Fourth Generation
8. [Unknown Father] LOONIE was born (date unknown). According to "The Surnames of Ireland" by Edward MacLysaght, published in Dublin in 1980, the name Loonie or Looney -- in Gaelic "Luanaigh" ["luan" means hound, warrior, or light] -- is a Munster name mainly found in County Clare, and is quite distinct from Lunnay and Lowney. We were told our Loonie ancestors lived on the east coast of Ireland, near Wexford. In America, later generations changed the spelling of their surname, in our family-line to Loomie.
Children were: | i. | Jeremiah "Jerry" LOONIE was born in 1842 in Ireland. He died on 4 November 1908 at the age of 66 in Elmira, NY. In the 1880 census, he was a brickmason living with his family in Elmira, NY. He apparently immigrated to the US about 1865. In the 1892 NY State Census, he and his wife and their four youngest children were still living in Elmira. He was not remembered by the family, and there is no real evidence, other than the Elmira connection, that he is a brother of PJ. | 4 | ii. | Patrick Joseph "PJ" LOONIE. | | iii. | Michael LOONIE was born in 1850 in Ireland. He died on 23 April 1879 at the age of 29 in Elmira, NY. He died at age 29 of tuberculosis. He may be the 35-year-old "Gent" who arrived in NYC aboard the SS City of Washington from Liverpool on 15 July 1874 as one of the few cabin-class passengers. | | iv. | James LOONIE was born in September 1861 in Ireland. In 1886, he was working with his brother PJ in Meridian, Texas on the Bosque County Courthouse project. According to the 1900 census, he was a 39 year-old carpet layer in Manhattan who had immigrated from Ireland in 1865 and was a naturalized US citizen. |
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