Irish in America Topic of March 18th Brown Bag Lunch

Irish in America Topic of March 18th Brown Bag Lunch

CANTON – Want to extend your St. Patrick’s Day celebration an extra day? Then join Ron Semple for his noontime Brown Bag Lunch program A Study in Green: The Irish in Our Midst, on Thursday, March 18th at the St. Lawrence County Historical Association at the Silas Wright House, 3 East Main St., Canton.



Semple will trace the journey of the Irish in America from the trickle in colonial days, through the flood touched off by the devastating Irish famine in the mid-19th century, through the Civil War that brought them glory but not acceptance, to their long delayed assimilation in the mid-20th century.



Ron Semple is a retired newspaperman and a member of the board of trustees of the St. Lawrence County Historical Association. He is also the descendent of Irish immigrants who arrived in America in the 19th and 20th Centuries.



Nowadays, everyone is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day. It wasn’t always so. Semple notes that the Protestant Irish assimilated swiftly upon arrival but their Catholic compatriots, who formed the vast majority of immigrants, faced attitudes ranging from mild hostility to resolute hate.



According to Semple, the Irish formed their own communities, established their own churches, schools and institutions, and managed to be both prominent and isolated as they stubbornly made their way upwards in an American society that simultaneously grew more tolerant.



Now, Semple says, most Americans probably don’t know or care that Vice President Joe Biden is both Irish and Catholic.



In the 2000 census, 16 percent of the residents of St. Lawrence County identified themselves as Irish. That was more than any other ethnic group in the county except for the French who, as Semple points out, got there first.



The talk will begin at noon on March 18th, the day after St. Patrick’s Day, in the County Gallery of the St. Lawrence County Historical Association at the Silas Wright House, 3 E. Main St., Canton. The public is welcome to this free program; those attending may bring their lunch. Coffee, tea, and light refreshments will be provided.



Parking is available in back of the SLCHA, next to the main entrance to the museum. For more information, call the SLCHA at 315-386-8133 or e-mail info@slcha.org. This program is made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency. Visit the SLCHA’s website www.slcha.org for more information on St. Lawrence County history.