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Contact: [email protected] A Brief History of the Irish-American Athletic Club: The “Winged Fists” of Celtic Park Ian McGowan February, 2012 City College, City University of New York, Department of History Thesis Advisory Professor Gerardo Renique Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of History at the City College of New York 1 Preface The research for this thesis began quite unintentionally as an exercise in intellectual curiosity in 2004, when I moved into an apartment complex called Celtic Park, in Sunnyside/Woodside, Queens. I was curious as to where the complex got its name, and when I scratched the surface, I soon discovered that Celtic Park had an incredibly rich and almost completely forgotten history, and that it was once the home of a world-renown group of athletes called the Irish-American Athletic Club, also known as the Winged Fists of Celtic Park. As a result of my research, I have since become the founder and executive director of a non-profit historical society called the Winged Fist Organization, which is dedicated to preserving the legacy of the Irish-American Athletic Club. The Winged Fist Organization’s advisory board includes a number of prominent historians and published authors, an NYPD Police Chief, and a New York State Supreme Court Justice. Our research has been published for review on our website, www.WingedFist.org. I have presented my findings on the Irish-American Athletic Club in the form of a PowerPoint presentation and lecture to more than dozen organizations, including; The American Conference of Irish Studies, The American Irish Historical Society, The Greater Astoria Historical Society, The Queens Historical Society, The Queens Public Library, The NYPD Emerald Society, The Irish Family History Forum of Long Island, The Irish Cultural Society of Garden City and the Irish Studies Institute of Molloy College, to name a few. My research has been supported in no small part by a scholarship from the New York Irish History Roundtable, as an earlier version of this paper received the coveted John O’Connor Graduate Scholarship in 2009. Part of this research is currently being considered for publication in the academic journal of the New York Irish History Roundtable – New York Irish History. 2 Introduction In 1897 the Greater New York Irish Athletic Association purchased seven-plus acres of land in the suburban farming community then known as Laurel Hill, Long Island, from George Thomson for $9,000. (In 1904, Greater New York Irish Athletic Association changed their name to the Irish-American Athletic Club). The athletic complex they built on those seven acres was called Celtic Park. For the first two decades of the 20th century, numerous world-class athletes were nurtured, trained and competed at Celtic Park, making it one of the premier track and field training facilities in the world. Even though Celtic Park was the training ground for multiple Olympic medalists and a village green for tens of thousands of Irish immigrants, like many other New York landmarks it was razed — in this case for an apartment complex – by 1931. Construction began on Celtic Park in 1898, (in an area that has alternately been referred to as Laurel Hill, Thomson Hill, Long Island, Long Island City, and is today considered part of Woodside and Sunnyside, Queens). It wasn’t until 1901 that the park had its proper public debut: “Improvements that…resulted in the practical rebuilding and remodeling of the stands and grounds of Celtic Park” took place three years after the land was purchased, making it one of the “most completely equipped places of the kind about the city.”1 Cover Image: The Winged Fist emblem of the Irish-American Athletic Club adorned with American flags and shamrocks and the Irish motto ‘Láim Láidir Abú’ or Strong Hands Forever. http://www.wingedfist.com/ 3 The park was intentionally built on the trolley line running to Calvary Cemetery, making it convenient to access for Irish immigrants already visiting their dearly departed in the City’s largest Catholic cemetery. The clubhouse was a two story building, which included a dining room that could seat 1,000, and a basement with 12 foot high ceilings, and bowling lanes. On the second floor, there was café, dressing rooms, reception room and a private dining hall, and piazzas with views of the track and field, and the Manhattan skyline. On the west side of the grounds was an enclosed grandstand with a seating capacity of 2,500. 