An Irish Famine Memorial (Patreon)

A few of us from Extra Credits were in Boston a few weeks back for PAX East. Boston's certainly not a city that lacks for history. Big glass skyscrapers stand right next to preserved state buildings from the 1700s. We walked the bridge over the Boston Harbor every morning, right past the Boston Tea Party Museum. The number of plaques to read was dizzying. But this memorial, a block away from my hotel, stood out most. 

Boston is one of the cities in America with the largest Irish American population. A majority of them came from the Potato Famine. Boston would be a lesser city without those people. I think this memorial captures a lot of what we tried to represent: the helpless horror of starvation, the bold hope of those who managed to escape, and the heartbreak of leaving behind those who couldn't. The families are a mirror of each other, just a short distance apart. The healthy mother looks back over her shoulder, the only connection between the two, as if she can hear her starving counterpart's cry.

The memorial was put up in 1998, to mark 150 years since the height of the Famine. Since then, it's been used as a rally point to protest for the rights of immigrants. Whatever your political leanings might be, it's important for us to be able to look to the past and its tragedies, so we can be better people. 

Because History Matters. - A