punk band formed in Quincy, Massachusetts, nearly a decade later. The Decemberists, a band featuring Irish-American singer Colin Meloy, released "Shankill Butchers", a song that deals with the Ulster Loyalist gang of the same name. The song appears on their album "The Crane Wife". Flogging Molly, led by Dublin-born Dave King, are relative newcomers building upon this new tradition.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish immigrants brought many traditional Irish recipes with them when they emigrated to the United States, which they adapted to meet the different ingredients available to them there. Irish Americans introduced foods like soda bread and colcannon to American cuisine. The famous Irish American meal of corned beef and cabbage was developed by Irish immigrants in the U.S., who adapted it from the traditional Irish recipe for bacon and cabbage. Irish beer such as Guinness is widely consumed in the United States, including an estimated 13 million pints on Saint Patrick's Day alone.


title: Irish Americans

text: Starting with the sons of the famine generation, the Irish dominated baseball and boxing, and played a major role in other sports.


title: Irish Americans

text: Famous in their day were NFL quarterbacks and Super Bowl champions John Elway and Tom Brady, NBA forward Rick Barry, tennis greats Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe, baseball pitcher Nolan Ryan, baseball shortstop Derek Jeter, basketball point guard Jason Kidd, boxing legend Jack Dempsey and Muhammad Ali, world champion pro surfer Kelly Slater, national champion skier Ryan Max Riley, and legendary golfer Ben Hogan.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish dominated professional baseball in the late 19th century, making up a third or more of the players and many of the top stars and managers. The professional teams played in northeastern cities with large Irish populations that provided a fan base, as well as training for ambitious youth. Casway argues that:


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish stars included Charles Comiskey, Connie Mack, Michael "King" Kelly, Roger Connor, Eddie Collins, Roger Bresnahan, Ed Walsh and New York Giants manager John McGraw. The large 1945 class of inductees enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown included nine Irish Americans.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Philadelphia Phillies always play at home during spring training on St. Patrick's Day. The Phillies hold the distinction of being the first baseball team to wear green uniforms on St. Patricks Day. The tradition was started by Phillies pitcher Tug McGraw, who dyed his uniform green the night before March 17, 1981.


title: Irish Americans

text: John L. Sullivan (1858–1918), The heavyweight boxing champion, was the first of the modern sports superstars, winning scores of contests – perhaps as many as 200—with a purse that reached the fabulous sum of one million dollars.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish brought their native games of handball, hurling and Gaelic football to America. Along with camogie, these sports are part of the Gaelic Athletic Association. The North American GAA organization is still strong, with 128 clubs across its ten divisions.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish Americans have been prominent in comedy. Notable comedians of Irish descent include Jimmy Dore, Jackie Gleason, George Carlin, Bill Burr, Bill Murray, Will Ferrell, Bryan Callen, Pete Holmes, Joe Rogan, Ben Stiller, Chris Farley, Stephen Colbert, Conan O'Brien, Denis Leary (holds dual American and Irish citizenship), Colin Quinn, Charles Nelson Reilly, Bill Maher, Molly Shannon, John Mulaney, Kathleen Madigan, Jimmy Fallon, Des Bishop, and Jim Gaffigan, among others.


title: Irish Americans

text: Musicians of Irish descent include Christina Aguilera, Kelly Clarkson, Kurt Cobain, Bing Crosby, Tori Kelly, Tim McGraw, Mandy Moore, Hilary Duff, Fergie, Jerry Garcia, Judy Garland, Katy Perry, Tom Petty, Pink, Bruce Springsteen, Gwen Stefani, Lindsay Lohan, Post Malone, Trippie Redd and others.


title: Irish Americans

text: Many people of Irish descent retain a sense of their Irish heritage. Article 2 of the Constitution of Ireland formally recognizes and embraces this fact: ...the Irish Nation cherishes its special affinity with people of Irish ancestry living abroad who share its cultural identity and heritage.


title: Irish Americans

text: Irish independence from the United Kingdom encouraged the hope that descendants of Irish abroad who had retained a cultural connection and identified with Ireland would resettle there, as opposed to attracting immigrants from other cultures in other countries. One member of an Irish government of the Irish Free State expressed his hope as follows:


title: Irish Americans

text: I do not think [the Irish Free State] will afford sufficient allurements to the citizens of other States ... The children of Irish parents born abroad are sometimes more Irish than the Irish themselves, and they would come with added experience and knowledge to our country...|4=Sen. Patrick Kenny, Seanad Éireann 1924,


title: Irish Americans

text: A sense of exile, diaspora, and (in the case of songs) even nostalgia is a common theme. The modern term "Plastic Paddy" generally refers to someone who was not born in Ireland and is separated from his closest Irish-born ancestor by several generations but still considers themselves "Irish". It is occasionally used in a derogatory fashion towards Irish Americans, in an attempt to cast doubt the "Irishness" of the Irish diaspora based on nationality and (citizenship) rather than ethnicity. The term is freely applied to relevant people of all nationalities, not solely Irish Americans.


