The prime minister of Ireland came to town last week, and he visited our community on two separate occasions.
Bertie Ahern – he’s called “an Taoiseach,” Irish words for “the leader” – came to the United States for a farewell visit, as he was coming to the end of his long career in elective office in his homeland. Ahern has been in politics for three decades and he moved into the leadership post in Ireland in 1997, just as the peace talks were gathering momentum in Northern Ireland. Ahern and his counterpart, Great Britain’s PM Tony Blair, became deeply engaged in the peace negotiations, and they each led their government’s policies towards the devolution of the government in Belfast, NI. And people who observed the process say that, without the leadership shown by Ahern, the peace process might have come to an end.
So Bertie, the Dublin man from the northside, was making what amounted to a victory tour of the states, where so much had been done by so many Americans to support the peace process. His first stop was in Washington DC, where he addressed a joint session of Congress, and later he was feted at a luncheon sponsored by Irish American members of Congress. Then, it was off to Boston, where he spent two days making speeches at the Boston College Club downtown, at Harvard University last Thursday evening, and on Friday at a breakfast at the Kennedy Presidential Library here on Columbia Point. At the JFK, Ahern praised the support he received from the Kennedys — Senator Ted Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg and former Ambassador to Ireland Jean Kennedy Smith were his hosts here — and he announced an Irish government grant of $2 million, to establish the Irish Heritage Collection of the Kennedy Library Digital Archive, supporting the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award, and presenting public programs that celebrate diversity in the tradition of John F. Kennedy.
During his whirlwind tour of Boston, after he completed his Harvard speech, Ahern took time for a quick visit to Dorchester’s Eire Pub last Thursday night. There, he was greeted by pub owner John Stenson and barman Martin Nicholson, and joined about 40 pub regulars for a pint. Surrounded by secret service security guards and several Boston Police motorcycle officers, the retiring leader had a grand time meeting and greeting the locals, spending about a half hour at the pub where once Ronald Reagan and later Bill Clinton had posed for photo ops. Ahern drank up – then left to a round of applause to return to his overnight home at Jurys Boston Hotel.
