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Yahoo
09-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
When Katie Taylor came to America
NEW YORK — In the early hours of May 1, 2022, the Irish population of New York City were dotted all over Midtown Manhattan, celebrating the island's most revered fighting product hours after her victory in the biggest women's boxing match of all time. You see, Katie Taylor is much more than an athlete to the Irish. And when she was given the grandest stage to display her pugilistic prowess, they showed up in droves. With more than 40 million people in the United States claiming Irish heritage, they travelled from far and wide, with hundreds also making the trip across the Atlantic for Taylor's long-awaited boxing blockbuster against Amanda Serrano. Advertisement Deep in the bowels of a legendary venue, where I was brought with colleagues to record a post-fight show, director of press relations for Madison Square Garden, Larry Torres, told us the undisputed lightweight championship bout was one of the best fights he'd seen in the decades he'd worked there. Just as we began, in walked the queen of boxing, Taylor, with the battle scars still fresh on her face from the first of what would soon become multiple legendary duels with Serrano. Katie Taylor feels the Irish support wherever she goes. (Damien Eagers - PA Images via Getty Images) Serrano's passionate support from the Puerto Rican community was every bit as impressive and numerous as the Irish that night. Together, they provided a perfect backdrop for the first women's fight to ever headline the fabled New York institution that is Madison Square Garden, with the watching world feeling the emotional outpouring from the historic gathering through their screens. Advertisement 'Thanks so much for coming,' Taylor told the host of our show, Uncrowned's own Ariel Helwani, as if he'd been invited to a birthday party, while fellow colleague Chuck Mindenhall and I scraped our jaws off the floor. That unforgettable night in New York wasn't just a sporting milestone, it was a cultural flashpoint. The energy pulsing through Midtown spoke to something deeper: The enduring, intricate bond between Ireland and Taylor — and Ireland and the United States. The Irish Hunger Memorial stands proudly beside the Port Authority ferry terminal in Manhattan's Battery City Park. The memorial is dedicated to raising awareness of the Great Irish Hunger — An Gorta Mór in Irish — a catastrophic period between 1845 and 1852 during which more than 1 million people starved to death, not for lack of food, but due to British colonial policies that withheld it. In the decade that followed, approximately 1 million Irish emigrants passed through the port of New York, and by 1855, Irish-born residents made up nearly one-third of the city's population. To this day, it's estimated that thousands of Irish immigrate to the States every year. Text on a wall in the entrance to The Irish Hunger Memorial in Battery Park, New York. (STAN HONDA via Getty Images) Providing a safe haven from the blight was far from the only contribution the U.S. made to the Irish. The U.S. gave the island inspiration with its own fight for independence from British rule and also supplied ample public pressure, financial support and diplomatic influence before the establishment of the Irish Free State in 1922. Advertisement In 1998, U.S. President Bill Clinton played a pivotal role in negotiations for the Good Friday Agreement, which brought an end to most of the violence in 'The Troubles' — the sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland between Irish and British officials that took place over the course of 30 years. It is considered the most significant milestone in the Northern Irish peace process. The second meeting between Taylor and Serrano lacked the historical weight — and the cultural backdrop — of their first, largely because it took place in Arlington, Texas, on the undercard of the global circus that was Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson. However, when the integrity of one of the country's brightest sporting beacons was called into question, her faithful fan base bristled accordingly. Something stirred deep within the Emerald Isle while watching the Netflix broadcast this past November when commentator Rosie Perez claimed that Taylor's second win over Serrano would forever be 'an asterisk' on her legacy. Serrano's head coach, Jordan Maldonado, had a similar scathing appraisal of the contest, accusing Taylor of 'fighting dirty.' While iconic names like Roy Jones Jr. and Teddy Atlas offered a counterbalance to the lofty criticisms — explaining that head-butts are a naturally occurring consequence of the lead foot battle when an orthodox fighters meets a southpaw — Serrano was adamant that the fouls were intentional. Advertisement 'She kept head-butting me, but we knew that from the very beginning, from the first fight — that's what they do,' Serrano told Helwani in the ring after the contest. 