PIERCE BROSNAN is an actor, film producer, artist, environmentalist, and two-time Golden Globe Award nominee. Irish born, Brosnan moved to Los Angeles in 1982 to star in the popular NBC television series Remington Steele. In the 1990s, he reinvigorated the popularity of the Bond franchise in box-office blockbusters Goldeneye, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough, and Die Another Day. Brosnan’s production company, Irish DreamTime, has produced eleven films to date, including The November Man, The Matador, Evelyn, and The Thomas Crown Affair. An avid painter, Brosnan will exhibit his work in 2018. He was born in County Meath.
TERRY GOLWAY is a senior editor at Politico and the author of several books, including Washington’s General, For the Cause of Liberty, and, most recently, Machine Made: Tammany Hall and the Creation of Modern American Politics. A journalist for more than forty years, Golway is a former member of the editorial board of the New York Times and former city editor of the New York Observer. He has taught at the New School, New York University, and Kean University. Golway traces his roots back to County Donegal.
TOM HAYDEN was an activist, writer, and politician. A legend of the sixties, having drafted The Port Huron Statement at age twenty-one, he was a founder of Students for a Democratic Society, a Freedom Rider, a community organizer in Newark, a leader in the Vietnam antiwar movement, and eventually a state senator and assemblyman in the California State Legislature for eighteen years. The author and editor of over twenty books, including the recently published Hell No: The Forgotten Power of the Vietnam Peace Movement, Hayden was on the editorial board and a columnist for the Nation magazine and was regularly published in the New York Times, the Guardian, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Boston Globe, and weekly alternatives. He was a leading voice in social movements for over fifty years. Hayden’s family came from Counties Armagh, Cavan, Louth, and Monaghan.
KATHLEEN HILL is a novelist and teaches in the MFA program at Sarah Lawrence College. Hill’s novel Still Waters in Niger was nominated for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and named a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Chicago Tribune. The French translation, Eaux Tranquilles, was shortlisted for the Prix Femina Etranger. Who Occupies This House, a second novel, was named an Editors’ Choice at the New York Times. Hill’s work has appeared in Best American Short Stories, Best Spiritual Writing, Pushcart Prize XXV, and The Pushcart Book of Short Stories. A memoir, She Read to Us in the Late Afternoons: A Life in Novels, was published in 2017. Hill’s family emigrated from Counties Clare and Roscommon.
MARY JORDAN and KEVIN SULLIVAN are Washington Post journalists who have traveled the world as the Post’s bureau chiefs in Tokyo, Mexico City, and London. They won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting for coverage of the Mexican criminal justice system—one of only two married couples ever to win a journalism Pulitzer. They have also written two books: The Prison Angel and the New York Times #1 bestseller Hope: A Memoir of Survival in Cleveland. They were contributing writers on Trump Revealed, a 2016 Washington Post biography of Donald Trump. Jordan’s parents emigrated from County Mayo. Sullivan’s family comes from County Cork.
JILL MCDONOUGH is a poet and professor in the MFA program at UMass Boston. The author of three collections, Habeas Corpus (2008), Oh, James! (2012), and Where You Live (2012), McDonough is the winner of a 2014 Lannan Literary Fellowship and three Pushcart prizes and the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Fine Arts Work Center, and the New York Public Library. Her work has appeared in Poetry, Slate, the Nation, the Threepenny Review, and Best American Poetry. McDonough’s fourth and fifth poetry collections, Reaper and Here All Night, are forthcoming. McDonough’s family comes from County Cork.
MICHAEL MOORE is an Academy Award–winning American filmmaker, bestselling author, and renowned political commentator and activist. He is the director and producer of numerous documentaries, including Roger & Me, Bowling for Columbine, Fahrenheit 9/11, Sicko, Capitalism: A Love Story, Where to Invade Next, and Michael Moore in TrumpLand. Moore has also produced and starred in the TV series TV Nation and The Awful Truth. His bestselling books include Stupid White Men, Downsize This, Dude, Where’s My Country, and Here Comes Trouble. Moore’s family hails from Counties Cork, Tipperary, and Waterford.
ROSIE O’DONNELL is a comedian, actress, author, and television personality. As host of NBC’s variety daytime television show The Rosie O’Donnell Show, Rosie won numerous Emmy awards and left a mark on American television. She joined the cast of ABC’s The View in 2006 and a year later went on to write her second memoir, Celebrity Detox. In 2009, O’Donnell shook the airwaves with her radio show, Rosie Radio. In addition to her work in entertainment, she launched the nonprofit Rosie’s Theater Kids, formerly known as Rosie’s Broadway Kids, which helps children realize their potential through the arts. Rosie’s family is from County Tyrone.
MARK K. SHRIVER is senior vice president of U.S. programs and advocacy at Save the Children and president of the organization’s political advocacy arm, Save the Children Action Network. Shriver created the Choice Program and is a former Maryland state legislator. His latest book, Pilgrimage: My Search for the Real Pope Francis, was published in November 2016. His New York Times and Washington Post bestselling memoir, A Good Man: Rediscovering My Father, Sargent Shriver, was published in June 2012 and received a 2013 Christopher Award. Shriver’s family is from Counties Cork, Cavan, Limerick, and Wexford.
ADDITIONAL
TOM DEIGNAN is the author of Coming to America: Irish Americans and served as a contributing writer for the book Irish American Chronicle. He is a columnist for the Irish Voice newspaper and Irish America magazine. His writing has appeared in newspapers such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Sunday Business Post (Ireland), as well as magazines such as Commonweal, America, and Publishers Weekly. Deignan has taught history, cinema, and English at CUNY, St. John’s University, and Bowling Green State University. His family comes from Counties Cork and Roscommon.
ILLUSTRATOR
EDWARD HEMINGWAY has written and illustrated several children’s books, including Bad Apple: A Tale of Friendship, Field Guide to the Grumpasaurus, and Tough Cookie. He is the illustrator of the books Hemingway & Bailey’s Bartending Guide to Great American Writers, Of All the Gin Joints: Stumbling through Hollywood History, and the children’s book Tiny Pie, all three written by Mark Bailey. Hemingway’s mother emigrated from Dublin.