Homecoming (sort of)

I had an evening fall free while working in Omaha this week and so I started checking maps to determine whether I was within visiting distance of my friend Evelyne; alas, it was not to be. However, whilst scanning the maps I found I was but an easy drive from my father’s birthplace of Oto, IA (current pop: 108) and decided to go check it out.

My father’s folks emigrated from Moville, County Donegal, Ireland at a time when economic conditions and subjugation by the Brits made it advisable for Irish of the Catholic persuasion to skedaddle. John B McDermott, my father’s grandfather founded the town of Moville, IA (current pop: 1,618) by the simple expedient of agreeing to the siting of the local U.S. Post Office in his front room.

I know, you might be wondering how the McDermotts, having come all the way from Inishowen Peninsula and the shores of Lough Foyle and having founded a town that is prospering to this day, failed to evolve into a dynasty. Frankly, I wouldn’t mind knowing that my own self. Seems like the McDermotts of my ancestry have always been more interested in raising children than money and we have succeeded admirably over the years in both child production and the avoidance of accumulation of wealth. In fact, given the numbers of McDermotts currently residing in the U.S. and figuring the birth rate based on the relatively small number who originally made their way here from the Old Sod, one might reasonably infer that the making of babies is a singularly McDermott-ish talent.

We have a coat of arms, with the primary imprint including profiles of three boars’ heads. (Me Da was not impressed when I wrote a report about this in the fifth grade, in the course of which I referred to our ancestral heraldic emblem as featuring “drawings of The Three Pigs.”)  No one these days seems to know why my father’s ancestors found boars’ heads representative of their clan. On the evidence of provable affinities, we might more accurately and descriptively have opted for a drawing of diapers, but perhaps they didn’t have those in the days of coat design.

It IS emblematic of our tribe that the town (Oto) of my father’s whelping is both small enough to erase any delusions of grandeur and thriving enough to prove the hard-working bull-headedness of the inhabitants. You can look up the township for yourself using your favorite search engine. It does show up, barely. Unfortunately, the street-view availability stops at the intersection where one would turn right to go into, you know, the town. Mayberry is a megalopolis by comparison. Even so, this is part of where I came from, however distantly or indirectly, and it was a very cool evening’s sojourn.

All hail, mighty Oto, forever may your banner wave! (Okay, so they don’t have a banner; what of it?)