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Date Posted: 00:20:01 06/26/04 Sat GMT
Author: Lynn
Subject: President has touch of Irish in family tree (USA TODAY)

President has touch of Irish in family tree
By Judy Keen, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — President Bush has to reach back 10 generations, but he can claim a sliver of Irish ancestry when he arrives in County Clare, Ireland, today for meetings with European Union leaders.

Bush ancestor Adam Holliday was born in County Down, in what is now Northern Ireland, in 1680. Another forebear, William Shannon, was born in County Cork in 1730, says Gary Boyd Roberts of the New England Historic Genealogical Society.

Shannon moved to Pennsylvania and fought in the Revolutionary War. Holliday's son William moved to Kentucky.

Bush is the 11th U.S. president with Irish roots. Like his predecessors, he is mindful of the fact that 30.5 million Americans, many of them voters, claim Irish ancestry. Bush may say it's nice to be "home" in Ireland, but Roberts says, "That would be a stretch."

Bush may not feel entirely at home at secluded Dromoland Castle. Anti-War Ireland, an alliance of protest groups, predicts that thousands of opponents of the war in Iraq will greet him.

Polls show that most Irish oppose the war and their government's decision to allow U.S. military jets to refuel at Shannon Airport, where Bush lands tonight.

"Bush is not liked in Ireland and certainly not respected," says Dominic Carroll, one of the protest organizers.

As for Bush's Irish roots, Carroll says, "No one takes it seriously — not only because it's probably not true, but also because Irish people are no longer interested in who is and who isn't Irish."

This will be Bush's first visit to the Republic of Ireland as president. In April 2003, he met with British Prime Minister Tony Blair in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Other presidents have made much of their Irish heritage.

"I have family ties here. My mother was a Cassidy," President Clinton said during a visit to Dublin in 1995. President Reagan's paternal great-grandparents were born in Ireland. During a visit in 1984 to a pub in County Tipperary that was renamed for him, Reagan said his ancestors brought to America an "indomitable spirit."

Roberts, author of the book Ancestors of American Presidents, says his research unearthed another intriguing element of Bush's heritage: The president and Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, his Democratic rival, are "cousins eight different ways."

 
 

 
Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-06-24-bush-irish_x.htm
 

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