title: Irish Americans

text: Some Irish Americans were enthusiastic supporters of Irish independence; the Fenian Brotherhood movement was based in the United States and in the late 1860s launched several unsuccessful attacks on British-controlled Canada known as the "Fenian Raids". The Provisional IRA received significant funding and volunteers for its paramilitary activities from Irish expatriates and Irish American supporters—in 1984, the US Department of Justice won a court case forcing the Irish American fund-raising organization NORAID to acknowledge the Provisional IRA as its "foreign principal".


title: Irish Americans

text: The vast majority of Irish Catholic Americans settled in large and small cities across the North, particularly railroad centers and mill towns. They became perhaps the most urbanized group in America, as few became farmers. Areas that retain a significant Irish American population include the metropolitan areas of Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Providence, Hartford, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Albany, Syracuse, Baltimore, St. Louis, Chicago, Cleveland, San Francisco, Savannah, and Los Angeles, where most new arrivals of the 1830–1910 period settled. As a percentage of the population, Massachusetts is the most Irish state, with about a fifth, 21.2%, of the population claiming Irish descent.


title: Irish Americans

text: The most Irish American towns in the United States are Scituate, Massachusetts, with 47.5% of its residents being of Irish descent; Milton, Massachusetts, with 44.6% of its 26,000 being of Irish descent; and Braintree, Massachusetts, with 46.5% of its 34,000 being of Irish descent. (Weymouth, Massachusetts, at 39% of its 54,000 citizens, and Quincy, Massachusetts, at 34% of its population of 90,000, are the two most Irish "cities" in the country. Squantum, a peninsula in the northern part of Quincy, is the most Irish neighborhood in the country, with close to 60% of its 2600 residents claiming Irish descent.)


title: Irish Americans

text: Philadelphia, Boston, New York, and Chicago have historically had neighborhoods with higher percentages of Irish American residents. Regionally, the most Irish American states are Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont, Rhode Island, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut, according to the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey in 2013. In consequence of its unique history as a mining center, Butte, Montana, is also one of the country's most thoroughly Irish American cities. Smaller towns, such as Greeley, Nebraska (population 466), with an estimated 51.7% of the residents identifying as Irish American as of 2009–13 were part of the Irish Catholic Colonization effort of Bishop O'Connor of New York in the 1880s.


title: Irish Americans

text: As of 2020, the distribution of Irish Americans across the 50 states and DC is as presented in the following table:


title: Irish Americans

text: According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the city of Butte, Montana has the highest percentage of Irish Americans per capita of any city in the United States, with around one-quarter of the population reporting Irish ancestry. Butte's Irish Catholic population originated with the waves of Irish immigrants who arrived in the city in the late-nineteenth century to work in the industrial mines. By population Boston and Philadelphia have the two largest Irish American populations in the country.


title: Irish Americans

text: There are Irish neighborhoods scattered all throughout Boston, most notably South Boston. Many of Philadelphia's Irish neighborhoods are located in the Northeast Philadelphia section of the city, particularly in the Fishtown, Mayfair, and Kensington neighborhoods, as well as the South Philadelphia section, most notably the Pennsport ("Two Street" to the locals) neighborhood. There are large Irish populations in the Boston and Philadelphia metropolitan areas as well. The South Side of Chicago, Illinois also has a large Irish community, who refer to themselves as the South Side Irish.


title: Irish Americans

text: The United States Declaration of Independence contained 56 delegate signatures. Of the signers, eight were of Irish descent. Three signers, Matthew Thornton, George Taylor and James Smith, were born in Ireland; the remaining five Irish Americans, George Read, Thomas McKean, Thomas Lynch Jr., Edward Rutledge, and Charles Carroll, were the sons or grandsons of Irish immigrants. Though not a delegate but the secretary at the Congress, Charles Thomson, also Irish American, signed as well. The United States Constitution was created by a convention of 36 delegates. Of these, at least six were of Irish ancestry. George Read and Thomas McKean had already worked on the Declaration, and were joined by John Rutledge, William Paterson, Pierce Butler, Daniel Carroll, and Thomas Fitzsimons. The Carrolls and Fitzsimons were Irish Catholic, while Thomas Lynch Jr, James Smith, Pierce Butler and George Read were Irish Protestants they were descended from Irish Normans Anglo-Irish and native Irish who had intermarried for several centuries not ulster-Scots. The remainder were Scotch-Irish.


