Irish Aunt

After the economic prosperity inspired by the Peat Wars of 1866, Ireland’s national product saw a surge in popularity all around the world, but particularly in North America. It was very fashionable for a young man or woman of society to possess an Irish Aunt (see fig. 1) for leisure and display. Irish Aunts quickly became a tool of social exchange and relaxation--for instance, in Braintree, Massachusetts, the members of the Irish Aunts Girls & Boys Club met weekly with their Irish Aunts to compare experiences, tips, and recipes. The Braintree club saw its counterpart all over North America and the rest of mainland Europe.

At the peak of the Irish Aunt craze, households with less than one Irish Aunt were vastly outpaced by household possessing two or more. A household without an Irish Aunt was considered strange and backward and often was reported to have detrimental effects on the success of the members of the household. If a young French man, for example, was seeking a position in Paris, he might be asked to speak about his experience with Irish Aunts to assess his level of capable responsibility. Thus was the Irish Aunt fad not only as a trend of popular culture but also a powerful social leverage tool.

In 1886 the most prominent Irish purveyors of Irish Aunts, Kennedy and Kilcreedy Ltd., experienced a severe shortage of Irish Aunts. Their production facilities in the rural counties shut down from disuse, and global Irish Aunt prices skyrocketed. Existing Irish Aunts became a feverishly desirable commodity; thefts of Irish Aunts became the number one reported crime in major cities like New York, Boston, and London. In response, people took to locking up their Irish Aunts if they were going to be absent.  The death of an Irish Aunt was the cause of great distress within a family. The Irish Aunt Famine, as it came to be called, affected the world in powerful, unpredictable ways and helped define a generation both economically and socially, as we will continue to see in the next section.

Questions for Thought

Respond in complete, thoughful sentences.
1) Ask your mom and dad if any of your relatives owned an Irish Aunt. How many? Did they like her?
2) There are still some Irish Aunts in existence today, but you cannot buy them. Do you have an Irish Aunt? Do you want one?