Cheers!

It's still St. Patrick's Day here, so Cheers to you all and hope you had a bit of the luck of the Irish on this fine day.   We actually had Indian food for dinner, (Tikka Masala and rice with a green salad - yum!) but I got a Guinness beer and some Irish soda bread today at the store, so that fulfills some of the St. Patrick's Day requirements, I guess. 

Bill's ancestor, Michael Collins (no, not THAT Michael Collins) was born in County Clair in 1822 and left in 1843 for Upper Ontario, Canada.  He married and began his family (13 kids! 12 I have found, one is missing)  there and had a business making some kind of bricks.  Then in 1870 they came to Sauk Center, Minnesota.  He followed his son's to Grand Forks, ND in 1882. Michael died in 1896 and I was thrilled when I got his obituary.  It ends with this:  

Mr. Collins has been an industrious, frugal and temperate man and the good habits of his early years placed him in such financial circumstances that his closing days were passed free from care, and his kindly, genial disposition kept him in touch with the active affairs and the brighter side of life until his spirit was called away.

 His son, Stephen, when Michael went to Grand Forks,  was in the process of building his successful farm implement business with his partner, Mr. Murphy.  The Collins & Murphy Implement Company flourished and their first year's sales were about $50,000.  In 1891 their sales were about $250,000.  That's quite a lot for that time period.  In the year 1890 they erected a building, of brick with stone trimmings, three stories and a basement.  They were right by the railroad, affording them splendid facilities for loading and unloading cars.  This, believe it or not, is new information I just found tonight.  I was trying to find a photo of the terrible flood and fire of 1997 that hit Grand Forks, ND, and came across Google books of this old volume of Farm Implement News of 1892.  I was tickled pink to find this little tidbit of information.  The Collins & Murphy building was one of the casualties of that awful flood and fire and it was destroyed.  I've seen photos of those wonderful old buildings that burned to nothing but a shell, and it's so very sad.  

Truth be told, when I figured it all out, Bill and his brother actually have a wee bit more of Scotland flowing through their veins than Ireland, and then Northern Germany( actually it's in NW Poland)  and Danish on their mother's side.   But today, we're all Irish, right?  

I think I have some Irish.  My GG Grandmother was a Kinney. That sounds Irish to me.  

Tomorrow is a support day for Blipfoto.  We are going to go to Hood River on a photo tour, so I can't promise if I can do the hands across Blipfoto thing or not.  I'll see what happens I guess.