Audio St. Patrick's in the "Norseland" (story audio) Photos Irish Ceili Dancing Steve O'Neil Father Charlie Flynn View full slideshow (5 images) Your Voice Join the conversation with other MPR listeners in the News Forum.

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St. Patrick's in the "Norseland"
by Bob Kelleher, Minnesota Public Radio
March 17, 2004

Dancers are grouped into two rings in this version of an Irish Ceili Dance. The music is provided by a traditional band from Wisconsin, The County Vernon Ceili Dance Band. (MPR Photo/Bob Kelleher)

It's not easy being green in Duluth. There's a smattering of Irish descendents around Northeast Minnesota, but they're easily lost among the hordes of Finns, Norwegians, and Swedes. Duluth dropped its annual St. Pat's parade several years ago. But one tradition has served as a touchstone for Duluth's Irish community - a dance that's marked the St. Pat's season for a quarter century. The 2004 dance was last Saturday.

	Steve O'Neil

Duluth, Minn. — Steve O'Neil grew up in one of America's classic Irish communities, on the south side of Chicago. It was a tightly knit Catholic neighborhood with a heavy dose of Irish pubs and celtic politics. He moved to Duluth in the 1970's.

"I came up here to go to school, and yeah, what a switch," O'Neil recalls. "I mean, very few Irish."

Look in the Duluth phone book and you'll find just half a column of Kellys. But there's pages and pages of Hansons, Carlsons, Nelsons, and Millers. O'Neil missed the Irish surnames, and he missed the dancing.

"Two of my five sisters studied Irish dance when they were in elementary school," O'Neil says. "And so I was kind of exposed to it. And we all would fool around, trying to learn these dances when we were kids."

I went to one St. Patrick's Day parade in St. Paul, and that was the last one I ever went to. I was just quite embarrassed by the antics of the participants, so I've never gone back to it. - Father Charlie Flynn

There's really nothing more Irish than dance. When O'Neil planned a community fundraiser in the late 1970's, he thought naturally of the traditional Irish ceili dance.

The ceili (pronounced KAY-lee) is a likely predecessor of the American square dance. O'Neil's first ceili was held in Duluth's Norway Hall. And it was a hit. The annual event quickly outgrew the small hall, and moved into a Catholic grade school auditorium.

The first years they served beer. But O'Neil says alcohol brought problems: eveything from licensing, to dancing that maybe was a little over enthusiastic. Now, the dance is dry.

"Father Vince Arimond was the Pastor at Good Shepherd at the time," O'Neil says. "And he'd come to these dances and watch and he'd say, 'Steve, how to do you get these people to be dancin' and having such a great time when there's no alcohol? And how do you get all these young people here?' I'd say, 'And I don't know Father, we just advertise it and people come and they don't seem to miss the booze.'"

To Duluth's Father Charlie Flynn, the Ceili Dance is authentic Ireland. He should know. Flynn came here from County Leitrim more than thirty years ago.

	Father Charlie Flynn

"There was very (little) - almost no Irish expression around here," says Flynn.

Flynn says St. Patrick's in Ireland is a much quieter celebration than here. And in Ireland, St. Patrick's is not a booze fest. Flynn found the American celebration rather shocking.

"I went to one St. Patrick's Day parade in St. Paul," Flynn says. "And that was the last one I ever went to. I was just quite embarrassed by the antics of the participants, so I've never gone back to it."

Now, Flynn's a regular at the St. Patrick's Ceili Dance. This single event has become the focus for the region's small Irish community.

	Terrance Smith

On the dance floor, Terrance Smith is a blur of green.

He's calling the dance - barking instructions for three steps; daisy chains; inner and outer circles. The weak quickly collapse onto wooden benches along the walls.

"To do them all night long, you have to be a hardy person," Smith says. "And, of course, a lot of people here are. And then you can kind of pick and choose which ones you want to do as you kind of get your stamina up. But, certainly, yeah, it's a work-out. A great work-out."

Mary Bernadette Newcomb has a face that could have come from the streets of Dublin. Her hair is still mostly dark -her eyes a sparkling Irish hazel. Newcomb's been coming since the first dance in 1979.

	Mary B. Newcomb

"We came when we had small children," Newcomb recalls. "We came when we had teenagers. We've come with foreign exchange students that we had living with us. So, we just keep coming, because they're really fun dances."

And like many here, she's of a mixed heritage - half German.

"And it doesn't matter if you're Irish or not," Newcomb says. "Everybody can be Irish tonight."

Saturday's dance raised a few hundred dollars - enough to help a Duluth daycare for families with special needs. The crowd was a little smaller than usual, probably because of an icy wind and blowing snow outside. But there was plenty of warmth inside. The fiddles and whistles and mandolins played into the wee hours that night.

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