I traveled almost 3,730 miles from Ireland to take part in the Twin Ports Festival of History and deliver two public lectures in a city that I first visited nine years ago.
In 2016, I was awarded a visiting fellowship by the University of Minnesota Duluth’s Alworth Institute for International Studies. I spent one month researching a well-traveled radical journalist named Jack Carney at UMD’s Kathryn A. Martin Library. A close friend and associate of the famous Irish labor leader Big Jim Larkin, Carney traveled to the U.S. from Ireland in 1916 and within two years settled in Duluth to take over the editorship of The Truth, a local weekly newspaper produced by Scandinavian socialists.
I have returned to Duluth a few times since then and delivered a lecture during a public history celebration week at UMD in September 2019 that helped to pave the way for the Twin Ports Festival of History, after I discussed my work as a public historian in Ireland and involvement in the annual Dublin Festival of History.
First held in 2013, the Dublin Festival of History has grown and generates substantial funding and publicity every year, with over 250 free events staged during last year’s offering. Predominantly featuring lectures, the Dublin history festival also hosts panel discussions, documentary film screenings, workshops, and guided tours.
I have taken part in dozens of Dublin Festival of History events, and some of these helped lead to the setting up of history book clubs at libraries and invitations to visit locations like prisons, schools, and nursing homes. In one instance, a library talk I delivered inspired attendees to successfully pursue the installation of a commemorative plaque, which was unveiled in Dublin last summer. Another time, a short presentation at a sports club led to me going on to curate a traveling history exhibition with the help of a local men’s shed group.
Undoubtedly, the Dublin Festival of History has played an important part in my career as a public historian, and it is an honor to return to Duluth to take part in the 2025 Twin Ports Festival of History, which this year is staging 22 free events.
To quote festival organizer David Woodward, director of UMD’s Museum Studies Program and instructor of history, “Our festival isn’t just about looking back, but about making connections between past and present. It’s about understanding where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re going.”
My first lecture in Duluth deals with the Clayton Jackson McGhie Memorial. Taking place at 5 p.m. on Thursday, April 3 at Zeitgeist, a short distance from the memorial, this lecture will discuss a collaborative work between sculptor Carla J. Stetson and writer Anthony Peyton Porter that has been hailed as “the first substantial public lynching memorial in the nation.” As somebody with an interest in commemorative public sculpture, when I first encountered the Clayton Jackson McGhie Memorial in April 2016, I was struck by its layout and the way it sought to “bring truth to light” about a notorious event in Duluth’s past. The fact that the memorial includes some engraved quotations from Dublin figures also immediately caught my eye, and I have been interested in the memorial and the event it commemorates ever since.
My second lecture will tell the story of an aspiring sculptor from Chicago named Mina Schoeneman (1892-1974), who married Irish radical journalist Jack Carney in 1917 and settled in Duluth the following year to help him produce The Truth newspaper. Known as an “exceedingly bright and very complex woman,” Mina Carney traveled extensively and has four sculptures housed in the permanent collections of a leading Irish art gallery. This event will take place at UMD’s Kathryn A. Martin Library Rotunda Room at 6 p.m. on Monday, April 7, and is dedicated to the memory of longtime Duluth resident Dick Hudelson, who passed away last April. A retired philosopher and critical thinker who lectured at the University of Minnesota Duluth and University of Wisconsin-Superior for several decades, Hudelson in 1994 published an article about Jack Carney for an Irish history journal and had a long-held interest in the Scandinavian socialist community that was active in Duluth throughout the early 20th century.
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James Curry is a public historian from the Republic of Ireland. A history graduate of Trinity College Dublin and the University of Galway, he is the author of “Artist of the Revolution: Ernest Kavanagh” and co-author of “Thomas Fitzpatrick and the Lepracaun Cartoon Monthly.” A former committee member of the Irish Labour History Society and founder of the One Hundred Dubliners YouTube channel, James is a regular visitor to Duluth and a former International Fellow at the Alworth Institute. He wrote this for the News Tribune.
GET INVOLVED
What: Twin Ports Festival of History, a multi-day celebration of regional, national, and international history
When: April 2-9
Where: Various sites throughout the Twin Ports area
Who: The public is invited to events organized by more than two dozen heritage organizations
Learn more: For a full schedule and more information, go to: z.umn.edu/TPFH .
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Related to this column: James Curry will deliver two lectures as part of the festival, one at 5 p.m. on Thursday, April 3, at Zeitgeist, about Duluth’s Clayton Jackson McGhie Memorial, and the other at 6 p.m. on Monday, April 7, in UMD’s Kathryn A. Martin Library Rotunda Room, about Chicago sculptor Mina Schoeneman.
The Trust Project