'She did it in our first fight, she did it against Chantelle Cameron.' There was something unsettling about Taylor — the primary reason why women's boxing became an Olympic sport — being portrayed in such a way. Lauded for her integrity and sporting brilliance, a career spanning decades void of controversy or scandal suddenly seemed to be called into question. With 47 million people viewing the contest globally, it was the most-watched women's boxing match of all time. While many argued that the headline bout pitting 58-year-old Tyson against a man 30 years his junior, Paul, was a blemish on boxing, Taylor and Serrano's offering was the epitome of the sport could offer. Advertisement There is no denying that both Taylor vs. Serrano fights were as excruciatingly close as they were spellbinding. No one would be blamed for scoring either bout in Serrano's favor. Yet an underlying theme has crept into the buildup for Friday's trilogy bout in Madison Square Garden, which once again takes center stage for a worldwide audience on Netflix: The idea that Taylor's second win was something of a heist. Although the respect between the two warriors is clear, their third meeting has arrived with added tension. When Serrano suggested that the world knew she won the second fight at an April press conference, the Bray boxer sparked off in a way that we have rarely seen. 'Even with the ridiculous point deduction during that fight, the three judges still saw it my way,' Taylor fired back at her rival. 'I was the deserved winner and we're having a silly conversation again because you're trying to create a narrative that you were robbed in that fight. That's not OK, Amanda.' Amanda Serrano (right) wearing headgear for her faceoff with Katie Taylor following remarks about illegal fouls in their rematch. (Anadolu via Getty Images) Two days after Taylor and Serrano first captured the broader world's attention with their Fight of the Year in 2022, a musician played an acoustic version of 'A Pair of Brown Eyes' by The Pogues in the corner of P.J. Horgan's in Sunnyside, Queens. Advertisement Surrounded by Irish immigrants, maybe it was the music or the Guinness that made me inquire, but I felt the need to ask the red-headed woman sitting next to me how it feels to hear songs from back home after being away for so long. 'It must hit a lot harder,' I said. She immediately burst into tears. A smile cracked across her husband's face sitting next to her. 'This happens all the time,' he told me in a thick New York bark. 'Anything to do with Ireland can set her off.' Taylor provides the same pull to home as the music and culture of the motherland. Signs of her return are dotted all over New York City this week. The Empire State Building that will take on the colors of the Irish and Puerto Rican flags on Friday. Times Square lit up with images of the duo's faceoff. On Tuesday, the Oculus at World Trade Center was transformed into a futuristic boxing arena for the open workouts, with thousands drinking in the festivities. Advertisement Taylor hates nothing more than to be asked about retirement, but at 39 years old, it's an obvious line of questioning. The support from home remains unanimous, but fight by fight the concern builds. With nothing left to prove, after accomplishing everything in the sport and beating Serrano twice, is there a need for a trilogy fight? Punishment is par for the course in the squared circle, but at what point will Taylor have had enough? In a sport with few happy endings, you just hope that Taylor gets the finale she deserves when the time comes, as the greatest fighting product to ever hoist the tricolor in triumph.
Irish Times
09-07-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
A belated appreciation of one of Britain's oldest ethnicities: the Irish ‘elders'
Irish-Americans have always been somewhat feted in their homeland, like a national gold card sitting proudly in the wallet of the State. It hasn't always been the same for the Irish in Britain , due to reasons rooted in Ireland 's complex historic relationship with its nearest neighbour to the east. Irish emigrants to Britain were not as celebrated back home and many knew it, according to older members of the community to whom I have spoken over the past 2½ years. 'It's a fair point,' said Neale Richmond , the Minister of State for Diaspora, as we supped coffee on Monday afternoon in the good room on the top floor of the Irish embassy. READ MORE He was in London to launch the Global Irish Survey, a Government initiative to canvass the views of Irish emigrants and their descendants across the world, in advance of the publication next year of a new five-year strategy for the diaspora. According to Richmond, a key component will be to demonstrate to the Irish in Britain that the State values them. The Minister said he believed President Michael D Higgins 's 2014 State visit to Britain was positive on a number of levels. He says it prompted the beginning of a 'real release, a reawakening' among Irish people back home of their relationship with their Irish-British kin across the water. The Irish who settled in Britain over past decades are now an aged community. They are one of the oldest ethnicities in Britain, according to census data. More than 32 per cent of those who ticked the 'white Irish' box in the England and Wales census of 2021 were over 65. This compared with an average of 18 per cent for the rest of the population. There were also 160 Irish centenarians