The Search for the O'Neil's
Apologies for the slow posts. I've broken the cardinal rule in blogging - deliver fresh content. Early market research shows I've lost as much as 67% of my viewership (dropping 2 of my faithful 3 readers...)
Now, we jump in the "way back" machine and head back in Ireland, where Pauline, Lisa, Dan and Andy have just left on a 8:30 train out of Galway. To where, you ask? Well, where everyone goes when they visit Ireland - the town of Roscommon.
Now if you know where Roscommon is, well you just know too much about Ireland. Ireland is about 5 hours across by train and Roscommon county is
smack in the middle. We were trekking into this forgotten territory to find the ancient ancestors of Dan O'Neill, who's great grandfather moved to the U.S. in the 1880's and in a fit of wild creativity, changed the family name from O'Neil to O'Neill. I'm always up for a good geneological scavenger hunt, so this little adventure was something I had been looking forward to.
The actual city of Roscommon can't have more residents than about, I don't know, maybe 6, so when I say we headed all over town tracking down leads it wasn't exactly an exhaustive exercise. We started at a giant Catholic church which dates back to the 1800's and has all the baptismal records going back through the history of Roscommon. And chances are mighty high that if your name was O'Neil and you lived in Central Ireland, a Catholic Church was a pretty focalpoint of your childhood.
Unfortunately, the priest was out doing mass or something else non-conducive to geneology tracking, so we wandered into the bustling city center. Along the way we passed Mr. Doyal O'Donelll (nope - not making that up), who used to be the head of the town council. We asked the lovely Mr. O'Donnell if he knew any
O'Neil's, and he gave us a wonderful rundown of every citizen of Roscommon in the last 40 years, but amazingly, said he knew no O'Neils. He knew of McNeills - they have a store down the street - but then he followed up with, "I knew an O'Neill, but she married a (something else) and they all died off. But you should talk to John Kerrigan of Henry Street. He's the town historian."
We weren't quite ready to invade a man's house, so we headed to the local pub to ask some locals. The bartender was insanely helpful, saying, 'I know some
MacNeil's - they have a store down the street. But you should ask John Kerrigan of Henry Street. He knows everyone."
Next we hit the town library to see if there were any old newspaper archives of the O'Neils. But sadly, there were none. (I was tempted to look up the McNeills to find out when they opened the store everyone raves about, but I forgot to.) The librarian was very helpful, and started her sentence, "You know who you should talk to..." and I interrupted, "John Kerrigan of Henry Street?" and she answered, "Um, no. I'd go to the church down the street and ask the priest."
Then she looked at me with disdain and disgust for interrupting her and I realized I would never be welcome as a full-time resident of Roscommon.
Dan headed back to the church, so I headed to Henry Street just out of curiosity. I was half-expecting to see an old guy in a rocking chair telling stories of Roscommon to a bunch of 8 year olds while drinking Irish Whisky on the rocks (the guy, not the kids - just pardon the dangling modifier). But alas, I walked up and down Henry Street a few times without ever catching the elusive Mr. Kerrigan, and there were far too many doors to knock on each one.
Plus, I didn't really have a better line of introduction than, "Um, I'm a crazy American with no Irish Heritage, but I just had to meet this Mr. Kerrigan fellow." Which would have been fine in itself but doesn't really lead to much follow up conversation of import. So I headed back to meet Dan.
So, long story short - The priest was done with his real job and able to track down the birth records of quite a few O'Neils, and Dan can now hand off the data to his little brother, who will follow up the quest in the spring. Hopefully, then they will meet a real live O'Neil that has some blood relation to their great grandfather who left long ago. And that, my friends, was our daytrip to Roscommon, and off to Dublin we went.
Now, we jump in the "way back" machine and head back in Ireland, where Pauline, Lisa, Dan and Andy have just left on a 8:30 train out of Galway. To where, you ask? Well, where everyone goes when they visit Ireland - the town of Roscommon.
Now if you know where Roscommon is, well you just know too much about Ireland. Ireland is about 5 hours across by train and Roscommon county is
The actual city of Roscommon can't have more residents than about, I don't know, maybe 6, so when I say we headed all over town tracking down leads it wasn't exactly an exhaustive exercise. We started at a giant Catholic church which dates back to the 1800's and has all the baptismal records going back through the history of Roscommon. And chances are mighty high that if your name was O'Neil and you lived in Central Ireland, a Catholic Church was a pretty focalpoint of your childhood.
Unfortunately, the priest was out doing mass or something else non-conducive to geneology tracking, so we wandered into the bustling city center. Along the way we passed Mr. Doyal O'Donelll (nope - not making that up), who used to be the head of the town council. We asked the lovely Mr. O'Donnell if he knew any
We weren't quite ready to invade a man's house, so we headed to the local pub to ask some locals. The bartender was insanely helpful, saying, 'I know some
Next we hit the town library to see if there were any old newspaper archives of the O'Neils. But sadly, there were none. (I was tempted to look up the McNeills to find out when they opened the store everyone raves about, but I forgot to.) The librarian was very helpful, and started her sentence, "You know who you should talk to..." and I interrupted, "John Kerrigan of Henry Street?" and she answered, "Um, no. I'd go to the church down the street and ask the priest."
Dan headed back to the church, so I headed to Henry Street just out of curiosity. I was half-expecting to see an old guy in a rocking chair telling stories of Roscommon to a bunch of 8 year olds while drinking Irish Whisky on the rocks (the guy, not the kids - just pardon the dangling modifier). But alas, I walked up and down Henry Street a few times without ever catching the elusive Mr. Kerrigan, and there were far too many doors to knock on each one.
So, long story short - The priest was done with his real job and able to track down the birth records of quite a few O'Neils, and Dan can now hand off the data to his little brother, who will follow up the quest in the spring. Hopefully, then they will meet a real live O'Neil that has some blood relation to their great grandfather who left long ago. And that, my friends, was our daytrip to Roscommon, and off to Dublin we went.
posted by ABoyer at
2:34 AM
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