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Reviewed by:
  • Beyond the American Pale: The Irish in the West, 1845–1910
  • Robert Carriker
Beyond the American Pale: The Irish in the West, 1845–1910. By David M. Emmons. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. 2010. Pp. viii, 472. $34.95. ISBN 978-0-806-14128-2.)

The present book began life as a “relatively uncomplicated account of western Irish,” but soon transformed itself into a “cluttered storyline of a people beyond a cultural as well as a geographical pale” (p. 460). To fully develop his thoughts, writes the author, the University of Oklahoma Press allowed him a larger than usual word limit. The result is a large, dynamic book about a people, a religion, a region, and a culture. Happily, this hefty volume is exceptionally well written.

An earlier book by David Emmons, The Butte Irish (Urbana, IL, 1989), is considered a model for the study of an ethnic group located in a specific town or region. Researching and writing Beyond the American Pale allowed Emmons to draw wider conclusions about the Irish by extending his field of vision to many different western locations. How deep is the research? The author has considered the influence of the Irish in 210 western cities or settlements, eighty-two mining locations, and ten railroad towns.

Emmons begins his task with enthusiasm in the introduction by debunking some assumptions about Irish immigration to America. Next, he examines some exaggerated myths about the West. All of this is relevant to “Part I. Unwelcome Strangers: the Irish and the American West,” the first five chapters in this two-part book. Among the most interesting considerations advanced by Emmons are the attitudes by the Irish immigrants toward slaves and Indians—two minority groups with whom they could identify. In the mind of many Americans, for example, rigid Catholicism was a form of slavery. Moreover, the British viewed the Catholic Irish as savages and therefore justifiably conquered, just as they had the Indians of America.

“Part II. An Alternate Frontier: The Irish in the American West” moves the story of Irish immigration across the 100th meridian. Of course, labor, both unorganized and unionized, is a major part of the story. Capitalism loved Irish laborers who worked in the mines, laid railroad track, and cleaned homes, but not when they dominated labor unions, as so often occurred. In the latter scenario, they became papists in need of assimilation into Protestant America. When the Irish resisted, they were kept beyond the American pale.

The glue that binds together the two parts of Emmons’s book is Catholicism. In the late-nineteenth century Butte, Montana, was the most Irish city in America in terms of percentage of total population, which made it the most Catholic city in America. That fact alone also made it the most antiwestern city. The West was Protestant country, notwithstanding the notable efforts of Jesuit and Franciscan missionaries. Emmons argues that the West was not a place of equal opportunity if an individual was Irish, Catholic, or both. The irony is, writes Emmons, that the West was viewed as [End Page 163] a place where people could go to be free, yet when the westering Irish took that to mean they were free to practice their clannishness and Catholicism they immediately became unwelcome.

Emmons, now professor emeritus at the University of Montana, has been at work on this project for thirty years. This is an outstanding contribution to Irish studies, the American West, and American history.

Robert Carriker
Gonzaga University
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