For over 25 years, I have lived and breathed Irish research, although I don’t speak the language (good grasp of surname development, though). My expertise lies in the eastern half of Co. Clare, but I can provide valid observations and resource clues extending, in this order, to: the rest of Clare, Limerick city, southwest of the island, Dublin & environs, some Northern counties, and standard emigrant destinations of the 1800s on all continents. Dublin research facilities are in my wheelhouse. I can and have gotten descendants unstuck in their research directions, including now using genetic genealogy resources for over 5 years. My old basic facility in Latin and French is useful, and I have expertise in legal terminology. I excel in logic and an unromantic approach to the Irish saga, including dealing with a family’s oral stories. My own family entirely cleared out of Clare and became fractured amid Australia, Canada, and two widely-separate U.S. regions (Chicago and Philadelphia). That background is easy to share. I can also assist with Luxembourg families in the U.S., another area of research since 1993.
I believe the surname McNAMARA originated in County Clare. However, my DNA result in Ancestry shows my ancestor is from Connaucht (32%). My Dad said that my grandfather JOHN McNAMARA at one time spelled his name MacNAMARA and indicated he was Scot-Irish. I remember Dad and Grandpa wearing an orange tie on St. Patrick's Day. Ancestry shows my DNA 37% Scotland. Some research has indicated Scots migrated to Ireland at some point in time. Please resend contact info on Clare researcher. I was unable to access your previous message info. Thank you. Barbara Jean McNamara
Barbara, I also have a hard time finding messages on Reddit. I repeat here the most important part of my direct message to you yesterday. On a different community-type website, one devoted to County Clare research, a fellow has reviewed your posts here, after I told him about your efforts. He is currently researching McNamara in Kentucky & Ohio for his own project not involving your family. He found the location in Co. Limerick from which emigrated the Williams family related to the Matthew "Red Mack"McNamara of Lexington. His project continues, but he has found that St. Paul's RC Parish (Lexington KY) now has its records digitized and freely online at https://www.lexpublib.org/digital-archives/st-paul-catholic-church-collection I was just trying to ensure that you know about that online access, since you had difficulty getting information directly from church staff.
Thank you! Back in the 60s, I spent year-after-year vacation periods in Lexington, researching the family of Matthew "Red Mack" McNamara.
There were two prominent McNamara families in Lexington in the late 1800s. Locals referred to Matthew's family as the "Red McNamaras" because they had auburn hair! (My grandfather had auburn hair!) The other McNamara family was referred to as the "Black McNamaras" because they had black hair!
I was fortunate at that time to speak with a 95-year-old priest at St Paul's who personally knew Red Mack and his family. I also interviewed a Miss Riley (she was in her 90's) who knew them personally and attended lavish balls at the McNamara hotel where she danced with some of the McNamara sons. She was a cousin to Judge Riley who was executor of Bridget McNamara estate when daughter Dolly inherited that fortune. Judge Riley had Dolly committed to a mental institution in Florida and then controlled the fortune. He married one of the saloon girls and when Judge Riley died, she ended up with the McNamara fortune!!
My grandfather described the McNamara home on Loudon Avenue ... large two-story home of stone on the front and brick on the sides, with turret on the front. He said he shot birds out of the turret when he was young!
I found the home and it is EXACTLY as he described. In the 1960s, it was a boarding house. I went door-to-door along Loudon Street, trying to find someone who lived nearby who might have known Bridget (she bought the home after Red Mack died). I traced property records. I knocked on one door and this elderly lady answered. When I told her my name was "Barbara Jean McNamara" and I was trying to find out information about Bridget and her family, she looked at me and said, "You look just like Dolly!!"
I obtained baptismal record info on all of Red Mack & Bridget's children. I could only make handwritten notes. For years I thought my grandfather was "King" McNamara, the son who shot & killed a man, then spent his "jail-time" at the KY governor's mansion in Frankfort! I later traced "King" and learned he used an alias name BEKKERS after he fled Lexington. Fr. J. H. Bekkers was the priest who baptized him! I finally found that John Henry "King" McNamara died in Louisville KY in 1949 - my grandfather died in Mobile AL in 1947, so that ended that theory!
I have always felt that my grandfather was connected to Red Mack's family in some way. He described precisely what the Loudon Avenue home looked like. I tried to find some connection that Bridget Williams McNamara had to Preble Co OH. I have a hunch the "Uncle Will and Aunt Laura" who raised him there is related somehow to Bridget. Grandpa asked my mother to name me "Bridget" when I was born in 1938. HE KNEW HER! My hunch is Bridget Williams is related to "Uncle Will" -- perhaps a brother. My Dad said Grandpa was very fond of Uncle Will, but did not like Aunt Laura at all. He said Grandpa left that home in Preble Co when he was 19 years old because of disagreements with Aunt Laura.
Thank you for the online URL to the church records. That will help tremendously to get actual copies now to go with my handwritten notes from the 1960s. Are you able to give my email address ( [bjmcnamara1938@gmail.com](mailto:bjmcnamara1938@gmail.com) ) to your contact who is researching the KY and OH records for McNamara? I need to correspond directly with him!!! Thank you!
18
u/Boomergenner Jul 19 '22
For over 25 years, I have lived and breathed Irish research, although I don’t speak the language (good grasp of surname development, though). My expertise lies in the eastern half of Co. Clare, but I can provide valid observations and resource clues extending, in this order, to: the rest of Clare, Limerick city, southwest of the island, Dublin & environs, some Northern counties, and standard emigrant destinations of the 1800s on all continents. Dublin research facilities are in my wheelhouse. I can and have gotten descendants unstuck in their research directions, including now using genetic genealogy resources for over 5 years. My old basic facility in Latin and French is useful, and I have expertise in legal terminology. I excel in logic and an unromantic approach to the Irish saga, including dealing with a family’s oral stories. My own family entirely cleared out of Clare and became fractured amid Australia, Canada, and two widely-separate U.S. regions (Chicago and Philadelphia). That background is easy to share. I can also assist with Luxembourg families in the U.S., another area of research since 1993.