Almost forgotten today is James Edmund Burke, long time mayor of Burlington, sometime city representative to the state legislature, and one-time candidate for governor. When he died in 1942 at age 93, he was eulogized as a “city builder “and as the “Grand Old Man of the Democratic Party”. He came to prominence in the 1890s and steered the emergence of Burlington’s large Irish American community into a leadership role in local politics. Through it all he was an uncompromising, take-no-prisoners politician. Currently working on a biography of Burke, historian Vince Feeney sheds new light on his illustrious career.
A historian by training, Vince received a PhD in History from the University of Washington in 1974. For many years he taught as an adjunct in the History Department at UVM and was a long-time lecturer for the Vermont Council on the Humanities. He has written extensively on Vermont history. His most important book is Finnigans, Slaters and Stonepeggers: A History of the Irish in Vermont. In 1995 he was one of the founders of the Burlington Irish Heritage Festival.