On this day in 1974, Charles Lindbergh died. He was the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. A feat he achieved on 21 May 1927, when he landed his aircraft – the Spirit of St. Louis – near Paris, having taken off from New York over 33 hours beforehand.
But even more importantly than that, did you know that he had Premier County blood running through his veins?
According to an Irish Press Article from May 1932, Charles Lindbergh’s mother, Evangeline L. Lindbergh, had informed the American Irish Historical Society of her, and therefore her son’s, Irish ancestry.
She wrote to the Historical Society: “According to my grandfather’s records, my mother’s mother, Emma B. Kissane, was born on November 10 1818 in Douglas, Isle of Man, where the family had moved from Tipperary. They later returned to Ireland. Her mother and father were William and Afra Kissane (I believe that Afra Kissane was a Healy).…Do not thank me for revealing Irish inheritance- All Irish descendants boast of it.”
This ‘inheritance’ as Mrs. Lindbergh calls it can be verified by Saunders’s Newsletter, a popular 19th century newspaper in Ireland, from 17 November 1810, where it is reported amongst the marriage notices that that ‘Wm. Kissane, of Skahagheen [Scalaheen], co. Tipperary, esq. to Afra Hely, daughter of George Hely, of Violet Hill, co. Kilkenny’.
The Tipperary diaspora has been to all corners of the globe, but we are delighted to say that Charles Lindbergh, one of history’s greatest aviators is one of our own!
Sources:
Irish Press, 16/05/1932, p1.
Saunders's News-Letter, 17/11/1810, p3.
