![]() With all the Irish Catholic touchpoints in Ford films, one would expect him to have been born in Munster rather than Maine. And then there was John Ford, who inserted his Irish ancestry and a Catholic sensibility into almost every movie he made in a 50-year career. Leo McCarey directed many classic films, from the very non-Irish gem Duck Soup, starring the Marx Brothers, to one of the most beloved Catholic films of all time, Going My Way. Some of the most influential figures in the early days of this industry were Irish Catholic. Since the overwhelming majority of the Irish who came to America brought their faith with them, a Catholic perspective made its presence known in the popular culture, especially in the film industry. Now there is an Irish nation in the United States, equally hostile, with plenty of money, absolutely beyond our reach, and yet within a ten days’ sail of our shores.”Īs they continued to be absorbed in political and cultural life, the Irish moved west and immigrated into the burgeoning motion-picture industry in the 20th Century. We could reach their forces, cut off their reserves in men and money, then to subjugate was comparatively easy. “In former Irish rebellions, the Irish were in Ireland. The extent of how far the Irish had come is found in a quote from the British home secretary at the time of the successful Irish Rebellion against English rule that started in 1916. By the dawn of the 1900s, the Irish were holding political office and increasingly becoming part of the American middle and even upper classes. Thanks to some courageous Catholics, like New York Archbishop John Hughes, who acted like an Irish tribal chieftain and almost single-handedly pulled the Irish out of their squalor in the 19th century, the Irish began to rise. There is a reason circa-1800s horse-drawn police vehicles in New York were called “Paddy wagons.” At first, the Irish immigrant story was one of a downtrodden population group trapped in poverty and chaos. The cultural pallet of America was tinted green when an influx of Irish immigrants poured into the United States in the 19th and early-20th centuries.
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