Troy, NY snubbed in two Irish documentaries
By: The Yank | Published Tuesday, October 5, 2010, 4:45 PM | Updated Friday, September 9, 2011, 9:51 PM
Twice in a few days Irish television has snubbed Troy, NY. Twice! And, let's face it, Troy doesn't exactly get a lot of opportunities to be featured in the media outside of newspaper and television reports in and around
Albany.
Early 20th Century Irish revolutionary
James Connolly was the topic of both programs. In each case the producers traveled to
New York cover the time Connolly lived and worked in America. Connolly spent about seven years in America, mostly in and around New York, but he lived in Troy from 1903 to 1905.
I wasn't too surprised that
the TG4 program skipped the trip to
Troy, but I hoped that RTE with its bigger budget would have made the journey to the Collar City, birthplace of Uncle Sam. The RTE documentary is one of a highly-promoted RTE series,
Ireland's Greatest. Given the importance of this series in RTE's calendar I actually presumed
last night's installment would include something about Troy. I mean, come on, cut Troy a break.
I know a mention in an Irish documentary is hardly the stuff that a city's tourism and commercial authorities dream of, but it would have been nice for Troy to get the acknowledgment it deserves as having been home to Connolly for two years.
Yet, there's more to the omission than simple sentiment on my part. I'm genuinely interested in what Connolly did in Troy. I had always believed he had helped organize meat-packers in the city, but when I searched online all I could find was that he had sold insurance there, hardly the kind of work you associate with a socialist agitator. He lost his job when his employer went bust and he then moved down to
Newark.
I was really hoping RTE's program would shed some light on Connolly in Troy for me. Did he continue his work for socialism and labor? Or was the plan that he would give that up, sell insurance and take care of his family - he had a wife and five children - in Troy only to be drawn back to those efforts for organized labor after the insurance company folded? Is it possible that one of the key leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising may never have returned to
Ireland if his job as insurance salesman had worked out?
Unfortunately RTE left me with this gap in the Connolly life story, one that I'll have to fill in on my own.
Twice in a few days Irish television has snubbed Troy, NY. Twice! And, let's face it, Troy doesn't exactly get a lot of opportunities to be featured in the media outside of newspaper and television reports in and around Albany. 
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Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.patrickesq | Dec 12, 2010, 01:02 PM EST
Troy has a rich Irish history. The Catholic Church was a major social force among the Irish in Troy. St. Patrick's Church in Troy was founded in 1872. As a sign of the times the local Bishop decided to close the Church this year due to financial stress, due mainly to the outward migration(suburbia) of the Irish residents over the years. My grandfather emigrated to Troy from Ireland in 1906 at the age of 21. He remained there until his death ,45 years later, raising his family of 4 children, with my grandmother, also an emigrant from Ireland. My father attended St. Patrick's parochial school and then the Catholic high school in Troy, LaSalle. My family history is but a speck of a much larger Irish presence in Troy. In 1889 there was a book published by the title: "Representative Young Irish-Americans of Troy, N.Y." So it is unfortunate that the RTE did not find , or make, time for Troy!
TheYank | Nov 12, 2010, 08:16 AM EST
patdonohue,
You're could well be right that Connolly would have returned to Ireland. I have a huge big biography of Connolly in my house now. It's staring at me nightly, daring me to read it.
patdonohue | Nov 10, 2010, 06:53 PM EST
I feel bad for Troy ny.I guess RTE didn't think it was important enough to mention where Connolly lived or what he did while he was in America.I think he would have returned to Ireland no matter what he was doing here.