title: Irish Americans

text: By the 1850s, the Irish were already a major presence in the police departments of large cities. In New York City in 1855, of the city's 1,149 policemen, 305 were natives of Ireland. Within 30 years, Irish Americans in the NYPD were almost twice their proportion of the city's population. Both Boston's police and fire departments provided many Irish immigrants with their first jobs. The creation of a unified police force in Philadelphia opened the door to the Irish in that city. By 1860 in Chicago, 49 of the 107 on the police force were Irish. Chief O'Leary headed the police force in New Orleans, and Malachi Fallon was chief of police of San Francisco.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish Catholic diaspora are very well-organized and since 1850 have produced a majority of the leaders of the U.S. Catholic Church, labor unions, the Democratic Party in larger cities, and Catholic high schools, colleges and universities.


title: Irish Americans

text: The cities of Milwaukee and Detroit currently () have Irish American mayors. Pittsburgh mayor Bob O'Connor died in office in 2006. New York City has had at least three Irish-born mayors and over eight Irish American mayors. The most recent one was County Mayo native William O'Dwyer, first elected in 1945. Beginning in the 1909 mayoral election, every Democratic candidate for mayor of New York City was a man of Irish descent until 1950, when a special election saw three Italian Americans as the top vote getters.


title: Irish Americans

text: The Irish Protestant vote has not been studied nearly as much. Historian Timothy J. Meagher argues that by the late 19th century, most of the Protestant Irish "turned their backs on all associations with Ireland and melted into the American Protestant mainstream." A minority insisted on a "Scots-Irish" identity.


title: Irish Americans

text: In Canada, by contrast, Irish Protestants remained a political force, with many belonging to the Orange Order. It was an anti-Catholic social organization with chapters across Canada. It was most powerful during the late 19th century.


title: Irish Americans

text: Al Smith and later John F. Kennedy were political heroes for American Catholics. Al Smith, who had an Irish mother and an Italian-German father, in 1928 became the first Catholic to run for president. From the 1830s to the 1960s, Irish Catholics voted heavily Democratic, with occasional exceptions like the 1920 United States presidential election. Their precincts showed average support levels of 80%. As historian Lawrence McCaffrey notes, "until recently they have been so closely associated with the Democratic party that Irish, Catholic, and Democrat composed a trinity of associations, serving mutual interests and needs. "


title: Irish Americans

text: The great majority of Irish Catholic politicians were Democrats, with a few exceptions before 1970 such as Connecticut Senator John A. Danaher and Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy. Today, Irish politicians are associated with both parties. Ronald Reagan boasted of his Irishness. Historically, Irish Catholics controlled prominent Democratic city organizations. Among the most prominent were New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Jersey City, and Albany. Many served as chairmen of the Democratic National Committee, including County Monaghan native Thomas Taggart, Vance McCormick, James Farley, Edward J. Flynn, Robert E. Hannegan, J. Howard McGrath, William H. Boyle, Jr., John Moran Bailey, Larry O'Brien, Christopher J. Dodd, Terry McAuliffe and Tim Kaine. In Congress, the Irish are represented in both parties; currently, Susan Collins of Maine, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, Bob Casey, Jr. of Pennsylvania, Ed Markey of Massachusetts, Dan Sullivan of Alaska, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Dick Durbin of Illinois, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, and Maria Cantwell of Washington are Irish Americans serving in the United States Senate. Former Speaker of the House of Representatives and Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan is another prominent Irish-American Republican. Exit polls show that in recent presidential elections Irish Catholics have split about 50–50 for Democratic and Republican candidates. The pro-life faction in the Democratic party includes many Irish Catholic politicians, such as the former Boston mayor and ambassador to the Vatican Ray Flynn and senator Bob Casey, Jr., who defeated Senator Rick Santorum in a high visibility race in Pennsylvania in 2006.


title: Irish Americans

text: In New York State where fusion voting is practiced, Irish Americans were instrumental in the founding of the Conservative party in opposition to Nelson Rockefeller and other liberal Republicans who dominated the state GOP during the 1960s and 70s. The party, founded by Irish American lawyers J. Daniel Mahoney and Kieran O'Doherty would serve as a vehicle for William F. Buckley when he ran for mayor of New York in 1965 against liberal WASP Republican John V. Lindsay and establishment Democrat Abe Beame. Elsewhere, significant majorities of the local Irish stayed with the Democratic party, such as in Massachusetts and in other parts of Southern New England.


