Irish immigration and Manifest Destiny

 The Chapter starts of by stating that Between1815 and the mid 1820’s most Irish immigrants were Protestants.  In the mid 1820’s the Irish became more Catholic and more poorer.  Then there was a dramatic change between 1845 and the early 1850’s  because of “The Great Famine.”  The Great Famine was a time were a disease was caused by the potatoes they grew and it killed a million people.  Those who survived escaped and about 1.8 million Irish emigrated to the United States in the decade after 1845.  The newest Irish immigrants started from the bottom, they worked in dug streets, canals, and railroads. The woman worked as maids and textile workers.  Poverty was caused woman to start working at early ages.  The Irish who secured skilled or semiskilled jobs clashed with native-born white workers.

The section that I found most interesting later on in the chapter was the section of Manifest Destiny.As quoted from the book "The railroad and the telegraph, they said, had annihilated the problem of distance and made expansion safe." Reading this section reminded me of this painting that my teacher in middle school showed us that represented Manifest Destiny. This movement became the slogan of expansionists.  I uploaded the photo that I was talking about earlier and I think its a great representation of what we've read so far.  This picture depicts the people moving westward and the telegraph is being build along the way as we learned in chapter 11. This painting has so much symbolism within it that I think its interesting enough for me to share with all of you.