Happy St. Patrick's Day 2026!

Happy St. Patrick's Day! These are my great-grandparents Thomas Keys Foster, born in County Tyrone on September 5, 1852 and Eliza Ann Job, born in Fintona, County Tyrone on August 18, 1852. Thomas came to Canada in 1876 to join his older brother, George, on his farm near London, Ontario, Canada. Eliza came the following year and worked on the same farm. Thomas and Eliza decided to move out west where they got married in 1882 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.

The couple obtained a land grant near Salcoats, Saskatchewan, a few miles south of Yorkton, where they built a sod house and survived the first winter. Later on they built a wood frame house that they named "Fairview" after a hill in Ireland overlooking the house where Eliza was born. That's where my grandmother, Ella, was born. Most of this house still exists—we visited it a few years ago.

This is a photo of the house where my great-grandmother, Eliza Ann Job was raised. It was in the small village of Syonee in Tyrone county Ireland. You can see Fairview Hill from there. This photo was taken 40 years ago and I'm told that the house no longer exists.

I have other Irish ancestors from the nearby counties of Donegal (surname Foster) and Fermanagh (surnames Keys, Emerson, Moore) and possibly Londonderry (surname Job).

It's nice to have an excuse to celebrate, especially when it means you can drink beer. However, I would be remiss if I didn't mention one little (tiny, actually) problem. Since my maternal grandmother is Irish, I should be 25% Irish but my latest DNA results (left) lump my ancestors into a grouping that combines Central Scotland & Northern Ireland representing 37% of my DNA markers. That's probably because my Irish ancestors were Protestants and were undoubtedly the descendants of settlers from Scotland who moved to Ireland in the 1600s. This explains why they don't have very Irish-sounding names.

When I want to focus on my Irish ancestry I mention my mother's maiden name, which was Doherty, and her ancestors on her father's side who were O'Doughertys. The O'Doughertys were a prominent Irish clan from Donegal and they were fierce enemies of the English invaders. My ancestor was Donald O'Dougherty (1760 - 1810) who came to Canada in 1803 from the Isle of Skye in Scotland where his family had been for several generations after fleeing Ireland in the 1600s. I can trace his ancestry back to Irish kings from 1000 years ago. My DNA results indicate that only 1% of my markers come from Donegal.

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