title: Irish Americans

text: In some heavily Irish small towns in northern New England and central New Jersey the Irish vote is quite Republican, but other places like Gloucester, New Jersey and Butte, Montana retain strongly liberal and Democratic-leaning Irish populations. In the 1984 United States Presidential Election Irish Catholics in Massachusetts voted 56% to 43% for Walter Mondale while their cousins in New York State voted 68% to 32% for Ronald Reagan.


title: Irish Americans

text: The voting intentions of Irish Americans and other white ethnic groups attracted attention in the 2016 US election. In the Democratic primaries, Boston's Irish were said to break strongly for Hillary Clinton, whose victories in Irish-heavy Boston suburbs may have helped her narrowly carry the state over Bernie Sanders. A 2016 March survey by Irish Central showed that 45% of Irish Americans nationwide supported Donald Trump, although the majority of those in Massachusetts supported Hillary Clinton. An October poll by Buzzfeed showed that Irish respondents nationwide split nearly evenly between Trump (40%) and Clinton (39%), with large numbers either undecided or supporting other candidates (21%), and that the Irish were more supportive of Clinton than all the other West European-descended Americans including fellow Catholic Italian Americans.


title: Irish Americans

text: In early November 2016, six days before the election, another poll by IrishCentral showed Clinton ahead at 52% among Irish Americans, while Trump was at 40% and the third-party candidates together had 8%; Irish respondents in Massachusetts similarly favored Clinton by majority. In 2017, a survey with 3,181 Irish American respondents (slightly over half being beyond third generation) by "Irish Times" found that 41% identified as Democrats while 23% identified as Republicans; moreover, 45% used NBC (typically considered left-leaning) for their news while 36% used Fox News (considered right-leaning).


title: Irish Americans

text: The presence of supporters of Trump among Irish and other white ethnic communities which had once themselves been marginalized immigrants generated controversy, with progressive Irish American media figures admonishing their co-ethnics against "myopia" and "amnesia". However, such criticisms by left leaning pundits were frequently leveled against Irish-American conservatives prior to Trump's presidential run, with one columnist from the liberal online magazine "Salon" calling Irish-American conservatives "disgusting". In New York City, ongoing trends of suburbanization, gentrification, and the increased tendency of Irish-Americans to vote Republican, as well as the increasingly left wing politics of the Democrat Party, led to the collapse of Irish political power in the city during the 2010s. This trend was exemplified by the defeat of Queens Representative and former House Democratic Caucus Chairman Joe Crowley by democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in the 2018 Democratic primary.


title: Irish Americans

text: A large number of the presidents of the United States have Irish origins. The extent of Irish heritage varies. For example, Chester Arthur's father and both of Andrew Jackson's parents were Irish-born of British ancestry, while George W. Bush has distant Irish ancestry. Ronald Reagan's father was of Irish ancestry, while his mother also had some Irish ancestors. John F. Kennedy and Joe Biden had Irish lineage on both sides and both are the only practicing Roman Catholics. Barack Obama's Irish heritage originates from his Kansas-born mother, Ann Dunham, whose ancestry is Irish and English.


title: Irish Americans

text: 17th president, 1865–69: Although he was Protestant, he had native Irish ancestry on his mother's side. His Mother was Mary "Polly" McDonough of Irish ancestry 1782


title: Irish Americans

text: 27th president 1909–13: His great-great-great-grandfather, Robert Taft was born in 1640 in Ireland and immigrated to America, during the mid 17th century. Robert Taft was from County Louth in the republic of Ireland, his ancestry was both native Irish and Anglo-Irish


title: Irish Americans

text: 28th president 1913-1921: His paternal grandfather, an Ulster Protestant, immigrated from Strabane, County Tyrone, in 1807.


title: Irish Americans

text: 22nd and 24th president, 1885–89 and 1893–97: although personally Protestant, Cleveland had native Ulster Irish ancestry. He was the maternal grandson of merchant Abner O'Neal, who emigrated from County Antrim in the 1790s


title: Irish Americans

text: 18th president, 1869–77: His grandmother was Rachel Kelley, the daughter of an Irish pioneer Surname Kelly within Ulster is almost entirely of Irish origin


