Connolly's Legacy Prominent in First NYC Irish Cultural Festival

James Connolly – the Irish rebel and revolutionary labor leader who inspired the founders of TWU Local 100 – will be a significant focus of New York City’s first annual Irish cultural festival.

Cuala NYC is an ambitious and sweeping endeavor with more than two dozen events, ranging from a William Butler Yeats play being performed on a beach in Coney Island, to live music at an Irish pub in the Riverdale section of the Bronx, to poetry readings on an East River ferry boat. Many activities will explore the important role that New York City played in Ireland’s historic 1916 Rising, now in its centennial anniversary.  At the same time, the festival will celebrate the indelible mark the Irish left on NYC, festival organizer Susan McKeown said.

"The 1916 Rising would not have happened without New York,” McKeown, a Grammy Award winning Irish Folk singer, said. “CualaNYC is inspired by the historic and cultural connections between the two places and I felt it was especially important to remember James Connolly in our events."

Connolly came to New York City in 1902 and lived in the United States for approximately 8 years, spreading his doctrine of industrial unionism through his writing and speeches at places like the Great Hall of Cooper Union. Workers are strongest when organized by industry and not fragmented into many smaller groups by trade and job title, Connolly stressed. The message resonated with Mike Quill decades later as he organized transit workers and founded the Transport Workers Union in 1934.

Cuala NYC will include “James Connolly’s New York” on May 12th at Cooper Union, a tribute with performances by New York Irish musicians, writers and storytellers. Bagpiper bands from various unions will perform in Union Square to honor Connolly on May 19, and both celebrities and members of the public will be invited to address the crowd from a soapbox as Connolly so famously did himself.

Connolly – and TWU founder Mike Quill - also will be featured in a historical comic book being produced by The Nerve Centre in Derry, Ireland, for distribution here. Local 100 is contributing towards the production costs.