Born and raised in Fullerton, California, the 2nd eldest of 4 children, Stefani grew up in a Roman Catholic household with an Italian father(Dennis)and her Mother Patti (née Flynn)being off Irish and Scottish descent.
Gwen was named her after a stewardess in the 1968 novel “Airport” and her middle name, Renée, coming from The the 1968 Four Tops hit single “Walk Away Renée”

Leonard Beatty Johnson was born Ireland in 1807 and moved to Canada with his parents in 1822. Leonard’s mother was related to John Beatty, who was a pioneer settler of Erie County.

By 1832, Leonard B. Johnson moved to Sandusky where he had a stove and tinware business. Later he started a Lime kiln business. In 1852, Bull’s Island was purchased by Leonard Johnson. He changed the name to Johnson’s Island. In the fall of 1861, the U.S. Government leased several acres of land on Johnson’s Island to be used as a prison for Confederate officers….Full Story

During the first half of the nineteenth century thousands of Irish emigrated to the United States. The potato famine of 1845 left devastating conditions in Ireland. The Irish immigrants had hopes of starting a new life in the United States. Often the only jobs available were among the least desirable. As a result many Irish born workers built the canals and railways of America and worked in dangerous mines. Besides working difficult jobs, the Irish often faced discrimination. They encountered signs that said “HELP WANTED – NO IRISH NEED APPLY.” Full story

Tags, Irish in Erie County

Born in 1902 in Omagh, Tyrone, Northern Ireland Jimmy Kennedy was undoubtedly one of the greatest songwriters of the last century and immortilised in the “Songwriter’s Hall of Fame”.

It is possibly not well known that Kennedy wrote for many of the great performers of the 20th Century including Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Perry Como, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong plus many more with such hits as Barmaids Song, Red Sails in the Sunset, South of the Border, We’re Going to Hang out the Washing on the Siegfried Line, The Isle of Capri, Istanbul (Not Constantinople) My Prayer, Teddy Bears Picnic, Love is Like a Violin, Hokey Pokey, Roll Along Covered Wagon. Kennedy’s first notable success came in 1932 when he wrote the words to The Teddy Bear Two-Step, and soon renamed it The Teddy Bears’ Picnic, a song that sold four million records and marked the beginning of one the world’s most prolific and successful songwriting careers.

Tags : Jimmy Kennedy

According to a number of well documented being published over the years, this honour belongs to one - Robert Jansen - who hailed from county Waterford in Ireland. It is reported that in 1704 Jansen along with 5 other fellow sailors escaped from the Dutch East India Company who had a presence in the Asian country of the Philippines. The party had set sail for Canton but were unfortunately captured and taken prisioners by a local clan who lived on one of the small islands of the Japanese mainland. The sailors were suspected by their captors as being Portugese Missionaries - who around this time did not take kindly to outsiders visting their shores. Jansen and his fellow sailors were finally allowed to leave Japanese territory some 5 months later whereby they reached their destination – Jakata, which was at the time part of the Dutch East Indies – nowdays called Indonesia.

Any Gaelic speakers on here?

“There’s always the darkness before the sunrise”

I have “ta an dorchadas ann i gconai roimhe eiri na greine”

Thanks - Joe Burke