Real Lace

by Stephen Birmingham

Stephen Birmingham turns his eye to the great Irish-Catholic dynasties of America-violent, colorful, charming and the Kennedys, the Cuddihys, Buckleys and Bradys, and the California "Silver Kings," the Floods, Fairs, Mackays and O'Briens. Many of these families started with every disadvantage; fleeing from the great Irish potato famine, they arrived penniless in the slums of New York and Boston.

But from desperate poverty and degradation they rose to fame and fortune, fueled by a powerful combination of driving energy, native wit, strong religion, stronger drink, and, of course, the luck of the Irish.

Remarkable characters, warring families, and fluctuating fortunes—out of this rich material Birmingham has fashioned an extraordinary social history.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, American History, Historical, Biography, Ireland

322 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1973

Reviews

[Pam · Rating 4 out of 5]

As social history this book may be dated (published in 1973) but it is very entertaining. The author categorizes the socially ambitious immigrant Irish as shanty Irish, lace curtain Irish and real lace Irish, something that would not be considered polite or even applicable today.

As social history Birmingham digs back into the F.I.F’s as a phenomenon, a F.I.F being a first (top ranking, “nice” Irish family. Those families tended to come first, settle in the New York area and often get into Wall Street Finance. The JFK generation of Kennedy’s who are pictured on the cover of my copy of the book may come to mind first as examples of prominent Irish families in the U.S., however they are categorized as a lesser group here. Joe Kennedy was too close to his father’s saloon roots and was considered uncouth and unscrupulous by those F.I.F’s.

Some other notable examples of monied Irish big or notorious people of Irish descent are discussed, mostly Westerners like the men who made money in silver mining, the Walshes of Colorado mining then on to Washington D. C. —think the Hope Diamond or the rogues involved in the Teapot Dome oil scandal of the Harding administration. All of that is interesting but strays from the theme of the book.

Fun to read but not all that significant. Many of these folk are totally unknown today. Birmingham ends with the disintegration of many of the families—loss of money, power and spinning away from their original moral core. As in the ancient Chinese proverb, “Wealth does not pass three generations.” That seems to hold for social standing and “morals” also.

[Jill H. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Several years ago I read Our Crowd: The Great Jewish Families of New York and The Rest of Us by this author and thoroughly enjoyed them. I found this book lurking in my shelves and hoped that it would be equally as interesting.......but it really wasn't although it was readable.

Due to the publishing date (1973) it has become extremely dated which, of course, is not the fault of the author but many of the resorts, restaurants, businesses, and debutante activities no longer exist and are rather meaningless to the modern day reader. Instead we visit a world of not too long ago where the Irish were excluded from membership in some of the "high society and old money" clubs, etc. due to their ethnicity. According to the author, the brash Irish attempted to force their way into society which further alienated the "old money" families. He stereotypes the rich Irish into two groups - heavy drinkers who were loud and pushy or saintly Roman Catholics. That type of profiling is wrong and certainly not acceptable in today's world.....it appears condescending and some of his comments on the Catholic Church border on insult.

On the other side of the coin, some of the information is fascinating as many of the poor early immigrants from Ireland became successful through hard work, some luck, and ambition and were considered the FIF (First Irish Families). Surprisingly, the Kennedys, America's most famous Irish family were not considered to belong to that group although they desperately wanted to be.

Others may enjoy this book better than I did but I found it rather mediocre but certainly not a waste of time

[Mandy · Rating 2 out of 5]

An interesting piece of social history, but not always a riveting read in spite of the interesting subject matter, Stephen Birmingham’s account of the rags to riches stories of America’s Irish Catholic families gets bogged down in its own morass of detail too often and makes it sometimes difficult to distinguish between the large and varied cast of characters he presents us with. They all seem to merge into one big lump of ambition and greed and social climbing. A more focussed account would have made for better appreciation of the admittedly amazing advancement many of them often managed to achieve. This scatter-gun approach is just too diffuse.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the family histories were very interesting, however, the social climbing and parties were a complete bore. I think my favorite family was the William Buckley,Sr. Clan.

[Marian · Rating 3 out of 5]

The kind of history that's fun to read. Learned some things I didn't know, gained some insight into my own Irish ancestors who came to Boston. Pretty amazing people as a whole.

[Sandi · Rating 4 out of 5]

A story of the people that were the rich Irish men and women. They were fighters and doers to get there interesting .