in England and Wales in 2021, a proportion that was 1½ times more than the rest of the population. Anyone who is familiar with London's old Irish haunts such as Kilburn, Cricklewood and Archway can attest to the ageing of the local embedded Irish population. It is a similar story elsewhere in Britain, perhaps most notably in Coventry, where there is a particularly old Irish community that was curiously underappreciated back home. Richmond said the State wants to send out the message to the Irish in Britain that 'yes, they are celebrated' by the rest of us. He also made them a promise, as politicians do: 'Using money from the Emigrant Support Programme, we will make sure their needs, particularly as they are later in life, are fully funded. The networks will be there, the lunch clubs, the bingo . . .' Irish community groups in Britain, meanwhile, toil to help their members. Many operate under the umbrella organisation Irish in Britain, which is supported by the Irish Government. Most individual groups operate on a mix of State cash and their own fundraising. Some Government funding is directed towards organisations such as the Irish Elderly Advice Network, which runs lunch clubs, and the London Irish Centre in Camden, which operates extensive community outreach to the ageing Irish in the city. So does the Irish Cultural Centre (ICC) in Hammersmith, which celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. Wear away, don't rust away — John Hurley The ICC last Thursday held an extravaganza to celebrate local Irish 'elders'. It comprised an intergenerational project in which teenagers from the local Sacred Heart Catholic High School interviewed older Irish immigrants to London about the lives they built in the city and the lives they left behind. The children sang songs and read poetry about their new older Irish friends. They screened an hour-long documentary they made about the elders. We heard from 80-year-old Margaret Curran from Dublin, who moved to London 63 years ago and worked in the fashion industry. Her bridal designs used to make the front cover of Wedding and Home magazine. Justa Madden, originally from Co Sligo, was also among the celebrated elders. After a sojourn in Chile, she moved to Britain and became a teacher. It is important to give students 'awe and wonder', she said. [ Government fears referendum to give Irish diaspora vote in presidential elections 'could be lost' Opens in new window ] Mary Leslie (90), originally from Athenry, Co Galway, advised the Sacred Heart students at the ICC to 'be positive and you will see the bright side of life'. Mary Hamrogue (86), from Ballinrobe, Co Mayo, came to London in 1958. She is now a stalwart of the ICC knitting club. She lamented that she no longer knows many of her neighbours in Hammersmith. Mary Swan (90) was born in England to Irish parents but moved to Ireland aged four at the outbreak of the second World War in 1939. She returned to London aged 19 when she got married. In 2020, she was voted the Belle of Soho. Cork man John Hurley (89), who moved to London aged 17, also shared his wisdom at the ICC project launch. He began writing at the age of 74 and has since published two novels, and also writes poems daily. His advice? 'Wear away, don't rust away.'
Irish Times
20-06-2025
- General
- Irish Times
Death of an ‘old boy from Ireland' in a London-Irish suburb
It began with a handwritten shop notice. A passerby photographed it in early June in the window of Butler's newsagents in Archway, north London . Over the decades the area had been a magnet for Irish immigrants, but the community aged. Younger London Irish now favour Hackney or Clapham. Meanwhile, Archway's green army went grey. The notice announced the death and upcoming funeral of Martin Fallon (73), originally from Sligo. It had a grainy passport-style photo of him. The passerby, a local, posted the picture she captured on X with a note about how Archway's 'old boys from Ireland' were 'slowly dying out'. She said the area had changed from its Irish heyday, with many pubs and betting shops closed. There was a wistful air to her post, embellished by her image of the note in the window. In neat capitals, it looked like the vintage handwriting typical of an older person. The passerby's tweet garnered two retweets and 18 likes. Then somebody took a screenshot of it and posted it on a slew of Irish Facebook groups. This second person seemed to misconstrue the shop notice as an appeal to find Fallon's family. Soon it was all over Facebook groups linked to London's Irish communities, as well as groups linked to communities in the west of Ireland. A narrative – inaccurate, as it turned out – took hold that Fallon must have lost touch with home. READ MORE The story fitted a stereotype: that of the older Irish man who moved to London years ago, perhaps 'to work on the buildings', and ended up alone. Facebook users shared the post widely in a well-intentioned but misguided attempt to find anyone who knew Fallon. There were even radio appeals in his native Sligo. But important elements of the narrative that sprang up around Fallon online did not survive scrutiny. In fact, he had been in touch with a few family members, in Ireland and in London. They knew he had died because