Tuesday, November 8, 2011


Brave New World

          The National Geographic Traveler Magazine recently published the top 20 “great places in the world to experience in 2012,” and among the list were the favorites - London, Dresden, and perhaps surprisingly, Pittsburgh. The same Pittsburgh, that not a century ago was notorious for boasting smog from its industrial borders, is now considered a high profile destination. Certainly, past generations contributed to Pittsburgh’s success today. Pittsburgh, like most cities, remained a destination throughout the immigration booms of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Irish immigrants held one of the largest percentages, and still do today, in Pittsburgh. Drawn in by the growing steel industry and open job market, many Irish immigrants travelled across the Atlantic Ocean to make a new life for themselves and their families. Ewa Morawska, in her chapter titled “The Immigrants Pictured and Unpictured in the Pittsburgh Survey,” discusses the living conditions and the assimilation into the American culture for these Irish immigrants, and through these beginnings, many generations since have stayed connected to Pittsburgh.

Compared to the green grass and the rolling hills of the Irish countryside, Pittsburgh seemed like a drab setting. Morawska states that “the immigrants deplored the ugliness and squalor of their new urban surroundings.” However poor the setting seemed, or how rigorous the work, the standard of living remained noticeably greater in the United States. Food became more plentiful, and clothes seemed to reflect this climbing of the social ladder, which was the entire motive for such a drastic life change. The immigrants’ endurance of “exploitative work and abusive treatment masked a determined ambition to better themselves” (Morawska 229). Mary Monroe, my great-grandmother, exemplified all of these characteristics. Hailing from the Irish countryside of Galway, an area that was arguably the poorest in the country at the time, Mary moved to Pittsburgh to start a better life, asking only for a job and a place to live. Falling in love with another Irish immigrant, Matthew McDonough, they were able to make a life for themselves and for their four children. Although their house would never be considered rich, they achieved their goal of living relatively comfortably.

Even though the way of life bettered for Irish immigrants, they still fought to hold onto aspects of their homeland in order to not fully assimilate to the new American culture. Morawska states that “immigrants preferred to turn inward toward their own communities and were uninterested in abandoning their customs and ethnic identities to become Americans.” The development of these Irish communities remained an outward symbol of a national consciousness within the Irish immigrant population. Of course, the Irish immigrants already spoke English as a native language, but the accent remained an aspect of pride for the Irish, even if Pittsburghers bullied or teased them. My mother remembers distinctly not recognizing what my great-grandmother said because her Irish accent remained very thick, even decades after moving to Pittsburgh. In addition, my great-grandmother kept her culture alive by performing river dances for family and friends whenever possible. By keeping the important cultural aspects of Ireland alive in her everyday life, my great-grandmother and many other immigrants, were able to stay true to who they were, while still taking advantage of and appreciating all that Pittsburgh had to offer.

Pittsburgh remains one of America’s best kept secrets. My great-grandparents discovered this secret when they immigrated from Ireland. Since then, many of the third generation McDonoughs have moved to various cities in search of a different and better future through job opportunities. However, they are always more than happy to return to their roots and explore all that the city has to offer. They have passed down the love for this city to their children, and even though neither I nor my siblings have ever lived in Pittsburgh, we view it as our second home. It comes as no surprise that Pittsburgh is considered one of the top 20 world destinations to visit during 2012, because I have visited and loved it my whole life.

Works Cited
Morawska, Ewa. "The Immigrants Pictured and Unpictured in the Pittsburgh Survey." Pittsburgh Surveyed: Social Science and Social Reform in the Early Twentieth Century. Eds. Maurine W. Greenwald and Margo Anderson. Pittsburgh: U of Pittsburgh P, 1996. 227-241. Print.
 
 
National Geographic. National Geographic, 1 Nov. 2011. Web. 2 Nov. 2011 <http://travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/best-trips-2012/#/botw-main-gallery-pittsburgh_41334_600x450.jpg>.

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