“This is Arthur Fields’ photo of our father, Thomas Fitzgerald, when he visited Dublin in August 1947. He was 22 at the time and in Dublin to complete his medical examination for an emigration visa at the US embassy. The eldest of nine children from a farm in Rabbitboro, Ballinlough, County Roscommon, he was determined to seek out opportunities in America. Two months later, after raising the fare for his passage by digging peat, he sailed for New York City. There, with the help of friends, he settled and found work as a labourer. In time, he met and married our mother, Eileen Reynolds, who had also emigrated to New York – from County Longford. He helped several of his siblings find their way to New York in the years that followed. Dad worked several jobs while attending the City University of New York at night to obtain his engineering degree. He eventually rose to become an executive vice president and the chief building engineer in charge of the historic Williamsburg Savings Bank building in Brooklyn – the one with the distinctive clock tower. He settled the family in Stony Brook on Long Island, where he lived the rest of his life, enjoying his lovely wife, four children, five grandchildren, and his beautiful gardens. He passed away in November 2011 from mesothelioma contracted from asbestos exposure during his years working as a labourer at the Kentile flooring factory in Brooklyn. He loved Ireland and visited his family there regularly until his death. We think he looks quite dapper in this photo and he’d love that it is part of history.”
(1947)
Submitted by Deirdre Cannan