they had arranged his funeral. Fallon's funeral took place in Islington Cemetery on June 9th, the week after the tale about him went viral. The Irish Times attended the service in the small crematorium chapel, flooded with light beneath a glass dome. The huge cemetery around it was the size of a city park. Irish surnames abounded on its headstones. The notice in Butlers newsagents window announcing Martin Fallon's funeral Flowers left for Martin Fallon outside his funeral in Islington Crematorium Although some elements of Fallon's story online were perceived inaccurately, he had indeed lived a life typical of some Irish men who moved to Archway decades ago. He was a regular in Butler's newsagents, which has continued to sell all the Irish regional newspapers. He never married. He appeared to have a tight-knit network of friends and some helped him when he fell ill. He died of lung cancer. Originally from Collooney, he once worked in a bakery in Sligo. He loved Liverpool FC and Sligo Rovers. He had three sisters, at least two of whom had moved to the Archway area before him. Fallon followed about 40 years ago. It seemed two of his sisters had died. The remaining sister now lived in Galway but wasn't able to travel to his funeral. Fallon had a niece, who was present. She said she would bring his ashes to Ireland. [ Irish in London: 'Nobody was making me stay. I could have left at any time and gone home to Sligo ... That was 24 years ago' Opens in new window ] Fallon's service was simple, dignified but still noticeably small by Irish norms. There were a dozen mourners, a fraction of the size of a typical funeral in the sort of west of Ireland community where Fallon grew up. It hadn't been correct that he had completely lost touch with all family, but clearly his network in London was tight. Charlie Patel outside his newsagents, Butler's, a hub of the old Irish community in Archway Irish local newspapers in the shop Charlie Patel, the owner of Butler's News, where the original funeral notice was posted, describes Fallon as a 'lovely man'. He always bought the Sligo Champion and occasionally some of the Irish food staples the shop also stocked. Fruitfield jams, Chef sauce, Erin soups, Flahavan's porridge and Clonakilty rashers are all sold in Butler's. 'Even when my old Irish customers move away from Archway to the suburbs, to Enfield and places like that, they come back to my shop to buy their local Irish papers,' says Patel. 'Or sometimes their grown-up children come in to buy it for them instead.' Over several hours in Patel's shop over a couple of days last weekend, other elderly Irish immigrants talk about the Archway they have known as a bastion of the London-Irish community, and what it is like now. Many are, like Fallon, bachelors who retired after working in manual jobs. They are friendly but some are also shy about being photographed or identified. A west of Ireland woman, younger than Fallon's peers, says many of Archway's older Irish contingent, especially the men, 'wouldn't be too forthcoming'. 'Especially if they ended up alone,' she says. The woman says putting up a shop window notice of the kind that sparked the viral online post about Fallon is common in Archway. It is, she says, a sort of community messaging service for the elderly Irish to spread funeral details and news of deaths. 'They wouldn't always have each other's phone numbers,' she says. Archway is at the northern end of Islington borough, which is more affluent towards its southern parts nearer central London. The local MP is former Labour leader – now Independent – Jeremy Corbyn . In 1983 he beat Clare man Michael O'Halloran, a former MP who had split from Labour. The heartland of Archway centres on Junction Road and its strip of shops; the Upper Holloway Road, which used to be lined with Irish pubs, and a pedestrian plaza beside Archway tube station, known as Navigator Square, named in honour of Irish 'navvies' who came to Britain in the 19th century to build transport networks. 'There is an older Irish community here who often talk about going back [to Ireland],' Corbyn told The Irish Times in an interview on Navigator Square during last year's election. 'But they're never going back. It's just the idea of it that's important to them.' [ Older Irish people in London: 'It is so important to have something to get people out of the house. It breaks down the loneliness' Opens in new window ] Corbyn said The Archway Tavern, still standing tall over Navigator Square (which used to be a roundabout), was a hub of the Irish community and was 'where building labourers got work'. He said many Irish women worked as nurses at nearby Whittington Hospital. One history book estimated that 85 per cent of its nurses were Irish in postwar years. 'Every pub on Holloway Road also used to be an Irish pub with Irish music,' Corbyn said. 