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: After an unassuming playing career as a right-back, Eriksson went on to experience major success in club management between 1977 and 2001, winning 18 trophies with a variety of league clubs in Sweden, Portugal and Italy; he became the first manager to win league-and-cup doubles in three countries. In European competition, he won both the UEFA Cup and the European Cup Winners' Cup (the last edition of the latter trophy before its abolition) and reached the final of the European Cup.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson later managed the national teams of England, Mexico, Philippines and the Ivory Coast, as well as two clubs in England. Eriksson has coached in ten countries: Sweden, Portugal, Italy, England, Mexico, Ivory Coast, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates, China, and the Philippines.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson was born in Sunne and raised in Torsby, both in Värmland. His father, also named Sven, was a bus conductor, and his mother, Ulla, worked in a textile store. He was nicknamed "Svennis" after his younger brother Lars-Erik's attempt to pronounce his name; Eriksson went on to become known, and is generally referred to in Sweden mononymously, by this nickname.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson made his debut for Swedish football Division 4 team Torsby IF at the age of 16. He switched clubs to SK Sifhälla after moving to Säffle to study economics. In 1972, he joined Swedish football Division 2 team KB Karlskoga FF, where he also worked as a physical education teacher in Örebro.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: He was heavily influenced by Karlskoga's player-manager, Tord Grip, who favoured the English style of play that Bob Houghton and Roy Hodgson had brought to the country. Eriksson retired from playing in 1975 at the age of 27, after giving up on his dream of playing professional football; he summed up his brief playing career by saying "I was looked upon as a distinctly average defender, but someone who rarely made mistakes".


