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Ballina and Carlingford may claim Joe Biden and Doonbeg Donald Trump, but Doonloughan in Connemara may join an illustrious list of famous Irish ancestral houses linked to the US presidential election.
CNN news anchor John King, one of the media stars of America’s election coverage thanks to his interactive “magic wall” election map that mesmerized Irish viewers, revealed his Irish roots in an early morning tweet. Sunday.
“It starts in Doonloughan, and we should have paid a visit a long time ago,” he replied to Sunday World reporter Kevin Palmer, who tweeted: “It’s about time we published your Irish story, John.”
Tourism Ireland CEO Niall Gibbons was among the people who responded to King’s tweet.
“We’ll have the green carpet ready for you,” Gibbons replied.
King, a proud Irish-American raised in the Irish neighborhood of Dorchester, Massachusetts, left little doubt about his ancestry during the long and traumatic electoral recount after Lisa McGee, the screenwriter of the hit comedy Derry Girls, tweeted: “Is it @JohnKingCNN Irish yet? ? “
“Always,” replied the 59-year-old television journalist.
King shared details of his family’s Irish ties to Connemara with The Irish Times and helped put his Irish story behind.
He wore an Irish leather cap and always a bowl of oranges on the table.
The American journalist said that his grandfather, Christopher King, was born in 1891 in Ballyconneely and later lived in Doonloughan in the early 20th century. He came to Boston in 1911 and settled in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston.
“He died when I was five years old; I have vague but fond memories of visiting him at the soldier’s retirement home where he lived, ”King said.
“He had an Irish leather cap and always a bowl of oranges on the table. He was coming to our vacation home. I don’t remember much except how much my dad was crushed when he died.
“My father’s name was Richard, but everyone called him Chris because he looked so much like his father.”
King said his grandmother, Bridget King (née Joyce), was also from Connemara. He was born in 1891 in Cashel, Co Galway and immigrated to Boston in 1909.
“I never knew my grandmother,” he said. “He died in 1960, three years before I was born.”
There are also Littles and Keenans in the Irish family tree, he said.
King, as even those with a passing knowledge of Connemara will know, is a common surname in and around the region with the name King associated with local shops, pubs and restaurants, and one of the best known seafood exporters in the country.
Doonloughan, a 25-minute drive south of Clifden along the Wild Atlantic Way beyond Mannin Bay, is well known for its picturesque and secluded sandy beach.
It’s not far from the scene of another major news event of 2020 (but one that King is unlikely to have heard of): the infamous Oireachtas Golf Society meeting at the Connemara golf course in Ballyconneely and the subsequent dinner. Very busy at Station House. Hotel in Clifden.
The 1911 census lists two families of 10 named Kings who lived in Doonloughan at the time: farmer Mark King and his wife Annie and their two young children Mary and John, and 20-year-old fisherman Festus “Festy” King who lived with his widowed mother Kate and four siblings.
Ten years earlier, the 1901 census shows 16 Kings in the region, with Kate’s husband, Patrick, still alive and three older children, Mary, Mark, Patrick, and John, still living in the home.
There is a long tradition of emigration from Connemara to Boston with the parents of another famous Connemara son-in-law, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, from Ros Muc and Callowfeenish near Carna in Co Galway.
Ship manifest records on New York’s Ellis Island, the entry point through which many Irish emigrants passed, show dozens of Connemara kings passing through its doors in the early years of the 20th century.
Perhaps that magical CNN wall could be used to plot a family tree and Irish emigration story rather than a victory in the presidential election.
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