2 “The Wilds of Long Island City” In a sports column in The New York Times in 1934, Robert F. Kelley wrote: “Celtic Park, out in what was then the wilds of Long Island City, was more inaccessible than Montauk Point is today to a New Yorker. All of these men worked for a living somewhere in New York City, and after an arduous day on the job, took this tiresome trip in order to engage in training.”3 While Kelley was guilty of slight hyperbole (the park was close to trolley lines that traveled from the ferry depot at the East River), he was accurate in stating that many of these athletes were “on the job,” i.e. the New York City Police Department. 1 “Athletic Field Remodeled. Celtic Park in New Garb to be Re-opened Monday.” New York Times 10 May, 1901: p. 10. 2 Ibid 3 Kelley, Robert F. “ Sports of the Times: There Were Men in Those Days.” New York Times 19 Dec., 1934: p. 32. 4 Many of the Irish and Irish-American athletes in the I-AAC were members of the New York City Police Department. An article in The New York Times in 1916 asserted that of the 11,000 members of the police force, there were 4,000 who could be classified as athletes and “fully 1,000 could win high athletic honors if they entered the best amateur or professional ranks.”4 Many of them had done just that. Detective Martin Sheridan of Manhattan’s First Branch Bureau won “1,000 cups and as many medals” in his thirteen years of competition. “It was not uncommon for him to win … eight or a dozen cups” during one athletic meet. He also won one bronze, three silver and five gold Olympic medals, making him the Irishman to this day to have won the most Olympic gold medals. “Patrolman Matt McGrath of the Oak Street Station (was) an Olympic Champion, and (held) the world’s record for (throwing a) 56-pound weight” and fellow Patrolman Patrick “Babe” MacDonald, a traffic cop whose post at one time was 43rd Street and Broadway “won more than 1,000 prizes putting the 16-pound shot.”5 When the Irish immigrants who formed this organization arrived in the United States, Irish immigrants were still largely distained in amateur athletic circles. Amateur athletics in New York were dominated by the almost entirely Protestant New York Athletic Club, the oldest private athletic club in the United States, which was founded in 1868. In the early 20th Century, amateur athletics were viewed as a rich man’s leisure 4 “4,000 Athletes on Police Force. Majority of New York Patrolmen are in Pink of Physical Condition. Some World Champions.” New York Times 17 July 1916: p. 9. McGrath was a member of both the I-AAC, and the rival New York Athletic Club. 5 Ibid. 5 activity, largely influenced by the Victorian and Edwardian perceptions of athleticism. The Irish-American Athletic Club would ultimately redefine this notion, by forming a successful athletic club that was dominated by working class athletes. In an interview in 1931, after the sale of Celtic Park, Limerick native P.J. Conway, who was a founding member of the I-AAC and served as its’ president for twenty-seven out of thirty-two years of existence, recalled proudly the athletes who trained and competed at Celtic Park, including; “Martin Sheridan, discus thrower and all- around champion, Matt McGrath, the hammer thrower; now Police Inspector, John Flanagan, our first star hammer thrower; Mal Shepard, [sic] (Melvin Sheppard) middle distance runner; Jack Joyce and John Daly, cross-country runners; John Hayes, the Olympic Marathon champion, and many others well known to the public.”6 Gaelic Games at Celtic Park From its inception, Celtic Park was built to provide a venue for Gaelic games in New York City. More than twenty years before the Gaelic Athletic Association revived the ancient Taiteann games in 1924 at Croke Park in Dublin, teams with names like the Wolf Tones, the Sarsfield’s, the Maher’s and the Daly’s7 were engaging in the ancient Irish sports of hurling and Gaelic Football at Celtic Park in Queens.8 (These teams would 6 “Paid $9,000 in 1897 for Celtic Park. City Home Company Bought the Athletic Field Last Year for about $500,000.” New York Times 28 June 1931: p. RE10. 7 “HURLING AT CELTIC PARK; THE MAHERS DEFEATED THE DALYS IN A SPIRITED EXHIBITION OF THE GAELIC PASTIME.” New York Times. 3 Nov. 1902. 8 “INTEREST IN OLD SPORTS; The Ancient Game of Hurling and Its New Popularity.