Galway Bay

Galway Bay

In a hidden <ST1:COUNTRY-REGION w:st="on"><ST1:PLACE w:st="on">Ireland</ST1:PLACE></ST1:COUNTRY-REGION> where fishermen and tenant farmers find solace in their ancient faith, songs, stories, and communal celebrations, young Honora Keeley and Michael Kelly wed and start a family. Because they and their countrymen must sell both their catch and their crops to pay exorbitant rents, potatoes have become their only staple food.<br><br>But when blight destroys the potatoes three times in four years, a callous government and uncaring landlords turn a natural disaster into The Great Starvation that will kill one million. Honora and Michael vow their children will live. The family joins two million other Irish refugees--victims saving themselves--in the emigration from <ST1:COUNTRY-REGION w:st="on"><ST1:PLACE w:st="on">Ireland</ST1:PLACE></ST1:COUNTRY-REGION>.<br><br>Danger and hardship await them in <ST1:COUNTRY-REGION w:st="on"><ST1:PLACE w:st="on">America</ST1:PLACE></ST1:COUNTRY-REGION>. Honora, her unconventional sister M¡ire, and their seven sons help transform <ST1:CITY w:st="on"><ST1:PLACE w:st="on">Chicago</ST1:PLACE></ST1:CITY> from a frontier town to the "City of the Century." The boys go on to fight in the Civil War and enlist in the cause of <ST1:COUNTRY-REGION w:st="on"><ST1:PLACE w:st="on">Ireland</ST1:PLACE></ST1:COUNTRY-REGION>'s freedom. <br><br>Spanning six generations and filled with joy, sadness, and heroism, <ST1:PLACE w:st="on"><ST1:PLACENAME w:st="on">GALWAY</ST1:PLACENAME> <ST1:PLACETYPE w:st="on">BAY</ST1:PLACETYPE></ST1:PLACE> sheds brilliant light on the ancestors of today's forty-four million Irish Americans--and is a universal story you will never forget.