How did Freddie Scappiticci make it to the highest ranks of the IRA before switching sides and spying for he British? After years of investigation the answers are starting to come…..but very slowly.

The weather on December 13, 2008 was truly terrible at Mount Calvary Cemetery. That didn't stop the dedication of the Celtic High Cross at the Oregon Potato Famine Memorial. This year, on the seventeenth anniversary of the dedication, the father could not have been better for December in Portland.

Glen Hansard, formerly of The Commitments, busking on the streets of Dublin is a musical Christmas treasure acc. to Minister of Music Mike Phillips. You’ll never guess what his favorite Christmas song of all is.

Though extremely popular at this time of year in England and Ireland, Fairy Tale of New York by the Pogues (with Kirsty MacColl) is hardly a Christmas chart topper in the US. Why do you think that is? Five reasons it deserves better here in the States.

Mary McAleese (L), the eighth President of Ireland (1997 - 2011) came to Portland seventeen years ago to dedicate the Celtic Cross at the Oregon Potato Famine Memorial. Find out more about who she is and what she’s doing today.

Filmed in Ireland and released fifty years ago on Dec. 11, 1975, Stanley Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon underperformed at the box office, disappointed most critics and was considered more of a hit than a miss for the master. But its fortunes have improved, even winning praise from one source as the Greatest Irish Film of all time. Really.

Gemma Whelan talks with Hibernian Daniel Curran about her pivot to publishing with Shangana Press, named after her childhood home in Dublin. Daniel has details about the annual theater tour to Ireland she runs with her husband.

Dublin decided not to change the name of Herzog Park. Originally named in 1995 for Chaim Herzog, a former President of Israel born in Belfast and raised in Dublin, the park’s name also honors his father, Yitzak Herzog, He was the first Chief Rabbi of Ireland after independence in 1921.

PART TWO - Ireland voted to legalize divorce thirty years ago. On Nov. 24, 1995 a tiny majority of voters amended the constitution, which banned the “dissolution of marriage.” The campaign was rancorous. The outcome established the right to remarry. Divorce rates didn’t rise as much as some feared they would.

Part One - Voters in Ireland said YES to legalizing divorce 30 years ago on Nov. 24, 1995. Just nine years earlier voters had said NO on the same issue. Much had changed in Ireland but the vote favoring divorce was extremely close.

We’re Irish. We like to read and we like to talk. Join us at Kells Restaurant Thursday 11.20 at Six P.M. for an evening of book talk.

Long before Patrick Radden Keefe got the idea to write Say Nothing about The Troubles, Ed Moloney had been running with and reporting on the major players in NI between 1972 and 1998. He died in mid-October.

Just when it looked like Ireland was out of the World Cup picture again, Troy Parrot scored a goal in the 95th minute against Hungary to keep hope alive. Ireland advances to WC play offs in late March. Opponents to be determined this Thursday 11.20.25.

As a result of the regular rotation of diplomats by Ireland’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Marianne Bolger will move from Amman, Jordan to San Francisco, California in 2026. Current Consul General Micheal Smith has been named Ambassador to Saudi Arabia and will move to Riyadh in September.

It’s a UK tradition to honor veterans by wearing red paper poppies in early November.But this season, four Irish professional soccer players in England aren’t wearing poppies on their uniforms. James McClean was the first pro soccer player not to wear the poppy on his uniform 13 years ago. He explains why.

The amazing story of Monsignor Hugh OFlaherty’s work to save more than 6,000 Jews, POWs and partisans in Italy in 1943 is being told again. But for too long it’s been untold, say some.

The last native Irishman elected Mayor of New York was William O’Dwyer. After a first term from 1945 to 1949, he was reelected in a landslide only to leave office in 1951 as a criminal corruption investigation reached Gracie Mansion. He was never charged. Questions persist.

The pint of Guinness. What could be more Irish than this one at Ted’s in Cashel, Co. Mayo? The maker of the best selling stout in the world is the subject of a Netflix series and plans to open a “brewery experience” in London in December. For Guinness, business has never been better. But they better not raise the price of a pint in Ireland.

Catherine Connolly, Independent, was expected to win the presidential election in Ireland. But not by a landslide. The Making of a President 2025.

The unlikely choice for Ireland’s first President was Douglas Hyde. The Leading advocate of the Irish language, he was an organizer of the Gaeic League, from which the 1916 Rising flowed. Hundreds of Oregonians heard him speak in 1906.