Paddy ran an Irish saloon in the heart of Chicago’s south side. With a name like Paddy, I didn’t have to tell you that he, given the names James Patrick by his mother upon his birth, was from Irish stock. His Irishness oozed from every pore. His bar wasn’t your normal bar, for sure. It featured Turkish Baths, a bowling alley, and a place to make bets on the various races around the US, with results coming in via telegraph and phone. If you are thinking of an image from the Oscar-winning film, The Sting, you’d be right. Paddy was deeply connected to the Chicago mafia, and he made good money during the 1920s. He was arrested a few times, but he was always able to escape real trouble because of his Irish mob connections.
People who came to Paddy’s place invariably asked about his mother. That’s one subject that could really get him going. Paddy’s mother, you see, was a saint–just ask him. He was born over on DeKoven Street, two years before the Great Chicago Fire destroyed the house and much of the street. He ended up marrying a girl who lived in the neighborhood. But the real love of his life was his mother. Sure, it’s almost a trope of the Irish boy thinking his mother was wonderful, but Paddy would get angry, almost violently so, when anyone questioned his mother’s character.
Catherine had immigrated to the United States in the period before the Civil War and married a man named Patrick, for whom she named her middle child. The couple were happy. Even though they weren’t wealthy, they felt blessed to have been able to come to the US and start over, much like the people of their neighborhood–other Irish, Lithuanians, and Italians–and to have the chance to enjoy the economic possibilities that were lacking in the lands of their birth. Catherine kept a couple of chickens in the shed out behind the house, and a cow that gave good milk. To Paddy, Catherine was the perfect example of how someone can come to America, work hard, and provide a better future for their children.
And that’s why he bristled when anyone came in his place and asked questions about his mother. You see, Catherine died in 1895, a heart-broken woman. Oh, she lived to see Paddy become wealthy, even if it were by nefarious means, and she was more than a little proud. But that success never repaired the distress she felt over the blame that was sent her way. There was a great deal of prejudice against Irish immigrants back in that time, much like there is today against Muslims and people coming to the US from the Middle East.
Perhaps those racist ideas caused people to blame Catherine for something that the evidence seems to say wasn’t her fault at all. Paddy always claimed that the unfounded accusations made towards his sainted mother hastened her death; she died of a broken heart, according to her beloved son. We’ll never know. What we do know is that, according to the legend, Paddy’s mother, Mrs. Catherine O’Leary, left a lantern in the shed.
And when the cow kicked it over…
The Rest of the Story 