Keating Ancestry

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Mother's Day Salute: A photo of Bridget Creagh

In honor of Mother's Day, I am focusing on one of the many fantastic Mothers in our family history. This year, I am choosing Bridget Creagh Keating, the mother of my dad's grandfather, Edward Michael Keating, and the mother of Mary Keating Motie, the grandmother of Ann O'Brien. (For those of you who would like to know connections to Felicite, Bridget was the mother-in-law to two of Felicite's grandchildren, Eleanor and George. Did Bridget know Felicite? They could have overlapped in Davenport, perhaps crossing paths at the Catholic church, but...probably not.) Bridget was born in Carrigaholt, County Clare, Ireland on February 1, 1838 to parents James Creagh and Margaret Gibson. Bridget had several siblings including Margaret, Martin, Mary and Michael. The big Irish famine was in 1847, so Bridget was a young girl when that happened. Far western County Clare was devastated by the famine, so Bridget and her family were absolutely impacted by that event and the fa

St. Patrick's Day Salute: focus on Patrick Maguire

Just in time for St. Patrick's Day, I'm back with a blog post about one of our ancestors named Patrick. I will focus on Patrick McGuire* (1797-1861) and I think you will not be disappointed by this remarkable Irish immigrant. For those of you (like my sister) who like to position ancestors around Felicite Constant Motier, Patrick was the father of Felicite's daughter-in-law, Mary McGuire Motie. In fact, Patrick almost surely interacted with Felicite in Davenport. Patrick was born in Kilrush, County Clare, a far western part of Ireland (also where the Keatings and the Creaghs come from later). Patrick immigrated to the U.S. with his wife, Margaret Slattery, and two older daughters, Mary (1828) and Catherine (1834). He arrived in Davenport in 1839 and I think he left Ireland a year or two early and went through Newfoundland on the way to Davenport. Again, we have no specific information about why he came to Iowa, but the "pull" was likely jobs and opportunities

Springtime of 1955..ish

Cousin Petra sent me this photo and it is so terrific, I felt it merited a blog posting. Although the photo is undated, Petra thinks it is from around 1955. Thanks to Petra, we know all of the people in the photo: Back row: Father Laurence, Irma Manning, Alice Stevens, Genie Lynch, Jean Marie Manning Front row: Edward (Buzz) Manning, Eleanor "Lillie" Motie Keating (seated), Petra Manning Steele, in the very front holding a chicken Mary Manning (Emily Skafish's mom!). Date and place. Although we do not know the exact date, from the ages of everyone present, we think it is 1954 or 1955. We also think it is springtime. Springtime in Chicago often includes coats, but little Mary is holding a chicken and Petra remembers that one year they got chickens in their Easter baskets (I'm guessing you only do that once!) The photo is taken in front of Irma and Ed Manning's home in Chesterton, Indiana. Eleanor was widowed in late 1944 and moved to Indiana with Irma and

Bastille Day Salute to Our French Ancestors!

Just in time for Bastille Day, I thought I would write a quick blog on some research I've done over the past few months into our French ancestors who lived in Illinois in the early 18th Century. First, a quick history of the French in North America. As we know, European countries began to explore and colonize North America starting in the mid-16th Century. The French got into this game with Jacques Cartier entering and exploring the St. Lawrence River on numerous voyages in the mid 1500s. In 1603, the French explorer Samuel de Champlain established a French settlement in what is now Quebec City. The French, like all of the Europeans, wanted to find a passage to the Pacific and had high hopes that the great Mississippi River they'd heard so much about from the native peoples would get them there. It was actually 350 years ago in the summer of 1673 that French explorers Louis Jolliet and Father Jacques Marquette traveled down the Mississippi from Quebec. They learned a

Mother's Day Salute: Mary Maguire Motie

This is a photo of our great, great grandmother Mary Maguire Motie. (Sometimes Maguire is spelled as McGuire). This undated photo is from Ancestry.com, (I've tried to reach out to the person who posted it to find out a date, but I haven't heard back from him.) Mary was born on December 26, 1828 in Kilrush, County Clare, Ireland. I have not been able to find her immigration records, but she immigrated to the United States with her parents when she was still a young person. In fact, several of her young siblings were born in Iowa (sister Margaret was born in 1842 in Iowa), so we know the Maguire family was in Iowa by 1842. Mary married our great, great grandfather, Joseph Motie, in Dubuque, Iowa in 1843 when she was 15 years old; Joseph was 25. (Joseph had a first marriage, but his wife, Louisa Knott died). Joseph and Mary had a long and fruitful marriage. They had 13 children, although not all of them survived to adulthood. I am guessing that this photo is taken of her

Road Trip to Davenport, Iowa

Eleanor "Lillie" Motie and Edward M. Keating 1893 Chicago Amy and I took a road trip this past Saturday to Davenport Iowa to learn more about our Keating and Motie relatives who lived in this area in the 1840s through the 1890s. Davenport is a mid-sized city (population around 380,000) located on the eastern border of Iowa along the Mississippi River. It is the largest of the so-called Quad Cities with a great location on rolling bluffs. This part of Iowa was originally inhabited by the Sauk, Fox, and Winnebago peoples. By the late 1600s, French explorers were in this area as they navigated up and down the river system. The Davenport area was part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and technically became United States territory at that time. In 1832, the famous Black Hawk war occurred in the area around Davenport and when that war was concluded, American settlers began founding more permanent cities. French settler Antoine Le Claire gets credit for founding Dave