Tired of ads? Subscribers enjoy a distraction-free reading experience.
Click here to subscribe today or Login.

By BRAD BRANAN; Times Leader Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 04, 1995     Page: 3A

BEAR CREEK TWP. — For most American children, summer means vacation and a
chance to escape the tedium of studying.
   
For a group of Irish children visiting the area, the season provides an
opportunity to escape the civil unrest that has gripped their homeland and the
occasional bombings that occur there despite the cease-fire that is in effect.
    Fifteen children from Northern Ireland arrived in Bear Creek on Monday
evening to begin their five-week stay in Pennsylvania. The trip is being
coordinated by Project Children, a division of the non-profit Donegal Society.
   
Project Children has brought children from Northern Ireland to America for
20 years, said Don McNamara, the project’s Harrisburg coordinator. The idea
started with Dennis Mulcahy, a captain with the New York Police Department’s
bomb squad.
   
Mulcahy was given permission this year to use four police squad cars to
escort the children on a bus ride from Kennedy Airport to New Jersey, said
McNamara.
   
Mulcahy wants children from Northern Ireland to visit America so they might
learn how to get along with others and enjoy life, McNamara said. The program
is open to children from ages 9 to 14.
   
In Pennsylvania, children will stay with host families in Wilkes-Barre,
Harrisburg and the Pocono Mountain area, said Peggy Weisgable, Wilkes-Barre
coordinator of Project Children.
   
The children do not have to pay for any of the trip’s costs, she said.
   
The program is open to both Protestant and Catholic children — sects that
are now living in precarious peace in Northern Ireland, despite having been at
odds there for years.
   
Most of the children are from Belfast, Weisgable said.
   
The Donegal Society, a major financial sponsor of the project, helped pay
the airfare for the 600 Irish children involved in the project who will stay
with host families throughout the United States this summer, Weisgable said.
   
The host families are responsible for food and lodging, said Don McNamara,
of Project Children.
   
“We don’t ask the families to do anything, but of course they are so
excited to see the children that they end up doing a lot for them,” he said.
   
Mary Joan Meehan of Wilkes-Barre will host 12-year-old Eamon Coyle, of
Belfast. Among other things, her plans include taking him to the beach in
Delaware.
   
Coyle, who stayed with the Meehans last year, said he enjoyed trips the
family took him on then — to historic Gettysburg, the Statue of Liberty and
Ellis Island.
   
But Coyle said the visit will be worthwhile even if he doesn’t leave
Wilkes-Barre. “I’d like to live in Wilkes-Barre because it’s more peaceful
than Belfast,” he said.