Some Famous Irish and Irish Americans

U.S. Presidents of Irish ancestry include:  John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, Andrew Jackson, James K. Polk, Chester A. Arthur, William McKinley, Woodrow Wilson, and Richard Nixon.

Grace Kelly - Irish American actress who married Prince Rainier III of Monaco.

Other Irish American actors and actresses: Mia Farrow, Margaret O'Brien, John McCormack, Mickey Rourke, Barry Fitzgerald, Art Carney, Colm Meaney, Tyrone Power, Carroll O'Connor, Errol Flynn, Audie Murphy, Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, James Cagney, Shirley Maclaine, Daniel Day-Lewis, Colin Farrell, Jackie Gleason, Mary Tyler Moore, Warren Beatty, Angelica Huston,  Bing Crosby, Spencer Tracy, Thomas Mitchell, Anthony Quinn, Jack Lemmon, Burt Lancaster, Gregory Peck, Buster Keaton Patricia Neal, George Kennedy, Robert Redford, Maureen O'Hara, Pierce Brosnan, Walter Brennan and the Barrymore family.

Sandra Day O'Connor (1930- ): First woman Supreme Court justice, appointed in 1981.

Edmund Burke - One of the best-known statesmen and political philosophers of the eighteenth century, serving in the British Parliament for some 2 decades beginning in 1766.

Mary Robinson – The first woman President of Ireland (elected in 1990).

Mary McAleese - The second and current woman to serve as President of The Republic of Ireland.

Chaim Herzog - Born in Ireland in 1918, he immigrated to Palestine in 1935, served in the British army in World War II, was the head of intelligence in northern Germany and helped in the liberation of  concentration camps.

Edward R. Murrow (1908-1965) Courageous news correspondent, known for his honesty and integrity in reporting the news, who produced a series of TV news reports that helped diminish the power of Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s.

Catherine Elizabeth MCAuley - Founder of the Sisters of Mercy in Dublin (1831). 

Robert Boyle - (1627 – 1691) Chemist who formulated a law of physics, "Boyle's law", that states that “under conditions of constant temperature  the pressure and volume of a gas are inversely proportional”.

Michael William Balfe - 1808.  Singer and composer, best known for the opera The Bohemian Girl and The Siege of Rochelle. 

Daniel Pollen - (1813 – 1896) Irish-born physician who served as Prime Minister in New Zealand from 1875 to 1876.

Doctor Robert James Graves – (1796 – 1853) Physician and a leader of the Dublin School of Diagnosis, which significantly advanced the fields of physical diagnosis and internal medicine because of their emphasis on the clinical observation of patients.

John McCormack – (1884 – 1945) Tenor considered to have been one of the finest singers of the first quarter of the 20th century.

Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton – Nobel Prize winning physicist (1951).

Liam Neeson - one of Ireland's most famous contemporary actors. His repertoire includes leading roles in a list of  films that include: Excalibur, Schindler's List, and Star Wars.

Henry Ford - Son of an Irish immigrant, he founded the Ford Motor Company.

Nellie Bly - (born Elizabeth Cochrane) Pioneer woman journalist and investigative reporter who also became famous for  making a trip around the world in a record 72 days.

Marrion Morrison - After changing his name to John Wayne, he became a legend of American films, mostly Westerns.

John Tyndall - (1820-1893) One of greatest scientists of 19th century who was a  pioneer in the areas of  radiant heat, the germ theory of disease, glacier motion, sound, and light diffusion in the Earth’s atmosphere.

William Thomson  (Lord Kelvin) -  (1824-1907) World renowned physicist who introduced the absolute scale of temperature, now known as the Kelvin scale.

Ernest Walton  - (1903-1997) a pioneer nuclear physicist and Ireland’s first science Nobel Laureate.

Jocelyn Bell Burnell - Professor of Physics at The Open University who discovered pulsars

George Bernard Shaw – Novelist and playwright.

Matthew Brady - (1823-1896) Civil War photographer.

William J. Brennan, Jr. - (1906-1997) U.S. Supreme Court Justice.

Buffalo Bill Cody - (1846-1917) Western scout and showman.

George M. Cohan -  (1872-1942) The father of American musical comedy.

Richard J. Daley and his son Richard M. Daley who both served long terms as mayors of Chicago.

F. Scott Fitzgerald  - (1896-1940) Novelist and author of The Great Gatsby among others.

Father Edward J. Flannagan - Founder of Boys Town, USA.

John Ford  - (1895-1973) Film director who won Oscars for The Grapes of Wrath and How Green Was My Valley.

William Randolph Hearst - (1863-1951) Editor and publisher of the largest newspaper chain in the United States.  He also served in Congress.

John Huston - Director of film classics such as The Maltese Falcon, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, The Red Badge of Courage, The African Queen, and  Moby Dick.

John O'Hara (1905-1970): Novelist and short-story writer.

Georgia O'Keefe (1887-1986) Artist and painter known for her brilliant colors and abstract style.