Finding additional information other than the miniscule amount of knowledge previously obtained from family members on both the meaning of my current last name, Kosur, and my mother's maiden name, Goller, proved extremely difficult. Kosur is a shortening of the Polish surname Kosuralski while Goller is of German descent, both of which I already aware. However, I was able to uncover the etymology of Irish, my maternal grandmother's maiden name.
Irish, or the variation of Ireland, originated as an English surname evolving from the place source, last names created using the location of a person. Initially used in a condescending manner by locals for foreigners emigrating from Ireland, Irish simply means a person originally from Ireland.
My great, great grandfather, Thomas Driver Irish, who was his brother's first mate, and his wife, Mary Lauther Irish, emigrated to the United States from Ireland in the 1880's after sailing for two years on my great, great grandfather's brother's merchant ship. The ship was traveling to Australia with my great, great grandmother on her way to visit relatives. She and my great, great grandfather fell in love and after ten days at port in Australia were married.
Following their two years of sea travel and the first of their first child during a terrible storm in which my great, great grandmother fell off her bunk several times during labor, the family settled in LeRoy, Illinois near some of my great, great grandfather's cousins. He tried farming to support the family but ended up as a merchant in a little store in over which they lived in Glen Avon, Illinois where they resided until retiring to Bloomington, Illinois where the Irish couple both died.
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