The East Bronx History Forum will meet one week early this month due to conflicts with St. Patrick’s Day celebrations. The meeting will be about the early Irish immigrant women who ran households throughout the city and nation and the focus this month will be on a Bronx household.The Bartow-Pell Mansion in Pelham Bay Park was home to a number of young Irish ladies seeking a better way of life in America.Their story is told in a rather unique way by former New York Times Reporter Doug Hearle who has investigated their history through the 1860 census and other sources.
If someone, in 1860, asked Maria Bartow who lived in her house she would have answered her husband and three of her children; a total of five people. But six other people also lived in the Bartow-Pell Mansion. These individuals cooked and cleaned and were almost invisible to the Maria and others of her class. Who were they? What did they do and how did they live? Join Doug Hearle as he discusses the household staff—all from a country suffering from famine and a disintegrating culture
The meeting will be held at the Huntington Free Library on Wednesday, March 10, at 7:30 p.m.The library is conveniently located a 9 Westchester Square adjacent to the Apple Bank for Savings just south of Benson Street.Further information about cancellations due to inclement weather, etc. may be obtained by calling the librarian, Catherine McChesney, at (718) 829-7770.
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