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Having retired as a player, Eriksson received an offer to become Tord Grip's assistant at Degerfors. A year later, Grip was appointed assistant manager of the Sweden national team, and Eriksson became Degerfors' manager. His stint as manager lasted from 1 January 1977 to 31 December 1978. He led the team to the playoffs in 1977 and 1978, winning the latter and promotion to Swedish Football Division 2.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: His success with assistant manager Tom Chadney by his side attracted the attention of much larger clubs, and Eriksson was appointed manager of IFK Göteborg on 1 January 1979. The move was such a surprise that many of the players had never even heard of him.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: They finished second in the Allsvenskan and won the Svenska Cupen for the first time in the club's history, defeating Åtvidabergs FF 6–1 in the final. Although results had improved, the team's style did not make him popular. He put results ahead of flair, emphasised tactical awareness and work rate, and he reined in the team's old cavalier style.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: As a consequence, the average attendance fell by 3,000 to 13,320. Like Grip, he was influenced by Houghton and Hodgson and played a 4–4–2 with zonal marking and heavy pressing. Göteborg finished third in the 1980 season and second again in 1981. The following season, they won the treble. The team won the League and subsequent playoff, the Svenska Cupen, defeating Östers IF 3–2 in the final.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson's international breakthrough came during the spring of 1982, when he led IFK Göteborg to the first ever UEFA Cup for a Swedish club, defeating Valencia in the quarter finals and 1. FC Kaiserslautern in the semi-finals. Awaiting them in the finals was Hamburger SV.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: At Ullevi stadium in Gothenburg, Göteborg managed to score a late deciding goal, and took a 1–0 score with them to the away fixture, which they won 3–0, and with it, the 1981–82 UEFA Cup by an aggregate score of 4–0. His club's success sparked interest in his skills from other clubs, leading him to leave IFK Göteborg in August 1982.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson's European success led to him being recruited by Portuguese club Benfica, which he joined on 1 September 1982. Eriksson's influence was immediate, winning the Primeira Divisão, the Taça de Portugal and finishing runners-up in the 1982–83 UEFA Cup to Anderlecht. After winning a second consecutive league title, Eriksson then moved on to Italy, becoming manager of Roma.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson joined Roma on 1 July 1984. He was not as immediately successful at the "Giallorossi" as he had been before, but nonetheless still won a Coppa Italia with the club in 1986. Eriksson left the club on 6 May 1987.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson was manager of Fiorentina from 1 July 1987. Eriksson's stint with the club was trophyless, and he moved back to Benfica for a second stint in 1989. Eriksson led the Portuguese side to the final of the 1989–90 European Cup (losing to Milan 1–0) in 1990, and another Primeira Divisão title in 1991. Eriksson left the club in June 1992.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In July 1992, Eriksson returned to Italy to lead Sampdoria, where he managed to win another Coppa Italia in 1994. In contrast to his predecessor, Vujadin Boškov, he introduced a defensive system which was based on zonal marking rather than man-marking. He left in June 1997.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In December 1996, Eriksson agreed to leave Sampdoria at the end of the season, to manage Blackburn Rovers. In February 1997, however, he went back on his word, and opted to stay in Italy and become the new manager at Lazio, effective 1 July 1997. Eriksson stated family reasons for wanting to stay in Italy, and Rovers would go on to appoint Roy Hodgson.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson employed fellow Swede Tord Grip as his assistant. Eriksson finally found major success in Italy with Lazio when he won the Coppa Italia and the Italian Supercup in 1998 and 2000, the European Cup Winners' Cup (1999, the final tournament), and the Serie A title (the "Scudetto") in 2000 – only the second time that the Roman club had won the Italian championship in their history.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Following the resignation of England manager Kevin Keegan after a home loss to Germany in October 2000, The Football Association (FA) pursued Eriksson as his replacement. Eriksson had initially agreed to take over after the expiration of his contract in June 2001, but decided to resign his post early at Lazio, and he officially began his England duties in January of that year. Eriksson was the first non-British manager to be appointed coach of the England national football team.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson turned around England's bid for qualification for the 2002 World Cup, with several crucial wins over lesser opposition, before his first real test – England's rematch with Germany in Munich on 1 September 2001. England defeated their long-time rivals 5–1. Despite this, England still needed a late equaliser at home to Greece to qualify automatically.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: At the finals, England drew with Sweden, defeated their other longtime rivals Argentina 1–0, and drew with Nigeria to qualify in second place from the four-team group. They went on to defeat Denmark 3–0 in the Round of 16, before losing 2–1 to ten-man Brazil, who went on to win the tournament.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: After winning their first qualifying match in Slovakia, England drew at home with Macedonia and were then booed off by their fans after losing a friendly to Australia. England, however, won their next five qualifiers and, needing a point from the last game to qualify, drew 0–0 in Turkey to top the group.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In their first match in the finals, England were winning 1–0 against France after 90 minutes, but lost after Zinedine Zidane scored twice in injury time. A 3–0 victory over Switzerland and a 4–2 victory over Croatia, however, meant England still qualified for a quarter-final against the hosts Portugal. There, Michael Owen gave England an early lead only for Hélder Postiga to equalize. England then had a Sol Campbell goal disallowed before ultimately losing on penalties.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Regardless of the antipathy to Eriksson expressed by some in the English media, the England team professed total confidence in him, and in July 2004, threatened to strike during a media-driven campaign to oust him. The FA renewed and extended Eriksson's contract by two further years to include UEFA Euro 2008. On 7 September 2005, Eriksson's England team lost a World Cup qualifying match against Northern Ireland 1–0, the first time that England had lost to that team since 1972, and one of only five competitive games lost during Eriksson's tenure.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Although it was England's first-ever defeat in a World Cup or European Championship qualifying match under Eriksson, it brought his position under pressure and he was criticized, both by some fans and by commentators from the BBC, for his alleged lack of charisma and tactical awareness. Criticism continued as England scraped a 1–0 victory over Austria, in a game which saw David Beckham controversially sent off. Some of the criticism from within the media was answered however, as England put in a much improved performance, despite the absence of Beckham through suspension and Sol Campbell and Steven Gerrard through injury, in a 2–1 win against Poland.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In January 2006, Eriksson was recorded saying he would be willing to leave England to manage Aston Villa if England won the World Cup, after being duped into believing that a wealthy Arab would buy the club, and wanted him as manager. The wealthy "Arab" was in fact the "Fake Sheikh" Mazher Mahmood, an undercover "News of the World" reporter.