Sean Prendiville is a first generation Irish American, born and raised in San Francisco, California. His father emigrated from County Kerry, his mother from County Roscommon. In Ireland, members of the Prendiville family were active Republicans during the country’s fight for independence from Great Britain (1919-1921) and subsequent civil war (1922-1923). Two of Sean Prendiville’s grand-uncles were in the Irish Republican Army (IRA): one was killed in a raid on a Royal Irish Constabulary (police) station in Castleisland, County Kerry; the other continued to fight with the IRA until he was wounded and captured during the civil war. Their nephew in San Francisco regularly took young Sean Prendiville to buy the Sinn Fein newspaper The United Irishman at the Golden Gate News Agency on Third Street.
When conflict broke out in Northern Ireland in 1968, following attacks on Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association marches, Sean Prendiville joined some of the Irish support groups that were established in San Francisco. Later, after the Republican movement split, he joined the Irish Republican Clubs, supporters of the Official Irish Republican movement, because their politics seemed more in line with the anti-Vietnam war movement that he was also participating in at the time. While a member of the Irish Republican Clubs, Prendiville met some older activists who had participated in the Irish Republican Congress Clubs of the 1930s, especially Vernon Healey in San Francisco and Gerald O'Reilly in New York. He became aware of a current in Irish-American and Irish Republican history that had been passed over - the links between left-wing Irish organizations and American progressives – sparking a research interest that eventually led to the assembly of this collection between 1986 and 1994
From the guide to the Sean Prendiville Papers, Bulk, 1920-1997, 1818-1997, bulk 1920-1997, (Tamiment Library / Wagner Archives)
