A lot of people don't know it but the name White is as Irish as Paddy's dog! The White's came from Waterford , Ireland in The mid to late 1800's. They lived in Lincoln near the CF boarder for years. Various generations married woman from Roscommon and County Lietrum. When my father married a full blooded Portuguese woman they all but hanged him. They got over it.
They ( the ancestors) bought a house just over the border from Lincoln in CF. Almost all worked in the Textile miles in Lonsdale and Sayleville. My Uncle Jeff was a great baseball player and despite being very smart , they say it was his baseball ability that made him popular and got him elected as a union leader in the mills. They say my great grandfather Thomas was crazy because he used to walk for miles all the time. He lived a long life so maybe he wasn't so crazy for getting all the exercise. Like most Irish families we had a lot of drinkers.
They always pulled their own weight though. My grandfather was one of the first to not work in a mill. He was a master baker. He didn't work in a small bakery. He traveled the country setting up huge commercial breadmaking factories. He made delicious bread at home without a recipe. I remember once he was asked to write down a recipe. What he wrote started with 1000 pounds of flour! Shamefully he was a drinker and womanizer and sent little money home to his family. My father was super smart and was offered a full scholarship to study Physics at Princeton while Einstein was there and also a second offer from Cornell to study chemistry. He had to pass both up and go to work in the mill to help support his mother and brothers and sisters . This was fairly normal at the time. He and his brothers and sisters were the last of the pure Irish in our direct line. All of them married other than Irish or had no children. I'm half Irish and half Portuguese. Its nice to celebrate the Irish side of my heritage once a year. I like to eat the boiled dinner and sing the songs etc at some Irish Pubs here and there.
I'm lucky because I get to celebrate St Patricks Day and go to the big St Johns Portuguese festival too. I enjoy both!
"An Irish youth proves his manhood by getting stuck in a pint, in a woman, and in a fish-in that order."
"May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
The rains fall soft upon your fields,
And until we meet again,
May God hold you
In the palm of his hand."