'That's not quite the same now. A lot has changed in Archway, just as it has in Ireland.' One thing that has stayed the same, however, is Butler's newsagents. Patel, who runs the Junction Road shop with his Gujarat-born wife, Naimesha, says they bought it 26 years ago. It was owned before that for 15 years by another Indian family. Another Indian family previously owned it for 18 years, after taking it over from Butlers, an Irish family. So for almost six decades since the mid-1960s, the newsagents shop has been run by Indians who kept its Irish name. Among the customers last Friday is Tipperary man Michael Coley (81). He has been in London for 67 years, since he was barely a teenager, but he still has a strong Irish accent. Coley used to work 'doing paving and sewage pipes'. With his late wife they had five children, who gave them 14 grandchildren. Coley used to go home to Thurles 'every few years' but no longer. On Saturday he is back in Butler's shop to buy Mikado biscuits and Fig Rolls for his grandchildren. A woman originally from a pretty village in Co Clare has been in London for 50 years. Would she ever think of moving back to Ireland? 'You get too used to the life over here,' she says. 'They're too nosy where I'm from anyway. They want to know everything but tell you nothing.' Betty Breen enters. She came to London 43 years ago. She has a glint in her eye. 'Where are you from?' she asks this reporter. Wicklow, comes the reply. 'We all have our problems in life,' she says. Breen married a Clare man, and her sister used to run the Archway Tavern, 'years ago, back when pubs were pubs'. Her London-born daughter moved to Kilkenny 15 years ago. Archway has changed a lot, she says. 'I think it's gone a bit rough.' Two men, bachelors, come in separately but chat together. Neither wants to be identified. One is from the southwest and moved to Archway in the 1970s. He worked in a trade. He didn't marry. 'I had a friendship years ago but it never worked out.' The other man is from a southern county. He used to travel between Ireland and England, and sometimes Scotland, 'when things were harder for the Irish in London'. One reason he stayed in Britain was the National Health Service. Joe Henry, from Tubbercurry in Sligo, moved to Archway in the 1970s. Like several of the others, he never married. He is friendly and chatty, but prefers not to divulge any more personal details. 'I've lived my life under the radar so far,' he says, laughing. Several of the men give lowdowns on the pubs on Holloway Road favoured by the Irish. Some drink in the Flóirín, an unfussy, locals kind of pub that used to be called the Mulberry. When The Irish Times visits, a Laois versus Tipperary hurling match is on the television. It is also clearly an Arsenal pub; the club's stadium is not far away. The woman behind the Flóirín bar looks familiar. It is Kerry woman Betty Breen, from Butler's earlier. She laughs when asked to stand for a photograph. After declining, she swaps banter with men at the bar. She is well able for them. The Flóirín The Crown Some men drink in the Crown on Upper Holloway. The Hercules, farther down the street, was also popular. The Mother Red Cap on Holloway Road, a former mainstay of the community once owned by the Phelan family, shut last year after St Patrick's Day. The legendary Gresham ballroom shut years ago and is now a Sainsbury's. Through the other side of Navigator Square, up Highgate Hill, a new Irish music and gastropub, Brendan the Navigator, was opened a couple of years ago by Clare flute player John Rynne. The Old Crown Inn, which was an Irish mainstay, used to sit on the same site. It was across the road from St Joseph's Catholic Church, jokingly known by some local Irish as the 'posh' church. The other church is St Gabriel's on Holloway. A grotto at St Joseph's church on Highgate Hill near Archway Many of the elderly Irish in Archway speak of how the area has changed. People from other ethnic backgrounds are now more numerous. Census data appears to bear out the perception. A 2021 council report based on census figures suggested 5.8 per cent of the Junction electoral ward's residents were of 'white Irish' ethnicity. About 11.5 per cent were black and 8 per cent Asian. About 4.1 per cent were born in the Republic, with 5.5 per cent born in Africa and 7.1 per cent born in the Middle East and Asia. A further 4.3 per cent were born in the Americas and Caribbean. Archway, it seems, is no longer an Irish stronghold. Other recent incidents have unsettled some of the older Irish community. John Mackey (87), originally from Callan in Co Kilkenny, a bachelor who lived for decades in nearby Finsbury Park, died in a knife attack in May. A man has been charged with his murder. Mackey had recently moved a little farther east to Manor House. He used to frequent Archway, however, where his late brother Christy used to live. Mackey's niece, Margaret Kennedy, said her uncle was 'an enigma', a popular, colourful character who wore a fedora and was 'loved by everybody who met him'. 'He was simply a charming man. He never married but he was a ladies man, always a woman on his elbow. I never once saw him cross.' Echoing something Corbyn had said earlier, Kennedy said her late uncle John always joked that he would 'be on that boat' back to Ireland, but he never moved home. Mackey's funeral is in Callan next week. Meanwhile, Fallon's funeral earlier this month concluded with the Liverpool football anthem, You'll Never Walk Alone. Sligo Rovers Football Club also sent flowers. Fallon died on April 27th, the day Liverpool beat Tottenham 5-1 to win the Premier League. He slipped away just before kickoff.