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 23 January, The FA announced that Eriksson would leave his job after the 2006 World Cup, and it was thought that the "News of the World" allegations played a part in this decision. This was later denied by both parties, with Eriksson explaining that there was a prior arrangement to terminate his contract immediately after the World Cup.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In March 2006, "The Guardian" reported that South Africa became the first potential employer publicly to register its interest in Eriksson. That job, however, went to Carlos Alberto Parreira.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: England finished top of Group B at the finals, beating Paraguay and Trinidad and Tobago, before a 2–2 draw with Sweden, although the English press considered their performances far from satisfactory.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In the second round, a David Beckham trademark free kick was enough to see Eriksson's England past Ecuador in a lacklustre 1–0 encounter affected by very high temperatures. Eriksson, however, once again fell to nemesis Luiz Felipe Scolari's Portugal. They defeated England 3–1 on penalties with the score 0–0 after extra time, with Beckham lost to injury and Wayne Rooney sent off for stamping on Ricardo Carvalho. The result was Eriksson's third successive exit in a major tournament quarter-final. In his farewell speech, Eriksson wished England well and singled out Rooney for special praise, advising the press not to blame the youngster's dismissal for England's exit.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson improved England's FIFA World Rankings place from seventeenth place in January 2001 to fifth in July 2006, reaching fourth during the 2006 World Cup, and was rated by The FA as England's second most successful manager after Alf Ramsey. Under Eriksson, England achieved the highest point percentage in major tournament matches of all time for an England manager, losing only three competitive games (excluding extra time) and achieved top qualifying place in all three international tournaments.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In July 2006, after his final match with England, ESPN FC reported he had turned down the chance to manage Jamaica, as well as an unknown participating club in the UEFA Champions League. In October 2006, it was rumoured he was in talks to manage Newcastle, in which his agent denied.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In July 2007, virtually a year to the day that he left the England job, Eriksson was confirmed as the new manager of Manchester City after signing a three-year contract worth £2 million per year, plus bonuses. He was City's first manager from outside the United Kingdom and the first Swedish manager in the Premier League. Before the season started, he signed striker Rolando Bianchi, along with midfielders Gélson Fernandes, Geovanni, Martin Petrov and Elano; and defenders Vedran Ćorluka and Javier Garrido.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 19 August, Manchester City beat reigning Premier League champions Manchester United to go top of the 2007–08 Premier League after three games without conceding a goal. Eriksson received the Premier League's Manager of the Month award for August. The club stayed in the top six throughout the rest of 2007, and were third throughout October and November, but fell to seventh on 12 January 2008 after winning only one of their previous five games.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In Spring 2008, owner Thaksin Shinawatra said that he would replace Eriksson after only one full season due to an "avalanche of very poor results which is unacceptable at this level". In the last game of the season, Manchester City suffered an 8–1 loss to Middlesbrough, the biggest defeat of Eriksson's career. Some concluded that the team had "gone on strike" as a symbolic protest during the game, although a red card for Richard Dunne after 15 minutes made the game difficult for City.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Manchester City ended in ninth place in the league, one place away from the UEFA Cup 2008–09 qualifying positions. Manchester City subsequently qualified through the extra place awarded to the Premier League for finishing as the highest placed team who had not already qualified for a European competition in the UEFA Fair Play League for 2007–08. Eriksson became the first Manchester City manager since 1969–70 to win both league derby games against Manchester United and also achieved the club's joint highest Premier League point total, 55.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 2 June 2008, Manchester City confirmed by club statement that they had parted company with Eriksson by "mutual consent", with Eriksson still having two years left on his contract. Following news of his departure, the City supporters' groups organised a petition with around 14,000 signatures which was handed to the club.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 3 June 2008, Eriksson was officially signed to become manager of the Mexico national team. He formally started the role after Mexico's World Cup qualifier against Belize on 21 June. On 20 August 2008, he debuted as manager of Mexico in a CONCACAF World Cup qualifier versus Honduras. Mexico went on to win 2–1. On the next matches some results were poor, as Mexico tied with Canada and lost to Jamaica and Honduras.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 11 February 2009, Eriksson was put under further pressure as his side lost 2–0 to the United States. Calls for him to quit or be sacked were heard from the fans while English club Portsmouth were rumoured to be interested in making him their new manager. This link was strengthened by reports of members from the Portsmouth board flying to Mexico City to discuss contract offers with Eriksson and a possible compensation settlement with the Mexican Football Federation.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 3 March 2009, Eriksson continued to deny that he would leave Mexico and return to manage Portsmouth, insisting that he would remain and help Mexico qualify for the World Cup. After a 3–1 World Cup qualifying loss at Honduras, Eriksson was removed as national team coach. Eriksson had only won one of his last seven non-friendly games as manager.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 22 July 2009, Eriksson was appointed as director of football at English League Two team Notts County, following that club's takeover by Middle East consortium Munto Finance with Eriksson getting a reported, but unconfirmed, £2 million per year deal. It is believed his contract was based on the future success of the club with a large percentage share holding making up his contract.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson later said that he was attracted by the consortium's plans to take the world's oldest league club to the top of the Premier League, and believed that they had the finance and commitment to do that. Large-scale investment in new facilities were promised, and Sol Campbell and Kasper Schmeichel joined the club from Premier League teams. Campbell, however, played only one game before departing and Schmeichel was released at the end of the season.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: County's large debts, including an unpaid tax bill, emerged in November 2009. On 11 February 2010, Eriksson resigned as director of football following the club's takeover by former Lincoln City chairman Ray Trew. Eriksson waived a multi-million payoff in order to assist the takeover, which chairman Trew described as the act of an "absolute gentleman". Notts County were promoted as League Two champions at the end of the season.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 28 March 2010, Eriksson became the manager of the Ivory Coast national team. Disclosure of the amount of money Eriksson's contract was worth has never been confirmed, but it has been reported that he received £270,000 for accepting the job. On 15 June, Ivory Coast played a 0–0 draw against Portugal in their opening game in Group G of the 2010 World Cup finals, followed by a 3–1 loss against Brazil on 20 June.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Despite defeating North Korea in the final group game 3–0, Ivory Coast failed to qualify for the knockout stages. Prior to the match against Brazil, Brazilian coach Dunga commented, "With Eriksson, Ivory Coast has great balance. We used to see them play and they didn't have this type of organisation that they have now."


