WHEN NEW YORK WAS IRISH I'll sing you a song of days long ago When people from Galway and County Mayo And all over Ireland came over to stay And take up a new life in Americay. They were ever so happy, they were ever so sad To grow old in a new world through good times and bad All the parties and weddings, the ceilis and wakes When New York was Irish, full of joys and heartbreaks. We worked on the subways, we ran the saloons We built all the bridges, we played all the tunes We put out the fires and controlled City Hall We started with nothing and wound up with it all. They were ever so happy, they were ever so sad To grow old in a new world through good times and bad All the parties and weddings, the ceilis and wakes When New York was Irish, full of joys and heartbreaks. You could travel from Kingsbridge to Queens or mid-town >From Highbridge to Bay Ridge, from uptown to down >From the East Side to the seaside's sweet summer scenes -- We made New York City our island of dreams. They were ever so happy, they were ever so sad To grow old in a new world through good times and bad All the parties and weddings the ceilis and wakes When New York was Irish, full of joys and heartbreaks. I look at the photos, now brittle with time Of the people I cherished when the city was mine O how I loved all those radiant smiles How I long for the days when we danced in the aisles. They were ever so happy, they were ever so sad To grow old in a new world through good times and bad All the parties and weddings, the ceilis and wakes When New York was Irish, full of joys and heartbreaks. -- Terence Winch Irish-American police officers and firefighters have given their lives countless times, leaving their grieving families to dwell on the tragic ironies of working in such "secure" professions, but in an excerpt from "Irish in America," (1997) Michael Coffey & Terry Golway, Dennis SMITH (author of "Report From Engine Co. 82) shared his thoughts and some of the history of the NYC Fire Department: "In my own 18 years with the New York City Fire Department, I often wondered why so many of my predecessors were Irish. I once heard it said that the Irish came off the farms in Ireland and were homesick for the rear end of a horse, and that's why they joined the fire departments of America! There is no doubt that the clanging bells and the horses galloping through narrow cobblestone streets offered more excitement than ever could be imagined in the bogside. And I am sure horses had something to do with it because the Irish are still to this day known as having magical powers wit! h equines and horses did pull New York's fire engines until 1922. But I believe that the Irish were first taken into the fire departments because of their considerable strength and bravery. And being natural raconteurs, they must have been most appreciated at the afternoon tea breaks around firehouse kitchen tables. In the first ten years after NY created a paid fire department, beginning in 1865, five of the 20 firefighters who died in the line of duty were Irish. In the next 30 years, from 1865 to 1905, one hundred firefighters made the supreme sacrifice, and 66 of them were Irish. Seventeen of our first 23 fire commissioners were Irish, as were 13 of our first 17 chiefs of the department. And two of these, Hugh BONNER and John KENLON, were actually born in Ireland. I grew up on the East Side of New York, where the neighborhoods were almost all Irish, where my friends had fathers who were cops or firemen or construction workers, and where my own thoughts about work! ing were molded by bits and pieces of conversations through the years. NYC firefighters and police were awarded the 20-year pension soon after the turn of the century because, it was rightly argued, they were both extremely strenuous and important jobs, and it was necessary to induce the brave-hearted to retire early so that the average age in the departments were kept young and the men physically viable... I spent nearly two decades with the NYC Fire Department, and I know that I will never again feel the thrill or the sense of accomplishment that came with pushing into the whirlwind of smoke in a burning building with those men of Engine 82 and Ladder 31 -- all neighborhood guys, like me, many with names like McCarthy, Bollon, Cassidy, and O'Meara. The Irish were central to the reputation for bravery in the annals of the department, but there were others, too, with names like Miloslau, Knapp, Coscia, and Rivera. Today, there are more Italians in the department than Iris! h, and there are more Hispanics and African Americans than ever before. The personality of the department will change according to immigration patterns, and it could be said that the Irish prevailed in numbers and administrative power for about 100 years. It is time now for other groups to prevail."