Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all!
Today is a good day to reprise the popular back-issue of the Gaslight News from March 2010 that ran the article about Riverton’s Irish Row by Priscilla Taylor.
At the time, so many people asked for extra copies to send to family members, we had to get more printed.
The article apparently also evoked memories and motivated several comments on the website about growing up Irish in Riverton.
It also irked at least one reader because a family name was not included in the “A Sampling of Irish Row Occupants Living on Cinnaminson Street —Irish Row (according to Riverton’s 1900 Census).”
- 703 – Annie McDonald (hairdresser)
- 707 – Nora Williams
- 709 – Julia & Patrick Ford (day laborer)
- 710 – James Flynn (florist)
- 712 – Annie & James McIlvain (coachman)
- 717 – Virginia & Patrick Rarins
- 721 – Maggie & John McDermott (steamfitter)
- 723 – Mary & Patrick Jordan (day laborer)
Certainly, there are many more names that could be included for 1900, and more still for other years. With increasing interest in genealogy and the popularity of websites such as ancestry.com that help with the task of discovering family stories, it is very likely that someone reading this can add another paragraph to this article, if not an entire chapter.
The person who is in the best position to tell your story is the person most closely connected to it. So please, send us more information, and we will incorporate it into what we have. Maybe someone will write a sequel.
Since the original publication, several readers have volunteered information or images such as this one sent in by Mary Yearly Flanagan.
In 2011, a reader recognized the photo of Kate the Cook shown in the March 2010 Gaslight News, pg. 5 as her great-grandmother.
That is just the kind of connection I hope that can happen here as we all collaborate on gathering more information.
At the Museum for a Day this past December, a woman remarked that her mother had been one of those Irish servants working in the big houses on the river. I gave her my card and pleaded with her to contact me so that I could find out more.
But it’s almost four months later, and no word. People get busy and, let’s face it, this stuff is way at the bottom of one’s to-do list.
If there is ever anything whatsoever that you can add to this collection, please do not hesitate to contact us. Don’t think that something is too small or insignificant because that bit might be just what we need to fill in a missing piece of a larger puzzle. Don’t imagine that we are experts or that we know it all.
We thank Moore’s Postcard Museum for the vintage St. Patrick’s Day card pictured above. This one came from the March 2011 post, but there are three more antique St. Patrick’s Day cards just posted there today, March 17, 2012.
Mayor Bill Brown tells us that so far he has eight names to add to the Riverton Honor Roll next Memorial Day. Last week we added another photo to the Riverton Honor Roll Album -Donald Rogers Taylor.
The landscape improvements and beautification efforts at the War Memorial site have truly revitalized that public space. Expanding eligibility for veterans to include “…any present or former resident of the Borough of Riverton, New Jersey who served on active duty in the Armed Forces of the United States of America during a time of war” has brought well-deserved recognition to veterans of other conflicts in addition to World War Two.
Please visit the Riverton War Memorial next to Riverton Square on South Main Street, next to the River LINE tracks. See information on the Veterans Page if you want to submit a veteran’s name for consideration. – John McCormick, Gaslight News editor
