Ireland to America – William Gray and Hessie Kirkpatrick
William Gray Kirkpatrick, born etc…
“A Hero In The Common Walks Of Life”
The Daily Courier, Saturday, April 7, 1928
(Near Pittsburgh, PA – tsk)
The possibility, even the certainty, of achieving an objective in life against many odds and under serious handicaps, such as are imposed by scant returns from one’s labor, as well also the lesson to be learned by persistence, industry and thrift, were strikingly illustrated in the life of William Kirkpatrick, who died near Flatwoods on Tuesday.
A friend who was familiar with the struggles through which this much respected citiizen passed in his earlier years, and with other neighbors admired the many excellent traits of his character, has written appreciatively of him as follows:
“William Kirkpatrick who died at his home near Flatwoods on Tuesday, April 8, 1928, at 9:30 A.M., aged 71, was born in Ireland. He was evidently industrious, economical, and in a proper sense ambitious, even in his youth. He had no school privileges in his native country, but at 22 years of age he had a wife and one child, John, and some money in the bank. Being out of employment and yet ambitious, as he expressed it, to ‘own something of his own,’ and this being practically impossible in Ireland, he withdrew his money from the bank, secured passage in a vessel for America and landed at Philadelphia, a boy of 22, not knowing a single person in this country.
“An employment agent in Philadelphia, for a consideration, directed him to Connellsville where he secured work with a railroad construction gang at $1.40 per day.
“It was a long, tedious and trying task to save sufficient funds to bring the wife and child to this country, but “Billy” Kirkpatrick did it. Not only so but in the course of time he bought a piece of land near Flatwoods, later selling it and buying another, and eventually disposing of that and buying the farm, near Flatwoods, where he died.
“He was a man of sound judgment, irreproachable character, untiring industry, more than ordinarily competent in matters pertaining to farm work, and accommodating to a degree. For many years, and until his death he was a member of the Flatwoods Baptist Church.
“He and his noble wife reared a family of ten children, provided for them well and he leaves them a good home. He was a hero in the common walks of life, and a worthy model for many an American born boy.”
J.W. Hays