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: As there were no reported negotiations of an extension to Eriksson's contract between his agent and the Ivorian Football Federation, his contract ended on 25 June.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson was appointed manager of Leicester City on 3 October 2010, as the Foxes sat in the relegation zone of the Championship. His first league game in charge resulted in a 1–1 draw against Hull City, managed by Nigel Pearson who had managed Leicester for the previous two seasons. This was quickly followed by Leicester's first victory under Eriksson, beating Leeds United 2–1 at Elland Road.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In December 2010, it was announced that Eriksson denied talks into becoming the new manager for Blackburn Rovers, following the exit of Sam Allardyce, stating he was happy managing Leicester.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Boosted by the loan signings of players such as Kyle Naughton and later Yakubu, results steadily improved under Eriksson as Leicester gradually began to climb the table, until a good run of form in the new year saw Leicester win seven of their first eight league games of 2011, and also take Premier League title challengers and eventual cup winners Manchester City to a replay in the FA Cup.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 18 February 2011, after an injury time winner from Martyn Waghorn at home to Bristol City, Leicester had climbed to seventh in the table, and just one point off a play-off place. Leicester's form, however, began to stutter as they won just two out of their following eleven games. The Foxes ended up finishing the season in 10th position.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson spent big in a bid for promotion in the summer of 2011, including multimillion-pound transfer fees on Matt Mills and Jermaine Beckford. making them pre season promotion favourites. After thirteen league matches, however, Eriksson left the club by mutual consent on 25 October 2011, with the Foxes sitting in the thirteenth position in the league, two points from a play-off position.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Three players who were signed by Eriksson – Kasper Schmeichel, David Nugent and Paul Konchesky – were part of the Leicester team that won the 2013–14 Championship and survived relegation from the 2014–15 Premier League under Nigel Pearson. Nugent credited Eriksson for his improved form at the club. Of the three, Schmeichel was a key member of the first team that won the 2015–16 Premier League.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: In an interview with Yorkshire Radio on 8 February 2012, the chairman of Football League Championship club Leeds United, Ken Bates, revealed that Eriksson had applied for the vacant managerial position at the club after the dismissal of Simon Grayson. Bates went on to state that his application was unsuccessful. On 3 September 2012, Eriksson was unveiled as the technical director of BEC Tero Sasana, a team in the Thai Premier League.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 17 November 2012, Norwegian media reported that Eriksson was in talks with Vålerenga, about the possibility of taking over the soon to be available manager job for the Oslo-based club. A meeting between the two parties was held on 21 November in Oslo, but no deal was made. In December, negotiations between Eriksson and the Football Federation of Ukraine, who had offered him the position of head coach of the Ukraine national team, did not bear fruit.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 15 January 2013, it was announced that Eriksson would be joining German 2. Bundesliga side 1860 Munich as assistant to Alexander Schmidt. On 18 January 2013, the club however reported, that Eriksson declined the offer to join 1860.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 21 January 2013, Eriksson became technical director of Dubai-based club Al Nasr SC in the UAE Arabian Gulf League.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 4 June 2013, Guangzhou R&F of the Chinese Super League announced Eriksson as their new head coach, on a nineteen-month contract lasting until December 2014. He was believed to be paid around £2 million a year for the job. He came up against former Italy manager Marcello Lippi in the city's derby matches, as the World Cup winner was manager of local rival Guangzhou Evergrande. Under Eriksson, Guangzhou R&F finished third in the league in 2014, and therefore qualified for the AFC Champions League for the first time. He left Guangzhou R&F on 10 November 2014, after a disagreement in negotiations for extending his contract.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Eriksson signed a two-year contract with fellow Chinese Super League side Shanghai SIPG on 18 November 2014. He led Shanghai SIPG to finish runners up in the season of 2015, and qualified for the AFC Champions League for the first time.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: Under Eriksson, Shanghai SIPG advanced to the quarter finals in their debut in the AFC Champions League, and secured a seat in the 2017 AFC Champions League by finishing third in the 2016 season. However, Eriksson was criticized by single tactical play and failing to give chances to young talents throughout his term at SIPG. He was replaced by André Villas-Boas on 4 November 2016.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 5 December 2016, Eriksson became the manager of China League One side Shenzhen, replacing Clarence Seedorf. He won his first six matches of the season of 2017, including five league matches and a FA Cup match. However, Eriksson was sacked on 14 June 2017, following a nine-game run without a win.


title: Sven-Göran Eriksson

text: On 27 October 2018, Eriksson returned to international football after he was appointed head coach of the Philippines national team on a six-month contract. He was recommended to the position by interim coach Scott Cooper, who took over after Terry Butcher's resignation in August; Eriksson and Cooper previously worked together for English club Leicester City.